It looks like we missed one another in Sacramento by 12 days, including this particular location )

What US cities did you cover on this trip?

Sacramento in 2022 was a complete shock to me. This was one of the original pioneer light rail projects introduced during the light rail renaissance in the US back in its time. About twenty years ago attractive brand new 4-car trains operated full of people. Enormous infrastructure including park-and-ride lots were built. In Sacramento and in many other cities where ridership was elastic (i.e. a choice of driving a car was always available) the goal was to attract passengers to the light rail with its conveniences and comfort, and thus reduce congestion.

Unfortunately ultra liberal politics in California (a heavily Democratic state, meaning the ruling party) led to some demise of public areas in downtowns in Californian cities. The same applies to public transportation. This is true for Sacramento, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego, while San Francisco with its inelastic transit usage is a separate story. COVID killed the rest of the remaining ridership. The light rail systems were left to their own local survival devices. Hence now 1-car or 2-car trains operate on extended headways and carry very low ridership, mostly some inner-city folks. Huge park-and-ride lots, including multi-level structures remain empty. A striking difference to some years ago. And a testament what extreme politics can do to cities and good public transit projects.

With hopes for the better, as new public transit policies are clearly needed in California.

Quote (Ymtram (Yury LRTA), 14.07.2022):
> Unfortunately ultra liberal politics in California (a heavily Democratic state, meaning the ruling party) led to some demise of public areas in downtowns in Californian cities. The same applies to public transportation.

Is there the same demise of public areas and transportation in heavily Democratic NYC and CT? Or in other words, are Democrats the issue?

Цитата (R. S., 14.07.2022):
> Is there the same demise of public areas and transportation in heavily Democratic NYC and CT?

Yes, but not to such an extent as in California (yet?). In addition, the weather is much better in California all year-around, which makes it a heaven for the homeless.

> Or in other words, are Democrats the issue?

As per my observations - yes. Moreover, the above described issues are much less of a problem in Texas and Florida, where the weather is also good year-around. The latter two states are heavily Republican.

Quote (Ymtram (Yury LRTA), 14.07.2022):
> It looks like we missed one another in Sacramento by 12 days, including this particular location )

Apparently, people are travelling a lot again :-) I would also have liked to meet the local editor of San José in his city, but he was in the Netherlands and Belgium at the time when I was in America... Too bad!

>
> What US cities did you cover on this trip?

A lot: San Francisco - Sacramento - San Jose - Phoenix + Tempe - Tucson - El Paso - Denver - Salt Lake City - Portland and Seattle + some museums. Photos will follow, soon or late...

>
> Sacramento in 2022 was a complete shock to me. This was one of the original pioneer light rail projects introduced during the light rail renaissance in the US back in its time. About twenty years ago attractive brand new 4-car trains operated full of people.

Coincidentally, my previous visit (in 1999) was also on a Saturday and also during the summer. This is not representative I think. In both cases, it is a system that could only convince me moderately. What I did notice now, is that the material looks lousy.

> Enormous infrastructure including park-and-ride lots were built. In Sacramento and in many other cities where ridership was elastic (i.e. a choice of driving a car was always available) the goal was to attract passengers to the light rail with its conveniences and comfort, and thus reduce congestion.

Fuel prices are outrageous. Agreed: in America you still pay half of what you do in Europe, but the vehicles there consume twice as much. Together with the sometimes exorbitant parking prices, I think that in the near future many will find their way back to public transport.

>
> COVID killed the rest of the remaining ridership.

The problem is everywhere. I recently spoke to an operations manager on the London underground and he was the first to give me a sensible explanation. During the Covid period, many staff members have left the company expectedly (e.g. retirement) and unexpectedly. This is not abnormal: this happens continuously.
However, the problem is that it was almost impossible to recruit and especially train new people during that period: driving schools were not allowed to operate, face-to-face contact was forbidden, etc. The backlog they had in the London underground is enormous. Increasing the capacity of driving schools, instruction etc. is not possible and safety comes before everything else: it is almost impossible to shorten the courses. The same problems exist in Antwerp, Amsterdam and Karlsruhe: 3 systems I recently visited where there are also major problems.


>The light rail systems were left to their own local survival devices. Hence now 1-car or 2-car trains operate on extended headways and carry very low ridership, mostly some inner-city folks. Huge park-and-ride lots, including multi-level structures remain empty. A striking difference to some years ago. And a testament what extreme politics can do to cities and good public transit projects.

This is also the case with us. At least in Europe, Covid has promoted home working enormously: even I still go to the office hardly twice a week. Shopping has also changed dramatically: much more is bought online.

Zitat (Ymtram (Yury LRTA), 15.07.2022):
> Moreover, the above described issues are much less of a problem in Texas and Florida, where the weather is also good year-around.

I wouldn't call long, 110s or humid 90s summers good, but to each their own

Speaking about transit, never really heard of these states being good with it, so I checked some metrics https://alltransit.cnt.org/rankings/ and it seems that while Miami is doing ok, Sacramento is on par with Dallas, San Antonio, Orlando and Houston, and most of the top cities are Democratic. (Data is from 2019 as I can tell, so maybe things changed a bit)

Tbf, all the top cities are also the most compact and dense ones, and honestly, I think exactly this matters the most when it comes to organizing good public transit. Sacramento and most TX, FL cities suffer from major suburban sprawl, with Houston being probably the worst example, and Florida's urban planning is basically a meme at this point: https://i.redd.it/jiddpm09pn991.jpg Hence all the struggle with public transit in many American cities - bad UP, with politics playing a secondary role. Or that is how it looks from the outside. Would be nice if you could share some perspective