Tourists bring in a boatload of money. I’m not even sure how you would enact a mechanism like this… A BC toll taker at every port, airport and land crossing? How much are we charging to pay for that, that somehow doesn’t hurt tourism industries but also completely subsidizes our use of public transit?
I love public transit, think it’s important but this seems more one of those “things I would like but don’t seem particularly feasible.”
(Also, if you’ve ever been on the N20 or even BLine and watched a mentally unhinged man threatening women, children, non white people or other vulnerable people, well… Not wildly sure I want to drop the barrier to entry to zero. I can be a scary looking dude and have had to use that at least 3 times in the last year as someone experiencing mental issues went off on a quiet brown guy, a woman and some teens respectively.)
You’re thinking short term as more people would have access to work and healthcare services the less strain they will have on their mental health from being excluded.
