[travel] Awesome public transit

[mattbell]

In the US, cities that went through big growth spurts prior to 1920 or so (New York, Washington DC, Boston) have excellent public transit, while those that bloomed later (LA, Houston etc) have dismal public transit. This is in part due to the rise of the automobile and the construction with cities with the focus on cars as the primary means of transport.

However, it seems that in Europe, public transit is *especially* good in cities that had their growth spurts prior to 1920 *and* were subject to Communism. Communism effectively held off private car ownership for an extra 50 years.

Budapest and Prague both had amazingly efficient systems, especially given their small size. Subway trains are often less than a minute apart, and there's an excellent surface tram system to supplement the subways.

Amusingly, the people of Budapest never learned the "walk on the left, stand on the right" principle of escalators. Instead, they *all* stand, and some of the escalator rides are over three minutes long. In Prague everyone neatly segregates even when there's a huge crowd funneling in.

Comments

[easwaran.livejournal.com]

I'm not certain if the timing of the growth spurt is the full explanation, though it's definitely part of it. For instance, San Francisco (early growth spurt) has not especially good public transport, while Portland (I believe late growth spurt) is quite good. Also, Washington DC had the early growth spurt, but the public transit wasn't added until the 1970s. Given that the LA Metro system was only started in the '90s, I guess that leaves room for hope here...