Randal O'Toole

@ggraham @GreenPlusAnE Guess all you want. If you actually look at the data, you will find that subsidies to driving are less than 2¢/pass-mile and most come from local governments, not the feds. Subsidies to transit are >$2/pm.

That chart is avg for all types of commuting, whether walking, riding a train, or driving. A minute of stop-and-go traffic is not the same as a minute of walking. You get more of what you subsidize (with federal debt), and I am guessing that no country subsidizes driving more than the United States.

“Americans have some of the shortest commutes in the developed world.”

@ggraham @Noahpinion Guess all you want, but if you would carefully look at the data, it turns out the central cities receive far more subsidies per capita than the suburbs. Higher taxes too.

@Noahpinion You get more of what you subsidize (with federal debt), and I am guessing no country subsidizes the infrastructure required to make suburbs livable (and to drive to/fro/within them) more than the United States.

America's suburbs get a lot of hate. But a lot of the critiques are just myths -- suburbs feature shorter, easier commutes, and equal or less loneliness compared to cities. noahpinion.blog/p/the-american…

@devonzuegel According to Italy's 2016 census, the population of the historic city center was about 13,000, not 30,000. If anything, it has declined since then.

The city center of Siena, Italy is home to 30,000 people. It is the same size as a single Houston highway interchange

@KosolapiMishka @JayinKyiv More like 20 percent since its 2025 peak.

@JayinKyiv Bruh I'm all for it but it looks like it's down 2 %, the spy had worse days this week

Russian stock market enters freefall.

@TristinHopper Lefties aren't satisfied with destroying entire cities. They want to make sure the suburbs are destroyed along with them.

Conservatives have generally made peace with the fact that lefties are obviously better at the arts. Lefties, by contrast, will ruthlessly destroy whole cities rather than admit that conservatives are obviously better at running them.

@potterlab What is a megaregion? Boston isn't culturally the same as Baltimore. Denver isn't economically the same as SLC. Austin isn't politically the same as Houston. Cleveland and MSP? Give me a break.

What’s life like outside of the megaregions I feel like I’ve lived a lot of places but turns out never outside of a megaregion

@cremieuxrecueil Instead of asking why they are declining (which your data don't really show), you need to ask why they were so high in 2018 and 2022. Answering that question may help explain more recent changes.

We really need to figure out why school shootings have declined so much recently.

@elonmusk @boringcompany For 0% of the cost of HSR, we can have intercity transportation that goes twice as fast as the fastest high-speed trains. We already do. Why is everyone so intent on building high-cost trains that are slower than flying?

The @BoringCompany could build a Hyperloop tunnel from downtown SF to downtown LA for <5% of this cost and it would be a technological marvel exceeding any high speed rail on Earth

@sloughhousedan @elonmusk @boringcompany The same applies to hyperloop.

I don't doubt this. The problem with this whole "planner" idea is the vast numbers of people crossing California are not travelling from downtown LA to downtown San Francisco, 9-5. They are travelling in a myriad of directions. This train idea works for East Coast cities but will never work for California.

@60Minutes 60 Minutes asks why we don't have HSR. It never mentioned we have planes that can go twice as fast and don't require tens of billions in infrastructure. Who needs HSR when you have that?

America’s hopes for its first high-speed rail line were kindled in 2008, when California voters approved a ballot measure for a bullet train between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Nearly two decades later, that dream is yet to arrive. cbsn.ws/48jzMBx

@60Minutes It's too bad we don't have a transportation technology that can go twice as fast as the fastest high-speed trains and doesn't require hundreds of miles of expensive infrastructure to support it.

An ambitious state-run high-speed rail project linking Los Angeles and San Francisco hasn’t stayed on track. 60 Minutes reports on the costly struggle to bring high-speed rail to the United States, Sunday. 60Minutes.com

@60Minutes If only someone such as, say, Boeing or Douglas had invented such a technology in, say, 1958, then maybe we wouldn't have panicked when Japan introduced trains that went 140 mph in 1964. Such a technology must exist in some multiverse; too bad it isn't ours.

@StarTribune Campaign claim: "Light rail is high-capacity transit." Reality: Light rail literally means "light-capacity transit." A single LR line can only move about 9,000 people per hour in one direction. Busways can move 40,000 or more people per hour for a lot less money.

Delayed Southwest light rail rolls toward opening as Twin Cities transit use lags startribune.com/metro-transit-…

@StarTribune Campaign claim: "We have to spend billions building light rail because middle-class people won't ride a bus." Reality: Bus ridership is growing, LR ridership is falling.

@houmanhemmati @KevinKileyCA Amen to most of that but aerial firefighting is nearly always a waste of money.

Congressman @KevinKileyCA is right about Newsom-proofing California. To this I would add: Creating a massive aerial firefighting force. Ending ALL climate spending including off shore wind & carbon capture. Eliminating special gasoline blends & refinery storage mandates. Encouraging energy exploration & many new nuclear power plants & desalination plants. Cutting state workforce by 50% after independent assessment of need for each job. Ending ALL spending on “homeless housing”. Banning transfer of ANY state taxpayer funds to NGOs & non profits. Mandating cameras for top state officials (Gov, LtGov, Treasurer, AG, Insurance Commissioner) with live feeds online. Special Prosecutor Office charged with investigating/charging corrupt elected officials. Ending sexual & race & gender teaching in school as well as “social emotional learning” to focus on core education. Banning ANY ultra processed or sugary foods in schools with taxpayer $. Building several homeless drug rehab & mental health centers in affordable locations in center of state to involuntarily treat underlying causes of homelessness for most homeless. Stopping closure of prisons, reopen closed prisons, perhaps add more prisons to house criminals prosecuted under tougher laws/DAs.

@pixeltoofar @VLine That's the kind of problem you get when you choose low-capacity transit technologies. Buses can move more people per hour but they aren't as expensive and aren't as glitzy so politicians choose rail instead.

Standing at Caulfield watching a @VLine train going to the city but “not talking suburban passengers” is on the PID screen and we are told we’re not allowed on. The train is 3/4 empty. I think this ancient rule is dumb. #trains #melbourne #transport

Portland spends an average of nearly $800/sf building so-called affordable housing. This is a betrayal of taxpayers who fund this program and of low-income people who would be better off with homes built at the market rate of $300 per square foot. See tinyurl.com/PDX800PerSF

Top-down plans to make housing more affordable in Portland will in fact make it less affordable. The plans rely too heavily on central control, the development of housing people don't want, and subsidies to low-income housing. See tinyurl.com/MetroHousingPl…

@the_transit_guy People think there is something wrong with the U.S. because transit ridership is so low. I think there is something wrong with other countries because their driving rates are so low. Miles of driving correlate with higher incomes, higher productivities, and many other benefits.

What's wild is Nuuk, Greenland (pop. 19.6k) has 16 buses in its transit system and has higher ridership than Wichita, Kansas's bus system (pop. 472k). Yet this country is defunding transit and wants to spend $700B on Greenland.

@imtheideaman @EndWokeness Actually, "affordable" (i.e., subsidized) housing does suck as an economic system. Most of the benefits go to the banks and developers. See cascadepolicy.org/land-use/the-a…

@EndWokeness Yeah, socialism sucks as an economic system, but affordable housing doesn’t. Maybe this idea isn’t horrible. Perhaps the other side should come up with a better idea on this issue other than “socialism bad”.

Zohran Mamdani: "We will slowly buy up the housing on the private market and convert properties into communes"