Driver pulls up. Opens door. Lets the first 12 out of 30+ on. Slams door in face of angry mob as he pulls away.
Angry mob chases bus while bus driver screams something about being late.
Bus slows to make a turn. Woman screaming to get on bus and banging on door as though her life depends on it.
Driver stops, tells her through the glass (with a nice gesture) that she should have been at the bus station in time (which she was). Driver proceeds to turn, clipping the curb, driving over sidewalk nearly crushing screaming woman and angry mob.
i was waiting for a 35 once and a bus driver was pulling up to the stop slowly, i looked into the big windshield and the guy's eyes were closed. he slept right through the stop about an extra 100 feet before almost running through a light into cross traffic.
The difference between New York and Washington DC's pub trans systems and all other american transit systems is that NYC & DC are massively subsidised. NYC realizes just how much money having 500,000 less cars in Manhattan everyday is worth and DC is just trying to show up Moscow (talk about a gorgeous subway system!)
LiG obviously knows a lot more than I - but when we realize that properly funding public transit is not something we do just to subsidise the poor carless folks out there - its to make travels easier for everyone - then we might spend what we should.
But before that happens, let fire Frank Kruesi, shall we?
today i got off the bus after getting on and it not moving for 5 min. walked from downtown half way up queen anne hill along my bus route and i beat it home... so i changed my opinion [but i suppose traffic is to blame, not public transit]
NYC has the good sense to use bridge and tunnel tolls to subsidize mass transit. That could work here in Chicago as well, but it would involve putting the Illinois Tollway Authority under the jurisdiction of the RTA, which would never happen in a million years because each agency is a patronage playpen for rival political fiefdoms.
I'm not sure about DC Metro's funding system, but I know they're facing problems because that first generation of subway cars and escalators that were so new and shiny in the 1970's are now approaching the end of their mechanical life expectancies. As a result, the system is facing some major capital expenses over the next several years.
Found this interesting tidbit on the web today. Not really surprised by these statistics. My friend in Portland was astonished they didn't make the list. Not surprised by that either.
San Francisco is among the cities with the highest use of public transit, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Tuesday. San Francisco tied with Boston, where about 31 percent of workers commute on public transportation.
The only U.S. cities with higher public transit use were New York, with 55 percent, and Washington, D.C., with 37 percent. One-third of the nation's 6.4 million people who travel to work on public transportation use systems in New York, according to the report.
Of the approximately 6.4 million people nationwide who usually travel to work using public transportation, nearly one-third live in New York City, according to a new analysis of American Community Survey data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau.
Chicago and Philadelphia each have 27 percent public transit usage among commuters. Newark, N.J. had 26 percent and Baltimore had 25 percent.
Only one Los Angeles worker in eight uses public transportation, and in Houston, only 6 percent of workers use public transportation.
Overall, 5 percent of the nation's 128.6 million workers use public transportation to get to work.
Other survey highlights:
* Nationwide, 77 percent of workers drove alone to work, 10 percent carpooled and 2 percent walked.
* Bus transportation accounted for 55 percent of public transportation use nationally
seattle was ridiculous yesterday.
flooding, broken down cars on aurora, football traffic - the city seemed basically shut down. it was faster for me to walk home as well.
Don't know about other cities, but in Boston riding a bike is faster and typically more convenient that taking the T or the bus. I can make it across Cambridge into Boston in traffic in 15-20 minutes without putting my foot down. Can't beat that!
I keep thinking about transit and am astonished we still support extensive bus systems in this country. If the cost of those bus systems were diverted to rail both commuter & transit we could have very extensive electrified systems.
The problem with busses are that they use fossil fuels just like our autos do. Often I see a city bus cruising at night with either nobody or just one person riding. How is that helping 1) traffic congestion and 2)CO2 emmissions and the environment?
In a world where Peak Oil is upon us we need to use transit that has some longevity. Electricity is something we have here at home either by coal/nuclear or renewable sources.
I'm still very pessimistic about transit, be rail or otherwise, because we have current technology to keep us individually mobile through EV cars. It's in the American psyche to have their own transportation. It will take generations to change and all our research will go into keeping the status quo, not making transit work.
However, without diesel/gasoline we can't keep the interstate freeway system running OR the jet airline. That's why I think the real forward thinking move is electrified high speed inter-state rail and forget about inner-city transit for now.
I don't want to be too alarmist. Personally I see real bad liquid oil shortages in 10+ years. Thus, ample time to start building decent infastructure for rail lines. However, I know that wouldn't happen without a huge disruption in Washington.
Just don't want to get caught in a post-oil era having ability to get around town and to a defunct airport, but only horseback to the neighboring city.
you can build high-speed rail, but nobody will ride it until they have to. This being America, nobody will pay for that until there are riders, probably not even the government.
Urban rail, on the other hand, does have riders and is gaining them, which is why it is expanding. It is proven, and therefore people are willing to invest.
An eventual good solution is to expand those systems to neighboring towns upon there being demand. ie. like the South Shore Line in Chicago. Ironically, a remnant of the long-lost era of rail interurbans...and likely an era coming again...
Here are two links regarding transit in Los Angeles:
In the first Michale Woo describes the efficiency and promise of providing dedictaed rapid bus lanes on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, for a fraction of the cost of subway.
