A recent letter asked about the subsidized operating cost of the Skyline rail system (“Let’s see true subsidy costs of operating rail,” Star-Advertiser, Jan. 25).

The published estimated cost of operations is about $85 million per year, or about $7 million per month. At the current passenger level of fewer than 90,000 rides per month, this amounts to about $80 per ride. The average fare is probably about $2.50, taking into account the full fare rate of $3 and the monthly cap of $80.

Thus the fare covers about 3% of costs. In comparison, fares and parking at BART in San Francisco currently are providing about 20% of the costs, down from 40% in pre-COVID times. Valley Rail in Phoenix was planned to recover about 20% of costs, but is doing better than that due to higher-than-expected usage.

Edward Conklin

Waikiki