4 ms·

It's not a matter of quality, it's a matter of preference. I don't own a car. I live three blocks from a bus stop and I Uber everywhere instead, because it's ch

by llbbdd 1y ago

It's not a matter of quality, it's a matter of preference. I don't own a car. I live three blocks from a bus stop and I Uber everywhere instead, because it's cheap and predictable. The buses are clean, they run on time, but the population is well-off enough that there's almost no reason to take them, and that filters to buses being full of people who for one reason or another (often significant problems integrating with society) cannot pay for an alternative. If one takes public transit it's because of convenience, cost, or virtue, and convenience is often the leg lacking, because it doesn't come to your house. I have walked blocks to and stood at many bus stops in my life surrounded by unwell people and telling myself that I'm being socially efficient does not smooth that over particularly well.

palata 1y ago
Not saying that you're wrong at all, but that feels pretty specific to the US. Which to me confirms that it is an urban planning failure. In many places in the world, it's not remotely like that. I understand that "public transportation sucks in the US", but I feel like US people conclude from it that "public transportation sucks". And this is wrong. It's really a failure in the US.
- llbbdd 1y ago
  That's fine, I've only lived in the US and can only provide that perspective. However I cannot imagine a version of public transit that would be so good that I would actually use it - and this includes looking at the options available in other countries, because as far as I know we're still operating with buses, trains, subways, carpools, etc. Until ya'll have free taxis that come to your house and take you directly to your destination, it's just not a comparable sell. To that extent I think it comes back to preference and maybe culture, and doesn't indicate any kind of failure. In the US we can afford not to take public transit and exercise that preference, in many places, it's not an option.
  - queenkjuul 1y ago
    Plenty of Europeans can afford to do whatever they want and still take transit. Same in Japan, China, all over the developed world. I just fundamentally can't get why you're so offput by trains.
  - palata 1y ago
    > In the US we can afford not to take public transit and exercise that preference, in many places, it's not an option. Public transit is objectively a better solution than individual cars. It's not that other countries have public transit because they don't have a choice. They do: they just choose the better option. > To that extent I think it comes back to preference and maybe culture, and doesn't indicate any kind of failure. Sure, it was built like this in the US because of the culture. But retrospectively it was a mistake. Driving an individual car emits more CO2 than taking a bus or a train, period. The US is probably the only place in the world where a swasticar is considered "ecological": it's using a lot of energy, just because it's heavy.
joseda-hg 1y ago
It's the association with unwell people that I don't get, and I do agree that it feels particularly US Centric Coming from a place where it's a lot more normalized, I've taken the bus, twice a day for the last say 7 Years, the worst I've seen has been the ocassional drunk person (I've also slept 90% of my commute plenty of times, that's how safe I feel) Mostly it's working people and high school students (But also, old people running errands or going to church) I assume most of those druggies/thiefs/etc, know that there's a lot to lose if they get caught messing with people on the bus (And I have seen a couple times a driver refusing service to specific people) All the drivers know each other, and people on the same route are more often than not in you community and will tell people around On the same note, a common thief usually avoids "working" places near his own house, because that's one quick way of destroying your life even if police never gets involved
- llbbdd 1y ago
  That's reasonable, and as I noted in another comment I've only lived in the US and can only provide that perspective. Though I see a lot of discourse around this dismissed as "US-centric" while avoiding the fact that the US, the melting-pot of the world, is potentially one of the best test-cases for whether public transit works. All of the situations you describe are just carpooling with extra steps. Public transit as described in the US is a bunch of strangers with different goals and different jobs getting together in the same car at approximately the same time to go to roughly the same block. As a system it needs to be able to handle those, and when you scale it past the carpooling step, it doesn't. Perhaps that's the problem to be solved, but if the US isn't handling it, I'm not sure you could point to a country solving the same problem and doing it better.
  - joseda-hg 1y ago
    I don't think I follow, all of those people in my example are taking the same route / the same bus, How is that different? Or what difference would there be on a carpool / not a carpool? On the same idea, walking a few blocks is the expectation here, being left on the same block on public transport would be enough to increase real state value The bus I take everyday usually has: - A random assortment of (Usually european) backpackers - Some hospital workers - A few factory workers - Some office monkeys like me - Random people dressed normally that I can't categorize We just go along roughly the same route at the same hour

