time to rebuild public transit t

{b Washington Post Editorial on Investing in Public transit systems

650 words

1: Public transportation must be updated to a regular standard

All over the world, governments have been investing heavily in public infrastructure building and improving public transit, including high-speed trains. Even Indian cities have been building state-of-the-art subway systems, even Bangkok has a decent system now. East Asia cities have been transformed, and European cities as well. Even African cities are building mass transit systems.
Yet in the US, we have not been investing in public transit and it shows. Public transit systems are old, failing, and falling apart and people are fleeing the systems if they can because they see public transit in the US as dangerous, expensive, and slow. They depend on fares and government funding but generate little income from developing the land next to the stations.

Just one interesting factoid. Seoul and DC both built their first subways in 1974. Both opened state-of-the-art systems. Contrast that to today. The Seoul subway system is vast and spreads out all over the capital region and connects to public transit systems across the region, including a train system to the airport. They are building a huge underground train system, the KTX system, that will make it possible to go from one part of the capital region to another within 30 minutes. The fares are still quite reasonable. Each station is a mini-community center, and all that development generates revenue for the system. The public sees the system as dependable, fast, and generally safe.

The DC system is falling apart and has safety issues, and riders have fled the system because it is correctly seen as old, run-down, dangerous, expensive, and inflexible, and public transit riders are subjected to bad behavior by people misusing the system. There are often no services available including public toilets! And Ione cannot hear clearly the announcements. A good deal of foreign transit systems have figured out that each train station can become a mini-community business center including building affordable housing, shopping, and office buildings along with parking, and clean public toilets. They give all announcements in multiple languages, which people can hear and see on displays! All that development occurs on land owned by the transit system and then generates rental income that they use to further maintain and improve the system. Most people take public transit in big cities around the world. Police who take quick action to prevent crimes and bad behavior patrolled the trains and buses. And people support the government by providing such essential public goods.

And now we have the possibility of building Maglev trains, and even Hyperloop trains. We could if we had the political will to build out in the big metro areas of East Asia like mass transit, which would benefit everyone – providing an alternative to driving and allowing people to go out and have a drink at night is just one benefit! Cutting way down on gasoline consumption, and pollution, and improving travel on congested highways as well. And with new models of transit on-demand local buses can become like Uber vans along with regular bus mass transit systems, and high-speed trains making it possible to go from NYC to DC in an hour, and all at an affordable cost to the user.
And if transit becomes dependable, inexpensive, and safe, it will become the preferred mode of travel for lots of trips. Solving the problem of bad behavior in public places is of course, a challenge every country is facing. But the fundamental point remains, the US public transit system is failing and is a joke.

It is time for the US to invest again in public infrastructure and do it right. No reason to reinvent the wheel. Just visit cities around the world that have shown how it can be done, and then do it. Including, of course, using public transit stations as mini-commercial centers and affordable housing clusters which generate revenues used to maintain and improve the systems. And look at the next-generation technology MAGLEV and Hyperloop technology, and of course BRT and bus-only lines along major urban and suburban arterial roads. And using AI systems to design stations that correspond to where people live and work better than the current bus and rail systems, which do not go where people need to go.

But sadly, as long we are held hostage to the anti-government spending philosophy and refuse to invest in public infrastructure, we will continue to have our public infrastructure fall apart, including roads, freeways, and bridges that we all depend upon.

(Choose one and bold it)

1: Public transportation must be updated to a regular standard

2: Why it is important to keep the rivers clean of plastics

3: Create more places for people with special needs

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