Columnist Steven Greenhut explains why public transit will never replace the auto, and chastises planners trying to use transit for social engineering.
"The Orange County Transportation Authority, charged with developing the transportation systems that move us around, is dominated by ideologues who echothat trendy anti-car sentiment.
...I call it nostalgia as public policy, as planners ignore the way Americans really get around and instead try to build retro-style systems that would prod us to live like in olden days.
...As a longtime transit user, I can attest that the transit-dependent world planners are recreating is a dreadful dystopian place of shuffling, huddled masses filing into train cars and buses, building their lives around other people's schedules and other people's preferences.
...Mobility is freedom. Which largely explains why government officials, academics and planners are so hostile to the automobile, suburbia and every other icon of the American Dream."
[Editor's note: The OC Register required free registration.]
Thanks to PreservingtheAmericanDream
Read the full story: The fevered dreams of transit planners
Desperate measures: Advocates weigh draining Lake Powell to fill Colorado River
Draining the reservoir could reduce evaporation losses by a couple hundred thousand acre-feet.
Eastern Nebraska is running out of electricity
Data centers and electrification are straining eastern Nebraska’s grid, throttling economic development.
Move over, LA: St. Louis gears up for Olympics, invests millions in downtown redevelopment
The Missouri city will host the 2028 Olympic soccer group stage and knockout matches.
Mass. votes against statewide minimum lot size for single-family homes
Over 2 million residents voted on Question 7; it was decided by just over 30,000 votes.
Maryland’s $15 billion bridge project gains key approval
The Maryland Transit Authority said the project will create over 60,000 jobs and add $23 billion to the local economy.
‘No clear next steps’ for Chicago's permanent festival grounds
Eleventh Ward Ald. Nicole Lee has suggested Soldier Field as a possible location for the permanent event space.
FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?
After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.
Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold
The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.
City of Rosemead
Rutgers University, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
One Hundred Miles
University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS)
Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY)
The Architects Foundation
City of Cambridge
Montrose County
The Pocatello Development Authority