Private bus companies are gaining in popularity, but Aaron Renn says that a large segment of the "urbanist/sustainability community" despise them for no good reason.
Renn thinks the reason urbanists are against these bus companies is that they undermine the case for high-speed rail. Some of the complaints he points to are:
"...that Megabus is 'subsidized' because it uses valuable curb side real estate in cities for free, that they are implicitly subsidized by highway funding, that passengers waiting for the bus at the stop are a nuisance, that the buses clog the streets and pump fumes into the air in a way that harms the 'neighborhood,' and that the service really isn't that good because of congestion. Even the government of Washington, DC is getting in on the act, as reported they want to charge Megabus a fee for access to their loading zones.
Every last one of these is bogus," writes Renn.
FULL STORY: Megabus – King of the Road
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