Why suburbia sucks (Atlanta: commute to, expenses, location)

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by abalashov

I needn't concern myself with the traffic—imposed on me—induced by other people's crappy design? Seriously?

You sound senile.

My life choices seldom involve traffic. Yours apparently do.

You sound pompous. I presume that you've invited name-calling into the conversation.

[abalashov]

Originally Posted by LovinDecatur

My life choices seldom involve traffic. Yours apparently do.

You sound pompous. I presume that you've invited name-calling into the conversation.

No, I didn't mean "senile" flippantly. I meant it quite literally; the non sequitur was so shocking that it gave the impression the author is having a very different conversation with himself than the one to which he is responding.

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by abalashov

No, I didn't mean "senile" flippantly. I meant it quite literally; the non sequitur was so shocking that it gave the impression the author is having a very different conversation with himself than the one to which he is responding.

Explain the non-sequitur, Plato. I'm not seeing it. I simply said that if you are chafed by your current situation vis a vis infrastructure, change it. Leave the problems to others. You really need not concern yourself.

[J2rescue]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Thanks for an excellent post, chiatldal.

However, is "suburban sprawl" really all that bad?

Let's look at the actual situation on the ground. The average commute in the ATL is 27 minutes and for many suburbanites it's less than that. It's pretty hard to beat that even in the densest, most transit rich city on earth.

In addition, you get a lot of other bang for the buck. $350K will buy you an extremely nice suburban home in an area with excellent schools, low crime and plenty of amenities. Taxes tend to be modest around here. Yes, you'll probably drive to to the grocery store and the doctor, but it won't be very far.

Sure, some young urban minded types will consider it bland and old fogeyish, but is it really that terrible? The suburbs have been a tremendous fountain of creativity and prosperity.

Its among the longest in the country, surpassing every other southern sprawl-opolis' and among areas with much larger populations.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by J2rescue

Its among the longest in the country, surpassing every other southern sprawl-opolis' and among areas with much larger populations.

Our average commuting times are within a minute or so of cities our size.

To really drill down, take a look at the data by census tract. You'll see a whole lot of folks who have commutes in the low to mid-20 minute range.


Moderator cut: link removed, linking to competitor sites is not ok

[cqholt]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Our average commuting times are within a minute or so of cities our size.

To really drill down, take a look at the data by census tract. You'll see a whole lot of folks who have commutes in the low to mid-20 minute range.


Moderator cut: link removed, linking to competitor sites is not ok

Did they include the time to takes to walk from the door to putting on seatbelt and the from parking lot/garage to the office door? Because anytime we talk about using trains, people want to point out the seconds it takes to walk from car/bus to fare gate, ride the escalator (expect maybe Peachtree Center, those are long escalators), etc.

[abalashov]

Originally Posted by cqholt

Did they include the time to takes to walk from the door to putting on seatbelt and the from parking lot/garage to the office door? Because anytime we talk about using trains, people want to point out the seconds it takes to walk from car/bus to fare gate, ride the escalator (expect maybe Peachtree Center, those are long escalators), etc.

And do they include cost? Any time we talk about using trains, people want to talk about the cost of fares...

A 20-minute commute each way, x 2, x 21 business days per month, let's say at an average speed of 40 MPH, in a car that gets, let's say 25 MPG, with a cost of gas at, say, as low as $2.20/gal, is about $49/mo in fuel. Then there's the car payment itself, insurance, maintenance/wear/tear to distribute into that.

Hard to estimate those costs since they vary so much, but with the 2016 federal mileage reimbursement rate being $0.54/mile, that's $14/day at best. Practically, that seems very low; given a low monthly car payment of $300/mo, that's +$14.26/business day, and insurance of say, $90/mo, +$4.28/day, an annual maintenance expense of merely $2000, +$8/business day. Or around $30/business day—an eye-popping $630/mo, or around $7500 annually. The accepted average cost of car ownership is around $9000, with around $6700 - $7000 for small sedans ( https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/loan...st-owning-car/ )

A MARTA 30-day pass is $95. Admittedly, a poor value given the poor reach of the system, but still, that's $4.52/business day.

Sure, a fair comparison would involve amortising the 1% sales tax and any other taxpayer subsidies to MARTA into that figure, since its farebox recovery rate is ~33%. But if we go through that exercise, we must also distribute the untold billions in taxpayer road/highway and infrastructure subsidies into the cost of the car commute. I'm absolutely confident the unit economics of public transport fare much better even in that arithmetic.

[AnsleyPark]

Originally Posted by abalashov

And do they include cost? Any time we talk about using trains, people want to talk about the cost of fares...

A 20-minute commute each way, x 2, x 21 business days per month, let's say at an average speed of 40 MPH, in a car that gets, let's say 25 MPG, with a cost of gas at, say, as low as $2.20/gal, is about $49/mo in fuel. Then there's the car payment itself, insurance, maintenance/wear/tear to distribute into that.

Hard to estimate those costs since they vary so much, but with the 2016 federal mileage reimbursement rate being $0.54/mile, that's $14/day at best. Practically, that seems very low; given a low monthly car payment of $300/mo, that's +$14.26/business day, and insurance of say, $90/mo, +$4.28/day, an annual maintenance expense of merely $2000, +$8/business day. Or around $30/business day—an eye-popping $630/mo, or around $7500 annually. The accepted average cost of car ownership is around $9000, with around $6700 - $7000 for small sedans ( https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/loan...st-owning-car/ )

A MARTA 30-day pass is $95. Admittedly, a poor value given the poor reach of the system, but still, that's $4.52/business day.

Sure, a fair comparison would involve amortising the 1% sales tax and any other taxpayer subsidies to MARTA into that figure, since its farebox recovery rate is ~33%. But if we go through that exercise, we must also distribute the untold billions in taxpayer road/highway and infrastructure subsidies into the cost of the car commute. I'm absolutely confident the unit economics of public transport fare much better even in that arithmetic.

How much does it cost to build one mile of HRT track? Not picking a fight - just wondering.

[abalashov]

Originally Posted by AnsleyPark

How much does it cost to build one mile of HRT track? Not picking a fight - just wondering.

Much. About $1m-$2m/mile. But not nearly as much as roads or highways [http://www.artba.org/about/faq/]:

"Construct a new 2-lane undivided road – about $2 million to $3 million per mile in rural areas, about $3 million to $5 million in urban areas.

Construct a new 4-lane highway — $4 million to $6 million per mile in rural and suburban areas, $8 million to $10 million per mile in urban areas."

Also, the payback is much greater for reasons of the aforementioned unit economics. Moreover, while tracks require maintenance also, they do not require as much maintenance as asphalt that has millions of people pushing their own private multi-ton single-carriage train over them every day.

What's more, a public transit system, no matter how extensive, is not going to have track mileage within orders of magnitude of what we've got for roadways.

[AnsleyPark]

By the way - why did you let Tennessee beat the Dawgs this weekend????