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Anybody who thinks Atlanta ( as in the city & where MARTA serves) has a bad mass transit system doesn't know what they are talking about!
The numbers for it's heavy rail system is impressive.
Miami is still working on it though it is going through expansion.
Houston has a impressive bus system in regards to the number of daily passengers.
Dallas has light rail which I guess it serves it's purpose.
Jacksonville is horrid and so is Tampa.
Orlando is finally joining the 2oth. Century! Some bus stops actually have a bench for you to sit on!
im thinking your right, there lite rail is hardly anything, and there asre 4.5 million people living there. Buses cant do everything.
But L.A. is in comparison its got well over 10 million people and is so spread out, and its subway system is just pointless.
SF is building a new subway line too, from SOMA to Chinatown...it's not as expensive as in NYC, but it's still up there, at $1.6 billion for 1.7 miles of subway. What's annoying aside from the cost is that there isn't even very high ridership predicted for that line, as its so short and the area it serves is already saturated with transit. There are other busy and much longer corridors in SF that could benefit better from a subway than Stockton street in Chinatown (Geary, Van Ness, Mission, 19th Ave, but i guess those locations make too much sense), which is already heavily served by buses, cable cars, and taxis, and which has BART/Muni Metro stops only several blocks away already. From what i've heard the new subway's location is partly a political thing, as lots of Chinatown business owners complained of lost business after the Embarcadero Freeway was torn down in the early 90's (it had an onramp/offramp right outside of Chinatown)...i dunno how true it is though. There are plans to maybe extend the central subway to North Beach after the SOMA/Chinatown phase is completed, which would be cool if it happens.
Anyways, if costs weren't so high maybe we would be getting subways in all those corridors i mentioned. Instead it looks like we might get bus rapid transit though, for Geary and Van Ness, at least...though there's actually some opposition against a subway down Geary by some short-sighted business owners who feel they'll lose business when drivers take the underground instead, and thus can't see their stores from the street...of course they ignore the fact that tons of people will still drive, and probably even MORE people (especially visitors) will venture out to the Richmond/down Geary if it simply means hopping on another train instead of trying to figure out buses and city streets...not to mentioned decreased traffic and decreased load on nearby bus lines during rush hour.
You just touched on something that does occur in many area's transit systems, the idea of the routing is done for political reasons. Where the routes are made and what order they are made can often be more based on local politics than what would actualy give the best return in ridership. It also as a flipside in blocking new lines due to various NIMBY politics.
Location: Moose Jaw, in between the Moose's butt and nose.
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I'm suprised more folks have not mentioned Detroit....joke of a system, SMART and the other mass transit outfit, needlessly ride on each others routes inseatd of spreading the system out and the bus to and from the airport takes 1.5 hours....for a 23 mile trip....
just a way, a bad mass transit system, particulary in the suburbs, for the whites to keep the blacks out of their areas....that's why most of them who vote against it, do so, shame.
I'm suprised more folks have not mentioned Detroit....joke of a system, SMART and the other mass transit outfit, needlessly ride on each others routes inseatd of spreading the system out and the bus to and from the airport takes 1.5 hours....for a 23 mile trip....
just a way, a bad mass transit system, particulary in the suburbs, for the whites to keep the blacks out of their areas....that's why most of them who vote against it, do so, shame.
I think this is common in many metro areas. Mass transit systems are poor by default and design as a result.
I always thought the People Mover in Wayne County airport is cool....but extremely pointless. That terminal isn't really that long, and every time I've been there it always seemed like a hassle to get on it as opposed to walking.
Detroit seems to have a People Mover fascination though:
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