"These things aren't important unless you can wedge them into my spreadsheet" is the time of consultant-brained nonsense that got us the world we're living in.

Nobody said that. But if you're gonna spend the public money, you need some way of determining "how much are we willing to pay for this good thing".

We spend public money on things that are almost impossible to put a concrete value on all the time. Parks. NASA. University subsidies. Animal welfare. The list goes on. "How much are we willing to pay" is entirely subjective and can't be produced by a nice clean spreadsheet.

If you could make a park for 5 million dollars, or the same park for 3 million, you would do the latter, would you not? Then you'd have 2 million left to do something else with.

Because that is the comparison being drawn here. A valid objection would be that there are other axes that are material but are not being considered when we reduce the question to dollars per ton of CO2 -- but arguing that we ought not even try to put a value on how we spend public money will not be a reasonable stance until public money is infinite.

This analogy simply doesn't work because transit isn't fungible. Trains and air travel or cars simply aren't "the same park". The benefit of trains is objectively not just the carbon footprint. The money spent by the government benefits the public in other ways, not just environmentally. Ignoring the wear on (and cost of ownership of) personal vehicles, for instance, dismisses a huge amount of savings for folks who can take trains instead. Rail travel is safer and results in fewer deaths. The list goes on. Even "having a train that takes me to work so I can relax on my commute" is an important one. And many of those things are almost impossible to truly quantify the monetary value of and jam into a spreadsheet.

All the things you listed are examples of "other axes" that I listed as being valid objections. I also agree that it's hard to estimate the dollar cost or benefit of these things. But I think we do have to attempt to estimate it, since we have no other sensible way to decide how to allocate public funds.

It's not even all that difficult to estimate, really. For example, every business does it, of necessity.

Society is not a business.

Markets are a useful tool that societies use to optimize certain kinds of capital allocation and goods production, where that makes sense. No more no less.

Most of the things societies value most highly don't fit into the market hole.

If trains were exclusively a mechanism for capturing or avoiding carbon, then the metric of $ / tons would be valid. Trains very obviously are not that.

Can you estimate the dollar value of happiness?

Can you estimate the additional happiness brought by trains?

No, but we can look at the amount of misery, that is prevented by not using cars. Traffic jams, pollution, accidents, waste of resources,... The difference is so huge, we don't need to put a number on it. Public transport might be unpleasant for the individual, but is clearly very much better for everyone than using cars.

> Public transport might be unpleasant for the individual

Where is this true?

When it’s overcrowded, typically caused by policies such as work from office.

At least here, that only happens the day after holidays.

Yes. For that matter, you can calculate the dollar value of a human life:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_of_life

Numbers vary around the world, but FEMA in the US decided on $7.5M in 2020.

Financial investments are economic decisions. Whether or not you like the idea of assigning financial value to fuzzy concepts like happiness or quality adjusted life years, you still have to do it. The simple act of choosing to spend $N or not choosing to spend $N puts an implicit price on the result.

By putting approximate numbers in the spreadsheet - no matter how crude - we can at least end up consistent and fair. Otherwise we could end up spending vast sums to make a few people a little happier instead of smaller sums to make lots of people a lot happier.

> It's not even all that difficult to estimate, really. For example, every business does it, of necessity.

This isn't even true. I run a business, and I frequently make decisions based on what I believe to be the right thing to do rather than what the data shows as being the most profitable outcome. The very notion of a "loss leader" is driven on fuzzy data where execs simply hope the loss in revenue from sales is made up for in other benefits that can't be concretely valued.

The park to park comparison is the opposite of what's being discussed. That's comparing the value of apple to another from the same tree - there are many subjective elements to compare but given that they're both nearly identical it's quite easy. Still doesn't fit on a spreadsheet e.g. bitterness, likelihood of having a worm inside, prettiness, whatever.

What is being suggested is comparing a train subsidy to... Unknown. Other modes of transportation? The money being spent on other carbon reduction efforts?

I don't understand why carbon reduction is the primary topic for discussion when trying to put a dollar value on the thing. Two apples are still a little difficult to compare but you at least can agree that the bigger tastier one is probably better value (unless the smaller is cheaper and you need to do gram for dollar value, idk, good luck). A train vs other things though is imo essentially impossible to compare, a genuine apples to oranges comparison.

For carbon reduction, I challenge the OP estimate. It assumes everyone drives if no train, as I understand it. So that's the carbon reduction comparison - wow great so many people not driving. But it's not just that. Less parking lots need to be constructed. Less concrete, less carbon. Less roads need re paving every 10 years or whatever - let's compare the carbon of rail maintenance to an asphalt road. Less car accidents, less cars needing to be recycled at plants. Maybe city designs start accommodating the train subsidy, less car centric design, more vertical and dense, less car travel that wouldn't have been served by the train but is now served by walking. On and on and on.

You can't compare these two on carbon alone, and that's not even considering the fact that I find it kinda ridiculous to focus on just carbon as a measure of worth-to-humans. There's so many other factors at play that I genuinely think it's impossible to put a dollar value on. Reduction in road noise for people near the highway. Reduction in smog and thus a reduction in lung cancer and related medical costs. Reduction in human deaths from car accidents. Increase in psychological happiness in commuters not exposed to daily road rage and also suddenly having more time to read or play games. Endless, endless comparisons.

