NEW ORLEANS -- Right now, tolls on the Crescent City Connection bridge subsidize the ferry operation in the New Orleans area.Right. It certainly could be like the Saints starting 0-4. Anything to keep us from concluding that perhaps some public services, while necessary and good things, don't have to function as profit-taking endeavors for private contractors. I'm sure it'll get better once Joe Vitt comes back to drive the boat.
By law, even though voters extended the tolls for another 20 years, beginning Jan. 1, none of the money can go to the ferries. The state's solution is to privatize the service.
But, the deadline to answer the state's request for proposal expired yesterday with no takers.
"We put out an RFP, there were no takers," said state Sen. David Heitmeier, D-Algiers. "So, we need to do something different. Just like the Saints on their first four games. They had to do something different. We were pretty happy with the results this weekend."
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Maybe if we doubled the tolls
Turns out finding a private operator for a system that operates at a loss is pretty difficult.
When they eliminated the Jackson-Gretna ferry (which I actually used), the whole operation became almost exclusively about perceived benefits to tourism. I for one don't want them subsidized in their current form.
ReplyDeleteNOPSI never had a problem with financing a great bus system and the ferries.
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