
The West Coast is beating the East Coast on transportation? - zonotope
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/01/nyregion/transportation-east-coast-vs-west-coast.html
======
lambdasquirrel
The thing that makes mass transit work is walkability. There are 3 million
people in NYC who use the subway every day. They can do that because the
walkability of the neighborhoods complements the mass transit.

In some European cities, the bicycle is its own form of transit, and it can
likewise be that because separate bike paths exist that complement the
walkable structure of those cities.

If we want to actually beat the East Coast on transportation we have to do one
or both of those things. Otherwise we can build all we like and no one will
ride. Problem is that the same homeowners who brought you Prop 13 also want to
keep getting places by car and you’re not going to get reasonable walkability
until you de-prioritize the car.

~~~
hannasanarion
That's just the thing though: Western cities are increasingly de-prioritizing
cars, and Eastern cities are falling behind.

There are parts of Phoenix that are more bikable than much of New York.

LA, SF, Portland, and Seattle have started pouring money into their new
transit systems, while MTA and NJ Transit and Port Authority keep having their
budgets cut, leading to reliability so low that it's driving people into cars.

The East Coast used to be the star of American transportation, not much
anymore.

~~~
crushcrashcrush
Genuine question - what has SF poured money into? What we need here is
expanded BART service and electrified Caltrain, unfortunately NIMBYs in
Atherton/Palo Alto block that at every move.

~~~
vechagup
\- $1.5B: [https://www.sfmta.com/projects/central-subway-
project](https://www.sfmta.com/projects/central-subway-project)

\- $0.5B:
[https://www.bart.gov/about/projects/ecc](https://www.bart.gov/about/projects/ecc)

\- $3.1B (thus far):
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Valley_BART_extension](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_Valley_BART_extension)

\- $2M (each):
[https://www.bart.gov/about/projects/cars](https://www.bart.gov/about/projects/cars)

\- $1.2B: [https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/SF-Muni-s-new-
light-r...](https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/SF-Muni-s-new-light-rail-
cars-are-different-12750729.php)

\- $1.9B: [https://calmod.org/](https://calmod.org/)

So stuff happens, and I'm grateful when it does -- the new BART cars are
_nice_ \-- but generally at a snail's pace. It's hard to tell whether NIMBY
obstruction ([https://www.almanacnews.com/news/2018/03/01/caltrain-and-
ath...](https://www.almanacnews.com/news/2018/03/01/caltrain-and-atherton-
cant-reach-a-deal-on-electrification-poles)) or contractor incompetence and
mismanagement ([https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/SF-subway-
stalle...](https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/SF-subway-stalled-
after-contractor-lays-down-12905429.php)) is more to blame.

------
flexie
The article doesn't really mention that most of these expansions will be ready
20-40 years into the future (if not delayed).

If you buy a house in an LA suburb hoping that you will soon get subway
nearby, you might get it once the mortgage is paid out and the kids have left
for college.

What will the technology be like in 20-40 years? Everybody surely have cheap
electric scooters and bikes or other electric devices and airbag helmets. Few,
if any, combustion engine cars are left on the streets. Truly self driving
cars are likely too. Drones that fly you across town? Boring tunnels in
multiple levels? Shuttles to Mars?

I am not saying the subways shouldn't be built or that planning decades ahead
is bad. I love subways. But in the area of transportation we will see huge
changes in the coming decades.

~~~
LeanderK
> 20-40 years into the future (if not delayed)

that seems to be unreasonably long. In germany, both the city I am studying at
and the city I was born are undertaking big changes in their transportation
infrastructure, and both don't take that long. In munich, building just
started and is expected to last unit 2026 [1]. And we always complain that
it's taking too long to plan and build!

40 years seems to be crazy! You would have to start repairing the old stuff
when the whole project is finished.

Or are you talking about the whole process, including the financing? Then it's
more understandable, many big project here also stall for 20 years until
everyone has enough money and the political will to follow through. But I
thought the financing is covered due to the sales-tax increase.

