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> If they were preferable, people would choose them. Balivernes. That’s just a tautology. I’m sure if you ask any American if they think the electoral college

> If they were preferable, people would choose them. Balivernes. That’s just a tautology. I’m sure if you ask any American if they think the electoral college system is fair, 99/100 will tell you it isn’t. Yet it persists. Why? Many reasons, among them being institutional inertia. Institutions are big and slow, especially ones involving concrete and steel. There are also power amplification issues. That is to say, certain groups of people might have more power to effect change than others. A majority can seemingly want something, but not know how or not be able to effectively get that change accomplished. In other words, I think it’s a bit more complicated than “if people wanted public transit we would have public transit”.

closeparen 9y ago
There is no institutional inertia or political organizing involved in walking, riding your bike, or taking the bus for your next trip. The real challenge is in building out the transit infrastructure and dense transit-oriented development that would make these options genuinely preferable to most people. Not in declaring that they're preferable or forcing people into them today.
- tachyoff 9y ago
  > There is no institutional inertia or political organizing involved in walking, riding your bike, or taking the bus for your next trip. Assuming you live in a bikeable or walkable area, sure. Bus service exists, but it can be patchy and/or underfunded. Some people simply have none of these options. I live in Detroit (yes, Motor City), and this area is crying out for good mass transit. In fact, two out of four necessary counties voted down a regional transit mileage (which amounted to peanuts every year on property tax bills), which would have provided billions to develop rapid transit for southeast Michigan, because of pretty much racial hangups and “screw you, got mine”-ism from the suburbs. These are complex issues. I agree that building out transit infrastructure is complicated, but I think making them politically attractive are equally difficult.
  - AckSyn 9y ago
    The issue about them shutting down a public transit system into the burbs isn't because of racism but one of access. These people don't want easy access via bus to their neighborhoods, and for a very good reason.
  - ars 9y ago
    Compared to having your own car, even the absolutely best, world class, mass transit service is just terrible. And I say this having tried both. It just doesn't compare. This is not a battle you are going to win. I'm happy for other people to take mass transit and leave more road space for me. Or I can be more fair and want more road space for everyone. Mass transit is not a good solution, it's a poor solution, that sometimes is the best thing available, but never mistake that for actually being a good solution. Properly designed cities would not need it.
    - tachyoff 9y ago
      > This is not a battle you are going to win. When cities are gridlocked by expensive, polluting cars, nobody wins. > I'm happy for other people to take mass transit and leave more road space for me. That kind of thinking is why we don’t have reliable public transit. > Mass transit is not a good solution, it's a poor solution... Nobody tell Europe, or Japan. I don’t know how to communicate the idea that perhaps every single person having their own 2,000-pound personal transportation machine doesn’t scale well. I mean, never mind that we could reduce climate change, road deaths, congestion, and the requirement to own a car. How is having one bus take 20 people somewhere worse than making those people buy a car, making them drive separately, then making them find parking? Public transit is one of those things that, like public healthcare or public education, involves giving up a bit of perceived individuality to benefit the greater good. But if you’ve already got yours and are convinced that’s the way to go, I can’t help you. See you at the voting booth.
      - closeparen 9y ago
        > How is having one bus take 20 people somewhere worse than making those people buy a car, making them drive separately, then making them find parking? Because those 20 people are extremely unlikely to share an origin, destination, or schedule.
- bluntfang 9y ago
  >There is no institutional inertia or political organizing involved in walking, riding your bike, or taking the bus for your next trip. you're right, Inertia isn't the right word. More like "institutional aggression against not using cars". Go to town hall meetings in developing cities about installing bike lanes. Many people, even when presenting with well done studies that state the contrary, believe biking and bike lanes will take from their profits. Taking away a parking spot for a bike lane or funding public transportation just doesn't happen as much as it could in urban areas today.