The second is a link to the MTA's Orange Line. I have ridden this and consider it to be one of the most important transit lines to open in the US in a long time. It is almost smart and sexy - my criteria for getting people out of their cars and onto mass transit, regardless of the technology.
It' difficult to convince people that buses can be smart and sexy given that most are not but when you have experienced such a system it seems clear that it makes a lot of sense to maximize the management of the use of the existing road system for buses before spending massive amounts of money on fixed rail systems. This is sort of what is happening by default, or with great political complexity in Los Angeles County where rapid bus systems, use of dedicated bus ways, and organized bus riders demanding better bus service all are contributing to the development of a much better and innovative system than existed several years ago - and it is serving as a valuable case study for systems around the country.
I have always been led to believe that the current explosion of light rail around the country has more to do with the availability of federal dollars that are limited with regard to use to this technology alone; i.e. you can't get it unless you build a light rail system. As a consequence, a lot of light rail is being built that has little transit practicality in terms of improving access for the most people for the least cost. perhaps some of you have more information on this conundrum.
Finally, given that we live in a networked and digital world, I am also fascinated by the obsession that many transit and urban design advocates have for nineteenth century technology and urban design platforms. But this is a discourse for another - related - thread.
i took a drive out to target on this mid december saturday. i had the sunroof open and the driver's side window down. i was cranking some ike reilly(thanks for the cd lb!!!) cuz it was definitely not christmassy outside today. anyway i cruised out to the east side target and god was traffic bad and anyway there were lots of folks waitin for buses. they all seem to have that "where is the bus at" look about them. and none of these folks had a choice i mean these are people who only have the option of taking the bus or walking. of course, if they would build a freakin target near downtown i would nt have to drive past all these people and feel sorry for them...
I sensed there was some controversey over the title of second largest transit system after New York. There are probably other ways of parsing the numbers but at least in trems of unlinked passenger trips, LA is second (see Table 11 below). Though interestingly, fewer people in Chicago are traveling more miles. I wonder what that actually says about the "sprawl" of Chicago versus the "sprawl" of Los Angeles?
With regard to transit agency size. Chicago is Number 2, suggesting that more people are riding in LA County but that there are other transit systems in this place that are shouldering more of the burden. Another way of saying it is that CTA may be more of a monopoly. (see Table 4 below). With regard to the latter, since I have no real knowledge of CTA, I would be curious if that is in fact the case.
Both of these tables are from the APTA web site.
TABLE 11: Annual Unlinked Passenger Trips and Passenger Miles for
Urbanized Areas Over 1,000,000 Population, Fiscal Year 2004 (Thousands) (a)
RANK (b) URBANIZED AREA UNLINKED TRIPS PASSENGER MILES
1 New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT 3,383,886.2 18,966,321.2
2 Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA 606,842.5 2,790,328.1
3 Chicago, IL-IN 582,785.7 3,751,324.8
4 Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD 350,517.6 1,589,177.9
5 Miami, FL 151,222.1 756,782.9
6 Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX 85,764.4 436,105.1
7 Boston, MA-NH-RI 396,087.1 1,888,774.3
8 Washington, DC-VA-MD 442,936.2 2,266,691.6
9 Detroit, MI 45,393.2 242,781.5
10 Houston, TX 95,881.6 565,113.0
11 Atlanta, GA 147,582.3 802,673.6
12 San Francisco-Oakland, CA 415,112.8 2,233,441.3
13 Phoenix-Mesa, AZ 55,334.2 224,274.4
14 Seattle, WA 156,255.6 1,015,891.8
15 San Diego, CA 88,604.5 512,939.6
16 Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN 67,398.6 318,719.3
17 San Juan, PR 84,941.0 386,988.5
18 St. Louis, MO-IL 47,883.1 283,928.2
19 Baltimore, MD 114,289.7 658,775.6
20 Tampa-St. Petersburg, FL 21,026.7 105,780.8
21 Denver-Aurora, CO 82,362.8 402,450.1
22 Cleveland, OH 58,869.8 252,096.3
23 Pittsburgh, PA 69,142.1 310,170.6
24 Portland, OR-WA 105,697.9 473,604.0
25 San Jose, CA 39,775.7 169,489.7
26 Riverside-San Bernardino, CA 24,182.9 127,541.6
27 Cincinnati, OH-KY-IN 27,123.9 156,237.3
28 Virginia Beach, VA 20,488.5 93,252.3
29 Sacramento, CA 32,353.5 141,581.4
30 Kansas City, MO-KS 13,754.3 55,787.9
31 San Antonio, TX 43,209.6 164,333.9
32 Las Vegas, NV 51,294.6 188,596.7
33 Milwaukee, WI 56,350.0 177,566.6
34 Indianapolis, IN 9,299.5 47,254.7
35 Providence, RI-MA 18,090.7 91,543.5
36 Orlando, FL 23,432.9 144,207.2
37 Columbus, OH 14,703.0 49,693.7
38 New Orleans, LA 54,945.3 134,675.2
Source: Federal Transit Administration National Transit Database.
(a) Data for some areas may be understated since not all transit agencies report to the federal
government. Data for some areas may be overstated since some transit agencies serve other
urbanized areas and only agency-total data are reported.
(b) By urbanized area population in 2000 Census.
