[Hasz]

Ah, but public transit is inherently the slowest option. I have no desire to make 10 stops before I get where I'm going. I also have zero desire to rent my modes, as that encourages literally rent seeking behavior.

Either we need to figure out how to drop off and pickup passengers at speed, or penalize individualized transport that is space inefficient (like cars). Good luck pursuing the latter in the US; punitive measure seem to work elsewhere.

I think the way forward is compact private transport, like bikes, scooters, walking, etc, augmented by a robust mass public transit. Unfortunately, that mix implies a expensive re-configuring of most American cities.

[robrenaud]

> Ah, but public transit is inherently the slowest option.

This isn't true if you are in a dense city with good public transit. This is currently mid day (3 PM), and it's about 30% faster (21 minutes vs 29 minutes) to go from my current location in Manhattan to a bar I enjoy hanging out in Brooklyn via public transit than car, according to Google Maps. It would be even better around rush hour.

[TylerE]

In the same way it isn't true that healthcare in the US isn't unaffordable as long as you're a successful businessman with lots of savings. Maybe technically correct, but useless to most people.

[jtcruthers]

There are maybe 2 or 3 cities in the entire United States that are dense enough with good enough public transportation. The vast majority of the population cannot relate.

[jgwil2]

GP is refuting the idea that public transit is inherently the slowest mode of transportation by providing an instructive counter-example. If the vast majority of the population cannot relate, that's a product of policy choices that favor sparse development in most of the country.

[look_lookatme]

Not true at 10pm but good on your for getting a 3pm drink going.

[sparkling]

New York City is perhaps the only major city in the US where public transit is indeed faster than individual modes transportation (scooter, car, bike, whatever).

[piffey]

This all is heavily dependent on how you align your day to day life. If you set up your work and living situation along the LA Subway or BART or Seattle's Link Light Rail then you'll always be able to get there faster using those services. Even in NYC you can end up in places that are a bit of transit wastelands that take longer to get to than by car.

[smallgovt]

>> Ah, but public transit is inherently the slowest option.

I don't see how it is 'inherently' the slowest, especially given the traffic patterns that inherently result from private transit options.

>> I have no desire to make 10 stops before I get where I'm going.

The point of public transit in the form of e-scooters and e-bikes is to make your door-to-door commute one trip.

>> I also have zero desire to rent my modes, as that encourages literally rent seeking behavior.

Most people just care about convenience and price. Shared mobility options like e-bikes and e-scooters check both boxes if they can reach scale.

[zymhan]

I work 4.5 miles from my apartment in Atlanta. I can either spend 40 minutes in traffic getting home every day, or I can spend an equivalent amount of time on a train, and the a bus ride or walking.

In a lot of cities, driving is not faster. It's just sometimes the only option.

[pasttense01]

So how frequently does the train run? If it runs every hour that means on average there is a half hour wait for the train--in addition to the 40 minutes for the trip. Conversely the car is instantly available.

[JohnFen]

> public transit is inherently the slowest option

This is certainly true where I live -- public transit is the slowest by a large margin. Driving is generally the next slowest, depending on the exact trip. Bicycling tends to be the quickest.

[NhanH]

Scooter is a horrible horrible mean of transporation for the mass.

I lives in Vietnam, where scooters are dominant. It is even less compact than car on the road.

[Symbiote]

Almost everyone means an electric kick scooter, not the vehicles in Vietnam - those are motor scooters.

[rainyMammoth]

Which I also find a weird language abuse. The original meaning of "scooter" is the vehicle in Vietnam. Why did we suddenly agree to call those "kick scooters" as "scooters".

This is even more confusing for companies like "scoot" that rent both "scooters" and "kick scooters"

[Symbiote]

No. The original meaning is actually a boat for use on ice and water, in 1903.

Then in 1917 it was used to refer to the children's toy.

Source: printed OED.

[et2o]

They have called these things scooters for over twenty years at this point.