Price controls is an unfairly simple way to say that the company signed a long-term contract in which the city covered 2/3rds of the construction costs and set the fare at a maximum of 5 cents for most rides for the next 49 years.
When the company tried to raise the fare to 7 cents, they were disallowed by the courts because they couldn't prove the 5 cents fare was confiscatory.
I understand the city could raise the fare to benefit the company, but that isn't their obligation.
I would assume you're libertarian from the point you've made, and am curious whether you believe it was right for the contract to be enforced as it was agreed upon.
So, the contract should be viewed as a suicide pact? The results of the decisions by the politicos speak for themselves: money poured into duplicative infrastructure, starvation of existing infrastructure, stagnation.
Passenger rail service in the US suffered a similar fate when the federal government called in its chips to move personnel and supplies all over the place during the command economy years of WWII. Yes, the rails received substantial subsidies in land grants, etc, to get started. Yes, there was agreement to serve the public interest in this way because of that. Yes, this was a big blow to passenger rail.
When the company tried to raise the fare to 7 cents, they were disallowed by the courts because they couldn't prove the 5 cents fare was confiscatory.
I understand the city could raise the fare to benefit the company, but that isn't their obligation.
I would assume you're libertarian from the point you've made, and am curious whether you believe it was right for the contract to be enforced as it was agreed upon.