Quote of the Day: Tri-Met and the public teat

This comes from Jack Bog's blog, in the comments following Jack's expression of incredulity over Tri-Met's poor maintenance and customer service habits:

But this fare problem is ridiculous, especially at a time when more people are using they system due to high gas prices. There aren't as many fare inspectors for the system you would expect for the number of passengers it carries. That and the devil-may-care attitude about broken vending machines shows you the low priority Tri-Met puts on collecting fares. If Tri-Met actually had to survive on fares rather than taxes, you can bet we'd have a division of inspectors and every machine would be fixed lickety-split.

As an aside, I, too, had a recent run-in with a malfunctioning ticket machine. There are only two machines at the Sunset Transit Center, and neither one would sell me anything other than a seven-day pass. I chose to chance it for the ride downtown and got away with it. How many others have done the same?