America Always Gets This Wrong (when building transit)

The issue with North America isn't that it's too small in population for public transport to work. It's that there aren't really actual cities – density of population is too low. But it's too low because they build small buildings and ludicrous amounts of lanes for cars to move, and parking lots to park them, which makes distances way too big, which disincentivises public transport and requires more cars that press city officials to make more lanes and parking lots for cars and... well, you get the vicious cycle.

When you mentioned about the towns being "too small" for the tram and subway systems, Nuremberg came to the mind. Nuremberg was too small to have the subway system when the idea was proposed in the 1960s. Yet, Nuremberg went ahead and built the three-line subway system. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise because the city centre is much more thriving and popular today without the countless trams and buses rumbling through the shopping district all day long. The daily ridership is about 400,000 on the average, which is almost the same number of residents within Nuremberg city limit.

When Dallas and Denver were battling to get the tram network built, one argument was that nobody would ever ride them. Upon the launches in 1996 and 1994 respectively, both tram network has higher than anticipation demand and ridership. Denver paid Siemens extra fee to have the trams delivered sooner. This convinced the Denver area residents to vote for FasTrack, a further expansion of tram and commuter train network.

Edmonton had amazing efficient street cars,in the 40's GM said they would sell them 400 busses at a huge reduced cost, if they got rid of those useless streetcars. The original lrt plan called for lines from the international airport by leduc to downtown and from there to ft Saskatchewan using existing rail lines offered up for a lease of 1 dollar for 99 years to be maintained by cp rail. Instead they spent 16 million to build a special bridge and hundreds of millions extra to build a few useless short lines that go out of their way to block traffic.

Public transportation doesn't work in the US when people cannot get to it because they cannot walk or bike to it and still have to rely on a car to get there, and thus don't need public transportation anymore.
America's idea of having something be accessible means placing behemoth parking lots everywhere that are never going to see more than 20% if it's capacity filled, which is impressive considering that number isn't mitigated by foot and bike traffic.

I've lived in Guangzhou, China for 6 years, where all the places you want to go (in general day-to-day life) are within a 15 minute walk from a metro station. Now, if I'm recommended a restaurant a 30 minute walk from a metro station, I'm very unlikely to be interested in going lol

So N American: we need to build a transit system to get everyone out of their cars; don't forget the parking lot at the stations!

Are there options for big towns/small cities for the more rural parts of the US? What would be best for a city of 20k with two small towns (another 20k total) about a 15 minute drive away? The city itself is I feel like train/subway would be far too expensive, but are there examples of a good bus system for towns this size? The city itself is pretty spread out with a small downtown, and while I can walk or bike many places, that's only because I live so close by. Pretty much anybody else has to utilize a car every day for literally anything, and they live in the city, it's insanity!

I drive for a transit system close to London, ON, and I wish we were as reliable as London's. There is no need for a schedule, because every day we pretty much arrive at a different time! One day we could be 5 minutes late, the next 15 minutes late, the next on time, and the day after 5 minutes early (sorry, 25 minutes late from the previous lap)! The sad thing is that if we can't provide a reliable service now when traffic is light and population is low, what is going to happen if we grow and traffic becomes heavy?

One time I was in Miami near the port cause I came by cargoship for work. I took a taxi to a supermarket. The supermarket was big with indeed an even bigger parking lot, after 5 minutes walk I went to the next shop. Did not find what I was looking for and asked for directions. The lady said, oooh yeah I know a place it's 15 minutes from here. I said cool, but then I was thinking, wait 15 minutes? So I asked 15 minutes walk? Noooooo she said, 15 to 20 minutes by car. Oh hell no and took a taxi back to the ship LoL. 15 to 20 minutes driving in Netherlands is way too much, you never need to do that only if you live in a really small town with 5000 people or less

impressive he knows about the running gag about Bielefeld - nice!

I'm from Memphis, TN where the word "tradition" is thrown around as much as BBQ. The current city layout is much the same as the clips you showed in this video. It's one of the reasons I had to get out of there. There's no place in the entire metro area where you can just "walk." And nobody wants to change anything because of... something. Really not sure. But the folks in charge hide behind the word tradition as if it actually helps the city progress in any meaningful way.

say kilo byte
good
now say kilo gram
great
now say kilo metre
NO WTF damnit America

You should make a list of steps that could/should be taken by municipalities trying to legitimately pivot towards economical, transit heavy use. Town I live in right now (Redlands, CA) is about to open a new local train to a nearby hub, but I fear it will be underused. Would also be curious to hear you analyze San Francisco's situation.

