Why does the United States have such bad public transportation? (Munich, Dallas)

[BrooklynJo]

Originally Posted by l1995

I grew up middle class (probably leaning towards the lower end of what is considered middle class), and never had a problem taking any sort of public transportation. The only reason I don't like taking the bus where I live is because it doesn't run that late and the headways can be up to an hour depending what day it is.



But I'm guessing those people don't look down on bus riders and drive cars just because they find them more convenient. And I'm also 100% sure that public transportation usage is way higher in Canarsie and Flatlands than say, Levittown or Massapequa. Don't some of the busiest bus routes in the city run through Flatlands?

A ton of people even in the super urban Brooklyn neighborhoods like Bushwick drive, too (even if it's not that large a percentage of the neighborhood's population). Interestingly, white people in Bushwick are probably the least likely to own cars.

Yes they do. Many people in those areas view riding the bus as bummy and having a car equals goals.

The reason why bus ridership is higher there than Long Island is because it’s cheaper and all around available. Cars cost money so most people in those areas will use it until they can get a car.

Also you need to understand that many immigrant families view buying a car as a goal. To them it means having all the pieces of The American pie.

[l1995]

Originally Posted by BrooklynJo

Yes they do. Many people in those areas view riding the bus as bummy and having a car equals goals.

The reason why bus ridership is higher there than Long Island is because it’s cheaper and all around available. Cars cost money so most people in those areas will use it until they can get a car.

Also you need to understand that many immigrant families view buying a car as a goal. To them it means having all the pieces of The American pie.

The Long Island bus is not more expensive than the NYCT bus. They used to both be ran by the MTA until not too long ago.

Sure there are people who view the bus as being bummy, but I've never really heard anyone from even Southeast Queens insinuate that the bus is for bums, the bus is part of city culture and I think that's something that's understood.

But I do agree that NYC is way more car centric than most people seem to realize. There's a reason finding parking spots is so difficult in many neighborhoods.

[pvande55]

Originally Posted by 46H

It is more about lack of service.

People do not ride the bus in suburbia because there is very little service between the suburban towns. The bulk of the service here in Bergen County is headed towards NYC. If you need to commute 2 towns over and not in the NYC direction, a bus could take you hours - if the service even exists. The ride by car could be only 10 minutes.

Almost every town in NNJ has residential RE and commercial RE. That means commuters are going multiple different ways. This prevents the use of mass transit for many people. There are many people using the bus to get from suburbia here in NJ to NYC for jobs and/or entertainment.

New Jersey is a transit wonderland compared to most of the country. Bus service stinks, partially by its very nature, but also often by design. Rail lines should also run North South instead of "only to NY."

Only rail attracts more than the bottom of the barrel, for the most part.

There just aren't enough business interests in transit to influence politicians.

[emm74]

I grew up on LI and took the bus as a teen, but a) it was a several block walk to get to the main street where the buses run and b) there were only a couple of routes that made much sense to use it for - to the shopping mall and to the beach. Trying to get from say my house to a friend's house would have been tough to coordinate.

I live in a city now, but a city with lots of residential neighborhoods so there is still the same issue of needing to walk a few blocks to get to the main street where the bus runs. But it's convenient enough that my kiddo will be using it to get home from school every day.

and fwiw, I do know a fair number of people who live in Queens. Most of them use multiple forms of transportation for their daily commute - meaning they usually walk to a bus which takes them to the subway which they take into Manhattan. Not all of them, of course, but quite a high percentage.

[pvande55]

It's no secret that many politicians don't want attractive mass transit. But this reached a new extreme when Indiana legislators passed a law outlawing its premier city from building light rail.

[ilovelondon]

Originally Posted by pvande55

It's no secret that many politicians don't want attractive mass transit. But this reached a new extreme when Indiana legislators passed a law outlawing its premier city from building light rail.