  - closeparen 9y ago
    Again, developing infrastructure is distinct from influencing mode choices under existing infrastructure. "Driving is far and away your best option today" and "we should add a bike lane" are simultaneously true.
    - ergothus 9y ago
      I don't share your confidence in the distinction. Both statements can be true today, but as a result of those being true people will not build bike lanes and will cater to drivers. The fewer bike riders you have, the less it is that likely new development will accommodate bike riders, which means you have even fewer bike riders. Obviously people CAN overcome these tendencies, but it requires a stronger push (which is why we have unhappy bike riders everywhere, or Americans that disapprove of the electoral college, or terrible public transit) "Inertia" seems a very apt metaphor.
- s0rce 9y ago
  There are many suburban areas where walking is difficult/dangerous (little to no cross walks, multi-lane roads, high traffic speeds, inattentive drivers, etc.), biking is often possible but many don't feel comfortable or safe and in other places the weather can pose a challenge many month of the year. Buses are slow, expensive and inconvenient as well across many American cities. These options need to get better for more people to use them, however, sadly without more people using them they won't likely fund their improvement.
  - ergothus 9y ago
    For many decades American guides to design residential areas have promoted cul-de-sacs (with false and/or unproven assertions), resulting in less foot traffic and less concern for foot traffic. Culture has said these are "safer for children" which also promotes their use. From the air, you can often identify the age of a suburb by seeing how nested the cul-de-sacs are. Meanwhile, American culture also says transit is distasteful and for the poor. (Taxi exceptions granted for very dense urban areas, but only if they are VERY dense). You are correct that there is a lot of inertia for these issues. Even if we magically changed culture overnight (and replaced past/recent media to avoid immediate backslide) the infrastructural issues don't go away.
    - schiffern 9y ago
      >For many decades American guides to design residential areas have promoted cul-de-sacs (with false and/or unproven assertions), resulting in less foot traffic and less concern for foot traffic. Late to the party I know, but the simple solution is to decouple the pedestrian network from the car network. Cars get cul-de-sacs, pedestrians and cyclists get a fully-connected network. This was proposed as far back as 1977 in A Pattern Language. An exerpt[1]: "Cars are dangerous to pedestrians; yet activities occur just where cars and pedestrians meet. "It is common planning practice to separate pedestrians and cars. This makes pedestrian areas more human and safer. However) this practice fails to take account of the fact that cars and pedestrians also need each other: and that, in fact, a great deal of urban life occurs at just the point where these two systems meet. Many of the greatest places in cities, Piccadilly Circus, Times Square, the Champs Elyse'es, are alive because they are at places where pedestrians and vehicles meet. New towns like Cumbernauld, in Scotland, where there is total separation between the two, seldom have the same sort of liveliness. "The same thing is true at the local residential scale. A great deal of everyday social life occurs where cars and pedestrians meet. In Lima, for example, the car is used as an extension of the house: men, especially, often sit in parked cars, near their houses, drinking beer and talking. And in one way or another, something like this happens everywhere. Conversation and discussion grow naturally around the lots where people wash their cars. Vendors set themselves up where cars and pedestrians meet; they need all the traffic they can get. Children play in parking lots-perhaps because they sense that this is the main point of arrival and departure; and of course because they like the cars. Yet, at the same time, it is essential to keep pedestrians separate from vehicles: to protect children and old people; to preserve the tranquility of pedestrian life. "To resolve the conflict, it is necessary to find an arrangement of pedestrian paths and roads, so that the two are separate, but meet frequently, with the points where they meet recognized as focal points. In general, this requires two orthogonal networks, one for roads, one for paths, each connected and continuous, crossing at frequent intervals (our observations suggest that most points on the path network should be within 150 feet of the nearest road), meeting, when they meet, at right angles. "In practice, there are several possible ways of forming this relationship between the roads and paths..." [1] http://www.iwritewordsgood.com/apl/patterns/apl052.htm http://www.iwritewordsgood.com/apl/patterns/apl052.htm