🤣First ad after the video ended was for a new Cadillac.

Charleston SC used to have a streetcar line running a loop in its historic town center. Eventually the line was abandoned but the rail lines remained embedded in the asphalt for many decades until recently. I only saw those streetcars in photos but always thought, even as a kid, it would be much nicer to get around the downtown area that way than driving. Both driving and parking in the downtown Charleston area is a nightmare.

"One US city that is doing this correctly ... ok well, mostly correctly... is Portland Oregon"

Uh... it is? You sure about that? I'll have to watch the video you mention because I know what going through that area is like. A member of my family once described Portland as a fun place to walk around, but an utter hell to drive through. Maybe it is, and maybe it's moving towards a better way of doing things. I hope so, because as of right now it is a god awful experience. There's still tons and tons of cars, narrow streets you have to use as through-roads to get to highways, and a mess of a layout. If it's doing anything correctly it must have a long way to go. I sincerely hope my pessimism and fear gets proven wrong, because I just commented on one of your other videos literally using Portland as an example of being a god awful place to be, or at least drive. For instance, a number of things I struggle to call "parking garages", are some of the most bizarre and dangerous things I have ever experience in a car, and I've been through San Francisco traffic and mountain highways next to cliffs where idiots bring oversized RVs that have us nearly scraping rockfaces. It was not a parking garage, it was a multi-level residential looking building that someone put parking spots in. It's like a vertical closet you're trying to put cars in.

I just want to be able to drive to Portland and go to the Powell's City of Books to buy copies of Berserk without running on my freaking fight-or-flight instinct to keep me from hitting someone.

you can blame the pollution and lead poisoning that affected the generation of 1960-1985.

I studied at Uni Bielefeld for a semester back in my college days, thank you for recognizing its nonexistence.

Spent a week in NYC this summer, in Manhattan the whole time. Hadn’t been there in a while. Subway works great. Scan your Apple Watch for fast entry. Trains near every part of the highly walkable neighborhoods. No worries about crime or uncomfortable cars for me and my family. There are a very few cities in US that got it right and kept it that way for the most part. I live in Austin. Still struggling with TOD. Maybe we’ll get it right with our Project Connect.

Where I live we have been complaining about the decision to build an expensive metro instead of a high speed tram. One of the chief complaints besides cost has been that the metro replaced a lot of the extremely well functioning bus system that a lot of people depended on while making travel times longer for a few neighborhoods, another was that the view would have been nicer from a tram. Everyone understood that something should be built though, because the city needed new development (Sadly most of it has been ugly commie-block style cheap construction, but that's another matter).

This video really puts it into perspective, how much worse our problems could be.

The way you feel about urban infrastructure in the netherlands is exactly the same one I had when I moved there for a bit
I was mind blown by the logic of the infrastructure and how inviting the streets were even in smaller cities around the country.
I always think about going back because of how nice it was and am always frustrated with the way planning’s been done in other countries
Thanks for your videos! They’re awesome ! And you’re spreading valuable knowledge about urban planning and the idea that a carless human is just as valuable 😅

Dude you're using PORTLAND as an example of a good city?????

Would North America also have a problem of having too much free land? Not enough productive land usage in North America

Herne, best city ever!!! Let's go!!

If I'm not wrong, having a property in the US and Europe are different. Americans have their property but Europeans have only the surface, you have to get a permission even for a basement. It is very important for city development. Government can built a metro line under your house in Europe. I do not think it's possible in the US

The city of Anaheim California has a newer "Regional Transportation Intermodal Center" Both the Metrolink and Amtrak trains serving this station are bike friendly. However once you leave the station on a bike, you're on your own. The station dumps you onto a 6 lane, 50mph road with no bike lanes. (There is an urban river adjacent to the station that has a multi-use path, but it has limited usefulness for most travelers) For the most part going to, or from this new transit station by bicycle is a threat to your life. And they wonder why so few people choose a bike instead of a car to access this transit center. Poor planning by the city is why.

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I’m curious what you think of Boston’s transit, and City.

