AutoblogGreen

The USA's highway system is an engineering and developmental triumph that we should be proud of, not ashamed of. It's a huge success story, and the problems we have are really due to the overwhelming scale of its success.

I do think we can and should look at some changes to relieve congestion in urban areas, to curtail runaway suburban sprawl, and to encourage long-haul freight to move more onto railways (which ultimately can be electrified, though it will be expensive). I see a need for evolutionary changes, not a great upheaval and ripping up the pavement.

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1. From what I understand, Eisenhower saw the efficiency of the Autobhan for military mobility and helped to create a similar system in the US - which is about 25 times bigger than Germany if I did my math correctly. For that reason alone, I doubt we could convince Washington to neglect the Federal Highway Administration. Coming from a family that likes to do long distance road travel, I think not having a "guaranteed" decent method of travel across the US would be counter to many American traditions of travel and exploration, and would particularly be a disservice to National Parks. The author mentions travel, but fails to realize that there are still a significant number of people that travel the US by highway.

2. I'd love more passenger rail systems (esp. long distance, high speed railways) but not at the expense of the highway system. As far as higher density living, I don't like that being said as a good thing. It might work for some, but there are plenty of people who would be miserable without enough room around their house to build things. The author couldn't keep an RX-7 in his garage out back if he was living in an apartment with two parking spaces under it.

3. Rip up highways?! Neglecting highways saves money. Ripping them up costs money. Using the existing infrastructure to improve public transportation would be better. Imagine a monorail running above the median of every highway. That would be useful and still preserve the highway system.

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This is quite possibly the dumbest thing ever written...

The US highway system has been a keystone of our economic development and prosperity. If we didn't have a good infrastructure system we'd be Mexico.

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Well, I certainly appreciate the spirit in which this post was written, and I agree that places like Los Angeles need to give some serious thought (and resources) to public transportation. I imagine many of us are aware that at one time, L.A. had an outstanding public transit system, and no freeways!

So I say, hooray for public and alternative transit ... but please don't get rid of the highways. I love 'em. Some of the most amazing memories of my life include zipping across the country in my 20-year-old orange Volvo four times in two years when I was in graduate school.

Janis Mara
www.ecotality.com

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You have got to be kidding me...

Sometimes it seems that instead of logging onto Autoblog Green I have mistakenly logged onto Autoblog Delusional Utopian Wackiness.

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The problems with "mass transit" is that it is slow, forces patrons to wait, inconvenient, and too much of a hassle. If we build it, they will not come.
To get people to use public transit, we need a public transit system that people would actually want to use. One that does not require waiting, that is fast and convenient. Transit systems that do exactly that have been designed, they are called "personal rapid transit" (PRT).
Unfortunately, the beaureaucratic transit authorities don't like PRT, they prefer old style "light rail" trolleys that force people to wait, are slow, inconvenient, expensive, etc.

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There's no way they're going to eliminate our greatest love affair. Cruising across vast expanses of the American west in our all electric vehicles. Yes!

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"Unfortunately, the beaureaucratic transit authorities don't like PRT, they prefer old style "light rail" trolleys that force people to wait, are slow, inconvenient, expensive, etc."

In many areas of the US, there are freeways with travel speeds of zero to 15 MPH during rush hour.
Every single one of these vehicles is running despite the fact that they are close too or in a parked condition.
Twice a day five times a week, year round this happens.

Light rail is not as personal as your own vehicle, but it is much more efficeint.

You can sit in your car stuck in traffic, wasting fuel, pollouting like you don't care or push for more mass transit.

Mass transit with buses is an idea from you know who.

With that a train ride sounds a heck of a lot funner than a bus stuck in traffic.

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Yes, Mack, traffic jams are a problem. In the heart of Silicon Valley, Hiway 87 jams up just south of 280, every afternoon, even weekends. Funny thing is, there is a light rail line that runs right down the median of Hiway 87, in clear sight of all those commuters stopped in the traffic jam. Does that get people out of their cars?
Well, no. While the traffic creeps along at an average 15 mph in the evening commute, the average speed on the light rail, end to end, is 13 mph. Who rides the Light Rail? A study found that 98% of the light rail riders used to ride the bus, and the light rail costs more than the busses did.
If we want to get more people to use public transit, we need a transit system that is fast and convenient. Neither busses nor rail will do it.

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Ohh yes, let's rip up the highways. After all, highways are like the automobile; a symbol of individual freedom. You can just go and drive. It is therefore not surprising that the leftist moonbats at the Kos would suggest something like that. AB Green is looking more and more like a branch of the Daily Kos, similarly loony and irrational. I guess this is unavoidable whan you hire a bunch of car-hating liberals to manage a car-blog. Sorry guys but this is turning into a farce.

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Chris M, I am TOTALLY on board with your comments about the light rail. As it happens, I live in the San Francisco Bay Area too, and have refused extremely promising and well-paying jobs because I feel The Fear when it comes to driving that Corridor From Hell you describe.

But however agonizing it would be to sit in traffic inhaling everyone else's (and my own) exhaust fumes, the idea of waiting endlessly for the Bay Area Rapid Transit train (and leaving my car in the parking lot there to be vandalized or stolen), then paying the fare which is higher than the gas and depreciation for my vehicle, then waiting endlessly for my connection to the light rail - faggetaboutit!

I do take the Bay Area Rapid Transit quite a bit when it's convenient for me; I can get from downtown Oakland to San Francisco in an amazing 15 minutes and I've memorized the schedule. So, when it works, it works, and it's great.

Let's hear it for more public transit funding!

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The highway system was developed as a fast transportation system in the event of nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. It's secondary purpose was to promote and encourage interstate commerce and travel.

Do these tree hugging socialist idiots think that we are somehow immune to a regional/national crisis (Uh, hello, hurricane katrina?) and don't need interstate commerce and travel?

We need BOTH a much greatly improved inner city high density area mass transit system and interstate transport system. Paying for it is the hard question.

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I lived in Europe and Australia, several major cities, for about 5 years. I grew to love urban rail systems in mega-cities such as Barcelona and London, but realized urban rail is very costly and not practical for most American cities. They are developed long after most of Europe and hence less dense, less expensive to live in, and less polluted.

I have also done extensive research given the upcoming November referendum on light rail here in my hometown of Charlotte. I have created a website compiling my research, and my personal chronicles of living in cities around the world that have urban rail.

toddfullerdata.blogspot.com

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