Here is a look at some of the transportation headlines gathered by us and the Metro Library. The full list of headlines is posted on the library’s blog.
One Path to Better Jobs: More Density in Cities (New York Times)
Get this: the more crowded the city you live in, the more likely you’ll make better money and be more productive. Decades of research shows that density equals jobs, productivity, innovation and wealthy. Why?
Density simply facilitates interaction. Interactions translate into wealth when a population is educated and local institutions support private enterprise and entrepreneurship.
Why Towns With Good Transit Options Are Recovering Faster From the Recession (Treehugger)
A new report shows that a lack of good public transit access makes it harder for cities to lower unemployment numbers. Low-income groups suffer the most – since families without cars will face difficulty finding and keeping new jobs. This may be a reason that cities with good transit are faring better in the ongoing recesion.
Early success of Hub bike sharing [Boston] surprises even program’s backers (Boston.com)
A new bike sharing program in Boston is celebrating incredible success at the end of its first month. The program – which features 600 bikes, 53 stations and a yearly subscription fee of $85 – has already attracted over 2,000 annual subscribers and logged 36,612 station-to-station trips. Could Boston’s success be repeated in Los Angeles?
Categories: Transportation Headlines
And Los Angeles is dense. However, it feels less crowded is this is due to the quality of housing here compared with, say, New York. In New York, people have no choice but to leave their cockroach infested, 100 SqFt. walk-up “train” apartment with NO A/C no real kitchen to speak of and no place to really live. This is why NY streets are filled with people and the parks packed and restaurants filled (no way to really cook in the cracker box). It is always better to leave one’s crappy NY apartment and escape to the cruel HOT and MUGGY outside than stay at home and read or even relax.
Meanwhile we have far single family homes with front and back yards, and our apartments have some decent landscaping or even a pool and more space and amenities and, often, some form of A/C and with functional kitchens with either only one floor walk up or elevator. It is often good and better to stay in our little apartments here (not quite as cockroach infested) than to waste money escaping one’s place of residence.
It was always a pleasure staying at in at my aunt’s 600 SqFt or at my others 500 SqFt. apartment in Hancock Park. We never felt we had to escape those little places; There were always a pleasure to return to, and we often preferred doing things there than going out. We only went out for the sake of going somewhere, not to escape the fine, well-appointed little apartments.
Sorry to nitpick, but “density” and “crowding” are different things.
I love this definition of the difference: “Density is often associated with crowding, but it is important to distinguish between the two. Density is the number of people in a give space, while crowding is the subjective perception that that number is too high.”
— Campoli and MacLean (2007). Visualizing Density
With good design (and enough housing units) people can live in a dense place without being crowded and without giving up privacy, quiet, and access to nature.