Reconsidering Urban Mass Rapid Transit & High Density Housing

[Epigonos]

During the last twenty years in California the governors, both Democratic and Republican, and state legislators have STRONGLY pushed the development of mass rapid transit. Additional during the last ten years the concept of high density housing along the rapid transit routes and especially at the stations has also become a popular major issue.

 

If we look at the major areas of coronavirus outbreaks here in Southern California they are, by and large, on the west side of Los Angeles along the Wilshire Corridor. Along Wilshire Boulevard from Santa Monica Boulevard to Westwood there exists one high rise condominium complex after another. People living in these high rises must pass through common lobbies and use elevators to reach their units. Many of the people living in these complexes are older and must also use rapid transit to do their everyday shopping.

 

If we look at New York we see much the same pattern as we see along the Wilshire Corridor. The city is a mass of high rises where residents are virtually required to use rapid transit every day to exist – people simply don’t have any other choices. When New Yorkers were asked to curtail their use of the subways they did so and ridership and revenues decreased. With those decreases the number of trains were also decreased and the riders were again forced to ride cheek to cheek.

 

In London the city government, a number of years ago, in order to decrease traffic congestion and parking problems in central London placed a special tax on people using their cars to come into the inner city during the week. Tube ridership increased dramatically. Along came the coronavirus and the Lord Mayor asked people to curtail using the tube system because of overcrowding. The same thing that happened in New York happened in London. Ridership and revenue plummeted so the mayor cut the number of trains and rider are now riding cheek to cheek again.

 

My question here is are we going to have to reconsider our emphasis on mass rapid transit and high density housing in urban area to prevent future major virus outbreaks? What might the alternative be? Any ideas and suggestions?

[+ sniper]

Countries with just as much density managed fine because they have a culture of not being gd slobs. We'll figure it out. There are simply too many people on the planet currently to just start spreading out. But since once populations move to a "first world" standard of living, their reproduction rate tends to drop below replacement, this could change eventually.

[Guest]

Monorails..... and no Simpson's bullshit.

[MrMattBig]

It's definitely a dilemma and because of high density areas there is really no way around it. I agree above that people are damn slobs sometimes. When I went to LA from Vegas on the bus last the beginning of March, this guy say next to me who kept coughing without any effort to cover up his mouth! I have seen subway ads across several cities to take off backpack to avoid hitting someone and report suspicious activity. I think to start instead of ads on various things on subways and buses, they just need to always advertise both physical and medical health and add to cover your mouth with your shirt or elbow if coughing, avoid touching handrails unless necessary. If you are sick stay home or if necessary to ride wear a mask, suggest riders carry sanitizer, etc.

 

Create awareness to make high traffic areas as sanitary as possible

Edited April 15, 2020 by MrMattBig

[DMICS]

 

My question here is are we going to have to reconsider our emphasis on mass rapid transit and high density housing in urban area to prevent future major virus outbreaks? What might the alternative be? Any ideas and suggestions?

 

Some may, majority won't.

 

This issue actually hits home (literally and figuratively) since I was starting the process of looking for a new place. The areas I was looking at were somewhat developing neighborhoods that may turn into high density areas with multiple transit options already in place. Currently I'm in a low density, spaced out area which has worked to my advantage during this pandemic (no major line ups, empty parks, etc).

 

Moving forward I'm now reconsidering the areas I'm looking to move to.

[Monarchy79]

Great Topic!!!!

 

Although I don’t use mass transit and refuse to (for various reasons), I don’t think that mass transit is the problem here.

 

The problem here is more behavioral.

In order for mass transit to work for an ever increasing population, members of the US population must change their overall behaviors to adapt properly.

 

Most of it is based on basic public etiquette :

1.) public spitting

2.) coughing and sneezing without covering ones’ face

3.) lack of hand washing

4.) lack of bathing

 

I’ve been to other parts of the world (where I was fine with using mass transit), and was impressed at how polite, and CLEAN people were.

[+ tassojunior]

Like Elon Musk, I worry we'll destroy Earth before we can escape to Mars.

