Dependency on Subways?

[nickzou 1]

Now I'm not saying everyone should own an SUV and drive it everywhere. I know that public transit has its environmental advantages. But this isn't what I'm talking about.

Do you think living in a city with a complex subway system is a result of a city not necessarily being poorly designed (although sometimes that is the case) but of a city that was not intelligently designed to expand?

Now I bring this discussion up because I like in Toronto. And as anyone in Toronto who rides the Rocket knows that, the subway is not the greatest in the world. It's loud, its a bit primitive, and it does not cover the city very well. And being a Sim City fan for many years and learning a little something about urbanism through it and reading up on it, I have come up with my own ideas on public transit.

This first occurred to me when I noticed that there is no reason why Toronto's transit could not be world class, it is the biggest city in Canada and Canada is a pretty well of country. The only reason why I can think of for having a lackluster transit system is (other than municipal politics and such) is because Toronto's roads are well designed enough such that a complex subway system is necessary to navigate through the city.

I have a lot of friends who are from Asia (mostly China and Korea, I myself am from mainland China) and they always talk about how much better Hong Kong's subway is, or how much more advance Seoul's underground transit is. I've been to these cities myself, it seems that the reason for such efficient subways in my opinion is because of the failings of overground transit. It's clear that if you live in Hong Kong, you don't need a car, in fact it would be a big hassle. Now I'm not saying Hong Kong is a bad city, it was just erected in a time before this idea of intelligent design or this "new urbanism" had any value.

So what do you guys think? Is a complex subway an indication of flawed city design? Yes, no, maybe? Or is my anti-nationalist views skewing my ability to analyze the situation properly?

[Shingure 56]

No , A flawed design is one that one that doesnt allow the mass transit sector to grow at all. Actually Tokyo for instance is an old city but it was planned well. Because it is so crowded they need subway to make people commute more efficently. Also in cities that have too many cars and the roads that arent designed to handle such traffic , They need to move underground. In New York City that was the case when they first built their subway. However the thing about American Cities and Mass transit is that between the Late 60's and Middle 80's people were buying cars at a rate never seen before. That's what caused NYC's subway to be seemingly fall apart during the 70s and 80's . Economy also has to do with it. As the Economy gets better then more subways get built as there is more money. However if you look at the US seeing as gas is getting higher. People are taking rapid transit more often and leaving their cars. I live in the Suburbs of Philadelphia and I commute into the city to go to school. Over the last year I have seen the number of people taking mass transit triple. Meaning that now some mornings I will be late because there are too many people on one train so we have to wait for the next.

Subways and Mass transit isnt' a sign of flawed city design. If you look at Washington DC their city design isn't really that flawed. But they have a subway ( That Is probably one of the cleanest and most modern in the country) Plus in Washington DC their subway runs into Virginia and Maryland. Meaning that people can park and get on , Which is what many people do if they need to go downtown and the like. In short, It shows that the city is progressing and that the planning isn't done.

[Jasoncw 11,839]

Mass transportation is not the result of failed auto-centric planning, but part of a comprehensive system.  Mass transit is more efficient and economical than cars, so if anything, the fact that there are roads at all indicates a failure in city planning.

But you're totally right, that the layout of the city affects how much traffic/trips there is that needs to be accommodated by the transit system. 

You could reduce the distance of the trips.  If I need to go to work, I will contribute less to traffic if my job is across the street, instead of 10 miles across town.  So to get everyone living and working right next to each other, you need to move them all right next to each other, so there are more people in less area, meaning a higher density.  So density reduces the distance of trips.

You could reduce the number of trips.  I need to go to work, I need to go the store, I need to go to the bank, etc.  If those things are spread apart, then I'll need to make several trips.  If they're clustered together (meaning there is a higher density of destinations in one spot), then do all of my errands on one trip.  Usually these high concentrations of destinations are called downtowns.

But nothing is perfect and I'll still need to make trips.  But when I do need to make trips, they should be done in the most efficient and economical way possible.  As individuals and as a region, we don't want to be spending our money on transportation, we want to spend it spend it on other things (food, investments, cool stuff, etc.).  So there should be thorough mass transit.

So a well planned city traffic-wise is one that is dense, has downtowns, and has mass transit.

[Hummer bob 1 4]

Here in New York City, Its not that the city is badly laid out, its that if everyone had a car and drove it, you would have over 8 million cars on the roads. That would cause unimaginable gridlock. Having a subway system, a bus system, and taxis are essential to big cities. Also, the grid system of New York City allows for walkers to easily navigate the city streets.

