[pjerem]

Another huge exemple : in most big cities in Europe you have special parking lots around big public transit hubs outside of the city where you can park for free as long as you continue your journey by public transit.

In a lot of cities, that’s either the fastest or the most comfortable way to go somewhere in the city when you come from the outside.

Not any single navigation app support this (tbf, the few European ones don’t support it either)

[daemin]

There was a Not Just Bikes video about how Google Maps is optimised for driving where it pretty much actively hides the biggest walking routes and promotes roads for driving by making them bigger. Useful in the USA for sure but actively harmful in Europe, given that you're more likely to plan a route by which roads you can see, and unless you know what to look for you're not going to find them easily.

[spockz]

Yes. Unfortunately transit between public transit is always walking. No options to take a first part by bike or car, or folding bikes for intermediate hops.

[londons_explore]

The long tail of user desires is loooong. For example "I want to take transit, but please exclude transit options where I cannot take my non-folding bicycle". Or "I don't have a raincoat, suggest only bus stops with a roof, oh and by the way I don't like the uncomfortable seats on the purple line but will take it if there is no other way".

I think LLM's with access to lots of personal data and the ability to scout the web might solve all these use cases in one fell swoop, rather than trying to design a user interface with buttons, algorithms and data sources for every obscure use case.

[spockz]

Is it that long tail? Biking and riding are supported in most planners already. Park and ride, or kiss and ride, are well known concepts around the world. It seems like a straightforward extension of what already exists.

[pjerem]

I mean, my example about parking to take public transit are not long tails, it's what is officially encouraged by the cities themselves.

[pjmlp]

I think you mean country/region capitals, or countries like Germany.

I can assert than this isn't a thing in most Portuguese big cities, although it would be great to have it.

[holgerschurig]

In Germany it's often not IN cities, but around. Example for Frankfurt:

The's a metro ("S-Bahn") going north up to Friedberg/Hessen. Friedberg is the capital of the country. But there's no free "Park & Ride" there. Two stations towards Frankfurt you are in village called Wöllstadt. And there you have a free Park & Ride. More south some other village, no P&R. But then again in Bad Vilbel you have one.

Is however P&R + public tansport the fastest way to Frankfurt? That depends.

First, the Wöllstadt P&R isn't easily accessible from the Autobahn, or not even from the B3, which goes around Wöllstadt. And even when it went through it some years ago, it was several turn-left turn-rights through small streets.

And then the S6 only drives every 30 minutes to Frankfurt. It's supposed to change once they double the train tracks, but that will change. On top of it: metro lines don't have precedence, the quick trains like ICE have. So the S-Bahn more often than not waits until a faster train passes.

If it isn't between 7-9 in the morning, you're actually faster by car in Frankfurt than by public transport ... So the P&R is quite helpful for people living in the neighboring villages: they go by car to Wöllstadt, park there for free, commute to Frankfurt by metro. And that traffic jam free ... but not necessarily fast. And since parking in Frankfurt usually comes with a price tag, it's also a bit cheaper.

So it's nice to have this, but it's no all roses.

[pjmlp]

Well at least on NRW, I can say that there are enough P&R around here.

However compared with European countries like Portugal, this is a complete different reality.

This was my main point, because there are these "in Europe public transport is so great" remarks, yes it is, provided one is lucky to be on the right parts of Europe, as you also kind of refer to by your no all roses scenario.