5 ms·

The US definitely could embrace some of those ideas. Its not "too big". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REni8Oi1QJQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REni8Oi1QJQ

pembrook 3y ago
I think it's interesting that this is an emotional trigger topic for HN (along with anything having to do with right to repair, digital privacy, etc). In most things, if you post a comment with points of discussion you get a thoughtful response here. However on HN trigger topics, you get emotionally downvoted and nobody wants to engage in discussion. Instead of linking to a youtube video from the r/fuckcars filter bubble, is there any succinct points to refute why a 3X greater population density would not naturally result in greater public transportation formation? Or is it just the "dumb americans" and their "evil car culture?" With no further investigation of the first-principles reasons that culture was formed?
- melling 3y ago
  What’s the population density of Madrid and Barcelona compared to Los Angeles and San Francisco? i’ve been using this example for about a decade. of course, that route didn’t exist 20 years ago when I took Madrid to Seville. I can’t imagine what the population density of Seville is. it would help if you give us the numbers you’re working with. I sure hope you aren’t doing the population density of the entire country. That’s a common mistake.
- CamperBob2 3y ago
  HN'ers love fixed rail for some reason. It doesn't make any sense -- if there's a less progressive transportation modality I can't imagine what it would be -- but it's axiomatic. If you value your karma score you'll back away smiling and reach for the doorknob.
  - theluketaylor 3y ago
    > if there's a less progressive transportation modality I can't imagine what it would be Genuinely curious what is meant by this since if I was asked what the most progressive ideal city layout was I'd respond with extensive, highly connected, frequent metro lines with islands of density around the stations that included plenty of non-market rate housing options within easy walk of each station. When more housing is needed extend the lines and start a whole new island of density. Make sure plenty of public green space is accessible from the metros just beyond the density islands. Inter-city connections would be broadly similar, just zoomed out. Each city an island of density connected by fast and frequent rail.
    - CamperBob2 3y ago
      Progressive to me means, simply, "That which leaves the most options open for the most people." Creating hardwired infrastructure to transport people from one place where they don't want to be to another place where they don't want to be, over timespans measured in decades for construction and a good part of a century to pay off, at a time when technology is delivering more options for individual mobility concurrent with other options that render commuting and travel less relevant, doesn't strike me as progressive.
      - theluketaylor 3y ago
        Compared to the progressive utopia that is sitting in traffic? Passenger vehicle lanes move 1500-2000 cars per hour. Even with extensive carpooling and possible future technology that allows cars to bunch more, 10-15k people per hour is likely the limit. A double tracked train line can easily push 40-50k per hour without much stress and with grade separation can be fully automated with short dwell times and huge frequency. I'm a huge fan of ebikes and other micromobility solutions for solving the last mile problem that has always plagued rapid transit, especially in low density areas. You want to move huge amount of people any significant distance? You need a train. Pretty much every proposal I've seen to move masses of people without a train ends up being train but worse, either in OPEX or CAPX (usually both).
        3y ago
  - fire_lake 3y ago
    > for some reason Fixed rail is the only reasonable way to get large numbers of people in and out of cities. - walking and cycling takes too long - cars lead to congestion and you need to store them somewhere - flying has security overhead and is terrible for the environment
