I think people are usually pretty happy with living in those areas. They like being able to drive and park at things easily. It’s just the kids who are less thrilled with needing the mom and dad taxi.
Something tells me the average American who moves to a mass-transit friendly city is happier than someone from a mass-transit city that moves to a car-centric city.
I moved to Chicago in the 1990s, lived there for about 10 years. The mass-transit was very good, but I wasn't happy living there.
Move to a smaller town with basically no useful public transit, but am vastly happier.
People are allowed to like different lifestyles than you without being victims of Stockholm syndrome.
[1] https://www.irs.gov/publications/p530
[2] https://www.kingcounty.gov/property/permits/codes/growth/GMP...
[3] https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/documents/2...
[4] https://kingcounty.gov/depts/transportation/metro/about/acco...
I've found this urban design has created isolated neighborhoods where people without cars refuse to travel more than a mile away from home. An example that comes to mind is friends living in Capitol Hill refusing to visit any restaurant in Fremont, a distance of around 3.5 miles with both locations being located directly on highly trafficked bus lines, but if offered a ride (in a car) they would come. For comparison, when in the car-centric cities I lived in, people were willing to travel anywhere in the metro area. Now this is just a few pieces of anecdotal evidence, and you may reply with examples of people who behave completely differently, but it's no better to assume that everyone hates driving and living less dense areas just because you personally dislike them. I prefer living in an area that doesn't hate cars with a passion, and I'm far from the only one who thinks so.
But I think you are wrong about the focus here. They just opened the downtown tunnel recently, and they are opting to fix the West Seattle bridge even though they won’t be able to fit a train to it. They are also fixing the 520 bridge to Kirkland without a train line. And all the roro ferries have significantly more frequency then the walk on ferries (except for West Seattle). So cars definitely still weigh heavily for the city planners
It's kind of understandable that people protest against having their money stolen and used to build things they don't like. Why do you think it's weird?
The only explanation that's possible is extremely short-sighted and self-defeating selfishness: seeing something that's not for them and instinctively opposing it, without thinking of the bigger picture. It's just childish.
It's exactly like socialized healthcare: somehow the US system manages to be more expensive than anywhere else in the world, ranks among developing nations, yet people will fight fang and teeth against "communism".
It's a balancing act.
A helicopter is theoretically great, but in practice helipads on Manhattan were removed in 1980s because of several spectacular crashes, so it's only practical between e.g. the financial district and the airports, which is probably where all the customers are anyway.
The cheapest I know is $400 from Manhattan to JFK; I could probably use it in a pinch (say, a transatlantic flight with a connection), if split between four passengers.
Police helicopters and fire trucks are much more bothersome sources of noise.
I am unsure where the preference lies. I don't always think there's a preference, but you can get forced into it by other economic factors. Young people move into a city, getting adapted a mass transit lifestyle, but they move to a more car-centric area when they inevitably get priced out of car-free living downtown or on a popular rail/bus line because they want to start a family. Personally I don't really want to give up being able to walk outside and down the street to go to restaurants and shop or connect to transit easily, but it would be short-sighted to say that everyone has the same preferences as me.
There's benefits to living in a detached house with a yard. The price is usually being tethered to a car in the US. If you pick a low density area you're probably not going to have an oppressive commute and running errands will be easy (if predictably lengthy, but knowing it'll always be a 20 minute drive and not 20-60 minutes based on traffic is valuable) because there's large roads and every business was mandated to build a large parking lot.
The problem comes when inevitably other people make the same decision and development happens and more people move in. A Californian pattern of development (and in the many areas of the country that have since copied this pattern) is incredibly hostile to good public transit, but due to the geometry of cars, you inevitably have to do _something_... it's just probably going to suck and get underused. So, an alternative strategy emerges: fight tooth and nail against growth.
You basically said "people who disagree are mostly children".
yeah people probably are pretty happy with their situation. it probably works pretty well for them. they probably respond extremely negatively to any other possibilities. they'd tell you they wouldn't want to use public transit or bikes or whatever else. they couldn't imagine how inconvenient that would be. that sounds terrible to them.
but like, people across broad parts of Europe don't think of biking as inconvenient. people with good public transit don't think of it as inconvenient. i far prefer getting on the bus to taking my car, negotiating traffic & parking. at my last job, it took a couple months of trying it, but eventually i started to far prefer a bike commute to the bus, even though it was pretty long & hilly.
so much of our preferences is comfortability with the known, familiarity. the expressed preference of society, often, it turns out, matter for very little, reflect primarily bias, not intelligence or wisdom or what makes us (individually or collectively) happiest. and all too often these things we imagine serve us, they hold back society. they feed our id, they feed our ego, and the deny a greater super-ego, a better way, that we could better enjoy.
Well that, and weather. Only die-hards like to bike in the Pacific Northwest winter. Frigid, wet, windy. I'd rather bike in snow.
The city managed to complete a street car after ten years, but it faced opposition from the mayor, the governor, and federal congressman. The congressman in question even pushed a law that would prohibit any federal funding from going to the operation of the project. How fucked up is that? A congressman who prevents federal funding from flowing into their district.
On a political level: yes.
The political opposition to the project had nothing to do with preferring a technically superior form of public transportation. Instead, it was opposition to public transportation in general.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Cologne,+Germany/@51.20163...
to Houston:
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Houston,+TX/@29.759369,-95...
In the one case you are never more than five miles from green space, in the other you may be 20+ in the middle. It's a tragedy of the commons -- no one driveway thinks it caused the flood (literally, in some cases!). Even Paris is more compact than Houston despite having 2x the population!
This can affect air quality, urban heat islands, mental health, etc.