I got a lot of replies to my latest post chronicling my transit misadventures in San Francisco. Oversharing reader Rik pointed out in the comments that the Bay Area has 27 (!!!) different transit agencies that “largely don't coordinate with one another.” A sympathetic Twitter user sent condolences that I was “subjected to weekend BART” and explained that pre-pandemic the trains came every 20 minutes on weekends and holidays, but now are every half hour and sometimes also get cancelled, making the headway a full hour. Honestly, if it stays this way, they should just start calling it BAST (Bay Area Slow Transit).
Here are some other comments I got:
“Ali I vibe so much with this post. Having grown up in Singapore the idea of having to look up train schedules is foreign and sometimes I still show up at the station on a Sunday without realizing that I should have looked at the schedule and end up spending 25 minutes perusing memes. I have to say: America is great at beating the desire to ride public transit out of you.” –Vincent
“This puts into words how I feel about public transportation in Denver. In August, our local transportation, RTD, offered free rides for the whole month. I really tried to use it, but a similar experience drove me back to using my car. Denver falls firmly in the schedule based transit system, but operates like it’s frequency based. I was going to take the train south after a baseball game, and I arrived at the stop 10 minutes before the scheduled time only to see the train pulling away. I had to wait 40 min for the next one. It was such a pain… It's hard because I want to use public transit more, and RTD was clearly trying to convince more people to try. But if route options are limited and you risk getting stuck for 40 minutes, that's a deal breaker for most people. But then they don't get more funding to ameliorate those problems unless ridership is up. How do we solve that negative feedback loop?” –Trey W.
“That journey sounds miserable, but unfortunately, entirely par for the course given my undergrad and later professional experience between SF/Berkeley.” –Nate W.
Threads like this are typically reserved for paid Oversharing readers, but since this topic clearly struck a chord, I’m opening it up to everyone. So here we go: this Sunday, share your American transit nightmares. Leave a post in the comments below about a time you tried to take public transit in the U.S., were foiled by the system, driven back to your car, etc. Or suggest a way to fix it! Looking forward to reading. –Ali
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Transit managers in the US often focus on the wrong things: renovating stations, “new” cars or buses, Wifi, etc. Compare the DC metro (or BART) to the NY subway: the former looks way cleaner, airier, etc. but it’s way worse in practice because of headway.
I grew up in NYC using the MTA with frequency-based service. While definitely with its challenges, (there's an amazing 2017 article from Curbed that describes how Robert Moses can be thanked for many of the system's current woes - https://ny.curbed.com/2017/7/27/15985648/nyc-subway-robert-moses-power-broker), I was greatly unprepared for the schedule-based service available via Lane Transit District in Eugene, OR when I moved here for grad school.
Accustomed to taking transit every day, I attempted to commute from my apartment on the edge of town to the University campus, a commute that involved two busses - one regular and one Bus Rapid Transit. If all connections were seamless, the trip would take approx 45 minutes each way. If not, it could take over an hour. Or... I could just drive 20 minutes each way. I ended up driving for my first year of school. Fortunately, I was able to find an apartment closer to campus for my second year and bike back and forth.
Quick aside on the topic of housing... one of the reasons I was living on the edge of town my first year was because I have a 60lb dog. Trying to find housing with any pet, let alone a dog that weighs more than 20lbs, severely limits your options.
Your Bay Area experience is on par with mine. We lived in San Jose during the pandemic, and were constantly stunned that is was somehow cheaper and faster to drive to SF and find parking there than to take CalTrain or BART. An utter policy failure when the pro-social option is more expensive, stressful, and time consuming (which is saying *a lot* compared to Bay Area traffic). We usually still opted for the mixed method of driving to Milpitas or Redwood City then taking the train in so we didn't have to deal with a car *in* the city, but it wasn't any cheaper or faster.
A sad experience I had both in SF and more recently in Seattle was cruising along in the train either underground or elevated only to have it suddenly become a streetcar for a few stops, having to contend with car traffic. Cars and trains just really do not mix; so many regular critical failures coming from one hitting the other and the train not being able to pull over to allow undamaged trains by.
I was about to give one bright spot to SF transit about having an option to get to Muir Woods National Monument (yay access to nature!), but after further research, the route I'm thinking of is a private company that costs $65/person. The Bay Area has such amazing opportunity not just for commutes and culture but to connect people to the awesome scenery around them, but few such options exist.
I became car-less in LA a few months ago (a forklift totaled my car). It has been absolute hell. The buses are constantly late, even your stop is only the second one on the route. Once, I watched as my bus got stuck making a left turn for three traffic light cycles. If they aren't late, they're canceled altogether, or they switch to hourlong headways after 5 pm. The MetroMicro program is too small for the demand, and the zones are too disjointed. I have gotten stranded several times when there were simply no Ubers/Lyfts around, no other micromobility options like bikeshare or even a scooter, and I had to walk a mile and a half alongside a hideous stroad to wait 30 minutes for a bus running on hourlong headways and which dropped me off another half-mile from my home.