[jjkrkwood]

Perhaps we'll get to the point of the Jetsons, and all be flying around in wide open spaces in enclosed bubbles ?

[Quincy_7]

We can't base public policy on once in a century black swan events. Speaking as someone who lives in a large city, I appreciate an efficient subway system because it means I can save the money that I otherwise would have had to spend on a car. After car payments, insurance and gas, you're easily talking at least 10K annually getting sucked out of your bank account just to maintain a depreciating asset. I'd much rather be able to invest that 10K.

[Todd Jenkins]

It's definitely a dilemma and because of high density areas there is really no way around it. I agree above that people are damn slobs sometimes. When I went to LA from Vegas on the bus last the beginning of March, this guy say next to me who kept coughing without any effort to cover up his mouth! I have seen subway ads across several cities to take off backpack to avoid hitting someone and report suspicious activity. I think to start instead of ads on various things on subways and buses, they just need to always advertise both physical and medical health and add to cover your mouth with your shirt or elbow if coughing, avoid touching handrails unless necessary. If you are sick stay home or if necessary to ride wear a mask, suggest riders carry sanitizer, etc.

 

The people who do this kind of mess - cough without covering themselves, keep their backpack on, etc. etc. – are just human garbage and no amount of telling them to 'fix their behavior' will result in them changing. So, you have to watch out for yourself.

[+ tassojunior]

We can't base public policy on once in a century black swan events. Speaking as someone who lives in a large city, I appreciate an efficient subway system because it means I can save the money that I otherwise would have had to spend on a car. After car payments, insurance and gas, you're easily talking at least 10K annually getting sucked out of your bank account just to maintain a depreciating asset. I'd much rather be able to invest that 10K.

 

These viruses, even coronaviruses, are coming at a fast clip. It won't be the last. And biological warfare is a major thing now. Let robots have the factories and AI do the grunt work. Important work is mostly on the web in the future.

[Quincy_7]

These viruses, even coronaviruses, are coming at a fast clip. It won't be the last. And biological warfare is a major thing now. Let robots have the factories and AI do the grunt work. Important work is mostly on the web in the future.

 

The last major memorable pandemic was the Hong Kong Flu of the 1950s. The last major pandemic on this scale was the Spanish Flu over a century ago.

[+ Charlie]

The last major memorable pandemic was the Hong Kong Flu of the 1950s. The last major pandemic on this scale was the Spanish Flu over a century ago.

But new viral diseases are showing up more frequently, think SARS, MERS and COVID-19 all within the past twenty years. They are also being spread more easily as people travel more widely and easily. I don't think this is a once in a century black swan. And if we don't manage to develop a very effective vaccine (after 35 years we still don't have one for HIV), we may be adjusting to COVID-19 for more than just a few months.

[Guest]

We can't base public policy on once in a century black swan events. Speaking as someone who lives in a large city, I appreciate an efficient subway system because it means I can save the money that I otherwise would have had to spend on a car. After car payments, insurance and gas, you're easily talking at least 10K annually getting sucked out of your bank account just to maintain a depreciating asset. I'd much rather be able to invest that 10K.

I’m not sure it’s a black swan event (as opposed to something of increasing expectation for occurrence)...but even if it is, for New Yorkers, the memory will last a generation. I think the short term impact will trigger a deurbanization movement from the major metropolises to cities in the second tier of size and this will be led in knowledge industries and finance.

[+ Hoover42]

These viruses, even coronaviruses, are coming at a fast clip. It won't be the last. And biological warfare is a major thing now. Let robots have the factories and AI do the grunt work. Important work is mostly on the web in the future.

It does seem like the time between new viruses is shortening

[jawjateck]

Ah poor Epi.....I sympathize with your urban plight. I love my country home sojourn far from the madness and dysfunction of the city. Wish you were here!

[+ bashful]

In Chicago, Metra is a commuter rail line between suburbs and city. Many of the closer in suburban Metra stations/stops have "downtowns" with higher density housing of condos and apartments within walking distance near the station. I live in one of them, and can easily walk the two blocks to the station to get on the train into the city, and did so many times when working in the loop.