A good layout and mass transit is a good mixture for a city's success.

[nickzou 1]

Originally posted by: Hummer bob 1 Here in New York City, Its not that the city is badly laid out, its that if everyone had a car and drove it, you would have over 8 million cars on the roads. That would cause unimaginable gridlock. Having a subway system, a bus system, and taxis are essential to big cities. Also, the grid system of New York City allows for walkers to easily navigate the city streets.

A good layout and mass transit is a good mixture for a city's success.

quote>

I said subway for a reason. I know that there is nothing wrong with mass transit. But mass transit must work together. I remember a while back someone posted a thread about the transit system in Vienna and the key to its success as far as I could tell was not solely based on advanced subways but rather a network of mass transit that could reach anywhere in the city easily as efficiently as possible utilizing overground and underground networks.

I stated the subway as it is a single component of transit that I see is overly depended on by many of these megatropolises. The drive to create an efficient underground network almost seems to be a second striked at a failed or unimprovable situation with the overground networks. Not that any of these cities with complex underground networks are badly designed, rather it seems that some of these cities did not take into account the population boom and urban sprawl of the 20th century.

Now who could blame them, and indeed Toronto is guilty of this too. But the fact remains there is something lacking in Toronto's subway system, might I add the bus system is fine. And this problem can't solely be due to lack of funding because clearly the other half of the TTC hasn't really been hit as hard. And as far as I can tell there are two main reasons in terms of design (as oppose to politics), one is that the demand for transit simply just isn't high enough (I don't know why, maybe Toronto in general is a well off city and its citizen can afford to pay the ridiculous prices at the pumps, though not without moaning and grumbling) and secondly maybe as far as the moment, the overground networks of roads are still sufficient that the need for a subway system is not high. In effect, "getting it right" so to speak, by pure luck or otherwise, the first time around.

My point is not that public or mass transit is a bad thing. Far from it, I am not a SUV driving conservative, I'm just saying a lack of a good complex subway system or a subway system at all should not be an indication of any shortcomings of a city. Maybe they did something right? Maybe they did something different. Maybe its not that the city does not have the means or ingenuity to deal with a transit problem, maybe they just found other ways in dealing with it. The bottom line is, I guess, having a complex subway system should not be an indication of how prestigous a city is.

Good discussion though, I appreciate everyone's input.

[Duke87 1,070]

I fail to see how building subways or any other sort of transit underground is a failure in planning. In fact, it's a good idea, for several reasons.

Firstly, you get more out of the same ground space if you have a street with a subway tunnel under it rather than just a street.

Secondly, busy transit networks (like subways/trains) tend to be loud and people tend to not like having them in their backyard since they don't want to put up with the noise and the sight. But if you put it underground, that problem is solved since now it's out of sight and out of mind unless you're using it.

The downside, of course, is that construction of such things tends to be expensive. It's cheaper to build things above ground since there's nowhere near as much digging involved (moving/removing dirt is a labor intensive and time consuming process). Of course, doing that is not always practical. If you build rail lines on the surface, you bring the NIMBY problem back and unless there's already a clear right of way to use you're going to either be removing lanes from streets or knocking buildings down (perhaps both) to do so. The former cuts into your increase in transit capacity and the latter tears neighborhoods apart and displaces homes and businesses.

Buses are all well and good to a point, but the problem is that they, like cars, can and will still get caught in traffic unless provided with their own dedicated lanes... which there isn't always space for. And which, unless physically barricade off from the general use lanes (which also isn't always practical), will require enforcement to keep people who aren't supposed to be using the from doing so. I know this past June when New York repainted 34th Street to include bus-only lanes, it initially made the situation for the buses worse instead of better because people saw fit to use those bus lanes as places to park ... and the city's proposal to enforce them through use of cameras had been shot down by the state legislature. The same sort of thing continually happens with bike lanes all over the city. People park and drive in them. Because, you know, people in New York never obey the rules unless you make them.

Then again, New York is the city with a subway that has enough track to stretch to Chicago if you laid it end to end, more stations than all the rest of the cities on the east coast combined, and more than twice as many riders per day than every other subway system in the country combined... and despite all of that still leaves considerable areas of the city unserviced. So we can't really consider it typical, and thus it might not be the best of examples.

