General Road and Highway Discussion

[danbrotherston]

"Yes, there are areas of the province which don't support mass transit, I'm not talking about those areas, obviously."

To be clear, I mean areas like Waterloo Region.  Almost all of it.

Like, let's do a thought experiment.  If Waterloo Region, or even just the cities themselves banned single occupant travel, what do you think would happen?

If it's really as economically and socially expensive as you keep claiming then we should be better off.

I think you miss the vast benefits that our current transportation system provides. It gives more freedom to employees to choose where they work. It gives more freedom to families where two people want to work in different areas.  It means faster average travel times, which gives people more leisure time.  Etc. Etc.

I'm generally a data person. So I'd love to see numbers on this economic and social cost you keep talking about.  Like I said it's an enormously complex system and it's really hard to measure impacts of single variables but it seems to me like you're very much overstating the costs and understating the benefits. I could be wrong though.

The cities all have the density and size to support transit.  And none of the things you list are benefits of transit over single occupant vehicles.  They are advantages in our cities, ONLY because we've decided to build for cars.  Because we've compromised the option of providing an efficient transit system, it now functions very poorly.  This is a function of the road design, the built environment.  It's a choice we've made, but it was still a choice.  I'm not saying we can change it with the flip of a coin, but its something we could change gradually, and are doing so, with the LRT, improved train service, etc.

It is important to realize that the design of our roads and our buildings plays an enormous role in how our transportation system works.