Just because the transit system compares favorably to others doesn't automatically qualify it for being decent. My personal situation serves as a good example.
By bus, it takes me over an hour and a half to get to work. By bike, it's about 35 minutes. By car, I think it would probably be about 20 minutes. When you also consider how infrequently the bus comes past my aparment, it's no contest. Commuting by bus would cost me an extra 2 hours every day, probably more counting time spent waiting for the bus. In my opinion, it's no wonder people aren't taking the bus. Tom Theisen > The Madison area already has an excellent and well-used transit system, > comparing very favorably to > systems in similarly sized areas as well as peer transit systems with > similar service levels. Yet despite having such a system, and a bicycle > path system for much of the city that's top notch compared to most > similar sized cities around the country, most Madisonians continue to > choose driving their own cars to work everyday, mostly alone in their > vehicle. According to the Draft Comprehensive Plan, the percentage share > of City of Madison commuters driving alone to work increased from 61 > percent to 66 percent from 1990 to 2000, and the percentage share taking > mass transit dropped from 7.7 percent to 7.2 percent. > > A decent public transit system is clearly NOT enough of a draw to > Madisonians to get them out of their cars, SUVs and other motorized > vehicles and using a more environmentally sustainable and > community-friendly mode of travel such as Madison Metro transit. The > answer is clearly not to provide yet another mass transit system on top > of the one that's currently not even being used to capacity. > > The answer is to find ways to make it more desirable for Madisonians to > choose mass transit and non motorized forms of travel options over > driving their own personally owned automobiles, particular driving alone. > (See above links.) > > Now go have a beer, or two, or three... but whatever you do, please don't > drive! > > Mike Neuman _______________________________________________ Bikies mailing list [email protected] http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies
