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Life in the greater Phoenix area is so much better, now that the Valley Metro Light Rail system connects to the airport. I can walk from my house in Tempe to a local bus to get on the light rail to the free Sky Train to the airport terminals and back.

I've been in Austin since 2013 and the city continues to grow leaps and bounds. Just look at all of the highrises on Rainey street. I spend most of my time in north austin around burnet and north lamar area and can say there has been a lot of ongoing construction of six story loft apartments in the area. Just look at the old Highland Mall. I've noticed a trend up here where retail land owners are selling their parking lots to developers who then put up these lofts. One of the biggest things that is needed to soften up a housing market is investment capital and there is no shortage of that in Texas. One day Austin will connect San Antonio with Temple Killeen and will be one of the largest metro areas in the nation and thus putting in transportation in at this stage of the game is key to keeping those transportation development costs low. Otherwise, trying to upgrade transportation projects after the fact is very costly. Austin is on a good role.

I like this video as a Houstonian, as it shines light onto the bus and rail system we have in the city. Hopefully, we can improve our transportation system and make it more accessible for everyone.

amazing video!

Excellent content. Enjoying it in San Diego.

Thanks for your recent Houston episode, things definitely seem better than when I tepidly used METRO in the late 1990s...it could be hit or miss, all you had were paper schedules, busses would sometimes just not show up, etc. The train's still pretty cool, I need to try riding it to UH someday for a football game because on-campus/near campus parking on game day is impossible/expensive. Would love to see a video of you guys riding around DFW on public transit....I'm glad that it's theoretically possible to ride DART all the way from Denton to DFW Airport, but disappointed the trip takes just under 3 hours per Google Maps. Would increasing frequency of service make this route faster, more feasible?

@transittangents Hey, I'm the Deputy Director of the City and County of Honolulu's Department of Transportation Services. I run Skyline (ahem, not "Skyway") rail, TheBus fixed-route, Handi-Van paratransit, and Biki bikeshare on the island of Oʻahu. Couple thoughts: We needed a large parcel for the maintenance and storage facility as well as the rail operations center in rural Oʻahu. Yes, it appears we built this backwards when you don't look at the context of the land use, but we simply didn't have the land in our extremely dense and high-cost land urban core. There was no way to start in the city center without a connection to the rail yard, plain and simple. You said it yourself at 26:40, "You gotta build something first." Message me and we can chat about your coverage of our system and point out some of the features of our system that many other American cities are striving to do now: fully autonomous operations, full platform screen gates, open gangways between all cars, 99.2% on-time performance and availability (measured to the second), 100% grade separation) before you say "Cities like Austin need to pay attention to cities like Phoenix... maybe not Honolulu..." If you dug a bit deeper, you'd be surprised. Come pay a visit and I'll show you, honest promise. Message me and let me change your mind. Or at least get our name right before you trash talk us. Skyline.

Light rail to the airport is such a game changer....it makes your city worth visiting.

Arch Student here, Great job combining Transit and Housing development into one single video, a lot of complicated topic explained in an interesting way

I really wish our rail system extended all the way to IAH (Intercontinental Airport) or at least HOU (Hobby Airport)....it's more likely the line will be extended to Hobby (HOU) first and I think that is in the eventual plans.

I sometimes park in the paid garage in Rice Village then walk over to the Rice University/Hermann Park stop if I want to ride into downtown for some reason. It would also be feasible to park in downtown Houston and ride the train over to the University of Houston for a Cougar Football game because near-campus parking is a nightmare on game days.

Man back when I moved to Austin in 2015, my roommate and I shared a 900 sq ft. apartment in Travis Heights for 1025/mo - we both individually paid a little over $500. We were both barbacks at a bar downtown and made $12/hr plus some tips and worked less than 40 hours a week. I biked or took the bus to work every day and ending up selling my car to save some money. It's really great that Austin is really making improvements to zoning that are having actual, tangible benefits and finally making the city more affordable. I really hope that they keep it up.

Boston had an enormous housing opportunity with the Big Dig but ppl wanted a greenway instead. Result? They got a surface stroad!

Suburban sprawl means the only way one can get around is by car

No it is not doing that much to connect from NO to Mobile to say you have undone Katrina. It needs to go to Jacksonville as it did before Katrina.

How did I miss this? The issue is how long it takes to get a line going between bigger cities. The freight railroads will fight and new track will be needed. Meanwhile, Montana only might need a couple of sidings Many rural areas also have no nearby airport and have lost bus service. Amtrak can also be faulted for the expensive private rooms instead of affordable seats to people without cars.

Once they connect the Honolulu El Train to the Military bases and the Airport, the ridership will go through the roof.

