Cities Need Walkability and Transit To Keep Millenials

[finehoe]

To keep millennials, cities are going to need to improve their transit options, a new study suggests.

http://t4america.org/2014/04/22/survey-to-recruit-and-keep-millennials-give-them-walkable-places-with-good-transit-and-other-options/

The study, released by the Rockefeller Foundation and Transportation for America, suggests four in five millennials (those aged 18-34) want multiple options for getting to school, work and other daily destinations. Right now, most cities aren't doing a very good job: the majority of respondents in all but the three largest cities studied — Chicago, New York City and San Francisco — said options weren't good enough where they lived.

A few more takeaways from the study:

•54 percent of those interviewed said they'd be willing to move to a different city with better transit options.
•46 percent said they'd consider giving up their car if they had a range of transit options.
•Among those who don't own a car, 70 percent said they couldn't afford to live in an area without transit.
•A large majority, 91 percent, said "investing in quality public transportation systems creates more jobs and improves the economy."

In the release, the director of Transportation for America, James Corless, suggested it was in cities' best interest to keep improving transit.

"The talented young workforce that every region is trying to recruit expects to live in places where they can find walkable neighborhoods with convenient access to public transportation. Providing those travel and living options will be the key to future economic success."

[finehoe]

"The talented young workforce that every region is trying to recruit expects to live in places where they can find walkable neighborhoods with convenient access to public transportation. Providing those travel and living options will be the key to future economic success."

Are you listening, Jacksonville?

[tufsu1]

^ yes many are

[IrvAdams]

The love of and endless curiosity over the "freedom machine" automobile that we Baby Boomers had is simply not there anymore. Young people want to get from point A to point B to do whatever they are setting out to do.

It doesn't have to be in a big fine car - it will work just as well in a big fine streetcar.

[simms3]

It's funny that a majority in SF didn't say transit options weren't sufficient.  Yes, we have options, but they all kinda' suck, LoL.   Most people around here have nothing but bad things to say about our transit at this point, which hasn't been expanded even though we've added 114,000 people in just 46 sq miles since 1990 (not even going to mention the Bay as a whole).

[mvp]

If you care about the future of walkability and transit in our region, please come to the Path Forward 2040 Long Range Transportation Plan public meeting tonight, 5-7 p.m. at FSCJ Deerwood!

[IrvAdams]

The love of and endless curiosity over the "freedom machine" automobile that we Baby Boomers had is simply not there anymore. Young people want to get from point A to point B to do whatever they are setting out to do.

It doesn't have to be in a big fine car - it will work just as well in a big fine streetcar.

Keep in mind that the baby boomer got cars when they were mechanically simple enough that teenagers could build them and maintain them.  There were no federal regulations about the materials that the bodies were made out of, drinking and driving was hardly a serious offense, insurance was not mandatory and relatively rare, gas was 40 cents a gallon and most of the infrastructure that we presently pay for daily was not in existence.

There were no mandatory cancellations of your drivers license for lack of insurance or missed renewal dates, most streets didnt have lanes painted onto them, there were no fines for emissions, there wasnt an extra tax on gas, you didnt get a revoked drivers lisense for dui, non payment of fines, lack of insurance or failure to appear, and there wasnt a brisk business in towing other peoples cars that turned into officially sponsored chop shops that took your car, charged you storage fees, filed a lien against the vehicle and then sold it off for parts or to a wholesaler within a matter of a month.

The "Car Culture" has ceased to exist.

Absolutely. And that explains why, even at my age, given a good urban choice, I might even opt to give up the auto for the city. I'm tempted.

[finehoe]

Absolutely. And that explains why, even at my age, given a good urban choice, I might even opt to give up the auto for the city. I'm tempted.

When the right infrastructure exists, it's really not that hard.  When I lived in DC, I didn't have car, and rarely, if ever, missed it.  I could walk to anything I needed, rode transit to work, could catch a cab with ease or use bikeshare.  People talk about the "freedom" that an automobile gives you, but I felt much more free without one.

[tufsu1]

which hasn't been expanded even though we've added 114,000 people in just 46 sq miles since 1990 .

there have been several expansions since 1990....the Market street light rail line, Embarcadero trolley, and BART extension to the airport come to mind.

[johnny_simpatico]

I heard the current JTA chief on the Melissa Ross program the other day.  I'm not so impressed.
I heard promises that real-time transit information will be available when their schedules are revised.  My response:  Why wait?  My other response:  Why does their website say Next Bus will be implemented by the end of 2014?

http://www.jtafla.com/Blueprint2020/FAQ/RealTimePassInfoFAQ.pdf

... and why just Next Bus?  I've been using Transit Times + for my trips to Boston and Washington and find it superior to Next Bus.  Transit Times +, by the way is already available for Miami, Tampa, and Orlando.  What's holding JTA back other than inertia, laziness, and stupidity?

JTA's website has all kinds of whiz-bang stuff pushing all the right buttons for transit advocates.  Here's an example: 

http://futureplans.jtafla.com/TOD/Pages/default.aspx

But look at their record on TOD.  The logical place for implementing it would be Rosa Parks, where they have a flood of customers who would want to buy something.  Next-door is a JTA parking lot.  Wouldn't it be prudent for them to build a retail facility there that would integrate with Rosa Parks and move the parking elsewhere?

