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90% of NYC's subways were built by two private companies in the 19teens and 20s, then they got regulated and their fares got capped until in the late 1940s they

90% of NYC's subways were built by two private companies in the 19teens and 20s, then they got regulated and their fares got capped until in the late 1940s they were going bust and the city "nationalized" them. The streetcars between Queens and Brooklyn got killed this way too, and not even replaced. It's horrible. But public transit yo! It's funny. In the U.S. the federal government doesn't get to nationalize industry thanks to the Steel Cases. The States don't do it either because they compete with each other. But the cities do do it, and what can they nationalize? Public transportation is what they have nationalized. In other countries it tends to be the inverse. So Buenos Aires has an amazing privately-run public transit (bus) system that is the envy of any American city, and that's because in Argentina they nationalize big companies, not piddly ones, because the politicians who can do it are at the federal level, and they "dream big". I wish we could put all public transit in the U.S. in the private sector. Then finally we would have real public transit options.

bobthepanda 3y ago
Private transportation only works when all forms of it are privatized. A big reason the railroads and transit companies failed in the US was the construction of interstate highways that were free to use.
- cryptonector 3y ago
  Rail failed for transit because it's inflexible. Busses already get to be much more efficient than cars and much more flexible than trains. Rail is a fetish.
  - bobthepanda 3y ago
    Rail does one thing really well; it fits a lot of people into a tight space, much tighter than any road or bus lane. A single road lane carries 2,500 people per hour per direction; the same figure for a grade-separated railway track is 30,000 at the low end and 90,000 at the high end. This is vital in places where land values are high and land acquisition for a sufficiently sized highway, parking lot etc. becomes too high. Rail generally hasn’t failed in places that are dense enough to support it; Europe, East Asia, and even a few North American cities.
    - cryptonector 3y ago
      > Rail does one thing really well; it fits a lot of people into a tight space This is negated by its downsides: - rail is supremely expensive - rail is even more expensive to relocate - therefore rail is fixed forever - which means you can't alter routes to fit changing transit demand patterns Rail is dead. Rail is a fetish. It's an exceedingly expensive fetish. It's malinvestment for anything other than cargo. > Rail generally hasn’t failed in places that are dense enough to support it But not most of the U.S., China, Africa, Russia, etc. Even places dense enough for rail would still be better off making better use of roads for busses.
      - bobthepanda 3y ago
        > China, Africa, Russia China and Russia have a lot of railways and use them extensively. In fact China operates the world's largest high speed rail network at 45,000km, and 10,000km of urban rail transit. Russian Railways represents 2.5% of Russian GDP and the Moscow Metro is the 8th largest metro in the world and the 7th busiest. Africa doesn't really have railways but it also doesn't really have roads because the state of African infrastructure is poor in general.

bobthepanda 3y ago

Private transportation only works when all forms of it are privatized. A big reason the railroads and transit companies failed in the US was the construction of interstate highways that were free to use.

cryptonector 3y ago
Rail failed for transit because it's inflexible. Busses already get to be much more efficient than cars and much more flexible than trains. Rail is a fetish.
- bobthepanda 3y ago
  Rail does one thing really well; it fits a lot of people into a tight space, much tighter than any road or bus lane. A single road lane carries 2,500 people per hour per direction; the same figure for a grade-separated railway track is 30,000 at the low end and 90,000 at the high end. This is vital in places where land values are high and land acquisition for a sufficiently sized highway, parking lot etc. becomes too high. Rail generally hasn’t failed in places that are dense enough to support it; Europe, East Asia, and even a few North American cities.
  - cryptonector 3y ago
    > Rail does one thing really well; it fits a lot of people into a tight space This is negated by its downsides: - rail is supremely expensive - rail is even more expensive to relocate - therefore rail is fixed forever - which means you can't alter routes to fit changing transit demand patterns Rail is dead. Rail is a fetish. It's an exceedingly expensive fetish. It's malinvestment for anything other than cargo. > Rail generally hasn’t failed in places that are dense enough to support it But not most of the U.S., China, Africa, Russia, etc. Even places dense enough for rail would still be better off making better use of roads for busses.
    - bobthepanda 3y ago
      > China, Africa, Russia China and Russia have a lot of railways and use them extensively. In fact China operates the world's largest high speed rail network at 45,000km, and 10,000km of urban rail transit. Russian Railways represents 2.5% of Russian GDP and the Moscow Metro is the 8th largest metro in the world and the 7th busiest. Africa doesn't really have railways but it also doesn't really have roads because the state of African infrastructure is poor in general.