[ared38]

I'm not impressed with either side in this argument.

Jarrett Walker is confusing capacity with crowding. It's ridiculous that he can't admit having someone's underarm shoved into your face during peak hours does in fact suck.

Meanwhile Musk is an idiot if he actually thinks single occupancy self driving cars will reduce traffic (I don't think he does). If sitting in traffic becomes more pleasant because you'll be watching tv, more people will choose to sit in traffic. Adding tunnels won't help if you're still wasting a car-sized space on a tiny human.

Just running more buses and actually policing harassment on them would make transit both more convenient and pleasant without giving up the capacity that's essential to move an entire city worth of people around. It doesn't have to be rocket science.

[tbabb]

Agree. I suspect Musk doesn't get how efficient good public transport can be (NYC when the system is working well), and the author doesn't get how substandard most public transit systems are.

I have strong doubts that single- or low-occupancy vehicles could outcompete trains or buses on efficiency. I also think public transit could be way better than it is. I'm not sure I buy Musk's vision (which does seem out-of-touch), and I definitely don't buy the author's position that "nothing is wrong".

[dzhiurgis]

It's probably one of those cases where less efficient node in the system makes entire system more efficient overall. Perhaps we need to reduce car use by 20% to make transport 300% more comfortable, practical, attractive.

I remember seeing pics of a concept bus Tesla was rumoured to manufacture, where every seat has it's own doors and personal area. So maybe it's capacity is half normal bus, but 20x a car. Even if it works like Uber Pool, overall it's a net win.

Finally, I don't think he's trying to disrupt public transport entirely, rather to introduce better options.

[linkmotif]

> It's ridiculous that he can't admit having someone's underarm shoved into your face during peak hours does in fact suck.

I live in New York. If it wasn’t for gropers, I think it’s actually OK. Kind of a nice way to commune with humanity actually. I’m tired of the opposite: people expecting to be in lonesome luxury everywhere they go. It’s not efficient, it’s sterile and boring. This from a solid misanthrope.

[trowawee]

Also a bit of a misanthrope, but I'd totally second this. I moved to Chicago from another Midwestern city that had no public transit a few years back, and I seriously sing the praises of the CTA to everyone. I have my share of gripes about city life, but on the whole, I love Chicago and I love public transit. I went from spending half an hour every morning and half an hour every evening in the boring-but-also-dangerous hell that is a car commute to spending that same time on a train. I usually listen to music in the morning and read in the evenings, and I've listened to more new albums and read more new books in the last few years than I have in any comparable period since college.