TABLE 4: 20 Largest Transit Agencies Ranked by
Unlinked Passenger Trips, Fiscal Year 2004 (Thousands)
TRANSIT AGENCY URBANIZED AREA
(Primary City)
PASSENGER
TRIPS
1 MTA New York City Transit (NYCT) New York, NY 2,655,645.3
2 Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) Chicago, IL 474,750.7
3 Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) Washington, DC 397,782.7
4 Los Angeles County Metropolitan Trp Authority (LACMTA) Los Angeles, CA 393,598.0
5 Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Boston, MA 389,910.3
6 Southeastern Pennsylvania Trp Authority (SEPTA) Philadelphia, PA 332,690.4
7 New Jersey Transit Corporation (NJ TRANSIT) New York, NY 229,887.6
8 San Francisco Municipal Railway (MUNI) San Francisco, CA 215,743.7
9 Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) Atlanta, GA 136,157.1
10 Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) Baltimore, MD 112,634.1
11 King County DOT (King County Metro) Seattle, WA 102,088.5
12 Miami-Dade Transit (MDT) Miami, FL 98,543.5
13 Tri-County Metropolitan Trp District of Oregon (TriMet) Portland, OR 98,412.9
14 San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART) San Francisco, CA 97,545.6
15 MTA Long Island Rail Road (MTA-LIRR) New York, NY 96,202.0
16 Metropolitan Transit Auth of Harris County, Texas (Metro) Houston, TX 95,881.6
17 Denver Regional Transportation District (RTD) Denver, CO 82,362.8
18 Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) Dallas, TX 77,036.1
19 Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company (MTA-MNCR) New York, NY 72,617.9
20 GTJC (MTA NYCT took over service in 2005) New York, NY 69,759.3
Source: Federal Transit Administration National Transit Database
Its funny #6 is listed as "Dallas-Fort Worth-ARLINGTON"... since Arlington, Texas is the largest city in the country without any form of public transportation.
"Arlington may be getting professional football, but the third-largest city in the Dallas-Fort Worth area offers no mass transit aside from a Handitran service for senior citizens and disabled residents.
It is devoid of buses and commuter trains.
That is the price that Arlington's residents and visitors have been willing to pay, because it's obviously more important to funnel tax money into building major sports venues than providing transportation options.
Three times in the past 21 years, voters have turned down transit plans that would have brought Arlington into synch with the rest of the world.
While Fort Worth has developed "The T" bus system and Dallas has embraced DART buses and light-rail lines, Arlington has been stuck in traffic.
Its poor drivers don't even have one lousy stop on the Trinity Railway Express, the commuter-rail service that runs between Dallas and Fort Worth.
Still, Arlington voters have been happy to spend their tax dollars on what is now called Ameriquest Field and the as-yet-unnamed Cowboys stadium.
Maybe its 360,000 residents revel in the fact that they live in the largest city in the United States without some form of mass transit."
People in Arlington may not want transit but statistically they are still part of the metropolitan area. An example of democracy in action.
according to the sage Reyner Banham the Pacific Electric Railroad at it's peak was 1,164 miles of rail.
The Big Red Cars ran all over the Los Angeles area - literally all over. The route map of the PE at its point of greatest extensions, when it operated 1,164 miles of track in fifty-odd communities pretty well defines Greater Los Angeles as it is today. Services ran down the coast to Balboa and along the foot of the Palisades to the mouth of Santa Monica Canyon; up into the valley and to San Fernando; to Riverside, Corona, and San Bernardino; out through La Habra and through Anaheim to Orange; through the foothill cities of the Sierra Madre to Glendora, and via Pasadena to Echo Canyon and Mount Lowe. Within the area laced by this network the stops and terminals already bore the names of streets and localities that are current today.
don't have a date on this one
from 1949
if you look closely, you can see the rough alignment of all the current freeways- so los angeles was molded by the streetcar, not the freeway. if you want a freeway based urbanism, look to atlanta, houston, phoenix, or anyother sunbelt city.
jkaliski - I loved that you brought up the topic of sprawl in Chicago. Many people dont realize that 9 million proplr live with-in the 60 mile semi-circle around the Chicago "core" city and counties making up the statistical center. And many of these ares are now served by Metra's outer stations, some over 60 miles from the city. Im not sure that chart reflects the suburban Pace system of the Metra system, only the CTA.
Did the LA street Cars follow the aquaducts out of the basin and into the valleys? Is there a shared water/street car/ land developer trinity in LA?
True that Orhan. However I saw recently on PBS an interesting show disclaiming the myth that GM and big auto bought them to put them out of biz. According to the show, the only city where negligence was found was in Chicago. Specifically the show was about the persistent myth that Clevand'a lines were purposely destroyed by GM. According to the show, the buses made more sense for a shrinking population and that it was simple economics at play. However I suspect there was more to the story.
i really like the idea of orange line jkaliski posted earlier on. i've just returned from a trip to izmir, turkey, where a seamless combination of rail/metro/bus/ferry system being worked to provide public transportation for four million people. sure there are a lot of cars there too, but it looked/felt really retarted, arrogant, wastefull and egotistical after my return to la and driving on I-10 all by myself burning fossil fuel which sold 7.5$ a gallon in turkey which is right on the doorstep of major oil producing countries.
wait postal, can you post more info? what debate? and what happened last friday?
i'm considering living in wicker park/bucktown which means i will most likely be frequently taking the bus. not sure whether this is a good idea or not. the other option is the brown line. both options seem shitty at the moment.