While it's easy to complain about projects not moving for 20 years, the sums
are often quite enourmus and i am not sure whether inefficiencies are to
blame, or whether gathering enough money just takes a long time.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trunk_line_2_(Munich_S-
Bahn)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trunk_line_2_\(Munich_S-Bahn\))

~~~
guitarbill
Let's not get too smug with things like Stuttgart 21, Transrapid München, or
cities like Aachen getting rid of their tram network (and regretting it now
AFAIK). And having a public that values and prioritises mass transport is not
a given.

Admittedly, I'm a bit torn on this. Since infrastructure is so important to
the liveability and growth of a city, and any sort of long-term thinking is a
good thing. But predicting the future is hard, and having a 40 year plan
survive (short-term) politics is also unlikely.

~~~
LeanderK
I agree, i think I was more confused. I thought he meant the time to realize
the projects, not the complete cycle from estimating whether it's doable to
financing to building.

There are also project on hold for 30 years in munich.

------
francisofascii
For the West Coast, the simplest solution is electric buses with dedicated
lanes. Buses better serve the existing low density sprawl than trains. Lack of
infrastructure is not the problem, the roads are already built. The real
problem of course is lack of political will. Every road with two lanes gets at
least one dedicated bus lane. Single occupant traffic would slow to a crawl
making the buses faster. Buses would run on time because they have an empty
lane. Additional bus routes would be added everywhere, paid for by significant
increases to gas taxes. It would certainly work and be more efficient than our
current mess, but of course would never be politically viable.

~~~
bryanlarsen
Dedicated lanes don't do much to help; the capacity of virtually all city
streets is limited by the capacity of the intersections, not the streets
themselves.

Give buses priority at intersections, or even better build them dedicated
overpasses if you want to see buses really move.

~~~
callmeal
>Dedicated lanes don't do much to help;

Actually, they do. Take a look at the MetroBus infrastructure in Mexico
City[0] for example. Buses run on time, on an extensive, dedicated lane
network.

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico_City_Metrob%C3%BAs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico_City_Metrob%C3%BAs)

~~~
bryanlarsen
Good example, they have dedicated and priority intersections.

------
swebs
Weird that they don't mention New York's awful inefficiency, especially since
it was reported by the same paper. NYC tax payers are already spending
billions and not getting much to show for it.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/nyregion/new-york-
subway-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/28/nyregion/new-york-subway-
construction-costs.html?module=inline)

~~~
jdhn
If they did, it would undercut the argument that the NYC subway needs more
money on top of what it already has.

------
romwell
Hahaha.

I lived in Brooklyn, I lived on Long Island, spent a summer in Seattle, and I
live in San Jose now.

One can't speak for the entirety of the either coast, but no city in CA comes
_close_ to what NYC offers in terms of public transportation.

And what NYC offers is a true car-free lifestyle which carries you to work,
leisure, and back home via public transport.

E-scooters aren't a reliable way to get anywhere yet, and who knows if they'll
ever be, not to mention that they are not for everyone. My grandmother is not
going to ride one -- nor my wife, for that matter, nor should the kids. But
the Subway is a common denominator.

This reflects in the daily ridership. MTA carries an _order of magnitude_ more
passengers than, say, BART. The same can be said about overall transit
ridership[1].

East Coast vs. West Coast is a silly comparison when NYC Metro alone has more
ridership than nearly all _other_ major metro areas _combined_ (including both
Coasts, the Midwest, and the South).

So it's really NYC vs. Anywhere Else, and Anywhere Else still _sucks_ when it
comes to public transport because, in practical terms, most people aren't
commuting by public transport in Anywhere Else, but they do in NYC.

You can't slap a Lime scooter on a suburban development and call that "public
transport". And a self-driving car is still a car, a glorified jitney cab if
and when it arrives. And it's not going to solve the problems of the car-
centric (sub)urbanism[2] anyhow.

The mistake the article makes here is a classic one: percentage growth vs.
absolute value. Doubling from, say, 500K in a metro area with 7M population is
going to be a bit easier than doubling the 14M ridership in a 20M metro.

As for the problems - people on HN of all places should be the ones who
understand _scale_ and that some problems simply don't exist when the scale is
insignificant.

I _want_ every city to be a public transit success story, but as it currently
stands - the rest of the country will be playing catch-up for a long time.