I remember my shock when the light rail train I was on *got stuck in traffic.* After living in NYC for over a decade, I couldn't believe that the trains here run for stretches in traffic. None of this is functional.
You asked for a transit nightmare but I live in a city with essentially no mass transit. So I will submit a USA Transit Data Nightmare. From the latest edition of the DOT's Transportation Energy Data Book.
BTUs of energy consumed by passenger-mile, 2019, rounded (NB: pre-pandemic). Personal cars 2800, personal trucks (e.g. pickups) 3200, transit buses 4600, commercial airlines 2200, transit rail 850, commuter rail 1600. If I am a transit optimist ("dream") I focus on commuter rail (850!) ; if I am a transit pessimist ("nightmare"), I focus on transit buses (4600!). I am guessing that 4600 is due to most transit buses in the USA running far from full most of the time. The nightmare: more people won't take the bus until it runs frequently (and reliably); to add more buses to make that happen, in the short run we'll do more environmental damage (assuming, sorry BTUs and GHG emissions are roughly proportional: they may not be!) than if everyone just drove. Dang. (BTW "transit rail" is essentially the subway, operating within an urban area, and "commuter rail" is essentially something like the LIRR, connecting urban and suburban areas. Sorta.)
I await commentators who are much more expert than I am to correct my assumptions above!
Muni can be unreliable but that's not always the case. I had an amazingly smooth Muni trip over the weekend to and from Hardly Strictly Bluegrass. I went to catch the 14R Mission as it arrived, walked 2 blocks to catch the 5R to Golden Gate Park but as I arrived to the stop, a special Shuttle for the concert arrived, making my trip even faster. After the concert, there were Shuttles waiting along the park, I hopped on. As I stepped off the Shuttle, a 22 Fillmore was arriving to my next stop. During the whole round trip, two buses each way, I never waited once, the timing was impeccable. Thanks Muni.
My most recent petty frustration was three weeks ago, i was trying to take my two kids to a 350.org event, literally 1.6 miles from my home. We headed to the bus stop about 10 mins before the bus was schedule to arrive and watched it pass by when we were less than a block away. We walked down to the stop and the schedule said the next one was coming in 9 minutes. We waited. Google maps said the bus was just around the corner. Because of construction, the buses would start being re-routed at 6pm, but the next bus was scheduled for 5:52. We waited. Google said the bus was one stop away. We waited. Google said the bus was off route and that the next bus wasn’t for 20 mins. We finally started walking and realized that the bus had been put into the detour route early and we had to walk almost a mile to get to the stop the bus would stop off. We caught the bus for about 4 stops and decided to walk home after the event rather than even try the bus
Is there a point at which we finally admit that urban transit only works in urban areas? We have enough housing in dense (10k/square mile plus) urban areas for about 9% of the population, but somewhere between 65 and 75% of all transit trips happen there. Without density, the economics of buses can't work. I say that with confidence, because out of 569 defined metro- and micro-politan statistical areas in the US, exactly zero with lower density have viable transit.
We also know that the number one thing we can do for somebody to get them out of poverty is to get them a reliable car. Their productivity goes way up, their access to opportunities multiplies, and they have a lot more bandwidth to improve their lives.
I hate the idea of more cars on the road, but that's better than holding people in poverty for the sake of transit. We need to innovate and we need to stop looking at new ideas as competition to buses. Uber didn't work (another model that depends completely on density...) but there are others out there, like mine (RubyRide) that make a real difference in people's lives. Oddly the only pushback we ever get is from people who are pro-transit but have clearly never really worked the problem in a rigorous way.
Open thread: American transit nightmares
Transit managers in the US often focus on the wrong things: renovating stations, “new” cars or buses, Wifi, etc. Compare the DC metro (or BART) to the NY subway: the former looks way cleaner, airier, etc. but it’s way worse in practice because of headway.
Transit advocates here in NY get it though: https://www.ridersalliance.org/six-minute-service
I grew up in NYC using the MTA with frequency-based service. While definitely with its challenges, (there's an amazing 2017 article from Curbed that describes how Robert Moses can be thanked for many of the system's current woes - https://ny.curbed.com/2017/7/27/15985648/nyc-subway-robert-moses-power-broker), I was greatly unprepared for the schedule-based service available via Lane Transit District in Eugene, OR when I moved here for grad school.
Accustomed to taking transit every day, I attempted to commute from my apartment on the edge of town to the University campus, a commute that involved two busses - one regular and one Bus Rapid Transit. If all connections were seamless, the trip would take approx 45 minutes each way. If not, it could take over an hour. Or... I could just drive 20 minutes each way. I ended up driving for my first year of school. Fortunately, I was able to find an apartment closer to campus for my second year and bike back and forth.
Quick aside on the topic of housing... one of the reasons I was living on the edge of town my first year was because I have a 60lb dog. Trying to find housing with any pet, let alone a dog that weighs more than 20lbs, severely limits your options.