closeparen 9y ago

There is no institutional inertia or political organizing involved in walking, riding your bike, or taking the bus for your next trip. The real challenge is in building out the transit infrastructure and dense transit-oriented development that would make these options genuinely preferable to most people. Not in declaring that they're preferable or forcing people into them today.

tachyoff 9y ago
> There is no institutional inertia or political organizing involved in walking, riding your bike, or taking the bus for your next trip. Assuming you live in a bikeable or walkable area, sure. Bus service exists, but it can be patchy and/or underfunded. Some people simply have none of these options. I live in Detroit (yes, Motor City), and this area is crying out for good mass transit. In fact, two out of four necessary counties voted down a regional transit mileage (which amounted to peanuts every year on property tax bills), which would have provided billions to develop rapid transit for southeast Michigan, because of pretty much racial hangups and “screw you, got mine”-ism from the suburbs. These are complex issues. I agree that building out transit infrastructure is complicated, but I think making them politically attractive are equally difficult.
- AckSyn 9y ago
  The issue about them shutting down a public transit system into the burbs isn't because of racism but one of access. These people don't want easy access via bus to their neighborhoods, and for a very good reason.
- ars 9y ago
  Compared to having your own car, even the absolutely best, world class, mass transit service is just terrible. And I say this having tried both. It just doesn't compare. This is not a battle you are going to win. I'm happy for other people to take mass transit and leave more road space for me. Or I can be more fair and want more road space for everyone. Mass transit is not a good solution, it's a poor solution, that sometimes is the best thing available, but never mistake that for actually being a good solution. Properly designed cities would not need it.
  - tachyoff 9y ago
    > This is not a battle you are going to win. When cities are gridlocked by expensive, polluting cars, nobody wins. > I'm happy for other people to take mass transit and leave more road space for me. That kind of thinking is why we don’t have reliable public transit. > Mass transit is not a good solution, it's a poor solution... Nobody tell Europe, or Japan. I don’t know how to communicate the idea that perhaps every single person having their own 2,000-pound personal transportation machine doesn’t scale well. I mean, never mind that we could reduce climate change, road deaths, congestion, and the requirement to own a car. How is having one bus take 20 people somewhere worse than making those people buy a car, making them drive separately, then making them find parking? Public transit is one of those things that, like public healthcare or public education, involves giving up a bit of perceived individuality to benefit the greater good. But if you’ve already got yours and are convinced that’s the way to go, I can’t help you. See you at the voting booth.
    - closeparen 9y ago
      > How is having one bus take 20 people somewhere worse than making those people buy a car, making them drive separately, then making them find parking? Because those 20 people are extremely unlikely to share an origin, destination, or schedule.
bluntfang 9y ago
>There is no institutional inertia or political organizing involved in walking, riding your bike, or taking the bus for your next trip. you're right, Inertia isn't the right word. More like "institutional aggression against not using cars". Go to town hall meetings in developing cities about installing bike lanes. Many people, even when presenting with well done studies that state the contrary, believe biking and bike lanes will take from their profits. Taking away a parking spot for a bike lane or funding public transportation just doesn't happen as much as it could in urban areas today.
- closeparen 9y ago
  Again, developing infrastructure is distinct from influencing mode choices under existing infrastructure. "Driving is far and away your best option today" and "we should add a bike lane" are simultaneously true.
  - ergothus 9y ago
    I don't share your confidence in the distinction. Both statements can be true today, but as a result of those being true people will not build bike lanes and will cater to drivers. The fewer bike riders you have, the less it is that likely new development will accommodate bike riders, which means you have even fewer bike riders. Obviously people CAN overcome these tendencies, but it requires a stronger push (which is why we have unhappy bike riders everywhere, or Americans that disapprove of the electoral college, or terrible public transit) "Inertia" seems a very apt metaphor.
s0rce 9y ago
There are many suburban areas where walking is difficult/dangerous (little to no cross walks, multi-lane roads, high traffic speeds, inattentive drivers, etc.), biking is often possible but many don't feel comfortable or safe and in other places the weather can pose a challenge many month of the year. Buses are slow, expensive and inconvenient as well across many American cities. These options need to get better for more people to use them, however, sadly without more people using them they won't likely fund their improvement.
- ergothus 9y ago
  For many decades American guides to design residential areas have promoted cul-de-sacs (with false and/or unproven assertions), resulting in less foot traffic and less concern for foot traffic. Culture has said these are "safer for children" which also promotes their use. From the air, you can often identify the age of a suburb by seeing how nested the cul-de-sacs are. Meanwhile, American culture also says transit is distasteful and for the poor. (Taxi exceptions granted for very dense urban areas, but only if they are VERY dense). You are correct that there is a lot of inertia for these issues. Even if we magically changed culture overnight (and replaced past/recent media to avoid immediate backslide) the infrastructural issues don't go away.
  - schiffern 9y ago
    >For many decades American guides to design residential areas have promoted cul-de-sacs (with false and/or unproven assertions), resulting in less foot traffic and less concern for foot traffic. Late to the party I know, but the simple solution is to decouple the pedestrian network from the car network. Cars get cul-de-sacs, pedestrians and cyclists get a fully-connected network. This was proposed as far back as 1977 in A Pattern Language. An exerpt[1]: "Cars are dangerous to pedestrians; yet activities occur just where cars and pedestrians meet. "It is common planning practice to separate pedestrians and cars. This makes pedestrian areas more human and safer. However) this practice fails to take account of the fact that cars and pedestrians also need each other: and that, in fact, a great deal of urban life occurs at just the point where these two systems meet. Many of the greatest places in cities, Piccadilly Circus, Times Square, the Champs Elyse'es, are alive because they are at places where pedestrians and vehicles meet. New towns like Cumbernauld, in Scotland, where there is total separation between the two, seldom have the same sort of liveliness. "The same thing is true at the local residential scale. A great deal of everyday social life occurs where cars and pedestrians meet. In Lima, for example, the car is used as an extension of the house: men, especially, often sit in parked cars, near their houses, drinking beer and talking. And in one way or another, something like this happens everywhere. Conversation and discussion grow naturally around the lots where people wash their cars. Vendors set themselves up where cars and pedestrians meet; they need all the traffic they can get. Children play in parking lots-perhaps because they sense that this is the main point of arrival and departure; and of course because they like the cars. Yet, at the same time, it is essential to keep pedestrians separate from vehicles: to protect children and old people; to preserve the tranquility of pedestrian life. "To resolve the conflict, it is necessary to find an arrangement of pedestrian paths and roads, so that the two are separate, but meet frequently, with the points where they meet recognized as focal points. In general, this requires two orthogonal networks, one for roads, one for paths, each connected and continuous, crossing at frequent intervals (our observations suggest that most points on the path network should be within 150 feet of the nearest road), meeting, when they meet, at right angles. "In practice, there are several possible ways of forming this relationship between the roads and paths..." [1] http://www.iwritewordsgood.com/apl/patterns/apl052.htm http://www.iwritewordsgood.com/apl/patterns/apl052.htm