Dollars are a bad way to measure value. We either need a new way to describe value-for-dollars or a new way to describe actual value. Conflating the two was capitalism's ultimate coup and this thread is a great example of why.

>Less parking lots need to be constructed. Less concrete, less carbon. Less roads need re paving every 10 years or whatever - let's compare the carbon of rail maintenance to an asphalt road.

Yes, these are all valid other axes to consider. I nevertheless think it's necessary to estimate each of their values as so many "points", which, yes, may be subjective. Those points might as well be dollars, because dollars are what we (as the local government) finally wind up spending on whatever projects we decide on.

Why "might as well be?" Dollars can't accurately determine something's real value and I'm baffled that people continually assume this.

A teacher is more valuable than an investment banker and yet the investment banker is paid more. Maybe I can make a spreadsheet of all the instances of such things and it would reach tens of thousands of rows. It seems to me plain as day so I don't get it.

Sometimes the dollar value is accurate, often not. The frequency that it's incorrect makes me wonder at the authority we grant dollar valuations.

Who's "we"? The public is mostly not made up of consultants and do not appreciate consultant logic being applied to everything. People would prefer to define values and then act on those values.

That isn't "consultant logic", that's the way the world works. Resources are finite. We can't do everything everyone wants to do, so we need some means of prioritizing which things we are to do. You can call names all you want, but this is an unavoidable reality of existence.

Here's an alternative proposition then: try those things and if there's demand - stick to them.

No need for estimations, especially that they're typically wildly off, as the world is too complicated to summarise it on a spreadsheet.

So you would be good with spending more money and even increasing total carbon footprint, if it just felt good?

Seriously, if you're not going to measure anything or use logic, I'm not sure how you can even call them "defined" or "values". It sounds like, "I saw it on TV/internet/billboard so it must be true".

Yes, because that is exactly how American cities are currently built today -- expensive carbon-intensive roads paved out to sprawling suburbs, the independent financial upkeep of which is not sustainable long-term. [0]

The costs for car-based infrastructure are also sky high: $1+ million per mile of new road, excluding constant maintenance in repavings, potholes, and drainage systems. [1]

From an economic lens, transportation infrastructure is a net gain to the economy. To me, there is no reason why public transit subsidies should be scrutinized on financials above and beyond how public roads are scrutinized.

If we recognize roads are useful, then public transit should be an even more efficient use of taxpayer dollars on mobility per infrastructure footprint costs alone -- even before carbon reductions are considered at all.

---

[0] https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2021/5/12/6-principles-f...

[1] https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2020/1/27/how-much-does-...

Strong towns is a terrible source of numbers and has been debunked many times. Streetcar suburbs have been sustaining themselves for 140 years - rebuilding their infrastructure. Infrastructure is a tiny % of any government budget (https://pedestrianobservations.com/2024/10/07/taxes-are-not-...) and so infrastructure spending could go up a lot.

I didn't say that. The OP argued "Actually this is bad because the cost per ton of carbon saved is higher than some other way to save carbon."

The original replyer pointed out that "ways to save carbon" are not necessarily fungible and there are other benefits to subsidized rail travel. The followon dismissal was to throw back and come up with a way to "price" those other benefits.

What I am objecting to is the entire chain of thinking that starts with trying to do simplistic, reductionist price comparisons and then refusing to consider other factors that don't fit in the pricing exercise.

> "how much are we willing to pay for this good thing"

We don't even do that for cars. We shifted most of the transport cost to the individuals without any calculation. Nowadays, cars are the most costly item in a household besides the house itself, is that okay? I'm not so sure.

A car is an incredibly complex and incredibly useful machine. In a non-feudal banker run economy, a car would cost 5 times as much as a house. Or rather the house would be 5 times cheaper than the car.

The cost of something is not related to what it is worth to life. In any case the real measure is what someone is willing to pay. I'm driving a 25 year old car because I choose to buy a more expensive house, and put my kids in various activities - as a result I don't have enough money left over to pay for a new car. I do have enough money to pay for a used car when the current one breaks and is unfixable, but I have choosen to spend elsewhere - those used cars provide exactly as much value to me as a new car and save me money. (I save even more money by riding my bike where possible so I rarely drive)

A 25 year old car is still several orders of magnitude more complex than a house.

Any man can build a house for himself and his family if he sets his mind to it.

Almost no man can build an even semi-modern car. They depend on huge supply chains and thousands of specialized workers.

The house is artificially made more expensive than the car, as a vehicle for inflationary money making.

The house is "made more expensive" because land and materials are scarce.

You can, right now, build your own house. And it won't be cheap if it's anywhere that matters.

Also we have standards and regulations. Turns out burning down entire cities because of some cost cutting sucks, so we did away with that.

Neither land nor materials are scarce. They've been artificially made expensive to prop up the feudal system. This planet is still mostly wilderness - go zoom in anywhere on Google Maps and you'll see. And building materials are easy to find in nature everywhere except for in the oceans and the deserts.