Finally, it's worth pointing out that "if you build it, they will come". That is, the tendency is to build transit lines to densely populated areas, but given time neighborhoods and even cities will develop around any transit system you put in. Development will tend to cluster in areas which are close to the service and avoid areas which are not. So transit is both an answer to and a cause of heavy development.

The question is whether you want to start with the chicken or the egg.

[hamsterTK 93]

I can understand what your saying.

Sometimes the existance of a major transit system, or mega-sized freeways, or whatever, is a sign that the city had to go to desperate and expensive measures to solve major mobility problems.

Also Naturally once those issues are fixed then these systems can't be expanded easily because of the pricetag. Meaning if you are reliant on them you can't get around far enough.

I agree the construction of new heavy rapid transit systems and "gadgetbahn" things like the Metromover in Miami was a mistake in most cities except DC. Light rail is much better, especially seeing as how some of those subway lines in places like Baltimore served only 30,000 people a day. That's less than the thing could conceivably move in an hour.

[doc_foualier 0]

Well, AFAIK, I can talk to you about Paris (in France, since this is where I lived).

Obviously this city has not been designed in the begining to accomodate overground mass transportation, because of its historical past.

However there is a very complex metro system, which is historical too, the very first lines were created in early 1900's.

So to say that underground MT is a result of a failing transportation planification is not true in this case, since the metro was created nearly after the first car ever made ! And today, the metro network is incredibly dense and efficient, one can rarely be out of 200m-radius from a metro station.

Concerning the ground network, there is no highways crossing Paris center-town, just the outer ring that provide several "entry points" inside the road network of the capital. Railways from the country high-speed network find their ways in about 4 major railstations also linked to the others MT like metro, bus, and more important, suburban/regional trains that drive most employees every day from the suburbs to their jobs, vice-versa.

A weird fact in major french cities is that in the 30s their were lot of trams as a MT system, but they were later abandonned in the 60s (if not destroyed by WWII). That was, I think, because cars were becomming cheaper and cheaper, so the frequentation of trams dropped and they were decommissionned. But today, those cities tend to rebuild a tram network as a MT because car trafic, pollution are now a problem and the bus network cannot meet the incresing demand. Just a weird fact, kind of "lesson of the past": do not remove your GLR system.

[Deionn 137]

Afriggendaz! Just trying to get my post in this discussion before it becomes epic.

[awake_78 0]

In my city (Athens, Greece) The subway system is just 8 years old (except line 1 was build in early 1900) and has only 3 lines to serve a city of 4 million. And of course it doesn't drive you anywhere in the city. Just in city center.

To get from city center to my house (southeast suburbs) I need to take the red line untill the terminal station and then use a bus. And now the adventure begins... The bus going to my area passes every 30 minutes so imagine how many people are waiting for the bus. Everybody uses car. But even if i would like to use my car there is no parking near the subways station so everybody parks on the sidewalks an then pedestratians walk on the road and handycaps... stay at home. And everybody is shouting to each other and it's just nice....

There is also a ring road (motorway) build 5 years ago and guess what?? It stucks in traffic. Just 5 years old an STUCKS!!! 

There are some works going on but just the existing lines expansion. As for the buses there are bus lanes but as Duke 87 said about NY everybody parks there... Basically all Greek towns are a big parking lot...

Seriously the problem about the mass transit in Athens is a result of a continuesly social economic policy of all goverments. They insist to leave mass transit ticket rediculusely cheap so all mass transit companies are underworking.  

[doc_foualier 0]

Hey, awake_78 !

I'm in Athens for a 5-week job, and I confirm, MT in that city really sucks...

Fortunately my loft is at 20 minute on foot from the place I work, and I'm here from a week now and I never used any kind of MT up to now.

Why?

The system seems incredibly complicated, up to now I'v only seen just 1 metro station (!) while I was having a walk in center-town. Roads are a mess (I thought Paris was the worst place in the world for reckless drivers, but now I know I was wrong !), very dangerous for pedestrian, it's not scarce to see vehicle going in the wrong way in a one-way street.

Yesterday I enven spotted a taxi going reverse in an intersection with a red spotlight for him !

Will try to get to the port this week-end with the metro, will see if it's easy or not...

[awake_78 0]

Yes indeed...

We don't have a great MTS in Athens but we surely have a nice airport....

...with enough flights to get out of here as soon as possible... 

Maybe someday I will do it too.... (Run for your lives, RUNNNN!!!)

