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So it’s official: Americans are choosing public transportation in record numbers. The American Public Transportation Association announced this morning that the U.S. made 10.7 billion mass transit trips in 2013, the highest figure in 57 years.
The story here is not of a sudden resurgence, but rather a slow, steady climb over the last decade, back toward ridership levels not seen since the 1950s.
— theatlanticcities.com
Last night on the bucolic hilltop campus of Occidental College, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti spoke with the Los Angeles Times architecture critic, Christopher Hawthorne, about the state of L.A. urbanism. This broad topical platform positioned Hawthorne's interview not as a political... View full entry
Last January, Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia, did something that no other city its size had done before: It made all public transit in the city free for residents. [...]
One year later, this city of 430,000 people has firmly established itself as the leader of a budding international free-transit movement. [...]
What’s less clear on the first anniversary of free transit in Tallinn is whether it has actually changed commuting behavior all that much.
— Citiscope
As it turned out, Tallinn's bold move last year to offer free-transit to its residents did not have a very dramatic effect on its own ridership. But the experiment has clarified some subtle issues in public transit:Free-transit as a "second-best pricing scheme": if a city wants to curb... View full entry
Before the buses became a symbol for San Francisco’s gentrification woes, they were just a fleet of several hundred private coaches that whisked some seventeen thousand workers around San Francisco and to and from the Silicon Valley campuses of such companies as Apple, Google, and Genentech. [...]
San Francisco is deep into a second tech boom—and, with it, many less affluent workers are getting priced out of the city.
— newyorker.com
What we do know: the Hyperloop is a fantastic, gee-whiz! prospect that, in an idealized and seamless application, would get between A and B faster than we ever imagined. But whether the Hyperloop actually can (or should) be built is still very much unclear. Ever since Elon Musk (PayPal, Tesla... View full entry
Still standing strong after its opening in 1976, the Washington D.C. Metro rail system designed by architect Harry Weese was deemed the recipient of the AIA's Twenty-five Year Award.
The award recognizes a structure that demonstrates architectural resilience for 25-35 years. The structure must also show excellence in function, execution of its original program, and creative aspects in accordance with today's standards.
— bustler.net
These are a few of the D.C. Metro's stations. Find out more about the D.C. Metro on Bustler. View full entry
Reforming parking policy is an urgent imperative which could have significant positive effects on the natural environment, our cities, the economy, and our society. For many issues, from affordable housing to carbon emissions, it is an obvious solution that has remained hidden in plain sight for too long. — Graphing Parking
Architect Seth Goodman has taken it upon himself to expose how dramatically parking plays a role in planning, through a series of nifty infographics that show just how much parking space is allotted for a given institution or destination. Inspired by Donald Shoup's The High Cost of Free... View full entry
