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Comment by jonathankoren | Hacker News Reader

Never lived in the rural area did you?

No one likes buses, because buses are slow. They're slow because they make lots of stops that are irrelevant to your trip. As someone that regularly rode the school bus on a route that took an hour, compared to a 10 minute direct route. Fuck buses.

Yes taxis, exist, but not many. The only people I knew that ever took them were people that lost their licenses.

What you've actually described is a shuttle service. They exist everywhere. They're not popular because they're slow. Last time I took a shared shuttle from the airport it took an additional 45 minutes to get home than driving direct. They have more convenient pick up schedules and locations, but the transit times are almost as bad.

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I grew up in a rural area, thank you.

The cycle of poverty is strong in these rural locations because of the lack of public transportation and the cost to maintain a vehicle to hold a job. There are plenty of low-income people moving to common destinations (city center, plants, etc.) that would use an on-demand shared shuttle service if it had at-door pickup.

Having worked a couple summers on a factory line, we would set up carpools and pick people up along the way to work each day. Don't be a dismissive dick just because you personally didn't like your school bus ride.

> cycle of poverty is strong in these rural locations because of the lack of public transportation

Because? Really? Because someone has to buy a car? I think your feelings are in the way of your cognitive ability.

>of low-income people moving to common destinations I'm sure there are plenty of low-income people moving to the suburbs/rural areas because they are being priced out of high density centers.

Lets not forget, 5% of the population uses the bus, that's including major urban centers like NYC. Nationally, nobody uses the bus, its a joke throw back to a time before cars. Fuck buses.

Re: Buses - if you get a chance, come over to Singapore. The buses come by every 3-5 minutes, have world-class air-conditioning, and on the half-dozen or so routes that I ride regularly, I don't think I've ever had to stand.

I rarely bother to even use their (world class) MRT I love the buses so much.

An advanced city is not a place where the poor move about in cars, rather it’s where even the rich use public transportation

Singapore is ~1/4 of the size of Rhode Island and ~200 square miles larger than lichtenstein, the smallest country in Europe. It's like 50k USD to own the ability to own a car which expires in 10 years at which point you will have to scrap it or rebuy this cert. A passat is somewhere north of 150k.

Also, I would add that subways are probably a better way forward than busses for a modern city, or at least some sort of connected underground transport system.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_Singapore

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-06-04/singapore-...

https://www.google.com/search?q=singapore+size

https://www.google.com/search?q=rhode+island+size

https://www.google.com/search?q=size+of+the+vatican

I agree - that there are a number of factors that benefit it's bus system over cars - the reasonable size of the country, and the enlightened attitude towards car owners paying for their externiality costs (the Certificate of Entitlement, or COE).

I also agree that Subways are awesome - and Singapore has an awesome system for such a young country, and they are going to be adding a new one each year through 2024 - That's a new line, not just a new station. [1]

The nice thing about bus stops - is they are everywhere, and the buses come by very frequently, and they all have GPS locators on them - so you can time your arrival to the stop to be when the bus arrives (which you can look up on your smart phone). I've never been a fan of buses before Singapore - but it's great to see what can be done in a country where cars are not the default option.

[1] http://www.lta.gov.sg/apps/news/page.aspx?c=2&id=80d3169f-dc...

Maintain a car, not just buy. For a family below the poverty line & living paycheck to paycheck, this is costly.

55% of commuters in New York city use public transportation, 34% in SF, 26% in Chicago, 40% in D.C., etc. Don't be a dick about cognitive ability when you're quoting a 5% number that includes people who don't even have access to buses.

Those are generally larger buses that are completely fixed in their route and stops, right?

Smaller buses able to optimise routes to make fewer stops will help. Split the current big bus into 3-4 smaller ones and the people going close to the full distance might not stop for the first 80% of stops. That would cut out a lot of time.

Obviously rural areas will be the last to see these changes for non-commercial traffic.

If the city isn't designed for shared transit, even a small trip is going to be awful. SuperShuttle, which picks up 4-5 groups at a time from airports and doesn't use a fixed route, can still add hours to your trip home in LA.

On the other hand, I've used airport busses between transit hubs in cities where everyone takes the subway and it was really quite nice. Better if I ever figure out luggage delivery, of course.

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