Light rail is great, HSR is pretty useless (outside Northeast and California) (metro, Baltimore)

[Dragneel]

1. 237,700 - Boston - MBTA Green Line, Ashmont-Mattapan High Speed Line * and **

2. 186,200 - San Francisco - Muni Metro, F/Market Line and Muni Cable Cars

3. 142,100 - Los Angeles - Metro Rail Blue, Green and Gold Lines * and **

4. 112,400 - Portland - Max Light Rail **

5. 94,800 - Philadelphia - SEPTA Subway-Surface Lines, Suburban Trolley Lines and Girard Avenue Trolley*

6. 93,100 - San Diego - San Diego Trolley **


7. 63,200 - Dallas - DART: Red, Green & Blue Lines, MATA Streetcar **

8. 61,800 - Denver - RTD, The Ride Light Rail

9. 57,800 - St. Louis - MetroLink

10. 56,800 - Sacramento - Regional Transit District LRT

11. 45,200 - Salt Lake City - UTA TRAX **

12. 38,200 - Jersey City - Hudson-Bergen Light Rail *

13. 34,600 - Baltimore - Baltimore Light Rail * and **

14. 33,500 - Phoenix - METRO Light Rail

15. 33,200 - San Jose - Santa Clara VTA Light Rail **

16. 32,300 - Minneapolis - Hiawatha Line **

17. 31,100 - Houston - METRORail

18. 25,200 - Pittsburgh - The T

Light rail - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Light rail is really good to reduce oil use and for environment, it's cheaper than HSR too.I strongly support Light Rail, Obama's administration should forget most of the HSR projects (Midwest and South) and be concentrated on light rail, because people move mostly in their metro areas, so light rail linking big cities to their suburbs would be WAY MORE efficient.

[Dragneel]

Dallas plan is about that -- to link suburbs and Dallas - Fort Worth

http://www.dart.org/images/newsroom/...vicesdec10.gif

[pvande55]

Any statistics on number of riders per mile? Houston's numbers look low, but I think they've only got five miles.

[Dragneel]

Originally Posted by pvande55

Any statistics on number of riders per mile? Houston's numbers look low, but I think they've only got five miles.

Yeah Houston Light Rail is small, not important, but they expect a big extension in 2016, they spend $900 millions for that.This city is so huge, not easy.

[Frank DeForrest]

By what means are you measuring their success?
Most of them (if not all) rely on hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies and still run deficits.

[Dragneel]

Originally Posted by Frank DeForrest

By what means are you measuring their success?
Most of them (if not all) rely on hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies and still run deficits.

I know that, it's not a good thing....But honestly don't you think it's better than $700 billion a year for foreign oil ?

[Frank DeForrest]

Originally Posted by Dragneel

I know that, it's not a good thing....But honestly don't you think it's better than $700 billion a year for foreign oil ?

Are you saying $700 billion of our tax dollars a year is spent purchasing oil?

[Dragneel]

Originally Posted by Frank DeForrest

Are you saying $700 billion of our tax dollars a year is spent purchasing oil?

2008 stats.Unfortunately it's true..

[Frank DeForrest]

Originally Posted by Dragneel

2008 stats.Unfortunately it's true..

cite please.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by Dragneel

Light rail is really good...

Don't you mean "bus?" That's what light rail is, a bus. A bus by any other name is still a bus.

Originally Posted by Dragneel

I strongly support Light Rail, Obama's administration should forget most of the HSR projects (Midwest and South) and be concentrated on light rail, because people move mostly in their metro areas, so light rail linking big cities to their suburbs would be WAY MORE efficient.

No it wouldn't. I'm fighting bus, er, light-rail, whatever, here, in order to push rapid mass transit.

I suspect you're a lot like the idiots here, who have ZERO understanding of anything. There's a reason why people here don't ride light rail, um, I mean, bus, and why they've had to cut the light rail lines, er, um, bus lines on the "commuter" routes. The reason has nothing to do with cost, but it does have everything to do with "Time."

People are already commuting 60-90 minutes round-trip, why would they want to extent a 60-90 minute commute to a 3 hour round-trip?

What moron wants to get off work at 5:00 pm and then catch a light-rail bus thing and get home at 15 minutes before 7:00 pm? No one. They'd rather drive and be home at 6:00 pm. And are they saving money? Most of them aren't. It's $5-$6 depending on the commuter bus route, so even when gasoline is $3.50/gallon they're breaking even, or actually coming out ahead if you factor in Time.

In economics, we call that "Opportunity Cost" and for these people, spending an extra buck or two to be with their family another 45-60 minutes a day is worth it to them, and I won't even factor in the extra added cost of day-care, assuming they can even find a place that stays open after 6:00 pm.

Basically, if you can't move people 30 miles in 15 minutes you don't build it.