by llbbdd 1y ago

palata 1y ago

Not saying that you're wrong at all, but that feels pretty specific to the US. Which to me confirms that it is an urban planning failure. In many places in the world, it's not remotely like that. I understand that "public transportation sucks in the US", but I feel like US people conclude from it that "public transportation sucks". And this is wrong. It's really a failure in the US.

llbbdd 1y ago
That's fine, I've only lived in the US and can only provide that perspective. However I cannot imagine a version of public transit that would be so good that I would actually use it - and this includes looking at the options available in other countries, because as far as I know we're still operating with buses, trains, subways, carpools, etc. Until ya'll have free taxis that come to your house and take you directly to your destination, it's just not a comparable sell. To that extent I think it comes back to preference and maybe culture, and doesn't indicate any kind of failure. In the US we can afford not to take public transit and exercise that preference, in many places, it's not an option.
- queenkjuul 1y ago
  Plenty of Europeans can afford to do whatever they want and still take transit. Same in Japan, China, all over the developed world. I just fundamentally can't get why you're so offput by trains.
- palata 1y ago
  > In the US we can afford not to take public transit and exercise that preference, in many places, it's not an option. Public transit is objectively a better solution than individual cars. It's not that other countries have public transit because they don't have a choice. They do: they just choose the better option. > To that extent I think it comes back to preference and maybe culture, and doesn't indicate any kind of failure. Sure, it was built like this in the US because of the culture. But retrospectively it was a mistake. Driving an individual car emits more CO2 than taking a bus or a train, period. The US is probably the only place in the world where a swasticar is considered "ecological": it's using a lot of energy, just because it's heavy.

joseda-hg 1y ago

It's the association with unwell people that I don't get, and I do agree that it feels particularly US Centric Coming from a place where it's a lot more normalized, I've taken the bus, twice a day for the last say 7 Years, the worst I've seen has been the ocassional drunk person (I've also slept 90% of my commute plenty of times, that's how safe I feel) Mostly it's working people and high school students (But also, old people running errands or going to church) I assume most of those druggies/thiefs/etc, know that there's a lot to lose if they get caught messing with people on the bus (And I have seen a couple times a driver refusing service to specific people) All the drivers know each other, and people on the same route are more often than not in you community and will tell people around On the same note, a common thief usually avoids "working" places near his own house, because that's one quick way of destroying your life even if police never gets involved

llbbdd 1y ago
That's reasonable, and as I noted in another comment I've only lived in the US and can only provide that perspective. Though I see a lot of discourse around this dismissed as "US-centric" while avoiding the fact that the US, the melting-pot of the world, is potentially one of the best test-cases for whether public transit works. All of the situations you describe are just carpooling with extra steps. Public transit as described in the US is a bunch of strangers with different goals and different jobs getting together in the same car at approximately the same time to go to roughly the same block. As a system it needs to be able to handle those, and when you scale it past the carpooling step, it doesn't. Perhaps that's the problem to be solved, but if the US isn't handling it, I'm not sure you could point to a country solving the same problem and doing it better.
- joseda-hg 1y ago
  I don't think I follow, all of those people in my example are taking the same route / the same bus, How is that different? Or what difference would there be on a carpool / not a carpool? On the same idea, walking a few blocks is the expectation here, being left on the same block on public transport would be enough to increase real state value The bus I take everyday usually has: - A random assortment of (Usually european) backpackers - Some hospital workers - A few factory workers - Some office monkeys like me - Random people dressed normally that I can't categorize We just go along roughly the same route at the same hour