Parking Has Eaten American Cities

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by mhays

That's our buses. On our trains, you get checked for a ticket maybe 1/4 of the time, and they routinely kick people off and ticket them.

We used to do that . . . until some judge said it was discrimination against the poor to give them tickets they can't pay and to jail them for not paying. It's probably also discrimination to even ask them to pay.

I know BART has self-flagellated for years over the question of whether to put in effective fare gates since we all know that forcing people to pay to ride that system is highly discriminatory against the poor.

BART’s fare-evasion collection tally: One $95 payment on 6,000-plus tickets
Phil Matier
June 26, 2019

If BART had a motto for its fare-evasion ticket collection program, it might be, “No pay — no problem.”

Out of the more than 6,000 unpaid and delinquent proof-of-payment tickets issued in 2018, BART has managed to collect on only one so far.

Here’s the story:

As part of a crackdown on fare-gate jumping, BART handed out 6,799 citations last year to riders who failed to show a ticket when confronted by BART police and civilian fare inspectors.

The citations carried fines of $75 for adults and $55 for juveniles.

But when it came time to pay up, fewer than 1 in 10 violators did so — leaving BART with 6,218 unpaid fines to collect.

The goal of BART’s fare-evasion program is to change people’s behavior instead of criminalizing it, so the tickets are civil fines rather than criminal citations.

The courts handle criminal citations, but BART turns over its delinquent civil citations to the Franchise Tax Board.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the tax board: A whopping 5,677 of the tickets issued to BART riders last year were tossed because the offenders either were from out of state or gave a bogus address or other information to inspectors. There’s no recourse for the inspectors if suspected gate-jumpers say they can’t produce an ID . . . .

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/...s-14048881.php

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Sun Belt

Sorry JManc, you're a little out of touch, hate to say it, because you're normally on point.

"Unaccompanied minors" fly on airplanes around the world. When I was 12 years old I would fly coast to coast on my own with my younger brother. Of course underage children are taking Uber. You download the app on you kid's smartphone, link your credit card to it. Uber doesn't care, because they're getting paid.

While this is against corporate policy, Uber is known for bending/ignoring laws/rules. There is no enforcement mechanism to verify who is actually doing what.

I flew alone starting around 11 or 12 as an unaccompanied minor as well but always had someone from the airline with me at all times. A little different than Uber drivers skirting their own rules. All the more reason not to entrust your kid with a shifty ass service. Setting themselves up for a liability issue should something happen and knowing their track record. It will.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by JManc

I flew alone starting around 11 or 12 as an unaccompanied minor as well but always had someone from the airline with me at all times. A little different than Uber drivers skirting their own rules. All the more reason not to entrust your kid with a shifty ass service. Setting themselves up for a liability issue should something happen and knowing their track record. It will.

An Uber driver won't take you to Dusseldorf when your parents are sending you to Stockholm, though.

Airline apologizes after placing unaccompanied 14-year-old on flight to wrong country
By ENJOLI FRANCIS
Jul 2, 2019, 7:41 PM ET

A couple in Raleigh, North Carolina, are breathing a sigh of relief -- and still awaiting answers from two airlines -- after their 14-year-old son was accidentally placed on the wrong flight to a different country following a layover at Newark Liberty International Airport this weekend.

Bound for Stockholm, Sweden, Christer and Brenda Bergs' son Anton had traveled from Raleigh, North Carolina, to Newark, New Jersey, on Sunday, via United Airlines.

The Bergs said that they'd paid a fee to United to have Anton supervised as an unaccompanied minor during his travels from Raleigh to Newark.

At Newark, a United representative escorting the teen brought him from Terminal C to a gate in Terminal B, where a Scandinavian flight to Stockholm originally had been scheduled to depart.

That Scandinavian flight, however, had been moved to another gate, unbeknownst to the representative, and the teen was placed on the plane occupying that gate: a Eurowings bound for Dusseldorf, Germany.

The Bergs said that when Anton got on the plane, he texted them, remarking that a lot of passengers were speaking German on the flight. That's when he realized he'd been placed on the wrong plane and alerted the crew . . . .

https://abcnews.go.com/US/airline-ap...ry?id=64093506

[JManc]

Of course United would be involved.