Originally Posted by
Bham1982
Is LA a "successful large region"? Can't get much bigger or more successful than LA.
LA has 18 million people, one heavy rail line, and three light rail lines. Total rail ridership of a few hundred thousand on weekdays.
So it's overwhelmingly auto-oriented, but that doesn't seem to have constrained its growth.
And LA had no rail whatsoever until about 1990. Its greatest growth spurt followed WWII and preceded the reintroduction of rail.
I think it's fair to say that the relationship between economic health and transit mobility is at least somewhat murky.
I was wrong and thought Denver's system was smaller and of more recent vintage, but I still think Denver displays the murkiness of this alleged connection. Denver had no rail whatsoever prior to 1994, but certainly had very robust economic and population growth prior to the introduction of rail.
Detroit has rail. We have the People Mover. We had trolleys running down Jefferson and Washington until a few years ago. Yes, these systems are/were pathetic, but we're "on the list."
Couldn't it be that the largest cities have rail because they're the largest cities? I'm not getting any obvious "build rail and grow population and prosperity" linkages.
Austin has the creative class despite terrible transit and no rail. Plenty of creatives in Seattle, which just introduced light rail. It likely helps, but doesn't seem to be necessary.
And should we be invest in transit to attract hipster slackers, or to improve mobility for the working poor? Seems like Woodward light rail adds little for the working poor. Are they getting more frequent service than the current bus schedule? Everyone seems to be chasing slackers, especially poorer cities in the Rust Belt.
I'm not against light rail, but I think these questions aren't really being considered. and some of the pro-rail arguments are only slightly less silly than the anti-rail talking points.