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LA owns the film industry, even Orlando lost it's claim as the 3rd largest producer of TV in the US when Nickelodeon, the largest cable network at the time, left for NY and LA (numbers 1 & 2). The biggest movie to be entirely filmed in Orlando since then is Never Back Down which was actually pretty good. Marley & Me was probably the last major movie shot completely in Miami preceeded by Miami Vice in 2006.
Marley & Me was technically filmed in Fort Lauderdale I believe. But yeah I know what you mean.
Location: The Greatest city on Earth: City of Atlanta Proper
8,485 posts, read 14,993,141 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by OrlFlaUsa
Okay let's say I work in Atlanta and live in Sandy Springs. I wake up get ready for work and start my day. Today happens to be one of those days that makes you truly understand why they call it Hotlanta. I wear a suit to the office since I work at the BofA tower in city. I live 1.5 miles from the nearest MARTA stop, do you really think I'm going to walk in the heat, in a suit, to catch a ride that will let me off still needing to walk?
No, because even on a mild or cold day you as a supposed City of Sandy Springs resident would probably not walk to Sandy Springs Station. Sandy Springs station is a commuter station and is merely connected to the part of MARTA that is the subway in the city of Atlanta. Most of the users of that particular station either drive their car to the massive parking deck or take the bus to it no matter what the weather is like.
That part of MARTA is complete different from the part of MARTA that operates in the City of Atlanta. For example, I live in Buckhead, wear a suit to work, and walk to the train station both ways each day (unless it's raining). For what I mean by all of the above, refer to this post.
As for the bolded part, I'm not sure what you mean there since North Ave station is a grand total of 100 feet across the street from BofA tower. If you have trouble walking up two flights of stairs and then literally across the street, then you have problems I nor MARTA can help you with.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OrlFlaUsa
What if BofA requires me to travel to nearby branches to check in, how will MARTA help me then?? Guess I could always "take a bus"
Well how would any PT system work well in such a situation, even in NYC? People who have those types of jobs more than likely will utilize an automobile since taking a train or bus would be inefficient to getting their job done.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OrlFlaUsa
Under the correct circumstances, MARTA is fine. To go to work, most are going to opt for their cars, thus why Atlanta has some fairly heavy traffic.
Well, to go to work, most people in every city opt for their cars. That's just the way our society works and Atlanta is far from being unique in that case with the juxtaposition of it's PT system and car usage. For example, Washington D.C. has the second best and second most used subway in the country, the 4th most used PT system overall, and they have the system that Atlanta should have built. Guess what, DC has worse traffic than Atlanta even though our metro populations are basically the same. (References here, here, and here.)
But you are right that MARTA is fine for what it does, especially in the correct circumstances. That's why it's the 7th most used subway in the United States (11th most used in all of North America) and the 9th most used system overall. I'm not sure about anyone else, but being in the top 10 of anything does not constitute bad. (Disclaimer: This doesn't mean I don't think MARTA could be better).
Last edited by waronxmas; 08-27-2010 at 10:51 PM..
No, because even on a mild or cold day you as a supposed City of Sandy Springs resident would probably not walk to Sandy Springs Station. Sandy Springs station is a commuter station and is merely connected to the part of MARTA that is the subway in the city of Atlanta. Most of the users of that particular station either drive their car to the massive parking deck or take the bus to it no matter what the weather is like.
That part of MARTA is complete different from the part of MARTA that operates in the City of Atlanta. For example, I live in Buckhead, wear a suit to work, and walk to the train station both ways each day (unless it's raining). For what I mean by all of the above, refer to this post.
As for the bolded part, I'm not sure what you mean there since North Ave station is a grand total of 100 feet across the street from BofA tower. If you have trouble walking up two flights of stairs and then literally across the street, then you have problems I nor MARTA can help you with.
Well how would any PT system work well in such a situation, even in NYC? People who have those types of jobs more than likely will utilize an automobile since taking a train or bus would be inefficient to getting their job done.
Well, to go to work, most people in every city opt for their cars. That's just the way our society works and Atlanta is far from being unique in that case with the juxtaposition of it's PT system and car usage. For example, Washington D.C. has the second best and second most used subway in the country, the 4th most used PT system overall, and they have the system that Atlanta should have built. Guess what, DC has worse traffic than Atlanta even though our metro populations are basically the same. (References here, here, and here.)