There does not seem to be any vocal, powerful lobby group in the US on the national level that voices the interests of public transport users. In the UK, there are several powerful groups for public transport, such as:

Campaign for Better Transport
Railfuture
London Transport Watch
Living Streets
Urban Transport Group

(These are just a few I can think of)

There was even a political party formed during the 1970's called Homes before Roads, which successfully killed the Ringways project that would have created 4 concentric rings in London. The UK in general has a bit of history on road protests. These Brits are a very enlightened lot.

[ilovelondon]

From a UK government report, Traffic in Towns, published in 1963 on whether to follow the American route of mass highway building across the country:

It is impossible to spend any time on the study of the future of traffic in towns without at once being appalled by the magnitude of the emergency that is coming upon us. We are nourishing at immense cost a monster of great potential destructiveness, and yet we love him dearly. To refuse to accept the challenge it presents would be an act of defeatism.

The "monster" they are referring to above (way back in 1963!) is the automobile.

The American policy of providing motorways for commuters can succeed, even in American conditions, only if there is a disregard for all considerations other than the free flow of traffic which seems sometimes to be almost ruthless. Our British cities are not only packed with buildings, they are also packed with history and to drive motorways through them on the American scale would inevitably destroy much that ought to be preserved.

Distasteful though we find the whole idea, we think that some deliberate limitation of the volume of motor traffic is quite unavoidable. The need for it just can't be escaped. Even when everything that it is possibly to do by way of building new roads and expanding public transport has been done, there would still be, in the absence of deliberate limitation, more cars trying to move into, or within our cities than could possibly be accommodated.

That is one of the reasons why public transport is a big deal in the UK compared to the US.

And just like what I have posted in a different thread, the aspirational middle-class lifestyle in the UK is not living in a large McMansion surrounded by big roads, but by living in an idyllic quaint village atmosphere with a bustling high street filled with independent shops, cafes, and restaurants. The one thing that can destroy that idyllic setting is having a large road filled with cars blasting through the middle.

[Hemlock140]

Originally Posted by ilovelondon

From a UK government report, Traffic in Towns, published in 1963 on whether to follow the American route of mass highway building across the country:



The "monster" they are referring to above (way back in 1963!) is the automobile.



That is one of the reasons why public transport is a big deal in the UK compared to the US.

And just like what I have posted in a different thread, the aspirational middle-class lifestyle in the UK is not living in a large McMansion surrounded by big roads, but by living in an idyllic quaint village atmosphere with a bustling high street filled with independent shops, cafes, and restaurants. The one thing that can destroy that idyllic setting is having a large road filled with cars blasting through the middle.

Yes, since the UK has existed a long time. After they invaded Britain in 43 AD the Romans built a bridge across the Thames and in 50 AD London was founded, currently with over 8 million people and all of the buildings constructed since then. Even in 1963 there was really no place to put the kind of roads required for everyone to have a car. Here there was a huge country with plenty of room to grow and expand, and roads were needed to connect the many cities as they developed for different reasons in different places.

It seems easy to understand why there is such a difference in the attitude toward the car between the UK and USA, in fact, even between New York City and Los Angeles.

[ilovelondon]

Originally Posted by Hemlock140

Here there was a huge country with plenty of room to grow and expand, and roads were needed to connect the many cities as they developed for different reasons in different places.

It seems easy to understand why there is such a difference in the attitude toward the car between the UK and USA, in fact, even between New York City and Los Angeles.

You seem to forget that in a lot of American cities, several neighborhoods (most were low-income and usually African-American) were demolished to have multi-lane highways blast through downtown. Even in New York, there were plans by Robert Moses to build a highway through Soho and Greenwich Village.

[NW4me]

Originally Posted by ilovelondon

You seem to forget that in a lot of American cities, several neighborhoods (most were low-income and usually African-American) were demolished to have multi-lane highways blast through downtown. Even in New York, there were plans by Robert Moses to build a highway through Soho and Greenwich Village.

Moses accomplished his plans in other boroughs; only in Manhattan were the people at last able to stop him.
Meanwhile, it's taken a century to get a subway built under Second Avenue... and it still isn't finished.