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Do you take public transportation regularly?

yoyo5280 said:
Yea. Driving in Denver is just much more convenient for us. Easy to find your way, traffics okay, parking ain't to hard.

I am surprised though that I did not walk anywhere. Nobody does!
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Downtown, I guess, but nobody's going to walk down Colorado Boulevard to the suburbs.
 
public transportation where i am i pretty useless. the metro north station is about a mile from my house, so i walk up there (or get dropped off if it's cold or rainy, or i'm going out in shoes too fabulous to walk in) and i take the train sometimes. it's only good for going to a handful of places, usually i just take it a few towns over and get picked up by a friend at another station, it's just to avoid sitting in rush hour traffic, and since it only costs about $2-3 to get somewhere fairly local, it really works out to be the same as what it would cost me in gas sitting in traffic. other than that, i've never taken the bus here, it would be ridiculously inconvenient as opposed to just taking my car.

let's compare:

walking a mile to post road, waiting for a bus, probably needing to go to bridgeport and get on a different bus.

vs...

getting in my car and being where i need to be in 15 minutes, less than it would take me to walk to the bus stop.

i just don't live somewhere where i deal with a ton of traffic or anything, the bus here is just for people who don't have a car, it takes five times as long to get anywhere.
 
dsnort said:
The DC Metro is awesome!
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I visited D.C. a few summers ago and took the Metro everywhere. I had a great experience. Several of the people that sat by me worked at the White House and congressional office buildings.

They were all extremely friendly and unusually chatty. One lady worked as a secretary/assistant at the White House. She was telling me how laid back it was that week (middle of the Summer) because President Bush was on vacation in Crawford.

Haha.
 
I take public transit everyday.

Since I mostly travel during commute hours, I save at least 15-30 minutes each way, and 50 cents per trip in gas despite my very fuel efficient car.

Plus I can do work while riding the train, so it's a great way to get ready for the day, or conversely wind-down on the way home.
Gelfin said:
I never drive in town if I can help it.
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Yeah, SF is best done via public transit. Even Berkeley isn't so nice in a car, what with parking and the crazy pedestrians. :p
<snip>
When you've gotten by without for a while it becomes more obvious just how much the darn thing costs you.
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Indeed. I hope I can go for a few years without one, but I know that I'll eventually have to settle and buy one just because the Bay Area is too spread out. :eek:
 
tobefirst said:
I actually took the train/bus to work last week for the first time ever. My car was in the shop and I'm trying to save up my vacation days. My commute is about 35-40 by car (dang the Hwy 40 shutdown), and took me about an hour and 40 minutes to do it via public transportation. If I had had to have taken it home, it would have taken more than 2 hours.

Sadly, I get carsick when I read in a car, so I don't know that I'd be able to get much of anything done on the bus. ):
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Ahhh...you must live and/or work out in the city. Public transportation is nearly nonexistant out here in Chesterfield.
 
Absolutely. NYC has the most extensive subway system in the U.S. Really convenient for getting around.

As you can see, the subway lines cover pretty much the entire city...

sub1a.gif

sub2a.gif
 
Yes, I get public buses here regularly and they are quite good - very cheap (30 cents for any journey).

If I am in a hurry I catch a cab, which is pretty much any car on the road - peeople will take you to where you want to go for a small fee, if it is on their way or they have time to kill.
 
Me not. Not so often.
I usually move by my own car. But if a need to get Moscow center especially on workdays I use Tube as there are huge traffic jams in Moscow.
On weekends I also take tube if I go at the party on in the club/bar and going to drink some alco with my friends. :) Or I take a taxi if there is too late. Tube closes at 01.00 AM in Moscow. Here is the map, by the way:

moscow-karta-metro2.gif
 
Yes, but I don't like it.

It really, really gets to me that the backbone of Canada has such an abysmal transit system.
 
We've got this cool gig in Lyon where you can take these sturdy bikes around and just re-insert them at the nearest station to your destination, which are everywhere. It's pretty cool, and I don't drive too much in the city anymore.
 
shikimo said:
We've got this cool gig in Lyon where you can take these sturdy bikes around and just re-insert them at the nearest station to your destination, which are everywhere. It's pretty cool, and I don't drive too much in the city anymore.
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that's a really good idea! how is it paid for? (so idiots don't steal them) do you swipe a card to release them and swipe again when you return, or what? <curious>
 
Here's the RTD map for Denver:
lightrailmap.gif

Now that I look at it, it would make absolutely no sense for me to take it because my school is too far west and my home is due east from it.
 