But you are right that MARTA is fine for what it does, especially in the correct circumstances. That's why it's the 7th most used subway in the United States (11th most used in all of North America) and the 9th most used system overall. I'm not sure about anyone else, but being in the top 10 of anything does not constitute bad. (Disclaimer: This doesn't mean I don't think MARTA could be better).
I think we are saying the same thing, MARTA's great but in Atlanta and in most other cities, you still need a car. You're right, nobody really walks to the SS station, they drive in from further out places and then catch a ride in to the city. That was really my only point and also wanted to say that MARTA is great for that and also for going to and from Buckhead, DT, UT, and the airport. As a visitor, it's really nice to take a single seat bus ride from my place in Orlando to MCO, fly to ATL, and take a much cooler single seat ride from Hartsfield to Buckhead, where I usually stay & go out.
Many of you have posted comments regarding Detroit's public transit system (or lack thereof). I agree 100 percent. 40.00 cab ride from DTW to downtown with little, if any shared ride services such as Super Shuttle. The people mover sysytem is a farce at best, a tragedy at worst. You have to look at the big picture. Detroit is a decaying urban wasteland managed by an inept inefficent and draconian system whose leadership is corrupt within all levels. Film director Paul Verhoven did not actually film "Robocop" in Detroit because it was a little too dystopian.
The People Mover isn't bad at what it does (shuffling people between different parts of downtown), but it is comically small compared to the size of Detroit itself - just the city alone - not even considering the rest of the vast metro area. It doesn't even extend a few blocks north up Woodward Ave. to Wayne State University or the museum district. So in that sense, it almost feels like a parody of a "real" urban transit system.
I agree with all of what you said except for the bolded. It's kind of a "chicken or the egg" argument. They don't have the usage to support it because the system to support the usage doesn't exist.
It really does come down to cost, and not density. For one, while some will say Dallas or Houston are "low density" and "unwalkable", in reality that's only a relevant argument on C-D and in density fetish circles. While the walkability charge has merit, in reality Dallas and Houston aren't low density at all, they just have a lower density than most cities that have a subway. In practical real world terms that means absolute zilch. An area that has an average density of 10,000 people per mile may seem like the holy grail of urbanity on here, but is an area with 5000 people per square mile any less urban? It's just half the number of people.
The density/walkability argument also fails when to comes to St. Louis and Seattle. Both cities have a high population density and are very walkable. They just can't afford to build a subway. Why? It costs between $100 and $250 million dollars per mile on average to build a new subway line and it becomes even more expensive in places (oddly enough) that are already super dense. For instance, the Second Avenue subway line currently under construction in Manhattan will be 8.5 miles long and cost $17 billion dollars to build. That works out to be $2 billion dollars per mile just to build the thing.
So any city that does not currently have a subway can't really be faulted. It would just be plain dumb and way too expensive for any city to attempt to build a new subway from scratch in this day and age unfortunately.
No, but there are LRT systems that have heavy rail type usage. Good examples would be the Boston Green Line (237,700 boardings per day), San Francisco's MUNI (163,206 boardings per day), and the Manila MRT and LRT (about 600,000 boardings per line, per day on both lines). The latter one though, while an effective system, is just totally insane. I used to commute on the MRT to work when I lived in Manila and all it can say is it sucked beyond comprehension. A crush load on LRT stock is not enjoyable in the least.
Yeah Seattles expanding there subway there doing two deep bore tunnels to the UW about 3.5 more miles also there going to keep going to north gate that will be about another 4 miles. Also on the same line they have to agreed to go with subway tunnels in bellevue wa.For the light rail.All the projects are costing in excess of 16billion+ so it is expensive b ut worth it .When they finish the first phase ridership is predicted at 275,000 a day for the rail.
I rode on the St. Louis metrolink for the first time yesterday. It was nice and convenient. The wait wasn't too long. It felt safe for the most part. I just wish it was more popular. I got the sense that a lot of suburbanites would rather not ride it, maybe that's why it hasn't expanded further into the suburbs. Although, I hear that a lot of suburbanites use it when there's a Cardinals game downtown
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