Transportation For America » The invisible benefits of public transportation

The invisible benefits of public transportation

August 10, 2009
By Stephen Lee Davis

Every morning in New York City, hundreds of thousands pass quickly and nearly invisibly through tunnels and a few bridges into Manhattan’s Central Business District via New York’s well-traveled transit system. Though the sidewalks are still full of walkers and the streets full of cabs, buses, and cars, the real action is happening below the surface where the number of people traveling into the CBD is almost just beyond comprehension. Michael Frumin looked at the numbers at fruminator and tried to put it in perspective:

Just to get warmed up, chew on this — from 8:00AM to 8:59 AM on an average Fall day in 2007 the NYC Subway carried 388,802 passengers into the CBD on 370 trains over 22 tracks. In other words, a train carrying 1,050 people crossed into the CBD every 6 seconds. Breathtaking if you ask me.

Over this same period, the average number of passengers in a vehicle crossing any of the East River crossings was 1.20. This means that, lacking the subway, we would need to move 324,000 additional vehicles into the CBD (never mind where they would all park).

Frumin actually takes a shot at what Manhattan might look like if you had wide enough bridges to move all those cars — and more importantly, where to park them. And in a word? Wow.

Creative Commons Photo from Michael Frumin

h/t to kottke.org

Filed under: Campaign Blog
Tags: commuting, new york, parking, public transportation, trains, transit

9 Responses to “The invisible benefits of public transportation”

Rob on
August 10th, 2009 11:41 am

Very interesting. This provides a nice response to an argument I often hear in other cities: “if you don’t give people a place to cheaply park their cars, nobody is going to come downtown.”
Sydney Green on
August 24th, 2009 3:28 pm

I agree – transit is essential – FOR NEW YORK CITY. As for the rest of the country, it will never go enough places to be practical as a real alternative to personal vehicles. If transit is so popular, why can’t it sustain itself without huge tax subsidies? Transit is welfare for people who can’t afford cars. It saves nothing in pollution – I see huge smoke-billowing buses driving in major cities all over the country with like 5 people in them. And commuter rail only covers a tiny percentage of even large cities.
Let’s spend our money on roads and bridges that everyone can use, and on greener fuels for cars, not transit.
Oleg on
August 27th, 2009 1:47 pm

Too many cars on the streets, streets without sidewalks, “no pedestrian” signs, under-developed or non-existing public transportation options, etc. make a number of U.S. cities less desirable places to live or even “dead”…
Jay Everett on
August 27th, 2009 3:25 pm

It’s interesting that opponents of transit spending fail to recognize the 40 Billion dollar budget of the federal highway administration as subsidized transportation. Virtually our entire transportation system is “subsidized” the question is “Are we making smart decisions about how those dollars are being spent?”
In urban areas highways and parking garages will never match the efficiencies of a well funded transit system. Over 2 thirds of our population reside in cities; we should be investing where the people are, not building more rural highways when we already have a very extensive interstate system. Let’s promote rural economic development through agriculture instead of wasting our money on mile after mile of asphalt. Why not dedicate a higher percentage for repairing the existing highway infrastructure and focus all moneys for new transportation spending on transit and high-speed rail projects?
Stephen Lee Davis on
August 27th, 2009 4:55 pm

Sydney, you might be interested in this nugget from Ryan Avent:

“Consider: the Texas DOT determined that gas tax revenues came nowhere close to covering life-cycle road costs, and that for a typical road to cover its costs of maintenance and construction the gas tax might need to approach $2 per gallon.”

As far as transit goes outside of NYC, I would say the millions of daily riders on systems outside of NYC would probably disagree with you on the vital need for or utility of the systems in their area. As would the 1/3 of Americans who either don’t drive, can’t drive, or choose not to drive. People across the country — from huge metro areas outside of NYC down to dial-a-ride paratransit services in rural areas — depend on public transportation to get them where they’re going each day. And transit is welfare inasmuch as the roads we’re driving on are welfare; not fully covered by the taxes we pay for them. i.e., subsidized by the government.

While that bus you see with no one on it might not be that efficient, the thousands or hundreds of thousands of railcars and buses that are packed with record numbers of people each day are quite energy efficient. That issue has been studied extensively, and public transport is certainly more energy efficient and less-polluting.
Harvey I Kahler on
August 27th, 2009 6:00 pm

Three substantial costs often overlooked in auto commuting is the free parking at home and at the office.
1) How many executives get free parking at the office as a “perk” while the company contributes little in taxes for public transit for other employees?
2) Tax laws favor driving allowing full deduction for parking while transit fares are capped – who wouldn’t want to get as much out of the company as possible?
3) How many drivers include the cost of their garage at home in commuting costs?
Sandra ADICKES on
August 28th, 2009 1:06 pm

I plan to return to New York City because I miss public transportation, which is not as good as it should be because so many people are in love with cars.