[NoblePublius]

“ I love Disney and I love Dolly Parton, but it says something deeply broken about our national priorities when their theme park trains outclass public infrastructure in billion-dollar economies. Be serious.”

Europe has lots of train infrastructure because it was very poor after WW2, and its people could afford nothing but train fare.

America has lots of car infrastructure because it was very rich after WS2, and its people have the freedom to choose personal transportation.

Over 90% of American households have at least one car. It’s not because American government doesn’t invest in public transit. It’s because Americans, even poor Americans, overwhelmingly choose personal transportation.

[richiebful1]

Certainly there's an element of personal choice. I currently live in a town of 3,000 in a rural state that was previously served by trains. Once cars became accessible to the masses, that train service was no longer sustainable.

But in actual US metro areas where much of the country lives, land use choices were made to enhance moving cars at the expense of other modes of transport. Urban areas were bulldozed to funnel cars into downtowns from far-flung suburbs. Amsterdam, on the other hand, was once a car-loving city, but has chosen to redevelop streets for transit and active transportation. Personal choice matters, but how much is driven by incentives?

[NoblePublius]

“Land use choices” are downstream of what residents want less what they can afford. You have it backwards.

[omegaworks]

>its people have the freedom to choose personal transportation.

A lot of American choice is an illusion. The national expressway network was created to serve national security purposes. Beloved trolley systems in medium density cities were unceremoniously ripped out. Car and tire companies pushed the bus-ification of public transport in order to kill any notion that it should offer comfort and reliability.

The American government refuses to invest in density because its sees sprawl as a deterrant against nuclear threat. (A threat that it takes an active role in escalating, mind you.)

>It’s because Americans, even poor Americans, overwhelmingly choose personal transportation.

If you take notice, much of the most expensive and valuable property in this country is in dense regions where it is possible to live without a car. If Americans truly had a choice, they'd pick the kinds of walkable communities they can only experience now on university campuses and in theme parks.

[NoblePublius]

It’s funny to me that you think people were forced to by cars by “ripping out trolleys” when it was the buying of cars that did that.

[jandrese]

> It’s not because American government doesn’t invest in public transit. It’s because Americans, even poor Americans, overwhelmingly choose personal transportation.

If there is no usable public transit then people have to use cars. But if they have cars then there isn't the will for the public transit. A vicious circle.

Public transit does need to be built somewhat on a "if you build it they will come" philosophy, which is hard when people want immediate returns on investment.

[NoblePublius]

Again, you have it backwards. Penn Station went bankrupt in the 1960s because rail passenger volume didn’t match the projections made in the 40s and 50s. Most American, even poor Americans, could afford cars, so they bought them. The only way mass transit (it doesn’t have to be public) works is either in dense urban environments or with a society too poor to afford alternatives. I’m not making a pro car argument or anti transit market. I’m just pointing out the actual forces that influence the creation and usage of all transit.

[bpt3]

It is built in major metro areas, and requires endless subsidies to stay afloat in all but one of those areas.

Public transit cannot compete with private transit outside of cost unless you have a very, very high population density, which makes it unpopular with people who can afford alternatives (i.e. almost all Americans).

[pjc50]

Timeline is wrong. Most of the European rail infrastructure (and indeed American) was built before WW1, quite a lot before WW1.

The critical ingredient wasn't wealth per se but oil. Which also determined the lines of attack and victory in the war.

[NoblePublius]

America built train tracks at the same time and the rail Operators went bust post WW2 because Americans stopped taking trains.

[breaker-kind]

and we are severely worse off because of it

[amiga386]

It's a bit more complex than "Americans were rich". Whether they were rich or not:

* the US Federal Government gave returning servicemen a lot of money, including low-cost mortgages and loans, which resulted in huge housebuilding programs that created huge suburbs and exurbs (because it's much cheaper for the housebuilder): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.I._Bill

* the US Gov spent billions on public works to create the highway system in the 1950s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal-Aid_Highway_Act_of_195...

* huge swathes of the USA enacted zoning laws so that the only type of house that could be built was single-family homes with huge gaps between them, creating the lowest possible density neighbourhoods, effectively requiring a car to get around (whereas higher density housing could have the same number of residents and be walkable) -- there's a strong likelyhood this was done to allow white flight to neighbourhoods that keep the socioeconomically deprived out, and until the 1960s it was completely legal to say "you can't rent or sell this house to black people" (it was only made illegal in 1968 with the Fair Housing Act):

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-family_zoning

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redlining

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_steering

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenant_(law)#Exclusionary_co...

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_segregation_in_the_Uni...

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Residential_segregation_in_the...

These components very much add up to incentives to build widely and sparsely and to rely on cars to make it work. It didn't happen because Americans were rich, but because rich Americans wanted to exclude poor people from their lives

[bpt3]

I came here to say this as well.

I don't know why public transit nerds can't accept that their preferences are wildly unpopular with the American public at large, why they can't understand that public transit is a substandard option for anyone who isn't a single, healthy individual of limited means in a relatively urban area (which in case it's not clear, is a tiny percentage of the US population), or why they ignore that almost every human on Earth chooses to buy a private vehicle as soon as they can afford it.