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Coming from a rural area, I’m really appalled at how inefficient public transit is. It’s clearly only functional enough to be used by people a) fortuitous enoug

Coming from a rural area, I’m really appalled at how inefficient public transit is. It’s clearly only functional enough to be used by people a) fortuitous enough to live right by public transit centers or b) people without a choice. The last time I used transit it turned a 20 minute drive into a 50+ minute bus ride. I’m not about to trade away an hour+ of every day for the sake of being green. I had coworkers suggest biking to another route that was quicker, but that bike ride included an extra 30+ minutes of biking, had me hauling the bike on and off the bus, risking having my bike stolen (we had an enclosed cage, but people had bikes stolen occasionally) plus now I’m either a bit sweaty or have to take a shower at work (and then be sweaty at the end of the day). I know this isn’t an easy solution, but from an outsider perspective I see why people don’t use public transit that much. It disrupts life to the point where it’s simply not an option for most.

joe_the_user 8y ago
Indeed, but it doesn't have to be that way. Frequent, low cost timely bus-and-light-rail service is possible. It existed in other countries. Portland, OR, a quite spread-out city, once had it (I don't know it still does). BART was once an excellent system and after years of neglect is still better than many. One factor in this country is public transit is expected to pay for itself while the automobile is effectively massively subsidized.
danans 8y ago
> Coming from a rural area, I’m really appalled at how inefficient public transit is. A highly utilized public transit system is often far more efficient than cars when measured in people-miles/hr during hours of peak transit demand, whereas rural transit is a totally different and non comparable transportation problem space. The inefficient bus and rail systems are usually ones in areas where people mostly commute using cars, places like Silicon Valley. In these places, the bus and rail lines are sparse relative to the population, so they take longer to get to any individual's destination. > It’s clearly only functional enough to be used by people a) fortuitous enough to live right by public transit centers or b) people without a choice. It's true that housing with easy transit center access is a privilege for working and professional class people today, but that is a relatively recent phenomenon since less than a generation ago, people of some means completely eschewed transit.
- CalRobert 8y ago
  True, but even better is the fact that in addition to better people-miles per hour, a well designed system means people don't have to travel so far (by putting homes near jobs and amenities instead of surrounding everything with acres of asphalt - crazy idea!) so the <people-things they want to do> per hour ratio improves. If a thousand people in point A want to get to point B 2 miles away, obviously a big train is faster than cars. The next step is to _make point B closer_. This is what is so often forgotten - when I lived in LA I knew Angelenos who'd visit London and say how great the tube was, but the same tube network in LA would be garbage. What makes the tube really work is the fact that those Angelenos almost never had to go more than a few miles to what they wanted, instead of saying things like "well it's 30 miles so if it's more than 30 minutes something has gone wrong". People say things like "it took me 15 minutes to go a mile!!" but the real problem there is filling a mile of your city with garbage (parking and roads, mostly).
Johnny555 8y ago
Coming from a rural area, I’m really appalled at how inefficient public transit is. Coming from a rural area, you should be more cognizant about how density affects public transit. Compare SF Muni (density=18,000 people per sq mile) and VTA light rail (5700/sq mi) a) fortuitous enough to live right by public transit centers many people that live near transit didn't arrive there fortuitously, they made the tradeoff between living farther away in cheaper/larger/nicer housing, and living close to transit. I live in a small condo that's a 10 minute walk from a train station, but I didn't end up there by accident -- I chose between a 3 bedroom single family home a 40 minute drive from work and a much smaller condo, and I chose the condo. Ironically, I don't even take transit, when I bought the place it was a 30 minute bike ride from work (which is poorly served by transit), then I moved to a job that's a 10 minute bike ride away (well served by transit, but too close to make transit worthwhile)
CalRobert 8y ago
Fortuitous? It's no more fortuitous than living by a freeway, or on a mountain. Transport is something you should investigate thoroughly before moving to a place. Unfortunately virtually all home finding tools assume you want to drive everywhere (or at least surface that as the first option). I've worked on one to change this, but not for the US. Apparently it's fairly eye opening to people because it's not the sort of thing presented to them before buying.

joe_the_user 8y ago

Indeed, but it doesn't have to be that way. Frequent, low cost timely bus-and-light-rail service is possible. It existed in other countries. Portland, OR, a quite spread-out city, once had it (I don't know it still does). BART was once an excellent system and after years of neglect is still better than many. One factor in this country is public transit is expected to pay for itself while the automobile is effectively massively subsidized.

danans 8y ago

> Coming from a rural area, I’m really appalled at how inefficient public transit is. A highly utilized public transit system is often far more efficient than cars when measured in people-miles/hr during hours of peak transit demand, whereas rural transit is a totally different and non comparable transportation problem space. The inefficient bus and rail systems are usually ones in areas where people mostly commute using cars, places like Silicon Valley. In these places, the bus and rail lines are sparse relative to the population, so they take longer to get to any individual's destination. > It’s clearly only functional enough to be used by people a) fortuitous enough to live right by public transit centers or b) people without a choice. It's true that housing with easy transit center access is a privilege for working and professional class people today, but that is a relatively recent phenomenon since less than a generation ago, people of some means completely eschewed transit.

CalRobert 8y ago
True, but even better is the fact that in addition to better people-miles per hour, a well designed system means people don't have to travel so far (by putting homes near jobs and amenities instead of surrounding everything with acres of asphalt - crazy idea!) so the <people-things they want to do> per hour ratio improves. If a thousand people in point A want to get to point B 2 miles away, obviously a big train is faster than cars. The next step is to _make point B closer_. This is what is so often forgotten - when I lived in LA I knew Angelenos who'd visit London and say how great the tube was, but the same tube network in LA would be garbage. What makes the tube really work is the fact that those Angelenos almost never had to go more than a few miles to what they wanted, instead of saying things like "well it's 30 miles so if it's more than 30 minutes something has gone wrong". People say things like "it took me 15 minutes to go a mile!!" but the real problem there is filling a mile of your city with garbage (parking and roads, mostly).

Johnny555 8y ago

Coming from a rural area, I’m really appalled at how inefficient public transit is. Coming from a rural area, you should be more cognizant about how density affects public transit. Compare SF Muni (density=18,000 people per sq mile) and VTA light rail (5700/sq mi) a) fortuitous enough to live right by public transit centers many people that live near transit didn't arrive there fortuitously, they made the tradeoff between living farther away in cheaper/larger/nicer housing, and living close to transit. I live in a small condo that's a 10 minute walk from a train station, but I didn't end up there by accident -- I chose between a 3 bedroom single family home a 40 minute drive from work and a much smaller condo, and I chose the condo. Ironically, I don't even take transit, when I bought the place it was a 30 minute bike ride from work (which is poorly served by transit), then I moved to a job that's a 10 minute bike ride away (well served by transit, but too close to make transit worthwhile)

CalRobert 8y ago

Fortuitous? It's no more fortuitous than living by a freeway, or on a mountain. Transport is something you should investigate thoroughly before moving to a place. Unfortunately virtually all home finding tools assume you want to drive everywhere (or at least surface that as the first option). I've worked on one to change this, but not for the US. Apparently it's fairly eye opening to people because it's not the sort of thing presented to them before buying.