[valenterry]

There's pros and cons.

On the con side:

- When people get something for free, they often don't value it as much and treat it worse. E.g. more pollution.

- public transportation being free also means that it will be used even in cases where it is both economically and ecologically a suboptimal solution. This is a problem because more usage means higher costs. E.g. someone now might take a bus instead of cycling.

- Less competition. This point is tricky, but essentially, other solutions such as private long-distance busses (which have a comparibly good ecological footprint) might go out of business. In general, market might develop suboptimal.

There are a lot of good points too, which makes it a difficult decision. But since you asked, those can be named as reasons I suppose.

[atwood22]

> - public transportation being free also means that it will be used even in cases where it is both economically and ecologically a suboptimal solution. This is a problem because more usage means higher costs. E.g. someone now might take a bus instead of cycling.

That’s really reaching. Presumably people would do the thing that bear fits their circumstances after weighing the costs and benefits.

[Leherenn]

To back GP's point, see this study. https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Free-Fares-Policies%3A...

For instance in Estonia, the majority of "switchers" were cyclists and pedestrians.

[mecsred]

So if the cost changed to zero, and the benefit stayed the same, would that not change the "best fit"?

[secretsatan]

I have a bus pass for my city giving me unlimited use all year round, and the service is excellent, a stop right outside my house with buses every 5-10 mins, I still walk a lot, but I do like the option of jumping on the bus if the weather is bad, or I'm just lazy