No one is talking about spread out areas. This conversation is about US cities.

Pick a US city, then pick a neighborhood within that city you feel is emblematic of the pattern you observe. We've selected a few -- Seattle, Minneapolis -- go ahead and you pick one where a US city would not be able to support it. Then we can look at that example together.

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gwbas1c a day ago | parent | next [-]

> This conversation is about US cities.

Yes, exactly. Massachusetts; specifically the area around Boston, has this problem. There's plenty of land set aside for public transportation, but it's significantly underused for the reasons I described a few posts above.

When I started going into Boston one day a week, I tried the commuter rail twice, but it was so horrible I decided it was easier, and more comfortable to sit in traffic. (Even though it costs about 1/3rd to take the commuter rail into Boston.)

I was expecting an experience like Caltrain, I used to take it between Palo Alto and San Francisco and it was delightful. Not only are the trains more reliable, the seats are comfortable too.

	▲	schoen 9 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Can I assume you were taking the new electrified Caltrain? It feels a lot nicer than the old diesel Caltrain, including, I think, the comfort of the seats.

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xp84 a day ago | parent | prev [-]

Can you define city for me first? Not being a jackass. I'm defining them more broadly than you are, perhaps.

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buuyytp a day ago | parent | next [-]

I'm thinking predominantly urban area, probably at least 100k people in a non seasonal capacity. Eg. Pullman Washington is a small rural town that becomes huge during college and quiet in the summer as the students leave.

I tend to think of city limits as the boundaries of a city -- not the broad metropolitan area. Shorline is not Seattle, neither is Bellevue or Renton.

Edit: That said, we used to have streetcar suburbs as a prevailing model. Spokes that radiated out to the suburbs on relatively fast, uncomfortable streetcars. A similar model with trams or BRT could function.

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xp84 21 hours ago | parent [-]

Okay. The type of city I'm talking about would be like Aurora, Colorado.

I'm specifically not making any claims about cities like Seattle, Minneapolis, etc. Other than to say I think most of them already have all the transit that is economic for them to construct given each city's layout, makeup, climate etc.

Taking Aurora[1] there are almost 400,000 people and a median car ownership of 2 per household. This is the type of city where a lot of Americans live, and where no amount of BRT, Light Rail, etc. will convert them to a place where people can rely on transit for most of their trips, or even to decrease that car ownership figure to one per house.

[1] https://datausa.io/profile/geo/aurora-co/

	▲	buuyytp 17 hours ago \| parent [-]
		You'd have to change some lights, right of way, and lane use. I think you run Peoria Station, past the university hospital, down Peoria, cut through to Havana, the commercial districts (The Gardens) on Havana, hit Kaiser hospital, and end at Nine Mile station. Those anchors are high volume destinations -- workers, shoppers, students. It also ties into two regional rail lines, so commuting into Denver becomes a lot easier. Over all route length is maybe 8.5 miles. Put 8-12 stops along it, particularly along the big anchors. Convert some of those six lane roads into four plus two lane roads. Havana is perfect for mid lane platforms -- these provide not only good transit dwellings time, they also reduce pedestrian panic over having to cross six or seven lanes at once. Get across town, park n ride to park n ride, in around 35 minutes, protect that time using infrastructure changes. Car trips off the same distance can be faster, but are often slower due to traffic. Once people realize their median transit time can go down by bus, they'll come. Additionally, BRT can spur investment in mixed use development along the corridor. It would be unpopular at first, because it would mean making choices that prioritize buses. But anyone who has ever tried parking at a medical center knows how expensive and painful that can be. That region already supports some of the highest traffic on transit in Aurora, with three of their heaviest routes running along that corridor. Retail and medical workers have to get in to those workplaces. So they either commute by transit or would be served well here. You'd need ~6 buses in fare collecting service at a time to hit <15 minute service. If you want some comparisons, look at SWIFT Blue line in Snohomish county, a suburban sprawl outside Seattle. Or Indianapolis's IndyGo Red line. Both took highly car centered infrastructure and became their highest ridership lines, exceeding the buses they were replacing in very car centric environments.

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solyin 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

In order to be considered a city, it has to be dense enough to support a bus network. If no bus, then no city. Sprawling town.