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Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

nytimes.com

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Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#101

Post by Wowfunhappy »

mapgrep wrote: post #95

This conclusion of “a phenomenal success” is based on “a span of several days.” Again, several days. I want this to be true. I support this policy decision. I don’t own a car, live in NY, and want to see the streets reclaimed from drivers. Love it. But if someone declared this experiment a terrible failure after /several days/ I would laugh and say, “please wait a bit so we can examine some real data.” Please, urbani…

Well, it hasn't caused the immediate armageddon some were predicting.

It may be early yet, but realistically, what catastrophes do you foresee that wouldn't have come by now?

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#102

Post by andrewem »

mapgrep wrote: post #95

This conclusion of “a phenomenal success” is based on “a span of several days.” Again, several days. I want this to be true. I support this policy decision. I don’t own a car, live in NY, and want to see the streets reclaimed from drivers. Love it. But if someone declared this experiment a terrible failure after /several days/ I would laugh and say, “please wait a bit so we can examine some real data.” Please, urbani…

One can have evidentiary standards which don't in every circumstance require a long time period. For example, there are (rarely) medical clinical trials which are ended early because the experimental group's protocol (say, a drug or a procedure) works so well that it would be inappropriate to wait longer to give all the study participants the experimental intervention.

People who know more statistics better than I do could provide a more analytical description, but basically given the results so far, the likelihood of a "failure" (for whatever definition the city has chosen) is extremely low.

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#103

Post by kspacewalk2 »

Silverwood wrote: post #8
rememberlenny wrote: post #2

This is one of the more exciting things that has happened to traffic in NYC. Getting rid of cars in a city isn't possible, but being able to make this change to one street at a time seems feasible. I live a block away from this area, and it's completely transformed the neighborhood. It's much safer to walk across 14th st. There are many shops in the area that seem to be getting more foot traffic (no data behind this)…

I visited 14th street yesterday and was amazed by the change. I'm hoping that the city stops offering free street parking next.

Free street parking in Manhattan. Can anything be more ludicrous and unfair?

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#104

Post by [deleted] »

rubyboss wrote: post #32
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just about anyone who has breathed London air in the last 30 years sees how it is progress. Dirty, smelly and unhealthy that creates a coating on clothes, furniture and windows. That's probably not ideal for lungs. We notice, and hate it every time we visit the relatives down there. "Start breathing crap" kicks in around Hendon.

It sounds like you are agreeing with me that you don't want people to own their own cars? I suppose we should all just do as the millenials do: rent cars by the mile (Uber) at ridiculously expensive rates.

[deleted]

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#105

Post by repsilat »

Tiktaalik wrote: post #94

The tech industry is floating all these complex technological ideas so solve traffic congestion, from apps that track traffic, to ride hailing to autonomous cars, but the reality is that traffic congestion is not a tech problem but rather a simple physics problem (and political problem). The core issue is simply that cars physically take up too much space on the road, and move too few passengers. This simple physics…

Autonomous cars and ride-hailing weren't/aren't meant to solve traffic congestion. Traffic tracking actually does help by allowing people to make use of underused capacity.

Otherwise, I agree -- cars take up too much room, especially when there's just one or two people in them. And I like bus lanes, but I think per-vehicle traffic pricing is a better idea, because it achieves the "densification incentive" in a way that also works for carpooling and private bus-like modes.

And before someone says it's regressive, a toll is less onerous than a ban, which is what bus-only lanes are. And (way off topic) I think if income taxes are progressive enough then other types of taxation don't need to be -- and probably shouldn't be, if their purpose is to price externalities.

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#106

Post by lhopki01 »

desert_boi wrote: post #98
throebd wrote: post #4

Maybe fix the metro first? Kiev in Ukraine has better metro than NYC.

I was surprised Budapest had a nicer Metro than Boston/NYC. The Orange Line in Boston is probably older than any of the lines in Budapest.

The Budapest metro is the second oldest metro in the entire world. Only preceeded by the London metro. Boston is the 6th oldest beaten by Chicago in the US.

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#107

Post by thrower123 »

This kind of thing makes sense in Manhattan. Manhattan is relatively tiny, and it is dense, and there is workable public transit. A subway system with stations every quarter mile or less does wonders.

It just doesn't extrapolate to anywhere else in the country particularly well. Even Boston is a shit-show without cars, and that is another dense, old, East Coast city with legacy public transit, albeit much less well designed.

It's a complete non-starter most places.

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#108

Post by hoorayimhelping »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #101
mapgrep wrote: post #95

This conclusion of “a phenomenal success” is based on “a span of several days.” Again, several days. I want this to be true. I support this policy decision. I don’t own a car, live in NY, and want to see the streets reclaimed from drivers. Love it. But if someone declared this experiment a terrible failure after /several days/ I would laugh and say, “please wait a bit so we can examine some real data.” Please, urbani…

Well, it hasn't caused the immediate armageddon some were predicting. It may be early yet, but realistically, what catastrophes do you foresee that wouldn't have come by now?

In the six years I lived in NYC proper, there was a giant flood, a giant power outage, several hurricanes, several blizzards, several city-wide protests, and countless large events taking place on the streets.

That's just a few events I thought of off the top of my head. That doesn't cover the normal ebb and flow of activity in the city - it's pretty busy around Thanksgiving and Christmas, and dead in February, and a zoo in the summertime. How do all those things affect this? What happens when school is out? What happens during shopping season? What happens in heat waves or during snowstorms?

The point is, a lot of different things can happen in the city on pretty annual cycle, and declaring this a success even after a month is pretty silly and potentially very costly.

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#109

Post by refurb »

megaremote wrote: post #84
rubyboss wrote: post #5

I don't understand this anti-car sentiment from the city liberals. It's already happened here in London and it's getting worse. From 20mph speed limits to blocking roads for bus-only traffic to ultra-low emission zones and congestion charges. It's becoming pretty clear that they don't want people to own their own cars. I'm struggling to see how this is progress.

40,000 people are killed every single year in the USA due to cars. Over 2 million are injured or disabled. And that is direct deaths, not including deaths from pollution. That is the tip of the iceberg for problems with cars. And yet, you can't see why cars are a problem? I don't believe you.

Millions are killed by medical mistakes. Does that mean we should do away with doctors?

You can’t count the negative and ignore all the positives.

Re: Restricting Manhattan’s 14th street to buses has been a success

#110

Post by amarshall »

catalogia wrote: post #29
randall wrote: post #9

Imagine if, in high density areas like Manhattan, cars were simply not allowed. Wow. The thought of how pleasant Manhattan would become if only cabs + busses + delivery trucks + ambulances were allowed makes me almost too happy. Would be so awesome.

If driving into Manhattan were not an option, I would expect demand for housing in Manhattan would go up[0]. Of course, housing in Manhattan is already incredibly expensive... I'm sure Manhattan would become very pleasant for those who could still afford to live there. [0] (Suppose for the sake of argument my preference for commuting was driving,walking,transit (in that order.) With the option of driving eliminated m…

Your preference aside, most of the people who commute into Manhattan already take mass transit rather than a car. I don’t think too much would change for most.

I don’t know where you live, but NYC is very different than the rest of the U.S. when it comes to transportation. In NYC, only around half of people own a car (in Manhattan it’s even less: around a quarter).

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