4 ms·

Are you saying NYC is car centric? It isn't, that's why it is struggling without public transit. In the vast majority of American cities a large portion of wor

by dtwest 6y ago

Are you saying NYC is car centric? It isn't, that's why it is struggling without public transit. In the vast majority of American cities a large portion of workers drive to work during normal conditions. They already have the road capacity, parking, etc needed. The car-centric American cities are actually much better suited for this crisis than NYC is.

ruddct 6y ago
NYC is quite car-centric by international standards. Compare to London (or Paris, or lots of other places), which in response to COVID has: * Used congestion pricing as a tool to reduce pollution/returning traffic/mode-shift to cars * Shut off large areas of their city to cars * Rapidly built pedestrian/bike networks to accommodate for non-car movement While NYC has: * Indefinitely postponed congestion pricing * Defunded bike safety and public transit improvement initiatives * Not built any cohesive bike or pedestrian systems to encourage non-car transport Of course in pre-COVID times, NYC severely lagged in both pedestrian and cyclist infrastructure/investment, and famously has some of the most expensive public-transit construction costs in the world. re: car-centric cities, agreed that somewhere like Nashville is not going to have these kinds of problems. However, a large swath of Americans live in public transit or carpool-reliant cities (NYC/SF/Seattle/DC/Chicago/Southern California, many large southern cities). Mode-shift to private transit would increase traffic 10-20+% in most of these places, which I think we can all agree is not ideal for pollution, gridlock, parking needs, public health, etc.
- flipflipper 6y ago
  NYC did legalize e-bikes at the start of all this, a step in the right direction.
- dtwest 6y ago
  NYC public transit usage is more similar to Paris or London than it is to any of the cities you listed. 56.5% of New Yorkers commute with public transit (2015), seems pretty on par with European standards to me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_transit_ridership https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_... https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/10/riding-bikes-buses-trains-in-european-cities/543141/ https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/10/riding-bikes-...

by dtwest 6y ago

ruddct 6y ago

NYC is quite car-centric by international standards. Compare to London (or Paris, or lots of other places), which in response to COVID has: * Used congestion pricing as a tool to reduce pollution/returning traffic/mode-shift to cars * Shut off large areas of their city to cars * Rapidly built pedestrian/bike networks to accommodate for non-car movement While NYC has: * Indefinitely postponed congestion pricing * Defunded bike safety and public transit improvement initiatives * Not built any cohesive bike or pedestrian systems to encourage non-car transport Of course in pre-COVID times, NYC severely lagged in both pedestrian and cyclist infrastructure/investment, and famously has some of the most expensive public-transit construction costs in the world. re: car-centric cities, agreed that somewhere like Nashville is not going to have these kinds of problems. However, a large swath of Americans live in public transit or carpool-reliant cities (NYC/SF/Seattle/DC/Chicago/Southern California, many large southern cities). Mode-shift to private transit would increase traffic 10-20+% in most of these places, which I think we can all agree is not ideal for pollution, gridlock, parking needs, public health, etc.

flipflipper 6y ago
NYC did legalize e-bikes at the start of all this, a step in the right direction.
dtwest 6y ago
NYC public transit usage is more similar to Paris or London than it is to any of the cities you listed. 56.5% of New Yorkers commute with public transit (2015), seems pretty on par with European standards to me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_transit_ridership https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_... https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/10/riding-bikes-buses-trains-in-european-cities/543141/ https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2017/10/riding-bikes-...