[1][http://www.vitalsigns.mtc.ca.gov/transit-
ridership](http://www.vitalsigns.mtc.ca.gov/transit-ridership)

[2][https://www.technologyreview.com/the-download/611557/self-
dr...](https://www.technologyreview.com/the-download/611557/self-driving-cars-
could-make-urban-traffic-jams-worse/)

\--------

TL;DR: NYC mass transit carries more people than systems in _all_ other major
metros combined[1]. Any comparison - including this article - is silly.

~~~
bobthepanda
Seattle actually has extremely high transit ridership and walk commmute share,
which is pretty impressive considering how the transit system is mostly buses
right now. And by 2024, major centers in the region will be connected by rail
transit that is faster than road travel. Anecdotally, I live pretty well
without a car here; I use Uber and Lyft when transit don't work out, and if I
want to hike usually one of my friends will have a ride. So it feels just like
back home in New York, except the trains and buses have a better chance of
showing up on time.

~~~
pishpash
I think there is an objective measure here. Just plot a 30-minute transit
radius around the centers of various cities and you'll get a sense of the
transit size of the city vs. covered population. Some cities are notoriously
"small," like SF, despite it being on some best-to-live-without-car lists. You
can't go very far before _practically_ needing a car: so what if you can get
there by transit if it takes 1-2 hours and inconsistently? NYC, Boston are
"large." Seattle is even worse than SF in this regard.

Transit is all about density. There is no way the west coast can beat the east
coast in transit practicality for another 100 years.

~~~
gpapilion
Boston and San Francisco have realitively equivalent population densities and
population. So this makes a very good comparison of the two regions.

For example my 4.5 mi commute in sf takes around 25 min. That’s similar to
what I remember from Harvard square to Boylston street which is an equivalent
distance.

------
dangwu
I’m surprised by this article. Most people seem to agree that the the metro
systems of NYC, Philadelphia, and DC are much better than those of the west
coast. LA’s is unusable for most people because there aren’t enough stops.
Seattle’s light rail is definitely gaining steam as it adds more stops.

~~~
tallanvor
The difference is that places like Seattle and LA are expanding their systems.
In New York, Boston, and DC it's rather stagnant.

~~~
Klonoar
Having lived in both Seattle and DC... this is wrong, at least comparing those
two. DC managed to build a new line out to Dulles with others in the works,
Seattle's light rail is a joke if you're trying to use it for more than a
straight line through the city.

A common misconception people have about the DC metro is that it belongs to
DC, but the abbreviation WMATA has nothing to do with DC for a reason.
Maryland, Virginia, and I believe even the Federal Govt have to be a part of
any changes that happen there. Given that, it's an absolute wonder that
anything works.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
Boston supposedly has the north/south station rail connector project under way
again. It's only been half a century. I'll believe it when I see it. Even then
I won't ride on it for a few years in case the ceiling falls down.

~~~
rhodysurf
That has to be the most frustrating part of bostons transportation, none of
the big hubs are conveniently connected.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
And the lack of some sort of beltway line that connects the ends of the
existing subway lines. As it stands anyone who has to cross the city by rail
needs to go through the city.

------
gamehendge
It's worth noting that Boston has been investing quite a bit in improving the
T.

New rail cars are being added to all lines over the next 4 years. As another
poster mentioned, a new North/South link project is likely to start soon. The
Green Line is being extended into neighboring Somerville. The article seemed
to focus solely on NYC.

------
StreamBright
How about beating Europe or Asia?

~~~
chimeracoder
> How about beating Europe or Asia?

London is the only city in Europe that even comes close to offering what NYC
alone does in terms of public transit.

Even Berlin, the second largest city in the EU, has pitiful public transit in
comparison.

~~~
thatfrenchguy
Ever been to Paris ? London's transit is fairly bad compared to it. Or to Lyon
(which is vaguely SF's size) ?

~~~
chimeracoder
> Ever been to Paris ? London's transit is fairly bad compared to it. Or to
> Lyon (which is vaguely SF's size) ?

I have. As of 2010 (before Cuomo's tenure began), New York had unambiguously
better public transit overall than Paris, in addition to serving a city with
four times the population of Paris.

Cuomo is doing his best to "fix" that, but in 2018, I'd still take NYC over
Paris as far as public transit is concerned.

~~~
etiennemarcel
I have lived in both cities but I'm French so probably biased. The
transportation system in Paris is overall much better. Denser, more lines,
cheaper, and unlike New York it keeps growing. It's also more reliable (even
though it has its share of issues).

------
Tiktaalik
For years and years Seattle and LA doubled down on a automobile oriented
infrastructure system that clearly wasn't working, but voters finally gave up
and got tired of it. Given that referendums are so difficult to win,
especially ones that impose higher taxes, this is a commendable achievement.

