• boonhet@sopuli.xyz
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      8 hours ago

      Cars aren’t paid for by taxpayers. Roads are, true, but then both buses and cars need those anyway and buses do far more damage.

      • ayyy@sh.itjust.works
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        24 minutes ago

        Lmao leave it to Lemmy to downvote basic facts like “heavier vehicles cause more wear to roads.”

        • boonhet@sopuli.xyz
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          7 minutes ago

          And not linearly more wear either. It’s the fourth power of axle load.

          My 2 ton car (rounded up) is a ton per axle, a 12 ton bus (empty weight of a common city bus here) is 6 or 4 tons per axle. 3rd axle seems to be more common in buses weighing 15 tons or more (empty). So let’s say 6x more weight per axle. That’s 1296 times more wear.

          That doesn’t mean I hate public transit but it does mean it comes with additional hidden costs to the taxpayer. Well, buses do at least. The whole equation is rather different for trains.