Note about the Brown Line: As you probably know, the entire line is currently undergoing major reconstruction as station platforms are lengthened to handle 8-car trains and are made ADA-compliant.
What you may not know (it was just announced last week): Beginning April 1st, one of four tracks between Armitage and Belmont will be shut down as as the Armitage, Fullerton, Diversey, Wellington, and Belmont stations are rebuilt part of the Brown Line reconstruction project. These four tracks are already running at peak capacity during rush hours, so removing one track from service will result in massive delays. The CTA is telling people on the Red, Brown, and Purple lines to plan on doubling their commute times.
If either the Blue Line, the bus, or Metra is an option, take it.
Myriam - i used to live in Little Italy (Taylor) and also in UK village and was a devoted Blue Liner. It was, in 98,99,00,and 01 the most reliable train. Never too crowded but just enough people to feel safe, not as frequent at night as red line but never more than 15-20 min. wait. The only catch was if you had to go downtown to transfer.
myriam, don't panic... i may have been exaggerating or drunk when i posted that message...
as much as we all bitch about the CTA, it's still a damn decent system. stick to the blueline, i am also a blueliner, but unfortunately i don't live near anything cool to do, and my commute is an hour...if you're lookin at wickerpark/bucktown, stick near a blueline stop or a busline with a straight shot to work. you'll never sit down, but your ride will be fairly short...
...the debate was between a couple of alderman and Kruesi, (sorry for the butchering of his name before), they basically complained about the CTA budget...the alderman want to know where the money is going, and Kruesi wants more money from the state...i have to agree with both sides... they are holding some big meetings coming up soon to try and help both aggendas... my comments about kruesi mainly pertained to the fact that he was a poor speaker, and skirted around every question put to him...
and though i haven't used the tube, i really didn't enjoy my stay in london a while back... i'll like my shoulders big
The bigger issue is finacing methods - I suspect Illinois is not alone here. All these massive infrastructure improvements come at once - doubling the bullshit factor. Complete rebuild of the 18 lane dan Ryan, Blue Line B train, Pink Line, Red, Brow, Purple renovation, Station upgrades.
I visited London in 2001 and loved it all, including the tube, but then I made a special effort to avoid the tube during rush hours. I'm sure my opinion would sour if I were commuting on it everyday, but I found it to be incredibly clean and reliable compared to the CTA.
The CTA is much better than some systems (Philly's SEPTA for example), but I got incredibly spoiled in the NYC subways... They're loud, dirty and skanky, but I could get almost anywhere in Manhattan fairly reliably and with a minimum of hassle. If the NYC subway had the chronic delays and bad service that the CTA does, New Yorkers would be rioting in the streets.
The tube gives me severe anxiety. It seems to be precisely designed to be a claustrophobic's nightmare. Even thinking about it now is giving me slight nausea.
the problem in the states is funding comes in spurts - so defered maintainance builds up and b4 u know it all hell breaks loose cause all the work is at once. Its not the proper way to take care of machinary.
ha, yeah, seriously, vado! and a good book for the long ass wait.
My problem with living in Wicker Park is that unfortunately I don't like the blue line. It is very loud and rattly and I intensely dislike being underground. So it is a parka and the bus life for me, I suppose. We'll see!
And yes, evilp--the "deferred maintenance" problem is a big one in the states--think of how our health care "system" is built! It tackles problems when they arise--if you're lucky--but won't pay for any preventative care. This is the exact opposite of pretty much all other developed countries. Yay!
Infrastructural care is something Americans simply do NOT get.
Ive always wondered how inexspensive it would be if everyone had cat scans every 2 years - the price would come down by shear volume - and thousands of trained med students read the scans - very factory like - imagine all the tumors and cancers and clots, etc we'd catch and save trillions on costly extended care and medicine.
Unless thats the goal - costly care and medicine....
On transit - its a testament to the great industrial age that built our infrastructure "the EL" that it still standing!!! Despite deffered mantainance.
You know - they've always been there - and strangegly the yuppies dont take the el in the numbers the lowly clerical office worker does. Gone is the el rifding factory worker although their numbers have been replaced by hipster college student nomad
i hate the bus... or why public transport sucks a**
Last Thursdays Bus Ride -
Cold, shity, Raining. Bus is 25 minutes late.
Driver pulls up. Opens door. Lets the first 12 out of 30+ on. Slams door in face of angry mob as he pulls away.
Angry mob chases bus while bus driver screams something about being late.
Bus slows to make a turn. Woman screaming to get on bus and banging on door as though her life depends on it.
Driver stops, tells her through the glass (with a nice gesture) that she should have been at the bus station in time (which she was). Driver proceeds to turn, clipping the curb, driving over sidewalk nearly crushing screaming woman and angry mob.
LiG- the pressure is on to find the milage of the Pacific Electric Rail Road... I'll get back to you.
That same driver once made some guy run all the way to 2 bus stops before letting him on the bus. It was 4 very long blocks away.
well that's not very nice, thrifty...
i was waiting for a 35 once and a bus driver was pulling up to the stop slowly, i looked into the big windshield and the guy's eyes were closed. he slept right through the stop about an extra 100 feet before almost running through a light into cross traffic.
i waited for the next one.
what city was that, thrifty?
