Transportation

Blog

Private options could reverse transit ridership drops

One way to measure a city’s greatness is the ease of getting around: Does its public transit system improve or undermine its quality of life? In the 20th century, New York, London, Paris, Chicago, Berlin and Chicago were generally held in high regard for efficiently and quickly moving people through ...
Blog

Bullet train won’t improve urban transportation

(image courtesy California High-Speed Rail Commission) Even on its best day, California’s high-speed rail project was always going to struggle to deliver on its grandiose promises – a best day that was unfortunately Nov. 4, 2008. That was the day California voters approved a modest and fantastical version of what ...
Blog

Urban flight: Removing cars won’t revive our cities

As happened in the 1960s and 70s, America is witnessing a great exodus from some, but not all, of its cities. This time, even West Coast cities, with their sublime weather and ports on the Pacific Ocean, also are seeing residents flee paradise. According to U.S. Census Bureau data, in ...
Blog

Another San Francisco Treat

The network is in such straits that local transit agencies are looking at a grim scenario in which BART cancels weekend service and closes “nine stations just to keep the lights on elsewhere,” the San Francisco Chronicle reports. When they do run, trains won’t arrive in 15-minute intervals – instead ...
Commentary

Planners push transit, but it’s a hard sell in Western cities

Planners push transit, but it’s a hard sell in Western cities by Wendell Cox Over the six decades that transit subsidies have been virtually universal, governments and media have urged people to give up driving and switch to transit. Yet transit’s share of total urban travel was near modern lows ...
Blog

Pothole vigilantes fill in for the government’s failure

One of my favorite movies is “Brazil,” by the Monty Python comedy troupe’s alum Terry Gilliam. In the most-telling scene, Harry Tuttle, played by Robert De Niro, breaks into an apartment, not to rob it, but to fix a broken air conditioning system. That’s because the vast government bureaucracy, Central ...
Blog

The California Climate Quandary

Actually, there’s no predicament at all. One of these concerns is truly alarming, the other not worth worrying about at all. OC voters, in fact voters over the entire state, need not be concerned with the climate. There is no crisis now nor on the horizon.   Fuel prices, however, ...
Blog

Urban bike lanes no answer to climate change ‘code red’

But not in California, where the barriers to having a constructive debate about this issue are many. They start with the huge logical gap between the state’s goal to have “eligible” renewable power sources and zero-carbon resources supply 100 percent of California’s electricity retail sales and the electricity used by ...
Blog

Massachusetts Fails to Learn the Lesson of the “Success” From California’s AB 5

The top court in Massachusetts shut down a gig work ballot measure last week in a litigation battle brought on by opponents of independent contracting work. The ballot measure, that was anticipated to pass with over 80% of Uber and Lyft drivers in support in opinion surveys, would have classified ...
Blog

To Make California Dream a Reality for All, Remove Homebuilding Roadblocks

California’s median home price set a new record of $849,080 in March, according to the latest figures from the California Association of Realtors.  In 35 of California’s 58 counties, 50 percent or more of the homes sold above the asking price in March.  Given these continued troubling statistics, encouraging desperately ...
Blog

Private options could reverse transit ridership drops

One way to measure a city’s greatness is the ease of getting around: Does its public transit system improve or undermine its quality of life? In the 20th century, New York, London, Paris, Chicago, Berlin and Chicago were generally held in high regard for efficiently and quickly moving people through ...
Blog

Bullet train won’t improve urban transportation

(image courtesy California High-Speed Rail Commission) Even on its best day, California’s high-speed rail project was always going to struggle to deliver on its grandiose promises – a best day that was unfortunately Nov. 4, 2008. That was the day California voters approved a modest and fantastical version of what ...
Blog

Urban flight: Removing cars won’t revive our cities

As happened in the 1960s and 70s, America is witnessing a great exodus from some, but not all, of its cities. This time, even West Coast cities, with their sublime weather and ports on the Pacific Ocean, also are seeing residents flee paradise. According to U.S. Census Bureau data, in ...
Blog

Another San Francisco Treat

The network is in such straits that local transit agencies are looking at a grim scenario in which BART cancels weekend service and closes “nine stations just to keep the lights on elsewhere,” the San Francisco Chronicle reports. When they do run, trains won’t arrive in 15-minute intervals – instead ...
Commentary

Planners push transit, but it’s a hard sell in Western cities

Planners push transit, but it’s a hard sell in Western cities by Wendell Cox Over the six decades that transit subsidies have been virtually universal, governments and media have urged people to give up driving and switch to transit. Yet transit’s share of total urban travel was near modern lows ...
Blog

Pothole vigilantes fill in for the government’s failure

One of my favorite movies is “Brazil,” by the Monty Python comedy troupe’s alum Terry Gilliam. In the most-telling scene, Harry Tuttle, played by Robert De Niro, breaks into an apartment, not to rob it, but to fix a broken air conditioning system. That’s because the vast government bureaucracy, Central ...
Blog

The California Climate Quandary

Actually, there’s no predicament at all. One of these concerns is truly alarming, the other not worth worrying about at all. OC voters, in fact voters over the entire state, need not be concerned with the climate. There is no crisis now nor on the horizon.   Fuel prices, however, ...
Blog

Urban bike lanes no answer to climate change ‘code red’

But not in California, where the barriers to having a constructive debate about this issue are many. They start with the huge logical gap between the state’s goal to have “eligible” renewable power sources and zero-carbon resources supply 100 percent of California’s electricity retail sales and the electricity used by ...
Blog

Massachusetts Fails to Learn the Lesson of the “Success” From California’s AB 5

The top court in Massachusetts shut down a gig work ballot measure last week in a litigation battle brought on by opponents of independent contracting work. The ballot measure, that was anticipated to pass with over 80% of Uber and Lyft drivers in support in opinion surveys, would have classified ...
Blog

To Make California Dream a Reality for All, Remove Homebuilding Roadblocks

California’s median home price set a new record of $849,080 in March, according to the latest figures from the California Association of Realtors.  In 35 of California’s 58 counties, 50 percent or more of the homes sold above the asking price in March.  Given these continued troubling statistics, encouraging desperately ...
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