Your Bay Area experience is on par with mine. We lived in San Jose during the pandemic, and were constantly stunned that is was somehow cheaper and faster to drive to SF and find parking there than to take CalTrain or BART. An utter policy failure when the pro-social option is more expensive, stressful, and time consuming (which is saying *a lot* compared to Bay Area traffic). We usually still opted for the mixed method of driving to Milpitas or Redwood City then taking the train in so we didn't have to deal with a car *in* the city, but it wasn't any cheaper or faster.
A sad experience I had both in SF and more recently in Seattle was cruising along in the train either underground or elevated only to have it suddenly become a streetcar for a few stops, having to contend with car traffic. Cars and trains just really do not mix; so many regular critical failures coming from one hitting the other and the train not being able to pull over to allow undamaged trains by.
I was about to give one bright spot to SF transit about having an option to get to Muir Woods National Monument (yay access to nature!), but after further research, the route I'm thinking of is a private company that costs $65/person. The Bay Area has such amazing opportunity not just for commutes and culture but to connect people to the awesome scenery around them, but few such options exist.
I became car-less in LA a few months ago (a forklift totaled my car). It has been absolute hell. The buses are constantly late, even your stop is only the second one on the route. Once, I watched as my bus got stuck making a left turn for three traffic light cycles. If they aren't late, they're canceled altogether, or they switch to hourlong headways after 5 pm. The MetroMicro program is too small for the demand, and the zones are too disjointed. I have gotten stranded several times when there were simply no Ubers/Lyfts around, no other micromobility options like bikeshare or even a scooter, and I had to walk a mile and a half alongside a hideous stroad to wait 30 minutes for a bus running on hourlong headways and which dropped me off another half-mile from my home.
I remember my shock when the light rail train I was on *got stuck in traffic.* After living in NYC for over a decade, I couldn't believe that the trains here run for stretches in traffic. None of this is functional.
You asked for a transit nightmare but I live in a city with essentially no mass transit. So I will submit a USA Transit Data Nightmare. From the latest edition of the DOT's Transportation Energy Data Book.
BTUs of energy consumed by passenger-mile, 2019, rounded (NB: pre-pandemic). Personal cars 2800, personal trucks (e.g. pickups) 3200, transit buses 4600, commercial airlines 2200, transit rail 850, commuter rail 1600. If I am a transit optimist ("dream") I focus on commuter rail (850!) ; if I am a transit pessimist ("nightmare"), I focus on transit buses (4600!). I am guessing that 4600 is due to most transit buses in the USA running far from full most of the time. The nightmare: more people won't take the bus until it runs frequently (and reliably); to add more buses to make that happen, in the short run we'll do more environmental damage (assuming, sorry BTUs and GHG emissions are roughly proportional: they may not be!) than if everyone just drove. Dang. (BTW "transit rail" is essentially the subway, operating within an urban area, and "commuter rail" is essentially something like the LIRR, connecting urban and suburban areas. Sorta.)
I await commentators who are much more expert than I am to correct my assumptions above!
Muni can be unreliable but that's not always the case. I had an amazingly smooth Muni trip over the weekend to and from Hardly Strictly Bluegrass. I went to catch the 14R Mission as it arrived, walked 2 blocks to catch the 5R to Golden Gate Park but as I arrived to the stop, a special Shuttle for the concert arrived, making my trip even faster. After the concert, there were Shuttles waiting along the park, I hopped on. As I stepped off the Shuttle, a 22 Fillmore was arriving to my next stop. During the whole round trip, two buses each way, I never waited once, the timing was impeccable. Thanks Muni.
My most recent petty frustration was three weeks ago, i was trying to take my two kids to a 350.org event, literally 1.6 miles from my home. We headed to the bus stop about 10 mins before the bus was schedule to arrive and watched it pass by when we were less than a block away. We walked down to the stop and the schedule said the next one was coming in 9 minutes. We waited. Google maps said the bus was just around the corner. Because of construction, the buses would start being re-routed at 6pm, but the next bus was scheduled for 5:52. We waited. Google said the bus was one stop away. We waited. Google said the bus was off route and that the next bus wasn’t for 20 mins. We finally started walking and realized that the bus had been put into the detour route early and we had to walk almost a mile to get to the stop the bus would stop off. We caught the bus for about 4 stops and decided to walk home after the event rather than even try the bus
Is there a point at which we finally admit that urban transit only works in urban areas? We have enough housing in dense (10k/square mile plus) urban areas for about 9% of the population, but somewhere between 65 and 75% of all transit trips happen there. Without density, the economics of buses can't work. I say that with confidence, because out of 569 defined metro- and micro-politan statistical areas in the US, exactly zero with lower density have viable transit.
We also know that the number one thing we can do for somebody to get them out of poverty is to get them a reliable car. Their productivity goes way up, their access to opportunities multiplies, and they have a lot more bandwidth to improve their lives.
I hate the idea of more cars on the road, but that's better than holding people in poverty for the sake of transit. We need to innovate and we need to stop looking at new ideas as competition to buses. Uber didn't work (another model that depends completely on density...) but there are others out there, like mine (RubyRide) that make a real difference in people's lives. Oddly the only pushback we ever get is from people who are pro-transit but have clearly never really worked the problem in a rigorous way.