trains would be even better, but people don't like to see the price tag.
almost not worth discussing honestly. this has become yet another factionalized holy war over the last decade.
I’m all for public transit myself, but after 25 years in San Francisco, I’ve only seen it decline. That sentiment isn’t just mine—many longtime SF residents share this cynicism.
As a consolation, I must say that e.g. NYC was also handled miserably, say, in 1980s. Despite that, it rose from the filth, and is now fine, even outright enjoyable here and there.
I think that SF will also shake off its current insanity, and will turn back into a flourishing, living, and thus changing city.
It takes time, thoughtful voting (of many, many people), and likely a bit of luck.
This is not true at all. Some ways of increasing throughput for both: Build higher density housing which allows more people to take the bus/train and reduces congestion even for the people who still have to drive, add more lanes that either can use (e.g. by building parking garages and then converting street parking to travel lanes), make streets one-way on alternating blocks (reduces congestion at intersections), build pedestrian catwalks above busy intersections to reduce pedestrian-induced congestion and keep pedestrians safer, etc.
> but many more people can be moved with a bus.
The "can" is really the problem. If you do the numbers for a full bus the bus seems very attractive, but then to run buses to everywhere that everyone travels in cars without an impractical amount of latency, many of the buses would end up having only one or two passengers -- and sometimes none -- while still requiring three times the space and fuel of a car and on top of that requiring a separate driver at significant expense.
So instead there is no bus that goes to those places at those times. And since you can't get those people on a bus, they're reasonably going to demand a solution that doesn't make their life miserable when they have to drive a car.
> trains would be even better, but people don't like to see the price tag.
Trains (especially subways) work great in the areas with the population density to justify them. But now you're back to needing higher density housing.
Imagine a group of non-rich people who decide to carpool because of congestion pricing and end up spending half the time in traffic every day and as a result get more leisure time.
Considering that a parking spot in Mahnattan costs close to $1K per month, most of the cars are driven by people who are not poor.
And spy on everyone, all the time, because now it “““has to””” track every vehicle's every move — Total Information Awareness