Once they connect the Honolulu Elevated Train to the Military Bases and Airport, the ridership will go through the roof

Something not really mentioned when talking about the silver line is that Dallas (and DFW in general) is incredibly multi-nodal. 2 of the suburbs (Irving and Plano) have more office space than downtown Dallas and are major employment centers (although the suburban parts of Dallas mean that Dallas still has more overall than either city), and would both be mid sized cities in their own right at over 250k each. Not to mention theres Fort Worth at just under 1 million. In addition, there are 7 suburban cities between 200-400k with Arlington being the largest, and another 6 cities between 100-200k. The pure urban area is roughly the size of Connecticut, but the actual size of the metro area is roughly the same as New Jersey. Its an incredibly large metro area that now reaches as far north as the Oklahoma border. Its wild how far the region has sprawled.

It’s crazy there’s no mention of Seattle on here…between 2024 & 2026 the light rail expansion is one of the best & most ambitious in the country. Missed the mark on this one.

Zoning laws SHOULD allow taller apartment buildings, so that we can accommodate more people in one area.

San Antonio to Austin intercity rail NOW! 15 rides or more a day.

We NEED people like you in San Antonio! We could be so much better and Austin is our best model for positive growth.

Im all for it. It would work wonders to alleviate traffic on Austin's overcrowded roads.

How do we get Austin City Council to come talk to our city? I'm in Long Beach, CA and our housing crisis is nuts. Unfortunately, it true California fashion, our council is trying to over-regulate our way to more housing. I always reference all of the good things Austin is doing and the great results.

Make sure you attend S.W. Rail. It is a good conference.

Thanks!

A good video idea would be to tell us what level of density per acre and per mile is needed to make each type of transit viable such as buses, trams, and trains

🅱️austin

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Great video. We've been waiting for the Mobile to New Orleans route to resume after all these years. Glad to see the many other transit projects around the country.

Really hoping Hawaii is taking the route Chinese rail route. Develop transit along areas with little development then develop the area with medium and heavy density areas.

You guys would be welcome to check out the recent rail additions to the Helsinki area. You could also talk to the planners see how much quicker and at less cost transit RoWs are built here.

The vocal fry + haircut host combo is insane

Whitmore is a ghoul and a DINO

Cool video, it would be fun if you guys chose a random destination and then had to find the transit options to take you there. Great to see the frequencies on Houston's network, but the coverage is dicey. The rail seems only usable for a fraction of the sprawling population. These days poverty has been "suburbanizing", so I wonder what it is like trying to get to or from work on the fringe of town.

Please continue the train to Corpus. So many people drive between SA and Corpus. It would be safer and convenient. Put the station at the CRP airport.

Marylander here, wishing news of the Purple Line opening was in this vid ahaha Hurry up 2027!

It appears that the DART train shown there is not electrified as it should be. Many folks don't know that Congresswoman Ann Northrup made sure that Louisville, KY did not get light rail. Too bad, was going to serve U of L Cardinal stadium, Muhammad Ali airport, downtown, then cross over to S. Indiana. Too bad many Amtrak has to share tracks with freight trains with their slow trains. Being from MA originally I could be wrong about this. The Big Dig was supposed to include subway service to include going from South to North Stations. Now there's talk about extending the Blue line to the Red line/MGH station, but too bad somehow that it could then go to Park or Washington St station so one seat travel would be a reality. Also should be extended from I believe the terminus of Wonderland to Lynn. Also my gripe (last one) that the Blue line should @ Logan be reconfigured to actually go into the terminal vs taking a bus from the station to the terminals. Happy New Year!!

Streetcraft is amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i think they opened this part of the existing honolulu skyway first because the rail yard is in the suburbs, you can't open without a yard! Also you can see the full extent of the huuuge TOD projects around these "rural" stations on google maps: isn't the line funded by these TODs?

Congestion pricing is a failure of the Democrats. Where is all this money going. Tax the poor more

About the MBTA slow zones, they were actually completely removed over a week ago i believe on the 21st of December, nonetheless it has been a monumental effort across the past year and a half by Phil Eng, so looking forward to the next stages of repairing and improving the T

South Shore Line Monon Corridor also opens in Chicagoland in May 2025, connecting Dyer, IN to Chicago with electrified regional rail service!

The best example for utilizing gondolas for urban Transit is Medellin Colombia!

Just found this channel, subscribed now! Keep it up!

I’m definitely really nervous about the future of public transit with Trump being elected president. Republicans have a history of being anti-public transit, which is one of the main reasons I vote democrat.

Thanks for the update and Happy New Year! What's next on your transit wish list?

Fascinating but I had to drop out when you started all that animation around 7:00-8:00. Listening as a podcast, but missing having the maps and other visuals, and can only pay half attention while I read other sites.