- dghlsakjg 3y ago
  Population density and urbanization is not equally distributed, the Eastern half of the US has a population density on par with Europe since a huge majority of Americans live there. You are also starting from the assumption that higher population density is better for high speed rail, which is easily countered with my previous point. An argument could be made that, practically, high speed rail is really better suited to places with low population densities centered around urban areas... like the unpopulated parts of the US West. HSR is expensive and requires high degrees of funding and coordination. In other words there has to be a strong political and cultural will behind it, so yeah, it stands to reason that the US doesn't want it since they certainly have the money to do it if they want. Maybe there is a culture around forms of transportation that is particular to the US...
- panick21_ 3y ago
  Person spouts of nonsense about Hitler and then accuses other peopel of 'emotional trigger'. That's quite funny. > Instead of linking to a youtube video from the r/fuckcars filter bubble, is there any succinct points to refute why a 3X greater population density would not naturally result in greater public transportation formation? Do you really not understand how aggravation works? Somehow the US can have very dense subways in New York, how is this possible, the US isn't dense. Its as if aggregate statistics aren't a good indicator when doing regional transportation planning for a region.
- fire_lake 3y ago
  Linking urbanism to hitler was a strange point of discussion.
  - pembrook 3y ago
    Only strange if you’re not familiar with history. Direct from Wikipedia: “Lebensraum (Living space) was the leading motivation of Nazi Germany to initiate World War II”
    - panick21_ 3y ago
      You are completely misrepresenting history! The Germans wanted 'Lebensraum' because they didn't want to import food and resources from others. They didn't want to relay on anybody else. They wanted the German race to dominate those resource areas. They wanted to compete in the great power game with US, Britain and the Soviets. You act like they saw the apartment buildings in Berlin, decided that was 'to dense' and therefore they started WW2. That is simply not accurate. Their aim was not to reduce density, but rather massively increase the population of the German race. Their policy was literally pro population growth. Their 'Lebensraum' was not for currently existing Germans, because German was to dense. The 'Lebensraum' was for future generations of German Supermen that they would literally breed. I am serious by the way that this is an utterly disgusting way to argue. You should seriously be ashamed of yourself. I know that housing policy makes people insane, but you responding with 'Hitler genocide is because of urbanization' is the lowest level of argument I have come across.
      - pembrook 3y ago
        Twist my words however you like if it makes you feel better, but we’re both describing the same thing. Anyways, being confronted with contrarian ideas on the supremacy of European urbanism is clearly triggering for you (proving the point I made earlier). So much so that you feel the need to resort to ad-hominem personal attacks! I won’t be responding anymore, but I recommend examining why you’re revisiting a thread days later to call a random stranger on the internet “utterly disgusting” for challenging your feelings on this topic.
- msl 3y ago
  How much better do you think public transportation is in the US (35 people per square kilometer) than in Finland (16 people / km²) or Sweden (24 people / km²)? While you're checking the provided citation, you might want to compare those countries' fertility rates too (and others as well, of course – France's for instance is quite a bit higher than that of the US': 1.82 vs. 1.67). You have yet to demonstrate that your hypotheses are well supported by data. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependen...