🤣🤣🤣 The Bielefeld joke was amazing 👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻

Lately I lived in Scarborough Toronto for some time. Scarborough is a rather substantial district of Toronto but the public and private transportation from Scarborough to the heart of Toronto was really bad. The subway was slow, uncomfortable and unpopular. Traffic jams made private transportation slow. I felt pretty good when I returned back to Europe.

Surprised that the Bielefeld Joke is available in Australia too :-D

I think the TTC tried to do that when they expanded the YUS into Vaughan. The terminal station is supposed to be walkable. What I hope Toronto will do is replicate what is done in Hong Kong where development rights are sold around each station. I live north of the 401 next to a subway station and I think it's walkable, maybe it needs to be replicated along the line.

Funny thing, in Europe even small cities run public transport. Like even cities with population like 50 k., some even make it free. Yeah, often it's just a few lines, but it saves people from having to take a walk of 7-8 km. for 1,5 hour.

I live in NYC and loved trains/transit system. But when you say Portland, OR is the place where they designed it mostly right. I now have doubts on whether that should be a thing in US. I definitely did not dare to go out without a car in Portland, OR after dark last time I visited.

But there is hope. In Waterloo/Kitchener (Ont.) they buy a lot of buildings and placees to build a new tram (LRT) a view years ago.
Because Waterloo/Kitchener have a good university and a lot of students and there is a need for cheap and public transportation to all areas students want to go.

One question: If I was a tourist in Phoenix or any of those cities, how would I get around? I mean it doesn't look like one would want to go there for vacation, but is it just the norm to rent a car? I've only been to cities with exhaustive public transit systems yet ( London, Hongkong, Budapest, Nice, Zürich, Rome, all around Germany etc) and this totally baffles me.

What a great video. I live in a city that had trams up til 1964. Then it was time for the private car. This set us back 60 years. Now we are building light rails. Let us hope we can get our city back.

Time to start blasting local and regional city planners with not just bikes videos

I love your and share your passion and sensibilities regarding transit and urban development. I often wonder whether development in US and Canada has been influenced by strong lobbying from vested interests in the automotive, road&construction, petroleum and allied industries. Europe's automotive industries are typically heavily geared towards exports whereas in US and Canada those industries focus on ithe internal demand economy. Smaller compact cities make so much more sense from an energy, lifestyle and environmental point of view but mass changes to the way people and goods are moved in US and Canada will be viewed as a major threat to a myriad of corporations and workers that benefit from the ghastly prevalent spaced-out urbanisation model. Even as governments abour orgs and CEOs shout from their pedestals about climate change, peak oil etc they deliberately avoid obvious alternative solutions whilst aggresively pushing new technologies like EVs in order to sustain existing infrastructure models. It's all smoke and mirrors and about new opportuities, the economy and growth.

My two favorite neighborhoods in DC are both extremely walkable and you can find just about everything one needs within them, including public transit (Georgetown only has buses, but they are fairly reliable and stay within the District and go to Virginia). Capital Hill has shops, restaurants, churches, Government buildings, offices and 3 Metro stops plus buses and the Circulator (a local bus that goes to and from Union Station, Capital Hill, Georgetown and the Lincoln Memorial) and Union Station is just a few blocks away and there you have Amtrak, Greyhound and other bus companies. When I lived in NYC, my immediate neighborhood was also extremely walkable. That all changed when I moved back Upstate to a small city with an EXTREMELY limited bus service (didn't run past 6pm [only the mall bus ran to 9], stopped running at 5 on Saturday, didn't run to the lake on weekends except during the summer when there was a trolley, didn't run on Sundays or holidays so that anyone who needed to get to work and didn't have a vehicle, either had to get a ride, take a [very expensive] taxi or walk.

Yooo! I'm in Sarnia, ON 🤙🤙🤙

If people took public transit demand for oil and cars would plummet. This is the plot of Roger Rabbit that went over many heads.

As a European that doesnt even have a driving license (cause public transport works here lmao) whenever Americans say public transit wont work with "small cities" what i actually hear is closer to "we cant have public transit because our zoning laws demand carparks, causing our buildings to be too far apart for any sort of meaningful distance between stops"

My Home City in Germany has around 7k people living in it. We dont have trams, but we have many bus stations and a train station with "straight" connection (over the next citys, but you can just stay in the same train the whole time) to the Mid-German train connection point Erfurt. fromErfurtonly one train away is Berlin and München. So I need around max. 4hoursto go to munich or berlin

Good jokes, good explanation and all. 10/5 stars, would recommend