 

As the real estate market improved, our suburb began a building boom. While the sale prices of our condos were actually dropping on average. Seems everyone wanted to rent, not own. A seven story apartment building went up next to our condos, a four story apartment building is being constructed across the street, a huge loft/townhouse/apartment complex began construction on the other side of the train station, and just last February, it was announced a public works building, and another commercial building downtown would be cleared for apartments.

 

The seven story building next to us opened for occupancy in January. I know few want to move in winter, but it was mild this year, and today, the new building is mostly dark in the evening. The four story building will probably be completed as they have built the exterior for all four floors, but you never know. The loft/townhouse/apartment complex was in the excavation phase, and construction on the parking garage has begun, but it doesn't look like there's much progress since. Could be that builder is following the stay at home order while the four story builder has workers there every day. It will be an interesting year or two for us in our little "downtown"

[samhexum]

Maybe they can run zip lines from large apartment buildings to office towers.

[+ stevenkesslar]

My question here is are we going to have to reconsider our emphasis on mass rapid transit and high density housing in urban area to prevent future major virus outbreaks? What might the alternative be? Any ideas and suggestions?

 

That's a really interesting and perplexing question.

 

I think we need to be more Asian, and less stupid.

 

I buy the theory that if we were 50 % more Asian, and 25 % less ignorant, pretty much most dead people in America from COVID-19 would not be dead.

 

So, for example:

 

Largest cities in the world ranked by population density (1 to 125)

 

Seoul, population density rank # 6 16,700 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 230 (all of South Korea)

 

Taipei, population density rank # 7 15,200 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 6 (all of Taiwan)

 

Singapore, population density rank # 29 8,350 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 10

 

Tokyo, population density rank # 50 4,750 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 190 (all of Japan)

 

Los Angeles, population density rank # 90 2,750 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 457 (LA County only)

 

San Francisco, population density rank #104 2,350 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 17 (San Francisco County only)

 

New York City, population density rank # 114 2,050 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 11,477 deaths (NYC only)

 

New Orleans, population density rank # 116 1,950 people per sq/km COVID-19 deaths: 302 deaths (New Orleans only)

 

 

There has been a raging debate about this among Asian scholars. Many have noted that, with the exception of San Francsico, lower density and less mass transit seems to lead to way more COVID-19 death. So Asian scholars have asked: does riding mass transit in cities like Seoul and Tokyo confer immunity to COVID-19? Do cars on LA and NYC freeways cause COVID-19?

 

My question here is are we going to have to reconsider our emphasis on carbon producing cars and low density housing in urban areas to prevent future major virus outbreaks? What might the alternative be?

 

Other Asian scholars have noted that correlation and causation are not the same. So just because Americans who die of COVID-19 are way more likely to drive cars or live in less dense housing, that may not be why they die. Asian scholars have looked to other behavioral patterns to determine causation. For example, gun deaths in the US exceed gun deaths in Japan by a huge order of magnitude: 3 deaths in Japan versus 40,000 deaths in the US in one year. Asian scholars theorize that this is caused by American behavior. Specifically, American ignorance: the idea that more gun ownership results in less gun death, even though - from a scholarly perspective - it clearly results in more gun death.

 

Armed with this insight, Asian scholars have examined American ignorance and stupidity on COVID-19, to see if this could impact death rates. For example, does it impact mortality if Americans think, "This is a bullshit thing, I ought to be able to do whatever the fuck I want, and nobody has a right to close my business or my bar down?" Asian scholars have named this the "dip shit American" theory. They have studied whether there is a correlation between being an American "dip shit", and COVID-19 mortality.

 

Asian scholars have compared Asian and American behavior around "test, trace, treat" practices such as: masks, social distancing, bans on social behaviors such as mass gatherings, avoidance of "church packing", and overall conformity with regulations meant to prevent death and keep the economy going. Asian scholars have generally found that Asian awareness of and adherence to public health guidelines seems to be a causal factor. It is believed to cause much lower Asian death rates, as well as much less economic destruction.

