5 ms·

Certainly doesn't help that car companies actively worked to dismantle the public transit systems and promote personal vehicles.

by s0rce 8y ago

rayiner 8y ago
It doesn't help, but it probably doesn't make much of a difference in the grand scheme of things. Why is the D.C. Metro or Atlanta's MARTA so bad? I don't think car companies had anything to do with it. Americans are just bad at transit. The people don't care, and the people running it have bad taste, are bad at management, etc.
- jeieo3949 8y ago
  Depends on what “grand scheme” you’re speaking to. Liberal and conservative think tanks have both concluded that the Interstate and road projects have never paid themselves off. The oil and gas companies have been hiding studies that there has been significant environmental impact due to burning those fossil fuels in all those vehicles for decades. And you seem to be waving away lobbying and concluding “America is just bad at it.” That’s a naive take on the history.
- noirbot 8y ago
  I'm not sure about DC, but for Atlanta at least it's really a question of density. Atlanta's one of the least dense major metros, so outside of the major corridors that MARTA already runs on, there's not a lot of big wins to be had by adding more stations. In my opinion, Atlanta's actually pretty well-built in a lot of ways. While MARTA is awful for commuter/everyday use, MARTA is effective for a lot of other things like getting to major events downtown, or getting residents and tourists to/from the airport. I'm not sure you could really make it all that much better without some fairly insane investment.
  - smileysteve 8y ago
    As a Marta daily commuter, it's all about where you choose to live and where your work is. Training from Midtown to Buckhead is easy, it's 5 miles (half the length of manhatten), getting to the airport is easy, exact times of 27 and 37 minutes, getting to Decatur for dinner is easy. Getting to Dunwoody and Sandy springs are easy, except when you get there everything except for State Farm is a long outdoor walk away though 4 lane car traffic and inadequate sidewalks. I used to even ride from Alpharetta to Buckhead when the buses had priority in the shoulder; it was much preferable to morning Rush hour(s) if you got on the highway after 7am
    - noirbot 8y ago
      Oh, I definitely agree and Atlanta's generally done well recently at building more things nearer to the stations. That said, unless you live in one of the areas you just mentioned, there's not a lot you can do. There's a ton of Atlanta along 85/75 that's mostly unserved by MARTA, let alone a lot of stuff outside of 285. Atlanta has a pretty rough last-mile problem just due to its density. Outside of midtown/downtown, a lot of the stations are pretty far apart by NYC/Euro standards. You mention Midtown to Buckhead, which is 3 stops on MARTA, being half the length of Manhattan. That's more than the length of Battery Park to Penn Station, which is 12 stops on the 1/2/3 line. MARTA is fine if you're mostly going from major area to major area, but if you want to go to somewhere like Little 5, you're kinda out of options in a way that the MTA seldom has issues with. I don't so much see this as something MARTA could really fix, but more just innate to Atlanta's sprawling geography. It's getting better, but MARTA pretty much cannot be what people want it to be.
      - smileysteve 8y ago
        Some people don't think the beltline is a panacea; but that is the hope in the original plan and on the city planners; that by having a tighter perimeter that connects to the 4 spokes, we can focus the next 500k people in a smaller, denser area. Here's hoping.
- krinchan 8y ago
  Atlanta is finally hitting the tipping point, though. They've been building more and more condos and high rises along two lane streets inside of Interstate 285 for far too long. The traffic is extreme now, even on a Sunday evening when I normally fly in. compared to back when I left, around 2013. It's so much so I generally take MARTA to the nearest neighborhood to my usual hotel and call an Uber. Renting a car from the airport for 4 days costs more than than even taking Uber Black from the airport and back. Even then, it's faster to just take MARTA to the nearest neighborhood and grab a Lyft/Uber. So much of Atlanta is now stacked to the point that if you can get away with it, Zipcars, Uber, Lyft, and MARTA can combine to be cheaper than the cost of owning a car. There's a mood shift taking hold in the northern OTP neighborhoods. They see ITP folks not owning cars and spending that money on other things and they want a piece of that pie. It's still decades out but the change is at least finally starting. Just hope it isn't too late. Most everyone I know is either in the process of or already has left with traffic being the primary reason they're leaving.
amyjess 8y ago
You're thinking of a common misinterpretation of the GM streetcar conspiracy. Everyone's heard of it, and it did happen, but there are two big misconceptions most people have of it: Misconception 1: GM and their cohorts bought out and shut down all the streetcar lines because they wanted to destroy public transit and promote personal vehicles. Reality: GM and their cohorts wanted to promote buses as a replacement for streetcars, because GM and their cohorts were the largest suppliers of buses and bus parts in the country. They stood to get filthy stinking rich off the replacement of streetcars with buses. Misconception 2: Streetcar lines were doing just fine and dandy before GM came along. Reality: streetcar lines were failing, and GM was able to do what they did because the owners of streetcar lines were desperate to sell before the bottom falls out. And keep in mind that GM was successfully prosecuted for this, too (and they absolutely deserved it).
astrodust 8y ago
Now we have Uber and Elon Musk's batshit stupid tunnel project nibbling away at it again. If they ever make a new Roger Rabbit for the 2020s I've got a villain for you...

