Posts by linger

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  • OnPoint: Fish,

    bother, that didn't quite work as advertised...
    uh, how about this?

    sorry about that...

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • OnPoint: Fish,

    You could always bypass the spaghetti subway map entirely and use a route planner instead, like this one (link to English in top left corner).

    And, yes, as of this year there is the PASMO card, which covers all public transport within Tokyo and also some connections out into neighbouring prefectures.

    (To explain Stephen's joke for any non-Japanese speakers out there: _kowaii_ is the Japanese word for "scary". I keep getting it mixed up with _kawaii_ 'cute'...)

    --Robert.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Cracker: Kick it in the Butt (& Friday Links),

    Robyn: "[Nonsmokers] don't think about it"
    Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, and yet -- as Stephen points out -- is diametrically opposed to AA's "one day at a time" approach. Weird. Or do addictions to these two drugs benefit from different approaches?

    Re autopsied books: oh my gods, yes. The concept may be simple, but the execution (such an apt word!) is mindboggling. Really puts all the usual talk about "finding the sculpture within the stone/wood/etc" into perspective.

    --Robert

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Policy, finally,

    Kyle: can we agree that the truth is somewhere in between? The problem with low population density for a transport system is not that we've only got 1M people, but that they're taking up the same area as 20M. Also I think we're assuming different kinds of system.
    I started off considering rail (since that's the mass transit system in Tokyo) -- and clearly didn't factor in rolling stock volumes (which part of the cost is, as you state, roughly proportional to passenger volume, so should be cheaper for 1M). On the other hand, line and station construction and maintenance is something that should be roughly constant for the same area of coverage, regardless of volume of use -- and represents the largest part of the cost for a railway system. But if you're considering public transport = buses, then fair enough: roading isn't part of that budget ... though perhaps it should be!

    The other part of my argument (which I think still emerges unscathed?) is that if in the 20M-person population a route is viable with one bus every 15 minutes, then for the 1M-person population that route no longer exists (1/20 of a bus = a car), and thus the overall system for 1M cannot be as flexible/ convenient as that for 20M if we are covering the same area (and conversely, if we do try to deliver as flexible a system, it will be grossly uneconomic). This, I think, we can agree on: it is not possible to deliver the same system for 1M people that we could for 20M. To return to where I came in: that becomes a problem if the system that we can deliver for 1M people is, as a result, so inconvenient as not to be used.

    --Robert.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Policy, finally,

    [A previous version of this vanished in the ether; it hasn't reappeared after 30 minutes, so I'm trying again.]

    Kyle: I'm happy to admit my comparison is simplistic. But the economies of scale (it's cheaper per capita to provide a higher total volume of service) actually strengthen my argument (that a viable public transport system in NZ requires higher levels of funding than most local bodies are comfortable with), and that's why I dismissed them with a handwave above. The estimate of a 95% cost subsidy still stands as a minimum for NZ, if we are to have a comparable level of service in terms of frequency (NB: not capacity! this is a per capita comparison) and network density (station/ route spacing), while still keeping costs to commuters down to something affordable.

    NB by "Tokyo standards" of frequency I meant -- as stated -- 4 services per hour on average across the network. (Even in Tokyo, not many routes have more than 10 services per hour; some have only 1.) Frequency of service can't be reduced much below that point without seriously impacting convenience to commuters. Compare Wellington, where there are only 2 services per hour on average across the network as a whole (more on some routes, less on others) -- and an uncertainty of up to 15 minutes in arrival times. If the average journey takes only 30 minutes, but you have to wait that long for a bus or train anyway, surely that's a "bit silly"? :-)

    --Robert.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Policy, finally,

    Ben: Sure. I was actually equating time and money in my assumptions (taking $1/km = $1/10 minutes; the question for bus rides within most NZ cities being, how much would you pay to save yourself a 10-minute walk?) -- but yes, the longer the journey, the less practicable the walk, and hence the more attractive public transport becomes. (I fairly often choose to walk the 7km from my office to Ikebukuro in central Tokyo. My workmates regard this as utter insanity, given I could do the same journey as a 20-minute, 200-yen train ride; the point is that, over that scale, walking it only takes me an extra 45 minutes, and I can live with that. But even I would never consider walking the 50km from my office to my apartment in Saitama [50 minutes, 570 yen by train].)
    --Robert.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Policy, finally,

