01-12-2014, 01:49 AM
N-OS X-tasy! wrote:
Take this segment, for example:
Before I could even begin to debunk the myth of auto-centric Los Angeles, however, L.A.’s own complete streets advocates — aware of the conventions of the genre — gave me a preliminary debunking. “There’s this recycled myth that L.A. was built around the car, and pretty much everyone who ever writes anything starts with that,” explained Malcolm Carson, the policy director for environmental health at Community Health Councils, a local nonprofit. “Empirically, it’s just not true. The vast majority was built around streetcar lines, the most extensive rail system in the world.”
It is absolutely NOT a myth that Los Angeles was built around the car. While it is true that we used to have a light rail system here, as early as 1927 low ridership caused a shift in focus from light rail to buses for mass transit in L.A.
The following factors led to the rise of the automobile as the dominant mode of transit in L.A.:
- a population explosion that gave birth to the sprawling suburbs that today define the region
- creation of the interstate system, which gave rise to the famous L.A. freeways
- a sharp uptick in post-WWII prosperity that enabled many families to not only purchase new homes in far-flung suburbs, but also to purchase automobiles that enabled them to travel anywhere in the sprawling SoCal region quickly and conveniently
- obscenely inexpensive gas prices
By 1963 - FIFTY years ago - the final remnants of L.A.'s original light rail system had been removed from service. We've been a driver's town since then. Buses remain the primary mode of mass transit. While light rail has established a new foothold in the last 20 years or so, it will never become the dominant mode of transit for the simple reason that it is impossible to create a light rail system with a high enough station density to convince people to get out of their cars. No one wants to have to take a train AND THEN a bus to get to a destination - it is much easier to simply drive.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metro_Rail_...29#History
OK, let's take your 1927 "shift." Los Angeles had a million people at that point. It was "built." Nothing you wrote reinforces the assertion that L.A. was built around the car. If anything, your quoted passage made $tevie's article's point, no?