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Depending on your definition, this actually is not peak performance.
Subways are.
Obviously, the tunnels are absurdly expensive, but nothing moves as many people as quickly around a city as a subway.
They're also extremely reliable, meaning people are even more likely to actually use them, and their above-ground footprint is essentially zero.
Subways are for mobility (moving large numbers of people rapidly); trams are for access (getting you close to your destination). They complement each other and a well-designed city would have both.
STOP I can only get so erect
You're going to make me write a cute green-urbania fiction of my self-insert walking around a beautiful city with parks everywhere and using the sub-rails to go far distances and then get on cute retro san francisco style over land trams to make my way to walk-only brick roads and then walk to some book store, the corners piled high with books, with books stacked outside the store under a cloth awning, owned by a wise old man of unclear nationality who spends his days reading the books he sells, who knows me well enough to offer a glass of tea.
I have to disagree. Accessibility of underground transport is abhorrent. Changing from underground to aboveground buses and trains is also shit. The space use of public transport in comparison to car infrastructure is completely negligible. If anything put all the cars underground as they are ugly and stinky. This picture also give you happy chemical because it is green and is not another dead, sealed asphalt hellscape.
I quite like underground transport, the stations can be absolutely stunning.
But I like watching things outside the trams.
Skytrains my dude, similar footprint, same tech, and I assume it costs significantly less, and is able to dip underground when there absolutely ISNT the footprint for it above ground
Monorail!
While monorails are cool, skytrains are literally just trains and thus insanely hard to beat for cost vs efficiency
If San Francisco informs, light rail streetcars are a gateway to underground subways. It gets the city in the habit of getting on a railcar to go places while the greater infrastructure (the tunnels) are built.
MUNI is mixed undeground and street. BART is over and under and being extended to this day.
Yeah, I guess it depende of definition. For example there is also extra costs with lighting and ventilation for example for subways.
I cannot understand people that argue their 6 lane stroad is better than this in any way. It may feel more convenient for some, but at what cost?
Probably because public transit requires people to be around other people, and they'd rather get around in their little bubble without interaction (except giving a BMW the finger).
This but also a lack of experiencing good transit
True, but I'm just going off of my experience as an American. Too many people are so antisocial that the idea of sharing space with other strangers is foreign, mostly because they've lived so long without it. Obviously this isn't true in places like NYC, but in Los Angeles you'd have a hell of a time convincing people to give up their cars.
I think a lack of being in public spaces creates the antisocial "uncomfortable around other people" issues that have been growing. Sprawl kills communities!
For me its mostly the time factor. A 45 min drive takes 2 to 3 hours by transit in my city, or longer one way. And thats if busses show up and make connections. I would love to take transit but can't make it work in a any that would mean I still get to sleep.
That is because your transit is underfunded and under prioritized. Good, viable transit is as fast or faster than cars.
underfunded and under prioritized
Or designed and scheduled by incompetence
Japanese transit it a sight to behold. Experienced it firsthand. In the greater Tokyo area taking a car was literally always just a 3 or 4 minute time save AND this was including the walk from anywhere I was at, to the sub, to my destination. If you accounted for parking time, since I didnt see much easily accesible parking over there, it was probably quicker to take public transit. If I lived over there I legit wouldn't bother owning a car and I say this as someone who currently has one and really likes it.
There's no fucking public sitting areas though so that sucks.
Just today I saw this list of the largest tram networks in history: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_tram_and_light_rail_transit_systems_ever
The largest existing one is Melbourne, at a little over 250 km of tramways. Los Angeles at its peak had over 1700 km of tramways.
Truly insane what we tore up. A crime against humanity.
Truly insane what we tore up.
Didn't know much about this so just looked it up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy
Why does every problem ever always boil down to capitalism?
The combination of those trees and overhead power lines might be problematic in some climates, but overall, I'm all for getting as much greenery into city centers as possible.
This is at Helsinki, Finland. So all kind of weather is present here.. Well except hot and dry 😄
On the other hand, there's a billion saunas around the city if you want hot and dry
Off camera, there's a lawn mower driving as fast as it can away from the approaching tram
I'm stuck in stupid America, but my British friends tell me of regular rail delays because of leaves on the rails. I assume that isn't a problem with these trains, so why is this a problem in the UK?
It's a big problem for anything using rails. https://youtu.be/ZEuFSw-CMzU?feature=shared
Maybe they're just taking a piss? Same for the whole train system shutting down due to a single snowflake.
I've been looking into it since I posted that and apparently it makes the rails slippery and the trains have to slow down because of it and trains have to slow down because of it.
https://www.northernrailway.co.uk/leaves-line
So I guess the answer is that these trains have to slow down too.
This looks more like a tram than a train and they don't go fast anyway, so I don't think they'd need to slow down.
What's not to like?
I'm looking at unadulterated communism here and I hate it! Remove the green and the tracks and let honest working people park their lifted F 350 to go grocery shopping and bring little Braendin to school!
One small problem. Pantographs and tree lines.
It is beautiful though.
Eh, it's nothing that actually having enough budget to fund proper maintenance (e.g. tree pruning) can't solve. Presumably, any city on-the-ball enough to build decent infrastructure like this in the first place has got that covered.
devils advocate:
"Would"? The picture isn't fake, plenty of tram tracks look like this.
-concidering it is in the middle of a city there are basialy no wild animals -this isnt more dangerous to the remaining few than any 4 lane Road -there are city maintenance workers who take care of the trees -during realy bad storms there are also branches on the streets
vs
1 billion different advantages
The actuall biggest problem would be leaves on the rails in autumn.
me like tramz