    81stcolumn: I'm not sure how you'd get a level of service better than Tokyo (with more space per passenger), without "ridiculous subsidies". The point I was making is that 95% subsidisation of all costs is pretty much a minimum to provide a level of service that is desirable compared to cars, at NZ population densities. Still, you're right that the true (environmental) cost of cars isn't being weighed in that comparison. I should clarify -- I didn't intend the cost of providing that level of PT as an argument for not doing it. Say Auckland currently has 90% subsidy of PT costs; that still means the service isn't at that critical level yet (so the lack of uptake is unsurprising). But the more hopeful conclusion is that a further 5-10% increase in expenditure might be enough to create such a service level as to increase passenger uptake. (Or, putting it another way: councils court the worst kind of failure, in the form of an expensive but unused PT system, if they start with "how much can we afford to spend this year?" rather than "what will commuters want to use?")
    -- Robert.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Policy, finally,

    Handwringing over comparisons of public transport uptake in NZ with that in other countries strikes me as somewhat unrealistic.
    Public transport is always going to be more expensive per capita in NZ than in almost any other country, purely as a result of our low population density.
    Some crude back-of-envelope calculations. Compare Tokyo with greater Auckland: they're roughly the same area, but Tokyo has 20 times the population, which allows for a very efficient, convenient, yet cheap, public transport system. Especially as regards the train network. Inside the central 23 wards (pop=20M), generally there's less than 1km between train stations in any direction; trains run at least 4 times an hour, from 5am-midnight, 7 days a week; for any journey over 2km, tickets end up costing less than 100 yen/km (i.e., under $NZ1/km); services run rigorously to timetable. (Buses inside the 23 wards have a flat fee of 200 yen, though service is less regular than the trains.) Under Tokyo conditions, all of this is possible, and even profitable for the transport operators (which include some private companies).

    Now try doing the same thing with 1/20 the population. Even being conservative and ignoring economies of scale, if it's to be profitable you'll get at most 1/20 the service, i.e. services once every 5 hours(!) on average, and/or stopping only (on average) once every 4.5km, and/or costing $NZ20 for an average journey of a few km. Clearly, no-one would ever want to use such a patently inconvenient "service". In particular, $1/km probably would be close to the maximum viable fee level (seeing as most people could walk it in 10 minutes).

    Hence, a PT system good enough to use under NZ conditions requires massive subsidies from city councils/local bodies/central government. Getting to Tokyo standards would require 95% subsidisation of the actual cost. (Note that even 90% subsidisation doubles the cost to the commuter, pushing it over the viable maximum.) Christchurch actually comes close (journeys are more expensive than in Tokyo, though not onerously so). Wellington buses, by contrast, are generally less frequent, more expensive, and deviate wildly from timetable (and the Wellington train network is worse on all three counts). Auckland doesn't even come up to Wellington's mediocre standard.

    So, if the service is any less convenient (lower frequency/ lower network density/ higher cost) than some critical level, then public transport will not be chosen over cars wherever the latter are available. Some critical mass of service is required before a critical mass of the public will choose to use it. Councils can't expect the users to show up until the service is available.

    The fact that increasing spending on Auckland's PT system by 90% only increased usage by ~2% thus indicates only that even the improved Auckland PT system still sucks, and needs to have far more spent on it to reach anything remotely like an equivalence with private cars under NZ conditions. (But there are clear limits on what is practical; there is no possible environmental benefit if the average bus service has less than 2 passengers!)

    The other side of the coin is that in Japan it is, as a matter of policy, considerably less convenient to own and run a car than in NZ: vehicle licensing and inspection costs are notoriously high; and fees for parking and for using motorways will almost always be more expensive than the public-transport fee. Presumably NZ could adopt similar policies to reduce the competitive advantage of cars.

    --Robert

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

  • Southerly: A Slow Journey and a Quick Arrival,

    Congrats David & Jen; and gudday Robert!
    As Dorothy Parker said on such an occasion, "We all knew you had it in you".

    Cheers,
    Robert (who doesn't even remember entering the "name the baby" competition)
    Random takes on previous responses:
    Hadyn: I'm guessing he's gonna end up "BbbobbB" a la Blackadder. Seems to happen to all of us at some stage.

    Paul: It's only natural for maternity wards to inspire pushing urges.

    Tokyo • Since Apr 2007 • 1944 posts Report Reply

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