[torontosubway 11]

Don't know about this, but I think when Toronto got the LRT thing, then we are talking about transit

[Constantine88 0]

I respectfully disagree about the Metromover in Miami being a failure. Growing up in Miami I took the Metrorail to downtown a few times and then took the Metromover to get easily around downtown. Since then I have obtained a drivers license and moved to Tampa for college a few years later. I do however still take the Metro rail/mover alot when I come home to take summer classes at Miami Dade college. The Metromover takes me directly from the Metrorail Government center stop and to my college literally right across the street from it. The Metromover literally connects to all the major points of Downtown even Bayside.

[Deathcat001 8]

I lived in Athens for 3 years 2005 - 2008 and i was living in one of the more expensive areas of town (Jokes just kiffisa) and i found that that the MT was ok. For the craziness of Athens it will not be beaten by jakarta. The 3 lines in Athens were seiously flawed as it only served small amounts of population. Also with the unreiliablity of public transport (Numorous reason including Strike, Weather, Etc...) you couldn't get anywhere quickly..

Now living back in a super planned city where only 345,000 people living in it, there are some flaws in its devolpment aswell. This bieng lack of rail (none), bad bus service and no other form of transportation execpt cars.  

[ILL Tonkso 1,236]

Dependency on Subways is not a bad thing, can you imagine London with a great big motorway/highway ploughing through the city centre? Thankfully it does not have to have that thanks to it's Subway and Suburban Rail network. Also, Subways do not have to be entirely underground and expensive, Liverpool's subway only has 4 stations underground and the remaining 63 are above ground.

[diamonddog_74 32]

Originally posted by: nickzou

My point is not that public or mass transit is a bad thing. Far from it, I am not a SUV driving conservative, I'm just saying a lack of a good complex subway system or a subway system at all should not be an indication of any shortcomings of a city.quote>

I don't think it's an indication of shortcomings. Some cities don't really need rapid mass transit systems because they're not large enough geographically or in population, and cluster their work and residential areas close enough to walk or take a short ride. These are mostly smaller cities.

Maybe they did something right? Maybe they did something different.quote>

Perhaps, but again, most likely it means that they haven't grown enough to justify construction of a rapid mass transit system.

Maybe its not that the city does not have the means or ingenuity to deal with a transit problem, maybe they just found other ways in dealing with it.quote>

This implies that surface transportation is adequate, which may be true. However, at some point the city reaches a level where it needs to find a way of moving people efficiently from one part of town to another in the least amount of time. At that point surface transportation is not enough.

The bottom line is, I guess, having a complex subway system should not be an indication of how prestigous a city is.quote>

Venice, Italy is a good example. It has been a prestigious city for centuries, but it doesn't have a subway system. Its geographical, and physical limitations don't require this mode of transportation.

[ilikehotdogsalot 307]

Originally posted by: Constantine88

I respectfully disagree about the Metromover in Miami being a failure. Growing up in Miami I took the Metrorail to downtown a few times and then took the Metromover to get easily around downtown. Since then I have obtained a drivers license and moved to Tampa for college a few years later. I do however still take the Metro rail/mover alot when I come home to take summer classes at Miami Dade college. The Metromover takes me directly from the Metrorail Government center stop and to my college literally right across the street from it. The Metromover literally connects to all the major points of Downtown even Bayside.quote>

It would make more sense if they connected the metromover to Miami Beach so you wouldn't have to drive across the causeways.

[piccboi824 1]

Originally posted by: ilikehotdogsalot

Originally posted by: Constantine88

I respectfully disagree about the Metromover in Miami being a failure. Growing up in Miami I took the Metrorail to downtown a few times and then took the Metromover to get easily around downtown. Since then I have obtained a drivers license and moved to Tampa for college a few years later. I do however still take the Metro rail/mover alot when I come home to take summer classes at Miami Dade college. The Metromover takes me directly from the Metrorail Government center stop and to my college literally right across the street from it. The Metromover literally connects to all the major points of Downtown even Bayside.quote>

It would make more sense if they connected the metromover to Miami Beach so you wouldn't have to drive across the causeways.

quote>

FYI, they did plan to extend Metromover Service to Miami Beach, it was just overriden by the Taxi drivers because most of their business are trips to the beach. Besides have you been to Miami Beach? The streets are way too narrow to have Metromover tracks running along them; they would totally make the place cramp and ruin the vibe of the Beach. A streetcar line (like the proposed BayLink) would be better, because it would run on the streets and be less obtrusive. Plus it would add more to the area aesthetically. Driving across the causeways really isn't that bad unless there is some event on the beach. What's bad is driving from the suburbs along the Dolphin, US 1 , or I-95.

