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Comment by fasteddie31003 | Hacker News Reader

It sounds like all this needs is faster transportation. I remember when I first got a motorcycle in SF I could get everywhere so much faster and I enjoyed the city so much more. My commute went from 45 minutes to 20 minutes. I know motorcycles are not for everyone, but I think low powered electric scooters could be a better solution over buses. Maybe I'm just bitter from the 38 in SF.

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Buffalo is a 20 minute city, I believe if you include it in the list of major US cities it has the shortest commute.

It's thought that all the infrastructure planning that happened back when the city was growing in population in the 1950's and 60's is helping keep commute times down now that the population is much lower. Basically infrastructure planned for many millions of people but has a population of 800k.

I think faster is not the answer, as Ivan Illich theorised it, speed is part of the issue.

"Beyond a certain speed, motorized vehicles create remoteness which they alone can shrink. They create distances for all and shrink them for only a few."

Speed should be on an automated train of some sort. Humans are not capable of controlling a vehicle going faster than they can run. We fake it all the time, but if you are honest you will realize they are mostly get lucky and are not safe.

Go to South East Asia. They are scooter masters. The roads there are so efficient at moving people. American roads are congested with unnecessarily large vehicles in cities. Personal scooters are a decentralized transportation solution that works very well in Asia.

I've been there, (India), there are cars everywhere too, though scooters are common.

Scooters are not safe. They are everywhere, just like cars are everywhere in the US. That doesn't make either safe. They allow for more crowding than we get in the US, but they are not great transit in general.

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