pembrook 3y ago

I think it's interesting that this is an emotional trigger topic for HN (along with anything having to do with right to repair, digital privacy, etc). In most things, if you post a comment with points of discussion you get a thoughtful response here. However on HN trigger topics, you get emotionally downvoted and nobody wants to engage in discussion. Instead of linking to a youtube video from the r/fuckcars filter bubble, is there any succinct points to refute why a 3X greater population density would not naturally result in greater public transportation formation? Or is it just the "dumb americans" and their "evil car culture?" With no further investigation of the first-principles reasons that culture was formed?

melling 3y ago
What’s the population density of Madrid and Barcelona compared to Los Angeles and San Francisco? i’ve been using this example for about a decade. of course, that route didn’t exist 20 years ago when I took Madrid to Seville. I can’t imagine what the population density of Seville is. it would help if you give us the numbers you’re working with. I sure hope you aren’t doing the population density of the entire country. That’s a common mistake.
CamperBob2 3y ago
HN'ers love fixed rail for some reason. It doesn't make any sense -- if there's a less progressive transportation modality I can't imagine what it would be -- but it's axiomatic. If you value your karma score you'll back away smiling and reach for the doorknob.
- theluketaylor 3y ago
  > if there's a less progressive transportation modality I can't imagine what it would be Genuinely curious what is meant by this since if I was asked what the most progressive ideal city layout was I'd respond with extensive, highly connected, frequent metro lines with islands of density around the stations that included plenty of non-market rate housing options within easy walk of each station. When more housing is needed extend the lines and start a whole new island of density. Make sure plenty of public green space is accessible from the metros just beyond the density islands. Inter-city connections would be broadly similar, just zoomed out. Each city an island of density connected by fast and frequent rail.
  - CamperBob2 3y ago
    Progressive to me means, simply, "That which leaves the most options open for the most people." Creating hardwired infrastructure to transport people from one place where they don't want to be to another place where they don't want to be, over timespans measured in decades for construction and a good part of a century to pay off, at a time when technology is delivering more options for individual mobility concurrent with other options that render commuting and travel less relevant, doesn't strike me as progressive.
    - theluketaylor 3y ago
      Compared to the progressive utopia that is sitting in traffic? Passenger vehicle lanes move 1500-2000 cars per hour. Even with extensive carpooling and possible future technology that allows cars to bunch more, 10-15k people per hour is likely the limit. A double tracked train line can easily push 40-50k per hour without much stress and with grade separation can be fully automated with short dwell times and huge frequency. I'm a huge fan of ebikes and other micromobility solutions for solving the last mile problem that has always plagued rapid transit, especially in low density areas. You want to move huge amount of people any significant distance? You need a train. Pretty much every proposal I've seen to move masses of people without a train ends up being train but worse, either in OPEX or CAPX (usually both).
      - 3y ago
- fire_lake 3y ago
  > for some reason Fixed rail is the only reasonable way to get large numbers of people in and out of cities. - walking and cycling takes too long - cars lead to congestion and you need to store them somewhere - flying has security overhead and is terrible for the environment
dghlsakjg 3y ago
Population density and urbanization is not equally distributed, the Eastern half of the US has a population density on par with Europe since a huge majority of Americans live there. You are also starting from the assumption that higher population density is better for high speed rail, which is easily countered with my previous point. An argument could be made that, practically, high speed rail is really better suited to places with low population densities centered around urban areas... like the unpopulated parts of the US West. HSR is expensive and requires high degrees of funding and coordination. In other words there has to be a strong political and cultural will behind it, so yeah, it stands to reason that the US doesn't want it since they certainly have the money to do it if they want. Maybe there is a culture around forms of transportation that is particular to the US...
panick21_ 3y ago
Person spouts of nonsense about Hitler and then accuses other peopel of 'emotional trigger'. That's quite funny. > Instead of linking to a youtube video from the r/fuckcars filter bubble, is there any succinct points to refute why a 3X greater population density would not naturally result in greater public transportation formation? Do you really not understand how aggravation works? Somehow the US can have very dense subways in New York, how is this possible, the US isn't dense. Its as if aggregate statistics aren't a good indicator when doing regional transportation planning for a region.
fire_lake 3y ago
Linking urbanism to hitler was a strange point of discussion.
- pembrook 3y ago
  Only strange if you’re not familiar with history. Direct from Wikipedia: “Lebensraum (Living space) was the leading motivation of Nazi Germany to initiate World War II”
  - panick21_ 3y ago
    You are completely misrepresenting history! The Germans wanted 'Lebensraum' because they didn't want to import food and resources from others. They didn't want to relay on anybody else. They wanted the German race to dominate those resource areas. They wanted to compete in the great power game with US, Britain and the Soviets. You act like they saw the apartment buildings in Berlin, decided that was 'to dense' and therefore they started WW2. That is simply not accurate. Their aim was not to reduce density, but rather massively increase the population of the German race. Their policy was literally pro population growth. Their 'Lebensraum' was not for currently existing Germans, because German was to dense. The 'Lebensraum' was for future generations of German Supermen that they would literally breed. I am serious by the way that this is an utterly disgusting way to argue. You should seriously be ashamed of yourself. I know that housing policy makes people insane, but you responding with 'Hitler genocide is because of urbanization' is the lowest level of argument I have come across.
    - pembrook 3y ago
      Twist my words however you like if it makes you feel better, but we’re both describing the same thing. Anyways, being confronted with contrarian ideas on the supremacy of European urbanism is clearly triggering for you (proving the point I made earlier). So much so that you feel the need to resort to ad-hominem personal attacks! I won’t be responding anymore, but I recommend examining why you’re revisiting a thread days later to call a random stranger on the internet “utterly disgusting” for challenging your feelings on this topic.
msl 3y ago
How much better do you think public transportation is in the US (35 people per square kilometer) than in Finland (16 people / km²) or Sweden (24 people / km²)? While you're checking the provided citation, you might want to compare those countries' fertility rates too (and others as well, of course – France's for instance is quite a bit higher than that of the US': 1.82 vs. 1.67). You have yet to demonstrate that your hypotheses are well supported by data. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_population_density https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependen...