Martin Rich wrote:
On Sat, 10 May 2008 19:42:03 -0700, "Jack May"
wrote:


Your irrationality is that you think all the passengers get out of their
cars to use the LA rail system. Transportation people, especially in LA
have found that people are not getting out of their cars to ride rail
transit.

Instead they find that a very high percentage of the people are already
using transit and just switch to other transit systems when they open
because of an advantage in getting to work cheaper, faster, better than the
transit system they were using. So building new transit systems tends to
not decrease car traffic.


Wading into this late but still...

The statement above presupposes that the only measure of success of
public transport investment is whether it gets people to switch out of
their cars. In practice, in a place where cars account for quite a
small minority of travel (such as Inner London) investing so that
people switch from one mode of public transport to another cheaper,
faster mode, sounds a good deal, especially if it results in
alleviating congestion. As I understand it, a lot of the cost-benefit
analysis for transport investment in London, going right back to the
Victoria Line in the 1960s, recognises this, though I'm very happy to
be corrected on the specific point.

In the same way, the Midland Metro has not reduced car use, but it goes
through a lot of low income neighbourhoods, giving more journey
opportunities to poor people. Both the Duke of Wellington and many
stateside wingnuuts are agains this, of course.

--
Corporate society looks after everything. All it asks of anyone, all it
has ever asked of anyone, is that they do not interfere with management
decisions. -From “Rollerball”