Consequential Strangers

You know the type. The check out lady that knows your name or the bartender that knows your favorite beer. They are what make urban places great, and what make cities more social.

Creative People Walking to Bowl

When do trends or catch phrases end? Does a good background idea like the Creative Class ever just go bad? What does this mean for Walkable Urbanism or Bowling Alone? Folks like Richard Florida, Chris Leinberger and Robert Putnam build up names for themselves around a central theme. The theme must be a good idea at some point, and why if it was so catching before, does something fade or not fade?

I think you have to look at the underlying facts and basic premises of it all. At the most basic level, every city has a creative class, but at what point does being a really lame city hurt you and the generation of big ideas? To me all of these folks have something in common in that they are trying to figure out why there are some places that people like to live more than others. But the boiled down answers aren't so simple as they make them out to be. Different strokes for different folks I guess.

Inventor of Hotmail Wants to Sim City, Use BRT

I hope he leaves some lanes open for subways and overhead wires.

But his latest project is one that comes from the heart: He is trying to develop an Indian version of Silicon Valley, a sustainable city spread over 11,000 acres in northern India that he envisions will be home to 1 million residents employed largely by world-class universities and A-list companies that act as the country's idea generators. He calls it Nano City. One problem: Until recently, Bhatia knew nothing about developing cities.

Knowing nothing doesn't really matter so much when you have experts that can help. You guys know I'm biased, BRT wouldn't cut it in my city.

Vulgar Libertarianism in Pittsburgh

I often wonder if libertarianism has a built in preference for getting around. Why do I wonder? Because it shouldn't. But that is how conversations about transport and libertarianism start out in this country. Basically most libertarians (I say most because there are some that understand history) use their libertarianism to declare that transit does not work. "Let the free market work" they say, without discussing the massive amount of subsidies that turned the United States into its car loving, wealth transferring, big business loving self.

In fact during the time at which most transit was built, it was during the most free market period in the history of this country and it was about the development of land. That development opportunity disappeared with the invention of the automobile and the road funding by the government. By that time zoning was implemented and separate districts mostly single family were created like they were on an assembly line.

So I'm not surprised when the assistant editor of the Pittsburgh Tribune started his column out like this without historical context:

It was no place for a lone libertarian. And it was certainly no friendly place for anyone who thinks wasteful government transportation monopolies like the Port Authority of Allegheny County are proof that America's 40-year-old experiment in socialized urban mass transit is a failure.

Just jump right into it Bill, leave no history forgetting opinion out. Then the preference issue:

In fact, anyone who openly prefers cars to buses would have found himself feeling very alone during a salon dinner discussion on "The Future of Urban Growth and Transportation" Tuesday night at the upscale restaurant Eleven in the Strip District.

Why is it that you prefer cars? Is it because we've made cars and oil pretty much the only game in town? This brings me to Vulgar Libertarianism. The Mutualist Blog lays it out:

The defining feature of vulgar political economy, as Marx described it, was that it had ceased to be an attempt at the scientific explication of the laws of economics, and had become a hired prize-fighter on behalf of plutocratic interests.

Interests like the automobile, at the cost of every other mode. But Japan can have free market transit! Why not be like them?

When the lone libertarian finally found the nerve, he did his uncomfortable best to politely shame his fellow salon-goers for their blind acceptance of our obviously third-rate mass-transit industrial complex. He pointed out that Tokyo's gargantuan transit system -- arguably the world's best -- was about 90 percent private and mostly profitable.

He tried to point out that in progressive Europe, governments are decentralizing control and funding of mass transit or privatizing its bus and rail lines, as Stockholm and London have done.

Remember earlier when we talked about land and our zoning. Well Japan's railroad owns land and that's where it makes most of its money. We don't let transit agencies become real estate companies either in this country. If we do, we often get into the whole eminent domain mess, which libertarians hate. In addition, London's privatization has been seen as a money sucking failure and the government in Denmark provides the best bike infrastructure in the world by which 24% of total trips are made.

So all of this points to hypocrisy and a misunderstanding of the past(or even the present) by the libertarian faction, one in which we subsidized cars and trucks so much, it killed the private railroads, passenger and freight. Now when are we going to talk about how much money we're sending overseas to fuel those cars? Is that the free market at work?

Our Low Gas Taxes

Stephen Rees has a post up from the Economist showing gas taxes around the world. On this list we're the lowest! Yay....or something...not. We don't pay the full price for the externalities of using oil. Not only that, we've developed in a way that forces our dependence on it.

Last week I filled up my tank and saw it was about $50. Not a big hit considering the next time I go back to the pump will be about a month and a half from now. Last year I figured out that I spent 4% of my income on transportation. The average American spends 17.5%. So imagine if every person had an option to reduce their transportation costs by 10% or more. For a family that makes $35,000 per year, thats $3,500 that could go to a new home, to education, to local businesses, or to better food. Otherwise that 10% goes to an oil company, which I must say paid my dads salary which kept a roof over my head and well fed, but also makes a lot of fat cats at the top rich, and can send money to folks that don't like us.

