4 ms·

I am so pleased to see attention focused on this sad state of affairs. The San Jose light rail line referenced in the article is literally right outside my fro

by Bud 14y ago

I am so pleased to see attention focused on this sad state of affairs. The San Jose light rail line referenced in the article is literally right outside my front door. Yet I have never ridden it, despite living in San Jose for over a decade. Why? Because it simply doesn't take me anywhere useful in a useful amount of time. It can't even take me to the airport well, and that airport is only a couple miles away. That's sad. There is plenty of money in Silicon Valley, and plenty of need for relief from traffic congestion. It's true that San Jose is low-density. But I know we could do a lot better than we're doing. There's not even a fast, frequent train between San Jose (10th largest city in the US) and San Francisco (14th largest city in the US), for chrissakes. That's pathetic.

warfangle 14y ago
Low density is a reason to invest in public transportation, not a reason to divest from public transportation. To wit: most of Queens was farmland when the subway transit was built. Good public transportation, along with solid city centers, begets population density (and economies of scale). Poorly planned public transportation lingers as an afterthought; a mistake; a rallying cry that public transportation does not work in low-density areas.
- wilfra 14y ago
  It's not farmland low-density, it's just not manhattan. And I don't know that they want it to become more dense than it already is. Northern California likes its trees, low-rise buildings and greenbelts. I don't think anybody wants to see a concrete jungle from Santa Rosa to Gilroy, like happened in LA.
whyenot 14y ago
Take VTA to the Metro/Airport station. Get off and take the synchronized free shuttle to the airport. Congratulations, you are now at the airport. It doesn't take very long, and costs you a grand total of $2. There also is a fairly fast, frequent train between San Jose and San Francisco. CalTrain. One of the baby bullet trains will get you into SF faster than you can drive there, and when the new transbay terminal is completed, it will drop you off right in the middle of the city (the current station at 4th and King isn't the most convenient location, but even if you walk from there to market st. I bet you would get there faster than you could drive).
- Bud 14y ago
  This isn't really true. The baby bullet takes 59 minutes to get to a single SF location. One would then have to get through the city to one's real destination. I can reliably drive to northern neighborhoods in SF in about 50 minutes in light traffic. In addition, there are only a total of eleven of those baby bullet trains, per day. At many hours of the day, you can't get one at all. On average, given the average wait time til the next train and other factors, I can drive to SF about 2.5 times faster, round-trip, than I can reach various common destinations using CalTrain plus whatever else is available. It's true that if you are commuting in rush hour only, versus heavy traffic, and your destination happens to be very close to a CalTrain station, and you live close to the CalTrain station to begin with, the train will win. But not under most other conditions.
  - smsm42 14y ago
    Even taking that into account, I usually take the train when I'm going to SF on business. Even though the schedules are such that one time I had to freeze my butt of on a platform for 50 mins because there were no trains at all during this time to my direction. But at least the option is there, and at least in SF you can get somewhere with public transit. Somewhere in Santa Clara county, usually you don't have any imaginable option to use public transit unless you are ready to spend 2.5 hours on a trip that is 20-minute car ride otherwise.

by Bud 14y ago

warfangle 14y ago

Low density is a reason to invest in public transportation, not a reason to divest from public transportation. To wit: most of Queens was farmland when the subway transit was built. Good public transportation, along with solid city centers, begets population density (and economies of scale). Poorly planned public transportation lingers as an afterthought; a mistake; a rallying cry that public transportation does not work in low-density areas.

wilfra 14y ago
It's not farmland low-density, it's just not manhattan. And I don't know that they want it to become more dense than it already is. Northern California likes its trees, low-rise buildings and greenbelts. I don't think anybody wants to see a concrete jungle from Santa Rosa to Gilroy, like happened in LA.

whyenot 14y ago

Take VTA to the Metro/Airport station. Get off and take the synchronized free shuttle to the airport. Congratulations, you are now at the airport. It doesn't take very long, and costs you a grand total of $2. There also is a fairly fast, frequent train between San Jose and San Francisco. CalTrain. One of the baby bullet trains will get you into SF faster than you can drive there, and when the new transbay terminal is completed, it will drop you off right in the middle of the city (the current station at 4th and King isn't the most convenient location, but even if you walk from there to market st. I bet you would get there faster than you could drive).

Bud 14y ago
This isn't really true. The baby bullet takes 59 minutes to get to a single SF location. One would then have to get through the city to one's real destination. I can reliably drive to northern neighborhoods in SF in about 50 minutes in light traffic. In addition, there are only a total of eleven of those baby bullet trains, per day. At many hours of the day, you can't get one at all. On average, given the average wait time til the next train and other factors, I can drive to SF about 2.5 times faster, round-trip, than I can reach various common destinations using CalTrain plus whatever else is available. It's true that if you are commuting in rush hour only, versus heavy traffic, and your destination happens to be very close to a CalTrain station, and you live close to the CalTrain station to begin with, the train will win. But not under most other conditions.
- smsm42 14y ago
  Even taking that into account, I usually take the train when I'm going to SF on business. Even though the schedules are such that one time I had to freeze my butt of on a platform for 50 mins because there were no trains at all during this time to my direction. But at least the option is there, and at least in SF you can get somewhere with public transit. Somewhere in Santa Clara county, usually you don't have any imaginable option to use public transit unless you are ready to spend 2.5 hours on a trip that is 20-minute car ride otherwise.