Certainly doesn't help that car companies actively worked to dismantle the public transit systems and promote personal vehicles.

by s0rce 8y ago

Certainly doesn't help that car companies actively worked to dismantle the public transit systems and promote personal vehicles.

rayiner 8y ago

It doesn't help, but it probably doesn't make much of a difference in the grand scheme of things. Why is the D.C. Metro or Atlanta's MARTA so bad? I don't think car companies had anything to do with it. Americans are just bad at transit. The people don't care, and the people running it have bad taste, are bad at management, etc.

jeieo3949 8y ago
Depends on what “grand scheme” you’re speaking to. Liberal and conservative think tanks have both concluded that the Interstate and road projects have never paid themselves off. The oil and gas companies have been hiding studies that there has been significant environmental impact due to burning those fossil fuels in all those vehicles for decades. And you seem to be waving away lobbying and concluding “America is just bad at it.” That’s a naive take on the history.
noirbot 8y ago
I'm not sure about DC, but for Atlanta at least it's really a question of density. Atlanta's one of the least dense major metros, so outside of the major corridors that MARTA already runs on, there's not a lot of big wins to be had by adding more stations. In my opinion, Atlanta's actually pretty well-built in a lot of ways. While MARTA is awful for commuter/everyday use, MARTA is effective for a lot of other things like getting to major events downtown, or getting residents and tourists to/from the airport. I'm not sure you could really make it all that much better without some fairly insane investment.
- smileysteve 8y ago
  As a Marta daily commuter, it's all about where you choose to live and where your work is. Training from Midtown to Buckhead is easy, it's 5 miles (half the length of manhatten), getting to the airport is easy, exact times of 27 and 37 minutes, getting to Decatur for dinner is easy. Getting to Dunwoody and Sandy springs are easy, except when you get there everything except for State Farm is a long outdoor walk away though 4 lane car traffic and inadequate sidewalks. I used to even ride from Alpharetta to Buckhead when the buses had priority in the shoulder; it was much preferable to morning Rush hour(s) if you got on the highway after 7am
  - noirbot 8y ago
    Oh, I definitely agree and Atlanta's generally done well recently at building more things nearer to the stations. That said, unless you live in one of the areas you just mentioned, there's not a lot you can do. There's a ton of Atlanta along 85/75 that's mostly unserved by MARTA, let alone a lot of stuff outside of 285. Atlanta has a pretty rough last-mile problem just due to its density. Outside of midtown/downtown, a lot of the stations are pretty far apart by NYC/Euro standards. You mention Midtown to Buckhead, which is 3 stops on MARTA, being half the length of Manhattan. That's more than the length of Battery Park to Penn Station, which is 12 stops on the 1/2/3 line. MARTA is fine if you're mostly going from major area to major area, but if you want to go to somewhere like Little 5, you're kinda out of options in a way that the MTA seldom has issues with. I don't so much see this as something MARTA could really fix, but more just innate to Atlanta's sprawling geography. It's getting better, but MARTA pretty much cannot be what people want it to be.
    - smileysteve 8y ago
      Some people don't think the beltline is a panacea; but that is the hope in the original plan and on the city planners; that by having a tighter perimeter that connects to the 4 spokes, we can focus the next 500k people in a smaller, denser area. Here's hoping.
krinchan 8y ago
Atlanta is finally hitting the tipping point, though. They've been building more and more condos and high rises along two lane streets inside of Interstate 285 for far too long. The traffic is extreme now, even on a Sunday evening when I normally fly in. compared to back when I left, around 2013. It's so much so I generally take MARTA to the nearest neighborhood to my usual hotel and call an Uber. Renting a car from the airport for 4 days costs more than than even taking Uber Black from the airport and back. Even then, it's faster to just take MARTA to the nearest neighborhood and grab a Lyft/Uber. So much of Atlanta is now stacked to the point that if you can get away with it, Zipcars, Uber, Lyft, and MARTA can combine to be cheaper than the cost of owning a car. There's a mood shift taking hold in the northern OTP neighborhoods. They see ITP folks not owning cars and spending that money on other things and they want a piece of that pie. It's still decades out but the change is at least finally starting. Just hope it isn't too late. Most everyone I know is either in the process of or already has left with traffic being the primary reason they're leaving.

amyjess 8y ago

You're thinking of a common misinterpretation of the GM streetcar conspiracy. Everyone's heard of it, and it did happen, but there are two big misconceptions most people have of it: Misconception 1: GM and their cohorts bought out and shut down all the streetcar lines because they wanted to destroy public transit and promote personal vehicles. Reality: GM and their cohorts wanted to promote buses as a replacement for streetcars, because GM and their cohorts were the largest suppliers of buses and bus parts in the country. They stood to get filthy stinking rich off the replacement of streetcars with buses. Misconception 2: Streetcar lines were doing just fine and dandy before GM came along. Reality: streetcar lines were failing, and GM was able to do what they did because the owners of streetcar lines were desperate to sell before the bottom falls out. And keep in mind that GM was successfully prosecuted for this, too (and they absolutely deserved it).

astrodust 8y ago

Now we have Uber and Elon Musk's batshit stupid tunnel project nibbling away at it again. If they ever make a new Roger Rabbit for the 2020s I've got a villain for you...