More Highway Widening (Atlanta, Roswell, Dunwoody: mall, moving to, rail)

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by arjay57

The Chinese are definitely kicking our butt on infrastructure. They can flat get things done.

However, I don't want to live there or in Singapore.

Agreed. But sure would be nice if we could apply some of the things other countries are doing right right here in the US. We should not be letting a supposed communist country out free-market the US to better infrastrcture.

[MattCW]

Originally Posted by jsvh

I disagree. Transit used to be a profitable, private business (and still is in many places). If they don't have to compete with a product / service being given away basically for free it can do quite well. And if it can't, they should not exist.

Many of our oversized freeways would be in a lot more trouble if they had to pay their own way and compete against transit which can offer to move more people for a lower price.

But this is not something that should be decided by you, me, or a bureaucrat with their own angle. Scale back subsudies and privatize and let the people vote with their wallet as a whole.

If you're referring to Atlanta's early streetcar systems, then no, transit WAS NOT profitable. The companies that ran them were real estate companies or power companies that just used the systems as the means to ensure the other ventures were profitable. It's the same reason companies today have IT, mail rooms, HR, etc. None of those departments are profitable, yet without them the company itself wouldn't be profitable. We've been through this many times, when are you going to admit that these companies were not "transit companies?"

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by jsvh

I disagree. Transit used to be a profitable, private business (and still is in many places). If they don't have to compete with a product / service being given away basically for free it can do quite well. And if it can't, they should not exist.

Many of them are? From my quick research, it appears that only Tokyo and Hong Kong, maybe Singapore, are really profitable. And not all are entirely private.

But this is not something that should be decided by you, me, or a bureaucrat with their own angle. Scale back subsudies and privatize and let the people vote with their wallet as a whole.

I cannot vote with my wallet until a system is in place to allow me to do so. Build the transit network, and then I will decide if I want to use it. Until that happens, keep up with the system that we do use. I voted with my wallet when I voted to increase the sales tax.

Originally Posted by jsvh

Agreed. But sure would be nice if we could apply some of the things other countries are doing right right here in the US. We should not be letting a supposed communist country out free-market the US to better infrastrcture.

Which country are you talking about? China? China's highly profitable, private, free-market subway system?

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by jsvh

Agreed. But sure would be nice if we could apply some of the things other countries are doing right right here in the US. We should not be letting a supposed communist country out free-market the US to better infrastructure.

Why don't we do a PPP with some gigantic Chinese company and then just sit back and let them do their thing? They'd have it up and running in a fraction of the time it would take us to even decide to do a preliminary feasibility study.

Same with buses. Let them flood the zone with modern electric buses that zip in and out of neighborhoods and give us that last mile connectivity.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by samiwas1

Which country are you talking about? China? China's highly profitable, private, free-market subway system?

More referring to China's Highways. They do have a lot of transit subsidies there.

And yes, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore are great examples of private, profitable transit system. They get into the development business too and further feed into the positive feedback loop of more density and transit just like developers and private transit companies used to do right here in Atlanta. Win-win.

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by jsvh

More referring to China's Highways. They do have a lot of transit subsidies there.

You want to use China as a model for our road system? You mean like Beijing, where they have 6-lane roads next to 6-lane roads feeding 10-lane city roads right through the heart of town?

And yes, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore are great examples of private, profitable transit system. They get into the development business too and further feed into the positive feedback loop of more density and transit just like developers and private transit companies used to do right here in Atlanta. Win-win.[/quote]

And who are the shareholders of these companies? Who built the systems before turning them over to private companies? How many of them were built from the ground up, private?

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by samiwas1

You want to use China as a model for our road system? You mean like Beijing, where they have 6-lane roads next to 6-lane roads feeding 10-lane city roads right through the heart of town?

Yep, I do want to follow their model for highways. There actually is enough demand for 6 to 12 lane highways there. They do have a metro population of 25 million (in a country of 1.3 billion). But our giant 18 lane suburban (and 6 lane exurban) freeways are just poor planning.

Originally Posted by samiwas1

And who are the shareholders of these companies? Who built the systems before turning them over to private companies? How many of them were built from the ground up, private?

You can go buy shares of these companies like MTR (Hong Kong's transit company) today: https://www.google.com/webhp?q=MTRJY

Many of them did have some period of being a public entity. They have thrived since they were privatized and we should do the same with our transportation.

Heck even right here in Atlanta, you are probably still doing business with our original private transit company "Atlanta Consolidated Street Railway Company" (You probably recognize them as Georgia Power). They ran dozens of streetcar lines in the city that helped build most of the great intown neighborhoods you know for the equivalent fare of ~$1.50 today. It will be decades before Atlanta has a rail transit system anywhere close to expansive as private business had built right here 100 years ago.

[cqholt]

Originally Posted by primaltech

Fine with me. I'm all for converting every single freeway across the country to a managed tollway, that would increase the toll amount based on congestion. Then the states could use all that revenue to build more new tolled freeways, including underground tunnel ones near major cities. Without raising taxes.

I would still keep the special lane system on the left, though. But it would be strictly for buses only.

Also, in this fantasy world, every vehicle would be an AV, and at least half the cars would be Uber.

Let's do that right now. I'm all for it.

CarTube: A Radical Proposal to Solve Traffic of the Future - CityLab

[censusdata]

Atlanta needed multiple belt lines like Houston or Phoenix. A lot of through traffic is forced to go all the way to I-285 or even downtown.

[samiwas1]

Originally Posted by jsvh

Yep, I do want to follow their model for highways. There actually is enough demand for 6 to 12 lane highways there. They do have a metro population of 25 million (in a country of 1.3 billion). But our giant 18 lane suburban (and 6 lane exurban) freeways are just poor planning.

Be careful what you wish for. Beijing may have more people, but they also have many times more 8-12 lane (or more) roads and highways within an area smaller than our perimeter. Is that what you want?

18-lane highways are almost nowhere in Atlanta. Very few spots have that and only for short runs, usually where highways intersect. The downtown connecter is 15 at its widest point in Midtown, but it's a combination of two major interstates.