Not mentioned is the other west coast success story, Vancouver, which has lead
North America transit growth, with ridership up 5.7% in 2017. This has been
driven by major government investments to drive expansion and improve services
across the board. Additionally the system has not been hindered by ride share
competition.

[https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/translink-
ridership...](https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/translink-ridership-
growth-leads-canada-u-s)

------
exabrial
NYC's subway's are at a halt unfortunately. The MTA unions have paralyzed
innovation and development.

The West coast has an opportunity to one up them, but a lot of money gets
appropriated and given to contractors without a lot of actual results a lot of
the time.

~~~
oppositelock
It's so sad to see how the NYC's subway is falling into ruin. I spent my
adolescent years living in Brooklyn in the 1980's, and used the subways a lot.
Pre-Giuliani, they were filthy and covered with a lot of urban camouflage, but
they could be trusted to be there roughly on schedule. When they replaced them
with the shiny stainless steel cars, it was even nicer. I moved away from NYC,
but whenever I visit, it's sad to see the network, which worked really well in
the past, be in such a sad shape. It's like the system got built, and then
never maintained. What kind of idiots run such a large system in a world class
city?

------
helen___keller
The west coast epitomizes postwar American culture - car infatuation, suburban
sprawl, and so on. Transit is growing in the west coast, sure, but transit
needs a critical mass of convenience for people to actually live without
depending on their car (or choosing to own one at all)

We're not going to see cities go all-in on transit while self driving cars are
on the horizon.

Maybe after cars drive themselves, when people learn traffic is still not
getting better, more cities will get serious about transit infrastructure.

------
crimsonalucard
West coast public transportation will absolutely never beat East Coast
transportation and I say this as a person who has lived on the West coast my
entire life. In fact West coast public transportation will always be
significantly worse than the east coast.

It doesn't matter what initiatives or policies are being implemented on the
West coast. It is literally financially and physically unrealistic to have any
transportation system even remotely close to what they have in NYC on the West
Coast.

The reason is the layout of cities. West Coast cities are mostly suburban
sprawl. Suburban sprawl does not lend well to public transportation. For
public transportation to work, you need a high density city. Los Angeles will
never be walkable and will never have a subway system that all people use
regularly simply because the city is too spread out.

Lets put it to numbers:

L.A. County has 4,084 square miles. New York City has 304.8 square miles.

For LA county to build a network of rails with the same effectiveness of NYC,
the size of the NYC subway needs to be replicated approximately 13.4 times.

The NYC subway system has about 236.2 mi of rail. AN equivalent system for the
same coverage in LA will be 3165 mi. The current longest subway system in the
world is the Shanghai Metro at 420 mi.

Effective Public transportation will not work on the west coast due to
physical limits and impossibilities. If you want to live in a city with great
public transportation you need to live in a city of apartments. Any city where
you can have your own backyard is a city that is not dense enough.

------
huffmsa
Of course it is easier to build out new infrastucture to exacting
specifications than it is to update 100+ year old infrastructure to meet
modern demands.

------
samfisher83
Compare NYC public transportport to silicon valley transport and it's no
contest. Give me NYC. It connects way more places.

------
porpoisely
The post's title different from the article's title : "Why the West Coast Is
Suddenly Beating the East Coast on Transportation". Anyone else seeing
different titles?

Also, the article is nothing but PR for the NYC transportation commissioner.
Of course the NYC commissioner is going to say X is beating NYC because she
wants more funding. She could have gone to Boise, Idaho and came back with
similar story.

Electric scooters and a couple of test rides in self driving cars means the
west coast is beating the east coast on transportation. Really? NYC metro area
by itself outshines the entire west coast when it comes to public
transportation. I couldn't take this article seriously. There is certainly
room for improvement and investment in the NYC metro area, but what's the
point of "east coast vs west coast" comparison that is simply not true.

------
DubiousPusher
Kind of funny they don't mention Portland at all. It actually has a well
functioning system already built.

~~~
ppseafield
Portland's transit system is OK. The MAX works well, but it has been neutered
by NIMBYism: the new orange line has only a few stops in Milwaukee and goes no
further. (And for that they hired three full time cops when it opened). The
green line was supposed to be a loop, but it simply goes out to the Clackamas
Town Center (just a few miles south of the border with Portland proper). The
yellow line stops short of Vancouver, WA across the river, and we spent $4.5
million on coming up with several failed plans for a new bridge. The new line
headed SW has to be voted on by the city of Tigard. It'll go up to the bottom
of the OHSU hill, but they chose to simply increase the number of shuttles.