If we paid the true cost of gas and everyone could have access to transit like Fred, Adron, or Ben we'd be a lot better off as a country and investing more in our respective communities.

Jan Gehl: Urban Mastermind

He's the anti-Robert Moses and has led cities such as Copenhagen and Melbourne to pedestrian and cycling greatness. Now he's been hired by the Bloomberg Administration to retool New York City. From Streetsblog:

Asked during questions what he would do specifically for the city, Gehl said he would make pedestrians more comfortable in the city by adding street furniture, widening sidewalks and creating "oasises" for them. In addition, he would put immediate emphasis on better conditions for cyclists. And finally, he said attention should be paid to the mass transit system. Good mass transit and good pedestrian environments, he said, "are brothers and sisters," each depending on the other.

A Visceral Response

Visceral in the dictionary means not intellectual or dealing with crude or elemental emotions. This is the response that often comes when you talk to people about their opinions on politics and in fact transit. Some folks hold some deep seeded feelings about roads and others about transit. Right now the road folks are winning in most parts of the country because thats all that people know. They go with whats in their gut and what they know, whether its right or wrong.

So for places like San Francisco and New York, it isn't a question of does transit work or not, its how much more should we invest in to make it better than it already is. On the other side of the pale are these road oriented communities which are fighting hard to get transit off the ground such as Charlotte and Milwaukee. The road folks know they have a slight chance to kill transit in these places so they are throwing the kitchen sink because they are the last front in the road wars. The Anti's fight hard but in order to beat them back like we have for the last few decades we must not back down from their constant barrage of misinformation and misdirection.

An article in Newsweek suggests that politics is as I mentioned before, a visceral decision that leaves behind rational thought and that progressive minded folks shouldn't back down from a good fight. I see this as an ideological fight and when we get the chance we should sock it to the opposition Karl Rove style. Frame the issues in the most passionate way possible and set up decision makers with the facts they need to beat back the opposition. A mix of options and a vision for how all modes will work together. Cars are not the answer to everything. This is how we win.

Dream Crushers and Traffic

So a big pet peave of mine is when people tell you that something isn't possible when it more than likely is when you work at it. For example, if you tell a nation that there is no way they can rebuild their transit infrastructure in a meaningful way, what hope is there to do it. In the United States today people are too concerned with the short term fix rather than the long term goal and that really annoys me. In my former running life, years upon years of miles are built up on your legs to be able to run fast. Those guys at the olympics in the marathon train their whole lives to be there and no one ever told them to stop or that the road was too long. And if they were told that they simply ignored the naysayers. I'm not sure if i'm butchering this quote but a friend of mine has it up in his house. "Those who will try to convince you to abandon your dreams have already abandoned theirs."

On another note, I drove to work today. On Wednesdays I go visit my grandmother in suburbia and sometimes i take my car. Some days are nice for walking the three miles or biking, but BART doesn't allow bikes when i go to work so i have to sneak it on if i want to do that. They need runaround vehicles or bike rental at the station. I would totally use it.

But the main point was that driving out of San Francisco towards the maze there was no traffic. I mean there were cars but they were moving. There were cars at the toll plaza but not many. It was amazing. Did the shift to transit and other routes really make that big a difference? Are people just so lazy and lemming like that they drive their cars even if they have a good transit alternative? What this says to me is that the answer is yes. How long will induced traffic take to pick back up is the question.

Team Transitman

Be a part of the revolution, join TRANSiTMAN on his quest to change the world by riding the bus! I think this is great. This could be a way of pulling adults and kids alike who might not be into transit, but would like to learn more.

People on BART

I love riding transit. It's at its most interesting when people are cramped into the crush load at rush hour. A 10 car train comes every 4-6 minutes and people of all sorts rush on. There are people with crazy hair, nervous nellies that can't stop tapping their feet and little artists going to the city for inspiration yet live in the suburbs. It's a humanizing experience. Everyone has to compromise about where to stand and where to move and to let someone a little more fragile sit down. It's something everyone should experience.

The Social Capital of Transit

When i was in school i took a class called Public Health and the Built Environment. My professor Dr. McMillan often rode the #3 bus to school had a whole class day devoted to social capital. That day she told us of an encounter she had on the bus one day of a lady who was lacking enough change to get on the bus (In Austin it's still 50 cents). Obviously anyone that was standing there with the woman would give her the extra change she needed to get on the bus and its telling of the generosity of Austinites that her ride was paid for through the kindness of strangers.

But when does this type of kind interaction happen in your automobile? Sure you let people cut in front of you in a traffic jam, or you might let a pedestrian go in front of you but as a personal observation it seems like one never gets to truly interact with people like on transit. Some folks don't want to be bothered by people of different social status' whether higher, lower or even student but i think it allows people to be more able to empathize with life situations and stages. Younger folks learn how to give seats to their elders and older folks might find from looking at the kids that its a great idea to bring an ipod when in transit. Taking transit might be good for the environment and good for your pocketbook but it seems like it also might be good for your conscience.