I know it's easy and a habit to always defend the status quo, no matter what it is, but when it comes to housing the situation is much beyond ridiculous. I can purchase a literal airplane for half of what it would cost me to buy a run-down shack where I'm from, which is a region that neither has any high paying jobs nor lack of space. It's a mostly deserted, low-population density region, with population shrinking every year because people cannot afford a fucking simple house to live in. Housing prices has nothing to do with economy nor supply and demand. It is all politics and it's all a scam.

By the way, what do you think it takes in energy, factories and labour to make the material needed for a car? A whole lot more than what it takes for a house.

> This planet is still mostly wilderness

Ah, you made the classical blunder of forgetting location matters!

Living in the woods sounds grand until you have to live in the woods. The vast majority of humans prefer to live in Urban areas, where land is more expensive.

Living in the woods also sounds fun until you realize you have no infrastructure for anything. How will you shop? Cook? Entertain yourself?

There is a lifestyle there, yes. But that's the trick - lifestyle. You have to dedicate your life to achieving just the basics.

I wrote in the comment above that land and housing is expensive also in regions with low population density. Because the land owners there also demand top dollar for the land they have. The same problems are in rural areas as in urban areas, of course it is accentuated more in urban areas since those are also places where people can make a high income and population is denser.

I've lived in the woods, so I know exactly how it is. As long as you have a vehicle you are fine. Haven't you ever been outside of a city in your life? They have energy and modern comforts. I've lived off grid as well, and that was fine. You have to plan differently.

You are arguing from obsolete standpoints, which probably have never been true. Why? To defend a status quo that is strangling generations of people?

> As long as you have a vehicle you are fine

Right, so a vehicle... and a road and a city and thousands of years of human innovation.

> They have energy and modern comforts

Right, at the expense of the city which keeps the rural and even suburban areas on Welfare. Because providing funding to places where nobody lives in a money burner. Luckily, the "status-quo" is 100% to burn money on rural and suburban areas.

So, congratulations, the status-quo benefits you.

> Right, so a vehicle... and a road and a city and thousands of years of human innovation.

Or a boat, you know? Roads are everywhere and have nothing to do with any urban/rural division you feel so strongly about.

> So, congratulations, the status-quo benefits you.

I live in the city.

> I live in the city

That's actually hilarious

The concept is called "measurability bias"

These incentive is not permanent or has to be.

You try it, if thing gets better you keep it or you stop it.

Yes, that is right. Opinion building is a thing in a democracy.

The problem with op is that he attaches a strong value statement ("isn't good value") to an incomplete assessment. Now that's doing politics! Isn't that what we want to get away from? Don't we want to have it all objective and fact based?

So here is the question: How should we make decisions? Is it possible to use $ as a neutral decision making data point? Or do we have to discuss things broadly, and include elements that haven't been broken down to the cent, to reach a consensus about how we want to organise society?

I believe that this idiotic short-sighted minmaxing (mainly due to the conservative party) has led to many of Germany's current infrastructure issues. Laying fiber? VDSL is cheap and has been good enough so far. Renewable energies? Importing Russian gas halves CO2 emissions compared to coal and is way cheaper (surely Russia would never think of abusing the dependence). Maintaining the railway network? That would cost money, and it wasn't broken yet.

If Germany wants to be a militarized state again, the infrastructure will be fixed again. You have to transport things around.

Tbh, i think, germany has too much not needed but costly infrastructure maintained only for a few people.

> germany has too much not needed but costly infrastructure maintained only for a few people

What infrastructure do you mean? Can you give an example?

so how do you propose the limited public money ought to be spent on which project? Perhaps just feel good vibes?

I agree with you that it's important to avoid using such a bad strategy as feel good vibes, which could easily happen if one is careless.

However it might suffice to find a strong justification, rather than a pure quantification. One way to build such a justification is to consider rail transport as a part of a coherent whole, as part of a broader vision.

Indeed I think such a strategy can result in a better outcome than the one arising from optimizing everything in isolation; the latter risks leading to a local optimum.

However it is key that the vision is feasible and correctly evaluated. If one were to bet everything on one vision and that vision failed, if say one important factor was forgotten and not accounted for, the result might be rather unfortunate.

So concretely, making local public transport cheaps could fit into a vision of "where will people live, where will they work, and how will they commute from the first place to the second". Whereas including intercity rail and bus is harder to understand maybe it would fit into a vision of "how people will keep in contact with old friends and relatives after moving cities". Maybe "how people will spend their vaction, or go on business trips"?

Let's focus on the former one. It could then go hand in hand with zoning regulation, public-private partnership of building housing+utilities etc. Trying to encourage certain industries to provide jobs.

Road building and maintenance avoided?

Ok, the GP is only using carbon offsets, but the economic one are just as good. Forgoing car ownership allows for that money to then go other economic uses. Forgoing fuel costs, $20 for electric, $100 for gas, again allows that to go into the other areas of the economy. These are easy to calculate, why not use them?

Asthma from air pollution is calculatable.

Cancer reduction, road repairs, reduction in vehicle costs for tax payers, reduction in road fatalities, all of these can be added up.

I know a way.

Politics.