 

To confirm this theory, Asian scholars studied behavior and public health awareness in San Francisco, which has an unusually low COVID-19 death rate and an unusually high Asian population. Asian scholars found that San Francisco residents, including those who are not Asian, act much more like Asians when it comes to responding to public health crises. This appears to correlate with less death and economic destruction from COVID-19.

 

Meanwhile, Asian scholars found that 7 out of 10 American "dip shits" tested responded to the question, "Define test, trace, treat" with the answer: "What the fuck is that? Is that some fucked up Wuhan thing?"

 

So the hot new academic theory all over Asia now is that America has a massive lead in global COVID-19 deaths because of American ignorance and stupidity. Asian scholars theorize that if all Americans were 50 % more Asian, and 25 % less ignorant, most COVID-19 deaths would have been prevented.

 

My question here is are we going to have to reconsider our emphasis on ignorance and stupidity to prevent future major virus outbreaks? What might the alternative be? Any ideas and suggestions?

 

And the good news is this. I read the footnotes on all these Asian studies. It said that even if we have to act a bit more like Asians, we don't have to eat bats, snakes, or dogs. Sorry if I offend anyone, but personally that was a huge relief to me.

Edited April 17, 2020 by stevenkesslar

[+ stevenkesslar]

Ah poor Epi.....I sympathize with your urban plight. I love my country home sojourn far from the madness and dysfunction of the city. Wish you were here!

 

Just be careful what you wish for, buddy.

 

Georgia’s COVID-19 deaths surge, and a rural county coroner reels

COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, has been confirmed in all but four of Georgia’s 159 counties, and as the state has increased its testing capacity, the number of verified cases has surged. The state Department of Public Health said Tuesday evening that more than 9,000 Georgians have tested positive for the virus. That figure increased by about 1,500 between Monday and Tuesday. It more than doubled in a week.

[+ sniper]

Steven, those population density rankings. are suspect. They're counting surrounding suburbs in the NYC stat, which is a completely misleading picture. NYC proper has over 10.000 people per square kilometer according to wikipedia. Manhattan has over 27,000. That's a full order of magnitude greater than what the chart says.

[+ stevenkesslar]

Steven, those population density rankings. are suspect. They're counting surrounding suburbs in the NYC stat, which is a completely misleading picture. NYC proper has over 10.000 people per square kilometer according to wikipedia. Manhattan has over 27,000. That's a full order of magnitude greater than what the chart says.

 

Picky bitch!

 

I noticed that. In a separate post a while ago, I did a direct comparison of New York and Seoul. So if you just Google that it says this about NYC:

 

New York's two key demographic features are its density and diversity. The city has an extremely high population density of 26,403 people per square mile (10,194/km²), about 10,000 more people per square mile than the next densest large American city, San Francisco.

 

Seoul says this:

 

The population of Seoul in 2016 is estimated at 10.29 million, although this is just the population of the Special City, which has a density of about 17,000 people per square kilometer (45,000/square mile). The sprawling metropolitan area is much larger at 25.6 million.

 

 

So by just about any standard, I think those Asian cities are way more dense than the American cities. That chart was helpful because it compared major cities all over the world. By the standard it used, US cities are relatively less dense than large cities in many other countries.

 

I also posted it several weeks ago, but Seoul has a public transit system that looks clean and is disinfected daily. They had to because they had a cluster outbreak at a call center and a lot of the people at that call center rode the subway to work. So they have mostly stayed one step ahead of it. There's no evidence that riding on the subway causes infection. But infected people may be riding on the subway. So they are doing everything they can to create a perception of safety in subways.

 

It should be clear, but in that post I was comparing number of deaths in entire Asian countries (like Taiwan and Japan) to number of deaths in US counties (like New York and San Francisco) which is how the Johns Hopkins map works. So if I really went for a city to city comparison the number of deaths would be even more skewed on the US Side.