I really want to be encouraged, but I continue to be disappointed.

[peestandingup]

Absolutely. And that explains why, even at my age, given a good urban choice, I might even opt to give up the auto for the city. I'm tempted.

When the right infrastructure exists, it's really not that hard.  When I lived in DC, I didn't have car, and rarely, if ever, missed it.  I could walk to anything I needed, rode transit to work, could catch a cab with ease or use bikeshare.  People talk about the "freedom" that an automobile gives you, but I felt much more free without one.

Yep. We'll be living in DC all summer & looking forward to going truly carless again. We're not even bringing our cars into the city. Why bother?

And I feel like that's the great dupe of the boomer generation (among other things) & they fell for it hook, line & sinker. The car racket is just the opposite. Being chained to a never ending abyss of monthly payments, insurance, maintenance, fuel, tickets, etc is hardly any sane person's idea of "freedom".

You can say a lot of things about Gen Xers & Yers, but they know bullshit when they see it. The car culture (and everything built around it, including much of the 'burbs) are in for a rude awakening once they get a little older.

[simms3]

which hasn't been expanded even though we've added 114,000 people in just 46 sq miles since 1990 .

there have been several expansions since 1990....the Market street light rail line, Embarcadero trolley, and BART extension to the airport come to mind.

Well tell that to people like myself who live here.  Transit in SF is very inadequate for a city its size/density.  The Embarcadero trolley is nothing but a tourist line that no local would use (you would only know that if you lived here).  The BART extension to both SFO and Oakland is nice...but not useful for day to day, and BART means nothing to most city residents since it doesn't really serve the city itself, more the suburbs - bringing them into the city.

MUNI metro under Market came into being when streetcars were converted to LRT, in 1980.  I think you're thinking of the T Third, which is the least used and currently most useless line through Mission Bay into Dogpatch and points beyond.  It does serve the under-served Bayview area, which is good, and Mission Bay is being built now.  It will serve the Warriors' new arena when it opens, which has everyone terrified because we know it won't have the capacity to do so (really only BART will and the unfortunately politics and rising costs got in the way of the Warriors locating near BART).

[tufsu1]

The Embarcadero trolley is nothing but a tourist line that no local would use (you would only know that if you lived here). 

I include the light rail on past the ballpark as part of the Embarcadero...that's hardly a tourist trolley

[simms3]

^^^That's the T Third I mentioned.  The point of that line is really to serve Mission Bay (UC now), UCSF Mission Bay campus, Dogpatch, and Bayview, as well as connecting the system rather inconveniently to Caltrains (a better connection will be made once Central Subway finishes and shortcuts across part of town to that area, connecting to T Third).  Even though a brief section of it travels along the Embarcadero, it doesn't "serve" the Embarcadero area like you think.  And even if it did, that would not make it any more useful.

The vast majority of city residents have no direct access to LRT, and instead use the buses/trolley buses.  Ridership numbers correlate this if you want to look at Q4 2013 APTA reports.

Avg Daily Weekday Ridership #s, Linked

LRT - 214,600

Bus - 499,000 (includes E and F heritage streetcar lines, which are a small segment of this number and tourist driven)

CableCar (90% tourist driven) - 22,800

At SF's density, the split between rail and bus should be more 50-50 in my opinion, with a gradual transition over to more rail usage, since it's a lot more efficient at moving crowds, which occur naturally with greater density.  As it stands, MUNI has horrible coverage, and we all think it should be expanded immensely.  We all think BART needs a new line down Geary and the city will soon have to build a new Transbay Tube since the one we have now is reaching capacity (however, the powers that be are not even close to prepared to undertake that).

Tufsu, I know this is your "area", per se (and normally I would defer), but I'm at least decently educated on the topic of transit and I'm a daily rider of SF's transit options, so just take it from me



Anyway, back to my original point, I was surprised that this poll included SF as a city where the majority didn't think that transit options weren't sufficient.  The amount of complaining you hear here in the city you'd think MUNI was a crime.  Count me in as someone who definitely thinks transit could be better here, especially as we add 10,000 people a year and continue to get rid of street parking and force developers to not include much if any parking.  You can't force getting rid of the car and increasing density without substantially improving transit.  That's basic logic.

The city itself spends $165M annually on homeless services.  I think we need to look after the needy, but I think there's also a reason that SF is basically the country's dumping ground for the homeless (you think there are that many in Jax?!?!).  I think at least a portion of that money should start going to tax paying residents who are being forced to take inadequate transit due to SFMTA's and the City's general neglect.

I echo what seems to be the general consensus around here.

[ProjectMaximus]

Simms, I was gonna say that you're overthinking this, especially without knowing the context of the wording, which was taken from a summary of a report about a study.

So I actually went to look at the survey results, and yeah that wording is really not indicative of what really was asked or answered. The results actually do not show individual cities, but rather pre-determined groups of cities based on transit infrastructure. NYC, Chicago and San Fran were grouped together as the three "mature systems."

Take a look yourself, but as it pertains to this specific topic, the question was (I'm paraphrasing to take it out of the survey format):
"Tell me how you would rate your city in providing a convenient and reliable public transportation system?
excellent, good, just fair, or poor."

For the Mature Systems it went: Excellent (17%), good (50%), just fair (26%), or poor (6%).

http://t4america.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/RF-Millennials-Survey-Topline.pdf