That's really good - I lived there 20 years ago and there was nothing like that, but the bus system was pretty good anyway - the metro was a bit basic however.
shikimo said:
We've got this cool gig in Lyon where you can take these sturdy bikes around and just re-insert them at the nearest station to your destination, which are everywhere. It's pretty cool, and I don't drive too much in the city anymore.
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Pretty much never. If LA's public transportation system was better I'd use it though. When I studied in London I loved not having to worry about a car or parking. The closest I get to public transpo is riding my bike to work 2-3 days a week.


Lethal
 
iBlue said:
that's a really good idea! how is it paid for? (so idiots don't steal them) do you swipe a card to release them and swipe again when you return, or what? <curious>
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Yeah, that's pretty much how it works; you get a card, either short-term or long-term, that involves either giving a bank card number (short term) or check (long-term) for 150EU as a caution (they don't cash it unless you take a bike and don't return it), and then you beep the card to take a bike out. When you return it you don't have to do anything; the little gizmo you hook the bike up to beeps to acknowledge that you gave the bike back.

They are paid for and installed by a private company (JC Decaux, the multi-national advertising giant) in exchange for access to 1000s of extremely valuable advertising sites at bus stops in the city. They also travel around and fix the bikes as they become damaged, move them when there are too many in one place and not enough in another (as happens regularly in hilly parts of town), etc. The bikes are really heavy, but solid and functional, with most of the moving parts hidden to deter theft.

As mentioned in this article in le Monde about some of the troubles Paris is having with their velo arrangement, a similar system is coming to London in 2010 (it's only in French, sorry):

http://www.lemonde.fr/technologies/...us-caution_1030300_651865.html#ens_id=1021389

We are very proud of our "Velo'v" here, which is slightly different than the "Velibre" in Paris. Even if Parisiens won't admit it, Lyon was the first city in Europe to do this on such a large scale, and it's been a huge success; there are enough stations and enough bike lanes now to pretty much go anywhere in the city quickly and safely. Combined with a good subway, an above-ground tramway and a huge bus network, you can get anywhere in the Lyon urban area (about the size of Baltimore or Tampa in the US or Leeds in the UK) without a car quite easily. My wife and I have a car, but it's for vacations and moving heavy things only.

[wait, did i just say 'we' in reference to a city full of french people? have i lived here long enough to start BECOMING french?? WHO AM I?!?!?!?]
 
shikimo said:
We've got this cool gig in Lyon where you can take these sturdy bikes around and just re-insert them at the nearest station to your destination, which are everywhere. It's pretty cool, and I don't drive too much in the city anymore.
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iBlue said:
that's a really good idea! how is it paid for? (so idiots don't steal them) do you swipe a card to release them and swipe again when you return, or what? <curious>
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It is an excellent idea — I used the one in Paris a while back. The bikes are a bit "sit-up-and-beg" while the basket in front feels a tad twee. But gets the job done. :D:D

I see Ken Livingstone is proposing it for London… hummmmmmmm. I wonder if it will translate well into the UK. :rolleyes:

Link
“The cycle hire scheme in Paris has proved a huge success, and I have now instructed Transport for London to work with the London boroughs and interested parties to develop and implement a bike hire scheme in central London, accessible to all Londoners.
· A Central London bike hire scheme, similar to the recently launched Paris scheme, with up to 6,000 bikes located across docking stations every 300m so Londoners and visitors have quick and easy access to a bike. This will be supported by a series of easily navigable routes so that people can enjoy London’s sights by bike.
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iMacZealot said:
Here's the RTD map for Denver:
denver light rail
.
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Just from seeing it like that it looks horribly inefficient. What a dumb layout. (granted, I don't know the area but it doesn't take a genius to know that more lines going in more directions is better than several all doing the same thing with very few stops) <shrug>

arkitect said:
It is an excellent idea — I used the one in Paris a while back. The bikes are a bit "sit-up-and-beg" while the basket in front feels a tad twee. But gets the job done. :D:D

I see Ken Livingstone is proposing it for London… hummmmmmmm. I wonder if it will translate well into the UK. :rolleyes:

Link
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I do think it's a good idea and I imagine it would go over fairly well in london... enough that it would be worth a shot.
 
yoyo5280 said:
tokyo metro map ;)
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Just to add, here is the JR East railway lines around Tokyo proper.

TokyoJRMap.gif


Sorry for the large image.

To get your bearings, Tokyo proper is located between the Shinjuku and Tokyo stations -- basically what is inside the Yamanote line (green on the map and circles Tokyo).

Unfortunately, this map does not show the private railways and subways that surround Tokyo. Usually there are various ways to get to your location depending on which is important to you: speed, cost, train type, etc.

Heck even if you wanted to go skiing, you can go by train. Convenient.

Bottom line, is we are connected here with mass transit. :)
 
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