Your argument re-enforces the author's point. Amsterdam has lots of light rail, and is almost entirely gentrified. It's one of the top-10 most expensive cities in all of Europe.
The American version of this argument, is like saying "if rail was less scarce, there'd be less gentrification when it gets built. Just look at all the subway lines in New York City" -- without recognizing that NYC is one of the most hyper-gentrified expensive places in the entire nation.
> without recognizing that NYC is one of the most hyper-gentrified expensive places in the entire nation
The lines basically all existed before gentrification. As others have said, it seems like the argument here is that if you build transit that is too good, rich people will come, so keep to buses. In reality, if more cities had good rapid transit, gentrification wouldn't be focused on just a few cities in the US and instead high skilled workers would have more choices. Right now as someone who loves good public transit, my city options in the US are severely limited.
Really it comes down to this IMO: If you build it, they will come. If you build it in one place, they will all come to one place. If you build it in many places, they will disperse.
I do think the point on the positive feedback cycle is true, but it's not going away so to me that just says that from a market perspective there is a severe supply shortage of good public transit based cities, and the solution to that is not to forget about light rail. Building more transit everywhere is the only thing that will solve the problem.
The American version of this argument, is like saying "if rail was less scarce, there'd be less gentrification when it gets built. Just look at all the subway lines in New York City" -- without recognizing that NYC is one of the most hyper-gentrified expensive places in the entire nation.