The buses are mostly reliable and can get you downtown. But several areas feel
underserved, especially if you live outside Multnomah county.

~~~
ppseafield
Also the MAX slows to a crawl downtown, where it shares the street with cars
and busses and stops every 2-4 blocks.

~~~
edaemon
They're closing a few downtown stops that saw low usage to speed things up,
but it will still be sluggish. I think the only real solution would be to move
the Red/Blue lines to the transit mall and put all the downtown track
underground with a cut-and-cover tunnel.

Also, the attempts to get the Yellow line into Vancouver fell through because
the Washington legislature voted against it. There are renewed efforts to
build it, though.

~~~
ppseafield
Yeah, not much we can do about WA. But that bridge is so old and has no
shoulder. Any car accident means a huge slowdown.

It'd be nice if we had elevated trains that didn't have to share with busses,
cars, bikes, and pedestrians.

------
jeromebaek
> There is at least one bright spot: Citi Bike has become an essential part of
> the city’s fabric. The bike-share system has 12,000 bikes across Manhattan
> and parts of Brooklyn and Queens and recently announced plans to expand
> under new ownership by the ride-hail company Lyft, which will triple the
> number of bikes.

Almost a non-sequitur to mention _Citi Bikes_ in particular when there are far
more notable examples like Lime. This must be a paid advertisement.

------
inamberclad
Electric scooters aren't public.

------
Ericson2314
Ugh classic hype machine bullshit confusing the derivative with the function
itself.

West coast is still total shit in land use, other than parkland allocation
_sometimes_ , and until they make the hard choices to undo a century of
mistakes, can they catch up with the east coast's century of stagnation.

~~~
ummonk
Not just derivative, but relative change (derivative normalized by current
value). There are transit systems on the east coast growing faster in absolute
terms - they just have large existing systems so the relative growth is lower.

------
gok
Well the West Coast may be beating on getting voters to agree to dump money
into long term transit projects. Actually getting them built in our lifetimes
and then getting people to use them is a very different problem.

------
xrd
Can anyone in other west coast cities speak about the crime on the new transit
systems? I'm in Portland, and for the first time in my life, I'm worried about
crime on mass transit. Maybe it is just the automated news feeds that are
circulating stories of stabbings and attacks that have heightened my
internalized hysteria. At the same time, I've felt a larger presence of people
on mass transit who seem to be dealing with a mental health crisis of some
kind. And, it makes me feel less excited to bring my kids with me when I ride.
This article does not touch on that.

~~~
Gibbon1
When I listen to my friends that ride buses and BART the major complaint is
people doing utterly foul things like pissing or shitting. Or being harassed.
Being harrased depends a lot on sex age etc. My GF's who looks like she lives
in Walnut Creek gets harassed. Me who looks like an old skinny biker does not.

Got to remember BART carries around 400,000 riders a day, 365 days a year.

~~~
nicoburns
> Got to remember BART carries around 400,000 riders a day, 365 days a year.

Seems like the issue is lack of security/policing, not the number of
passengers. There are plenty of subway networks with far greater traffic that
don't have this problem to nearly the same extent.

~~~
Symbiote
> There are plenty of subway networks with far greater traffic that don't have
> this problem to nearly the same extent.

I think you can go a lot further: almost all public transport networks,
regardless of type or usage, don't have this problem to any extent.

Some people in large European or Asian cities don't like using public
transport because of overcrowding, slow journey times, cost, inflexibility,
infrequency, strikes, "terrorism" or whatever. I know people who would cite
each of these reasons.

I don't know anyone who would say there is excrement or urine in the vehicles
or stations, or even unwashed people. It's that rare.

Bay area residents needs to pressure their politicians into fixing the
problem. That means some combination of

\- extra policing

\- extra cleaning

\- extra public toilets

and maybe working out some long-term solution to the mentally ill homeless
people.

~~~
pishpash
If a dog or child pisses everywhere do you tolerate it? There is a way to deal
with it. It does not start with the word "tolerance" though, so no,
politicians aren't going to be pressured into solving anything, because they
were the ones that got voted in in the first place to turn a blind eye. People
get the society they deserve.