[Merlin of Flyote 8]

I think we should bear in mind that most cities weren't designed at all, they grew from small villages into towns into cities, over many years (sometimes over hundreds or thousands of years). Transport be it roads or rail grew with it. Also remember that rail is comparitively new (150ish years at most) and had to be slotted into already existing areas which may have involved demolishing what was already there, or extensive land engineering, (eg. draining marshland,  building embankments or cuttings, bridges and tunnels, etc.). Adding a subway system was just another part of this growth. Eventually towns grew into each other, becoming a metropolis.

[jim 546 43]

Originally posted by: nickzou

So what do you guys think? Is a complex subway an indication of flawed city design?quote>

what i think: No.

You should attach one of them vote-things to this topic, then we'll have hard figures to go with your question.

[ILL Tonkso 1,236]

Originally posted by: Merlin of Flyote

Also remember that rail is comparitively new (150ish years at most)quote>

 The worlds first passenger railway (locomotive hauled) opened in 1830 between Liverpool and Manchester. Thats 179 years ago. The British Rail Network was already pretty big by the 1840s.

[Cob92 360]

People can't always anticipate what transportation challenges will occur 100 years in the future. Many older cities were designed primarily for pedestrian and horse-drawn carriage traffic. Only in the 19th century did rail appear in any form, and only in the 20th century did city plans have to account for car traffic. The existence of a complex transit system, whether it be composed of rail or freeways, indicates not so much a lack of planning so much as a need to rethink that planning due to unforeseen challenges. Some cities, like New York, cope with their subway networks, while others, such as Houston, cope with massive freeway nets. Both serve their cities quite well.

[ilikehotdogsalot 307]

Originally posted by: piccboi824

Originally posted by: ilikehotdogsalot

Originally posted by: Constantine88

I respectfully disagree about the Metromover in Miami being a failure. Growing up in Miami I took the Metrorail to downtown a few times and then took the Metromover to get easily around downtown. Since then I have obtained a drivers license and moved to Tampa for college a few years later. I do however still take the Metro rail/mover alot when I come home to take summer classes at Miami Dade college. The Metromover takes me directly from the Metrorail Government center stop and to my college literally right across the street from it. The Metromover literally connects to all the major points of Downtown even Bayside.quote>

It would make more sense if they connected the metromover to Miami Beach so you wouldn't have to drive across the causeways.

quote>

FYI, they did plan to extend Metromover Service to Miami Beach, it was just overriden by the Taxi drivers because most of their business are trips to the beach. Besides have you been to Miami Beach? The streets are way too narrow to have Metromover tracks running along them; they would totally make the place cramp and ruin the vibe of the Beach. A streetcar line (like the proposed BayLink) would be better, because it would run on the streets and be less obtrusive. Plus it would add more to the area aesthetically. Driving across the causeways really isn't that bad unless there is some event on the beach. What's bad is driving from the suburbs along the Dolphin, US 1 , or I-95.

quote>

Yeah, that's a good point. I've been to Miami Beach many times (live pretty close to it), I was just thinking the metromover would be more efficient if they connected the downtown line and placed a track through one of the causeways so people inland wouldn't have to drive/taxi to the beach. The tracks wouldn't go too well by South Beach, but if they made some sort of station/drop off point at the western edge, you'd probably get more people riding it. But since the cab drivers aren't having it, I guess it'll just be another dream

[Death54 3]

No, in fact it is the opposite. At least in America, where the "default" mode of transportation is driving by a car on a freeway, which does signal bad city planning, as when the population increases and spreads out more the freeways will get more congested and slow down commuters. This forces the city governments to either expand the highway system or bring in more mass transit, and they almost always expand the highway system over the mass transit system. A people's dependence on subways or other forms of mass transit is more a sign of a well-planned mass transit system than a "flawed city design," especially considering that subways and mass transit systems are a part of the city design. For example, compare New York City to Atlanta. NYC has a great subway system that many people use, and a planned, gridded city (at least on Manhattan), whereas Atlanta has the MARTA, which is used half by crazy people and half by those wanting to get to the airport, and no grid whatsoever, and all of 10 regular, rectangular blocks and awful traffic. Which sounds better planned? Also, how could anyone in the 19th century predict the massive population boom that would happen in the 20th and 21st centuries? If you told someone in the late 1800s that the world would have almost 7 billion people on it in a hundred years, they would have laughed or asked you if you were joking.

