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From Wikipedia 3.7 million people were employed in New York City; Manhattan is the main employment center with 56% of all jobs.[19] Of those working in Manhatt
by TomK32 3y ago
From Wikipedia
3.7 million people were employed in New York City; Manhattan is the main employment center with 56% of all jobs.[19] Of those working in Manhattan, 30% commute from within Manhattan.
And:
The primary mode of transportation in New York City is rail. Only 6% of shopping trips in Manhattan involve the use of a car.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transportation_in_New_York_City https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transportation_in_New_York_Cit...
- ghaff 3y agoNYC, and specifically Manhattan, is pretty much the only US city where you can get by pretty easily without owning a car but there's no cultural expectation with respect to friends and recreational options that you have one.
- CharlesW 3y agoChicago is like this as well.
- ghaff 3y agoChicago probably comes closest. Yes, it's not really binary.
- treyd 3y agoYou can get by without a car in Boston as I do as well, if you work and live in the city.
- ghaff 3y agoThat applies to a number of cities but that's the caveat. Especially if you're a bit older, it's common for friends to live outside the city, many jobs aren't in the city, there are activities you might like to do outside the city etc. Yes, there are rental cars but that's the type of thing I was getting at with my comment about cultural expectations. Everyone in my circle who lives in Boston/Cambridge owns a car.
- hparadiz 3y agoWhen I lived in Philly I still drove to do my shopping but I had coworkers that didn't even have cars.
- fatnoah 3y ago> You can get by without a car in Boston as I do as well, if you work and live in the city. FWIW, I lived in the city and worked in a suburb, and also was able to live car-free without issue. This was in the days before ride-hailing apps, so I imagine it'd be even easier now. (Not technically car-free, I know)
- ghaff 3y agoI’ve always worked out by 495 not adjacent to commuter rail. So living in town without a car would have been impossible. Indeed would have been too long a commute for me with a car.
- fatnoah 3y agoI was working off 128 in Waltham and the time I worked overlapped perfectly with a city-sponsored local bus route that took people from the train station to the business areas. There were about 15-20 regulars doing the train-to-bus the morning Since the bus basically existed for commuters, the driver would always wait when the train was late. The most amazing part of that commute was that most of the commuters actually did a cross-platform transfer at North Station from the Newburyport/Rockport line to the Fitchburg line. Again, one reason it worked is that the conductors on the outbound train would hold a few minutes of the Newburyport train was late.
- programjames 3y agoI live in the area. You can get by, as long as you're willing to risk your life every few minutes. Some parts of Boston are walkable/bikeable, but most of it is not.
- ghaff 3y agoI don't really bike and certainly wouldn't in Boston. But most of the urban core (essentially Bay Bay plus the original pre-landfill Boston) plus Cambridge in general are absolutely walkable.
- arcticbull 3y agoYou don't need a car in San Francisco. It's a tiny city that's easily traversable by bike, metro and bus - or just walking. I haven't had a car in the city in over 10 years and it's really never impacted me - except for saving me boatloads of money, I guess, probably well over $100K.
- hehhehaha 3y agoDepends where you are in sf, the transit is an order of magnitude worse then manhattan
- xhkkffbf 3y agoI wouldn't be so sure. A number of my friends tried living without a car and they quickly bought one when they could afford it. There are so many places that the car unlocks. For instance, taking a bus to Golden Gate park from downtown isn't that fast. If you like to go to the park, it helps to have a car.
- arcticbull 3y ago> For instance, taking a bus to Golden Gate park from downtown isn't that fast. If you like to go to the park, it helps to have a car. From personal experience, yes, it's strictly "faster" to take a car to the park from downtown unless you include going to the parking lot, picking up your car, finding a parking spot and then walking to where you're actually trying to go. From Powell it's 16 minutes by the N train every 10 minutes, followed by a 3 minute walk. I guess driving is technically 16, but you know, parking on either side. Or 23 minutes by bike. Honestly, the fastest way between any two points in the city is a bike (or an e-bike, or scooter) at least 2/3 of the day. Then you have the spiky "oops all traffic" and your drive gets exponentially longer while your bike commute (or metro, or bus ride with protected lanes) remains exactly the same length. The kind of places a car actually unlocks (going out of town on weekends) are like $100 for a car rental vs depreciation, financing, tolls, registration, insurance, parking, fines, gas/charging, etc. That gives you a huge car rental and Uber budget. And rental cars are usually available at the same parking lots you'd normally be putting your car.
