As you know, I tend to write fairly long posts, partly because they’re faster to write than short ones. If I were writing for print, I’d obviously edit them down a bit.
So it’s with mixed emotions that I announce that you can find me on Twitter as “humantransit.” I’m not sure I can say anything much in under 140 characters, but we’ll see how it goes. Quips, at least, should be possible.
… where your job is to give two inspiring presentations to a large group of bus operations and scheduling managers. You want to help them feel that the fairly mundane work that many of them do is important for the future of the world. What do you tell them?
UDPATE: New, easier links!
My presentation “A Field Guide to Transit Quarrels,” which I did last month in San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver, is here as a PowerPoint with notes on each slide describing its essence.
If you want a taste of what I sounded like talking about this stuff, the backlit but audible video of the Seattle presentation is here. UPDATE: The Portland video, which is much clear, is here!
As always with free stuff on the web, there has to be some advertising. So: If you’d like me to do a presentation to your group or organisation. The recent North American tour was the last time I’ll do this for free, but costs can often be figured out.
Look forward to comments, as always. Thanks to Scott for the PDF links!
Re the argument “I need cheap parking in the city because I have to have my car for my job.”
If my job required me to have a personal elephant, I wouldn’t think it
reasonable to keep it in the city and park it on the street at night.
From the pinnacle of Amsterdam Central station, as seen from my hotel room last month. I’m guessing it’s from the Deco era, early 20th century. There’s an exuberant optimism about European rail architecture of that era that needs to find new expressions.
Note: I’m back in Sydney, but detritus of the just-completed round the world will probably continue showing up here for a while.
Canada’s Frontier Centre for Public Policy just published a paper by my colleague Stuart Donovan on the case for road pricing. The gist:
Accurate transport pricing not only reduces congestion, it also generates additional revenue to fund investment in additional capacity when and where it is justified by demand. Most importantly, accurate transport pricing is mode-neutral in that it neither discriminates against nor favours any transport mode, although it does favour high-value vehicles, such as buses and emergency vehicles. Accurate transport pricing also allows people the freedom to manage their travel needs in the way that best suits them. Some workplaces, for example, may allow their employees to work flexible hours in order to reduce their transport costs.
PDF here.
(Update: Welcome, Andrew Sullivan readers! Please have a look around, including the welcome and manifesto. We do fun stuff here.)
US parodies of San Francisco as leftist and socialist may soon need some revision. San Francisco will soon have the most libertarian, free-market parking policy in the nation. And it should become easier to find parking. Continue Reading →
This just had to happen: Portland’s TriMet has removed eight parking spaces from the Park-and-Ride at its Sunset Transit Center light rail station, and replaced them with secure space for 74 bikes. From the Oregonian coverage: Continue Reading →
Now and then, someone mentions that a particular public transit project did not reduce traffic congestion, as though that were evidence of failure. In fact, the relationship between transit and congestion is indirect. It is not always wise to claim congestion reduction as a likely result of your proposed transit project. Continue Reading →