The difference between New York and Washington DC's pub trans systems and all other american transit systems is that NYC & DC are massively subsidised. NYC realizes just how much money having 500,000 less cars in Manhattan everyday is worth and DC is just trying to show up Moscow (talk about a gorgeous subway system!)
LiG obviously knows a lot more than I - but when we realize that properly funding public transit is not something we do just to subsidise the poor carless folks out there - its to make travels easier for everyone - then we might spend what we should.
But before that happens, let fire Frank Kruesi, shall we?
today i got off the bus after getting on and it not moving for 5 min. walked from downtown half way up queen anne hill along my bus route and i beat it home... so i changed my opinion [but i suppose traffic is to blame, not public transit]
NYC has the good sense to use bridge and tunnel tolls to subsidize mass transit. That could work here in Chicago as well, but it would involve putting the Illinois Tollway Authority under the jurisdiction of the RTA, which would never happen in a million years because each agency is a patronage playpen for rival political fiefdoms.
I'm not sure about DC Metro's funding system, but I know they're facing problems because that first generation of subway cars and escalators that were so new and shiny in the 1970's are now approaching the end of their mechanical life expectancies. As a result, the system is facing some major capital expenses over the next several years.
time for my standard response to discussion regarding public transportation:
ride a bike (Myriam I'm looking right atcha!)
bikes suck...although i do occasionally ride them, i typically find it just as convenient to walk
There is no mention of Bay Area's Motley Mix of Bart, Caltrans, AC Transit, The Ferries, and the very much maligned Muni system?
Found this interesting tidbit on the web today. Not really surprised by these statistics. My friend in Portland was astonished they didn't make the list. Not surprised by that either.
San Francisco is among the cities with the highest use of public transit, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Tuesday. San Francisco tied with Boston, where about 31 percent of workers commute on public transportation.
The only U.S. cities with higher public transit use were New York, with 55 percent, and Washington, D.C., with 37 percent. One-third of the nation's 6.4 million people who travel to work on public transportation use systems in New York, according to the report.
Of the approximately 6.4 million people nationwide who usually travel to work using public transportation, nearly one-third live in New York City, according to a new analysis of American Community Survey data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau.
Chicago and Philadelphia each have 27 percent public transit usage among commuters. Newark, N.J. had 26 percent and Baltimore had 25 percent.
Only one Los Angeles worker in eight uses public transportation, and in Houston, only 6 percent of workers use public transportation.
Overall, 5 percent of the nation's 128.6 million workers use public transportation to get to work.
Other survey highlights:
* Nationwide, 77 percent of workers drove alone to work, 10 percent carpooled and 2 percent walked.
* Bus transportation accounted for 55 percent of public transportation use nationally
seattle was ridiculous yesterday.
flooding, broken down cars on aurora, football traffic - the city seemed basically shut down. it was faster for me to walk home as well.
Don't know about other cities, but in Boston riding a bike is faster and typically more convenient that taking the T or the bus. I can make it across Cambridge into Boston in traffic in 15-20 minutes without putting my foot down. Can't beat that!
I keep thinking about transit and am astonished we still support extensive bus systems in this country. If the cost of those bus systems were diverted to rail both commuter & transit we could have very extensive electrified systems.
The problem with busses are that they use fossil fuels just like our autos do. Often I see a city bus cruising at night with either nobody or just one person riding. How is that helping 1) traffic congestion and 2)CO2 emmissions and the environment?
In a world where Peak Oil is upon us we need to use transit that has some longevity. Electricity is something we have here at home either by coal/nuclear or renewable sources.
I'm still very pessimistic about transit, be rail or otherwise, because we have current technology to keep us individually mobile through EV cars. It's in the American psyche to have their own transportation. It will take generations to change and all our research will go into keeping the status quo, not making transit work.
However, without diesel/gasoline we can't keep the interstate freeway system running OR the jet airline. That's why I think the real forward thinking move is electrified high speed inter-state rail and forget about inner-city transit for now.
I don't want to be too alarmist. Personally I see real bad liquid oil shortages in 10+ years. Thus, ample time to start building decent infastructure for rail lines. However, I know that wouldn't happen without a huge disruption in Washington.
Just don't want to get caught in a post-oil era having ability to get around town and to a defunct airport, but only horseback to the neighboring city.
electrified systems use fossil fuels too...
you can build high-speed rail, but nobody will ride it until they have to. This being America, nobody will pay for that until there are riders, probably not even the government.
Urban rail, on the other hand, does have riders and is gaining them, which is why it is expanding. It is proven, and therefore people are willing to invest.
An eventual good solution is to expand those systems to neighboring towns upon there being demand. ie. like the South Shore Line in Chicago. Ironically, a remnant of the long-lost era of rail interurbans...and likely an era coming again...
Here are two links regarding transit in Los Angeles:
In the first Michale Woo describes the efficiency and promise of providing dedictaed rapid bus lanes on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, for a fraction of the cost of subway.
The second is a link to the MTA's Orange Line. I have ridden this and consider it to be one of the most important transit lines to open in the US in a long time. It is almost smart and sexy - my criteria for getting people out of their cars and onto mass transit, regardless of the technology.