I'm just saying a lack of a good complex subway system or a subway system at all should not be an indication of any shortcomings of a city. Maybe they did something right? Maybe they did something different. Maybe its not that the city does not have the means or ingenuity to deal with a transit problem, maybe they just found other ways in dealing with it.quote>

Or maybe they just built a ton of expressways through downtown.

[piccboi824 1]

It's not really fare to compare Atlanta to New York. I mean New York was founded in the 1600's and by the 1890's it already had like 2 million people living there, while Atlanta was founded later as a hobunk railroad crossing and didn't gain alot of population until the 20th Century after the invention of the car. Most of New York's subway was built in the early 1900's, when NO ONE had a car. They built underground and over the streets while rapid development occurred all around. By the time expressways were even thought of, New York was way to dense to build one and the established infrastructure wouldn't allow it, so they kept building subway lines and opening new services.

Atlanta grew in the 20th Century, around when the Ford Model T made cars cheaper for more people to have. Like many Sun Belt cities (which we love to gripe and complain about for not planning anything) Atlanta grew rapidly and expanded along old country roads (thus why there is no widespread grid) and then with the Interstate program going into effect, they built mor highways than rapid transit because on many ways it was just easier for people to access. Mass transit gets more use when it is easier to walk and make direct connections i.e walking. That means small blocks in a grid. In a none grid area, those connections are not that easy because it requires indirect connections i.e. bus, park-n-ride, etc. and during that connecting time, you could already be on your way to work.

So could we please just look at the cities we're comparing before we start passing judgements? I mean how many of us are professional city planners anyway, and just because some strategies work in Simcity, they don't always work here in the REAL WORLD.

[Pinoy30 0]

I don't mind taking public subway system. I used to live in New York and San Francisco.. I mean its easier if you work in downtown and take subway system....but if you live in the suburbs, and you need to drive to work and no subway system.. yeah it all depends where you live and work. I would rather live in the City if i have to work in downtown..then drive hella far to work.

[forestpark 0]

How much clout can the taxi drivers have? Connecting the metromover or metrorail to Miami Beach would create much revenue for the city. Elevated rail would fit perfectly along traveling east/west along 5th street and north/south along Washington Avenue. Asthetically, I don't believe Washington Avenue would lose much as that entire avenue is pretty ghetto until you get to Lincoln Road Mall. I wouldn't necessarily call this idea a dream due to the cries of taxi drivers, I mean look at cities with elite subway systems like New York and Chicago. Is Miami really that far off? I think it has more to do with the cities of Miami and Miami Beach coffing up the money to make this happen. There's also that occasional issue that happens every few summers, I forget the name, oh yeah...hurricanes.

[wolverine 12]

Great questions nickzou.

I got a masters in transportation planning, so hopefully I can lend some insight.

Subway planning and construction have always been secondary to central city growth, but not to fringe growth.  What I mean by this is when existing transit infrastructure became crowded in the growing city core, plans were put forth for grade seperated systems that would also satisfy future growth forecasts.

This explains why when you go to places like New York City, you find blocks upon blocks of homogenous tenement housing above central park.  These were speculative, meaning builders were predicting an influx of population after the opening of a new transit line.  And I'm glad you mentioned Toronto.  You can see the speculative growth over time along the city's major subway lines. 

So really, the planning for subways was the result of current congestion and the need for grade seperated transit, also to satisfy future growth needs and in a way, stimulate new construction.

So what cities do subways work best in?  Linear ones.  In fact, anything that runs on rails works best in cities that are stretched out along a line....just look at Manhattan.  The reason for this is that more customers can be served along a trunk line instead of diverging lines in all directions to serve scattered populations.  Of course, that doesn't mean non-linear cities will fail to operate a heavy rail system.  Remember I mentioned that future planning is also important.  Depending on a city's master plan, they can reshape its form through transportation...much like Toronto's North-South density was shaped after the 1960's

Hope this helps.

[confused04 14]

I think an easy way to look at this is to consider the alternative. What would NYC look like WITHOUT subways, commuter rails, etc. I think that pretty much shows that a city with subways is a well planned city. A well planned city has multiple modes of transportation to satisfy the various users.