- selimthegrim 3y agoNew Orleans used to be until they nuked the bus system recently.
- busterarm 3y agoThis broke my heart because it was one of the reasons that New Orleans was one of my favorite travel destinations. This move was so short-sighted.
- selimthegrim 3y agoThe board of the transit system is currently falling apart and probably facing an impending FBI investigation so all the statements that were made about it being right as rain again within a year when they made the latest service cuts are now laughable.
- cryptonector 3y agoMaybe Manhattanites should have to pay $15/day to park their cars on the street. That would quickly curb traffic issues in the city.
- apstls 3y agoI would love if (_consistently available_) $15/day street parking was a thing in Manhattan, it'd be a good deal cheaper than garages and obviously a lot more convenient than keeping your car elsewhere. There isn't much benefit to having a car in Manhattan for day-to-day life, but it would be nice to have for things like day trips. Right now I park my car about 45 minutes away in another borough (at my family's house) so when I do need to drive I have a +90min fixed cost added to my commute time.
- jcranmer 3y agoFWIW, Manhattan commercial real estate goes for about $80/ft²/yr. A parking space therefore costs about $40/day in real estate rent, so $15/day is well below costs.
- supertrope 3y agoIs that $80/ft^2/yr raw land value? Indoor space cannot be directly compared against a spot in a garage that’s not climate controlled and is more vulnerable to vandalism.
- supertrope 3y agoFor more on this solution read The High Cost of Free Parking by Donald Shoup.
- timr 3y agoThe primary mode of transportation is rail, but even ignoring taxis and Ubers (which we all use sometimes) we depend on things delivered by cars. They don't bring groceries or Amazon deliveries on the subway. This stuff adds up, and is a big reason why it's expensive to live here.
- arcticbull 3y agoI guess so, but a $15 toll vs whatever it is now isn't going to impact the price of goods materially unless all those trucks are mostly empty, in which case, good?
- timr 3y agoIt's $24 for small trucks, and $36 for large trucks. Plus the $1.25/$2.50 for taxis and Ubers, of course. I grant you that it's relatively small when amortized over a truck full of packages, but it's stupid to include trucks at all. They haven't thought it through beyond a superficial level (or worse: they have, and this was intentional). Regardless, Manhattan is not City of London. City of London is one tiny little corner of London. This tax is closer to the equivalent of putting congestion pricing on all of London inside of M25.
- eduction 3y agoNone of those numbers address the question at issue, which is, "What percentage of vehicles used in Manattan on a given day are from outside Manhattan?" >Of those working in Manhattan, 30% commute from within Manhattan. Most commuters terminating in Manhattan are on mass transit so this stat doesn't really speak to the car question. Also a lot of vehicular traffic in Manhattan is not to do with commuting. (I suspect the person you are replying to is incorrect, incidentally; I take no position in this argument. Your comment is a bit of a non sequitur is all.)
- mgce 3y agoSome review from 2007: https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/12/nyregion/12traffic.html https://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/12/nyregion/12traffic.html > Census data show that more city residents than suburbanites drive to work in Manhattan every day, according to Mr. Schaller. He estimated that 263,000 people in 19 counties in and around New York City drive regularly to jobs in Manhattan below 60th Street. Of those, 53 percent, or 141,000, live in the five boroughs, Mr. Schaller said. The greatest numbers are from Queens, with 51,300, and Brooklyn, with 33,400. About 23,900 auto commuters live in Manhattan, while 17,400 are from the Bronx and 15,200 from Staten Island. The suburban area with the most auto commuters to Manhattan is Nassau County, with 22,091 people driving to work in the borough, followed by Bergen County, with 19,975. So 53% from NYC, 10% from Manhattan, 47% from outside the city. Only counting commuting as you note.