It' difficult to convince people that buses can be smart and sexy given that most are not but when you have experienced such a system it seems clear that it makes a lot of sense to maximize the management of the use of the existing road system for buses before spending massive amounts of money on fixed rail systems. This is sort of what is happening by default, or with great political complexity in Los Angeles County where rapid bus systems, use of dedicated bus ways, and organized bus riders demanding better bus service all are contributing to the development of a much better and innovative system than existed several years ago - and it is serving as a valuable case study for systems around the country.
I have always been led to believe that the current explosion of light rail around the country has more to do with the availability of federal dollars that are limited with regard to use to this technology alone; i.e. you can't get it unless you build a light rail system. As a consequence, a lot of light rail is being built that has little transit practicality in terms of improving access for the most people for the least cost. perhaps some of you have more information on this conundrum.
Finally, given that we live in a networked and digital world, I am also fascinated by the obsession that many transit and urban design advocates have for nineteenth century technology and urban design platforms. But this is a discourse for another - related - thread.
i took a drive out to target on this mid december saturday. i had the sunroof open and the driver's side window down. i was cranking some ike reilly(thanks for the cd lb!!!) cuz it was definitely not christmassy outside today. anyway i cruised out to the east side target and god was traffic bad and anyway there were lots of folks waitin for buses. they all seem to have that "where is the bus at" look about them. and none of these folks had a choice i mean these are people who only have the option of taking the bus or walking. of course, if they would build a freakin target near downtown i would nt have to drive past all these people and feel sorry for them...
I sensed there was some controversey over the title of second largest transit system after New York. There are probably other ways of parsing the numbers but at least in trems of unlinked passenger trips, LA is second (see Table 11 below). Though interestingly, fewer people in Chicago are traveling more miles. I wonder what that actually says about the "sprawl" of Chicago versus the "sprawl" of Los Angeles?
With regard to transit agency size. Chicago is Number 2, suggesting that more people are riding in LA County but that there are other transit systems in this place that are shouldering more of the burden. Another way of saying it is that CTA may be more of a monopoly. (see Table 4 below). With regard to the latter, since I have no real knowledge of CTA, I would be curious if that is in fact the case.
Both of these tables are from the APTA web site.
TABLE 11: Annual Unlinked Passenger Trips and Passenger Miles for
Urbanized Areas Over 1,000,000 Population, Fiscal Year 2004 (Thousands) (a)
RANK (b) URBANIZED AREA UNLINKED TRIPS PASSENGER MILES
1 New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT 3,383,886.2 18,966,321.2
2 Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA 606,842.5 2,790,328.1
3 Chicago, IL-IN 582,785.7 3,751,324.8
4 Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD 350,517.6 1,589,177.9
5 Miami, FL 151,222.1 756,782.9
6 Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX 85,764.4 436,105.1
7 Boston, MA-NH-RI 396,087.1 1,888,774.3
8 Washington, DC-VA-MD 442,936.2 2,266,691.6
9 Detroit, MI 45,393.2 242,781.5
10 Houston, TX 95,881.6 565,113.0
11 Atlanta, GA 147,582.3 802,673.6
12 San Francisco-Oakland, CA 415,112.8 2,233,441.3
13 Phoenix-Mesa, AZ 55,334.2 224,274.4
14 Seattle, WA 156,255.6 1,015,891.8
15 San Diego, CA 88,604.5 512,939.6
16 Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN 67,398.6 318,719.3
17 San Juan, PR 84,941.0 386,988.5
18 St. Louis, MO-IL 47,883.1 283,928.2
19 Baltimore, MD 114,289.7 658,775.6
20 Tampa-St. Petersburg, FL 21,026.7 105,780.8
21 Denver-Aurora, CO 82,362.8 402,450.1
22 Cleveland, OH 58,869.8 252,096.3
23 Pittsburgh, PA 69,142.1 310,170.6
24 Portland, OR-WA 105,697.9 473,604.0
25 San Jose, CA 39,775.7 169,489.7
26 Riverside-San Bernardino, CA 24,182.9 127,541.6
27 Cincinnati, OH-KY-IN 27,123.9 156,237.3
28 Virginia Beach, VA 20,488.5 93,252.3
29 Sacramento, CA 32,353.5 141,581.4
30 Kansas City, MO-KS 13,754.3 55,787.9
31 San Antonio, TX 43,209.6 164,333.9
32 Las Vegas, NV 51,294.6 188,596.7
33 Milwaukee, WI 56,350.0 177,566.6
34 Indianapolis, IN 9,299.5 47,254.7
35 Providence, RI-MA 18,090.7 91,543.5
36 Orlando, FL 23,432.9 144,207.2
37 Columbus, OH 14,703.0 49,693.7
38 New Orleans, LA 54,945.3 134,675.2
Source: Federal Transit Administration National Transit Database.
(a) Data for some areas may be understated since not all transit agencies report to the federal
government. Data for some areas may be overstated since some transit agencies serve other
urbanized areas and only agency-total data are reported.
(b) By urbanized area population in 2000 Census.