 

I'm pretty sure most of the Korean infections are outside Seoul. The biggest driver so far has not been density, but membership in the Shincheonji Church of Jesus. If I recall right, they tested something like 10,000 church members and 4,000 were infected. Those 4,000 people infected a bunch of others. So most of the infection in South Korea has been behavioral: church members praying closely together.

 

Edited April 17, 2020 by stevenkesslar

[BgMstr4u]

Armed with this insight, Asian scholars have examined American ignorance and stupidity on COVID-19, to see if this could impact death rates. For example, does it impact mortality if Americans think, "This is a bullshit thing, I ought to be able to do whatever the fuck I want, and nobody has a right to close my business or my bar down?" Asian scholars have named this the "dip shit American" theory. They have studied whether there is a correlation between being an American "dip shit", and COVID-19 mortality.

 

Perhaps you could provide links to these provocatively worded studies, @stevenkesslar.

 

I don’t disagree with your main points here. Anyone who has lived there will agree that cleanliness of public spaces is not a notable cultural characteristic of NYC. The thought of disinfecting the subway can only invite howls of amused derision at the very concept, let alone even the remote possibility of it ever actually happening. NYC is far and away the most significantly covid19-affected urban center in the US, and it could also be the dirtiest, though SF and LA are in the running for that title now. Public politeness and personal cleanliness are no doubt practiced by many, but are not universal norms. Would that they were. I would certainly welcome a national campaign to raise politeness, good hygiene and cleanliness to the rank of primary American values.

 

But I do wonder about responsible scholarly publications seriously using the term “dip shit Americans”, deserved as it may be.

Edited April 18, 2020 by BgMstr4u

[+ WilliamM]

Picky bitch!

 

I noticed that. In a separate post a while ago, I did a direct comparison of New York and Seoul. So if you just Google that it says this about NYC:

 

 

 

Seoul says this:

 

 

 

 

So by just about any standard, I think those Asian cities are way more dense than the American cities. That chart was helpful because it compared major cities all over the world. By the standard it used, US cities are relatively less dense than large cities in many other countries.

 

I also posted it several weeks ago, but Seoul has a public transit system that looks clean and is disinfected daily. They had to because they had a cluster outbreak at a call center and a lot of the people at that call center rode the subway to work. So they have mostly stayed one step ahead of it. There's no evidence that riding on the subway causes infection. But infected people may be riding on the subway. So they are doing everything they can to create a perception of safety in subways.

 

It should be clear, but in that post I was comparing number of deaths in entire Asian countries (like Taiwan and Japan) to number of deaths in US counties (like New York and San Francisco) which is how the Johns Hopkins map works. So if I really went for a city to city comparison the number of deaths would be even more skewed on the US Side.

 

I'm pretty sure most of the Korean infections are outside Seoul. The biggest driver so far has not been density, but membership in the Shincheonji Church of Jesus. If I recall right, they tested something like 10,000 church members and 4,000 were infected. Those 4,000 people infected a bunch of others. So most of the infection in South Korea has been behavioral: church members praying closely together.

 

 

Hi Chi Minh City is one of dirties in the world. And it is difficult to cross the street without being hit by a freaking motor bike. In contrast, Toyko and Hong Kong are wonderful cities, although difficult to find addresses in Toyko, but better at night.

[+ keroscenefire]

We have to remember that COVID-19 and the Spanish Flu and these types of mass pandemics are still fairly rare events. And in the long-term cities still have many health advantages. Being closer to doctors and hospitals is one. Not having to drive is another (about 38,000 deaths per year from car accidents). If you look at car accident deaths per capita, denser states like New York, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia have much lower rates that rural/suburban states like Florida, Wyoming and Mississippi.

 

In some ways even dealing with a pandemic is easier in a city than rural area. You can much more easily lock down a city and well-staffed public health infrastructure gives cities a much clearer idea of what's going on with a disease in a community and can better spread out treatment and vaccination programs. We only have to look back to 2015 to Mike Pence's Indiana to see how quickly an HIV outbreak in a rural county can grow without proper monitoring.