TABLE 4: 20 Largest Transit Agencies Ranked by
Unlinked Passenger Trips, Fiscal Year 2004 (Thousands)
TRANSIT AGENCY URBANIZED AREA
(Primary City)
PASSENGER
TRIPS
1 MTA New York City Transit (NYCT) New York, NY 2,655,645.3
2 Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) Chicago, IL 474,750.7
3 Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) Washington, DC 397,782.7
4 Los Angeles County Metropolitan Trp Authority (LACMTA) Los Angeles, CA 393,598.0
5 Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) Boston, MA 389,910.3
6 Southeastern Pennsylvania Trp Authority (SEPTA) Philadelphia, PA 332,690.4
7 New Jersey Transit Corporation (NJ TRANSIT) New York, NY 229,887.6
8 San Francisco Municipal Railway (MUNI) San Francisco, CA 215,743.7
9 Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) Atlanta, GA 136,157.1
10 Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) Baltimore, MD 112,634.1
11 King County DOT (King County Metro) Seattle, WA 102,088.5
12 Miami-Dade Transit (MDT) Miami, FL 98,543.5
13 Tri-County Metropolitan Trp District of Oregon (TriMet) Portland, OR 98,412.9
14 San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (BART) San Francisco, CA 97,545.6
15 MTA Long Island Rail Road (MTA-LIRR) New York, NY 96,202.0
16 Metropolitan Transit Auth of Harris County, Texas (Metro) Houston, TX 95,881.6
17 Denver Regional Transportation District (RTD) Denver, CO 82,362.8
18 Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) Dallas, TX 77,036.1
19 Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company (MTA-MNCR) New York, NY 72,617.9
20 GTJC (MTA NYCT took over service in 2005) New York, NY 69,759.3
Source: Federal Transit Administration National Transit Database
Its funny #6 is listed as "Dallas-Fort Worth-ARLINGTON"... since Arlington, Texas is the largest city in the country without any form of public transportation.
Go figure...from the Dallas Morning News.
"Arlington may be getting professional football, but the third-largest city in the Dallas-Fort Worth area offers no mass transit aside from a Handitran service for senior citizens and disabled residents.
It is devoid of buses and commuter trains.
That is the price that Arlington's residents and visitors have been willing to pay, because it's obviously more important to funnel tax money into building major sports venues than providing transportation options.
Three times in the past 21 years, voters have turned down transit plans that would have brought Arlington into synch with the rest of the world.
While Fort Worth has developed "The T" bus system and Dallas has embraced DART buses and light-rail lines, Arlington has been stuck in traffic.
Its poor drivers don't even have one lousy stop on the Trinity Railway Express, the commuter-rail service that runs between Dallas and Fort Worth.
Still, Arlington voters have been happy to spend their tax dollars on what is now called Ameriquest Field and the as-yet-unnamed Cowboys stadium.
Maybe its 360,000 residents revel in the fact that they live in the largest city in the United States without some form of mass transit."
People in Arlington may not want transit but statistically they are still part of the metropolitan area. An example of democracy in action.
according to the sage Reyner Banham the Pacific Electric Railroad at it's peak was 1,164 miles of rail.
The Big Red Cars ran all over the Los Angeles area - literally all over. The route map of the PE at its point of greatest extensions, when it operated 1,164 miles of track in fifty-odd communities pretty well defines Greater Los Angeles as it is today. Services ran down the coast to Balboa and along the foot of the Palisades to the mouth of Santa Monica Canyon; up into the valley and to San Fernando; to Riverside, Corona, and San Bernardino; out through La Habra and through Anaheim to Orange; through the foothill cities of the Sierra Madre to Glendora, and via Pasadena to Echo Canyon and Mount Lowe. Within the area laced by this network the stops and terminals already bore the names of streets and localities that are current today.
don't have a date on this one
from 1949
if you look closely, you can see the rough alignment of all the current freeways- so los angeles was molded by the streetcar, not the freeway. if you want a freeway based urbanism, look to atlanta, houston, phoenix, or anyother sunbelt city.
1910 map
wow, is that a center?
jkaliski - I loved that you brought up the topic of sprawl in Chicago. Many people dont realize that 9 million proplr live with-in the 60 mile semi-circle around the Chicago "core" city and counties making up the statistical center. And many of these ares are now served by Metra's outer stations, some over 60 miles from the city. Im not sure that chart reflects the suburban Pace system of the Metra system, only the CTA.
Did the LA street Cars follow the aquaducts out of the basin and into the valleys? Is there a shared water/street car/ land developer trinity in LA?
more like a street car vs. tire makers and auto manufactures trinity. for starters.
True that Orhan. However I saw recently on PBS an interesting show disclaiming the myth that GM and big auto bought them to put them out of biz. According to the show, the only city where negligence was found was in Chicago. Specifically the show was about the persistent myth that Clevand'a lines were purposely destroyed by GM. According to the show, the buses made more sense for a shrinking population and that it was simple economics at play. However I suspect there was more to the story.
i didn't know gm sponsored shows on pbs.
i really like the idea of orange line jkaliski posted earlier on. i've just returned from a trip to izmir, turkey, where a seamless combination of rail/metro/bus/ferry system being worked to provide public transportation for four million people. sure there are a lot of cars there too, but it looked/felt really retarted, arrogant, wastefull and egotistical after my return to la and driving on I-10 all by myself burning fossil fuel which sold 7.5$ a gallon in turkey which is right on the doorstep of major oil producing countries.
did anyone see the debate on chicago tonight?
cruze looks like a moron... "as a matter of fact, as a matter of fact, as a matt..."
it's unfortunate that CTA is going through some tought times, last friday was particularly horrendous/ridiculous...
for all you clark/lakers...i'm bringin a six pack to the platform and chillin for a while before i get on the train.
today was smooth sailin' though, every day should be MLK jr. day!
in summation, i'm moving closer to the city and buying a bike.
wait postal, can you post more info? what debate? and what happened last friday?
i'm considering living in wicker park/bucktown which means i will most likely be frequently taking the bus. not sure whether this is a good idea or not. the other option is the brown line. both options seem shitty at the moment.
Note about the Brown Line: As you probably know, the entire line is currently undergoing major reconstruction as station platforms are lengthened to handle 8-car trains and are made ADA-compliant.
What you may not know (it was just announced last week): Beginning April 1st, one of four tracks between Armitage and Belmont will be shut down as as the Armitage, Fullerton, Diversey, Wellington, and Belmont stations are rebuilt part of the Brown Line reconstruction project. These four tracks are already running at peak capacity during rush hours, so removing one track from service will result in massive delays. The CTA is telling people on the Red, Brown, and Purple lines to plan on doubling their commute times.
If either the Blue Line, the bus, or Metra is an option, take it.
ahhhh, I didn't know the news, no. Interesting. Actually that really sucks for you, Gin, I'm sorry! :( Damn.
Might explain why I'm having a bitch of a time renting out my spare rooms.... Thanks a lot, CTA.
stop complaining, come to london
yeah, no one ever complains about the tube
Myriam - i used to live in Little Italy (Taylor) and also in UK village and was a devoted Blue Liner. It was, in 98,99,00,and 01 the most reliable train. Never too crowded but just enough people to feel safe, not as frequent at night as red line but never more than 15-20 min. wait. The only catch was if you had to go downtown to transfer.
If your in Bucktown Wicker Park you can always take the blue
i will be in chicago this weekend. im bringin my car though.
myriam, don't panic... i may have been exaggerating or drunk when i posted that message...
as much as we all bitch about the CTA, it's still a damn decent system. stick to the blueline, i am also a blueliner, but unfortunately i don't live near anything cool to do, and my commute is an hour...if you're lookin at wickerpark/bucktown, stick near a blueline stop or a busline with a straight shot to work. you'll never sit down, but your ride will be fairly short...
...the debate was between a couple of alderman and Kruesi, (sorry for the butchering of his name before), they basically complained about the CTA budget...the alderman want to know where the money is going, and Kruesi wants more money from the state...i have to agree with both sides... they are holding some big meetings coming up soon to try and help both aggendas... my comments about kruesi mainly pertained to the fact that he was a poor speaker, and skirted around every question put to him...
and though i haven't used the tube, i really didn't enjoy my stay in london a while back... i'll like my shoulders big
The bigger issue is finacing methods - I suspect Illinois is not alone here. All these massive infrastructure improvements come at once - doubling the bullshit factor. Complete rebuild of the 18 lane dan Ryan, Blue Line B train, Pink Line, Red, Brow, Purple renovation, Station upgrades.
I visited London in 2001 and loved it all, including the tube, but then I made a special effort to avoid the tube during rush hours. I'm sure my opinion would sour if I were commuting on it everyday, but I found it to be incredibly clean and reliable compared to the CTA.
The CTA is much better than some systems (Philly's SEPTA for example), but I got incredibly spoiled in the NYC subways... They're loud, dirty and skanky, but I could get almost anywhere in Manhattan fairly reliably and with a minimum of hassle. If the NYC subway had the chronic delays and bad service that the CTA does, New Yorkers would be rioting in the streets.
The tube gives me severe anxiety. It seems to be precisely designed to be a claustrophobic's nightmare. Even thinking about it now is giving me slight nausea.
myriam hope you got long johns and a good parka for bus waiting time in chicago!
the problem in the states is funding comes in spurts - so defered maintainance builds up and b4 u know it all hell breaks loose cause all the work is at once. Its not the proper way to take care of machinary.
ha, yeah, seriously, vado! and a good book for the long ass wait.
My problem with living in Wicker Park is that unfortunately I don't like the blue line. It is very loud and rattly and I intensely dislike being underground. So it is a parka and the bus life for me, I suppose. We'll see!
And yes, evilp--the "deferred maintenance" problem is a big one in the states--think of how our health care "system" is built! It tackles problems when they arise--if you're lucky--but won't pay for any preventative care. This is the exact opposite of pretty much all other developed countries. Yay!
Infrastructural care is something Americans simply do NOT get.
They get it - they just dont got it
Ive always wondered how inexspensive it would be if everyone had cat scans every 2 years - the price would come down by shear volume - and thousands of trained med students read the scans - very factory like - imagine all the tumors and cancers and clots, etc we'd catch and save trillions on costly extended care and medicine.
Unless thats the goal - costly care and medicine....
On transit - its a testament to the great industrial age that built our infrastructure "the EL" that it still standing!!! Despite deffered mantainance.
you must also consider the increased ridership over the past few years as the yuppy population moves to those neighborhoodz.
You know - they've always been there - and strangegly the yuppies dont take the el in the numbers the lowly clerical office worker does. Gone is the el rifding factory worker although their numbers have been replaced by hipster college student nomad
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