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Comment by eCa | Hacker News Reader

The question to ask is, why are there less cars?

Public transport. As an example, just the tram network had 57 million trips in 2019. The metro, 90+ million trips annually. The commuter rail network? 70+ million. (Source: wikipedia)

So yes. Urban planning has a hand or two in it.

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How people in Helsinki get to work: Car: 23% ; PublicTransport: 47% ; Walk: 12% ; Bike: 15%

How pupils in Helsinki get to school: Car: 7% ; PublicTransport: 32% ; Walk: 45% ; Bike: 14%

source: https://www.hel.fi/static/liitteet/kaupunkiymparisto/julkais...

I completely agree. Though implementing it is far easier said than done.

Here in San Francisco (and much of California), things are incredibly complicated.

Take this example: in SF, there’s a policy that prevents kids from attending elementary school in their own neighborhoods. Instead, they’re assigned to schools on the opposite side of town. In places that are practically inaccessible without a car. And there are no school buses.

Changing that policy has proven nearly impossible. But if kids could actually attend local schools, biking or walking would be realistic options. That one shift alone could make a huge difference in reducing car dependence.

What kind of policy is that based on? Seems very counter intuitive, aren't are supposed to meet your classmates after school?

It was a decision intended to foster racial and socioeconomic diversity, adopted in 2020[1]. It will likely be reversed in the 2026/2027 school year[2]

[1] https://drive.google.com/file/d/1WxAVUXfKCdhSlFa8rYZqTBC-Zmz...

[2] https://www.sfusd.edu/schools/enroll/student-assignment-poli...

The key of the new proposal is how they are going to define zones (neighbourhoods). Knowing the politics in SF, I think they will probably say that zone is 7-miles radius (and SF is 49 square miles).

The lottery has been around since way before 2020, I believe. You do get preferential assignment to one school close to you. Most schools can take in all the kids that have this neighborhood preference but I believe there are a couple that don’t. (This is for Kindergarten, TK is more of a mess).

I wonder if future centuries will look at the current obsession with diversity (tbh the peak is visibly behind us) the same way that we look at the ancient Egyptians collecting amulets with holy dung beetles: an utterly incomprehensible ritual.

Essentially, this was the cheapest solution for our “limousine liberals” to address the problem of racial and economic segregation in San Francisco’s public schools. The idea was simple: since schools in areas like Hunter’s Point struggle, while those in neighborhoods like the Sunset perform well, the district decided to send students from Hunter’s Point to Sunset schools, and vice versa in order to “balance” outcomes.

But in practice, it backfired. Most families in the Sunset opted out: either by enrolling their children in private schools or moving out of city. The policy didn’t create meaningful integration; it just hollowed out neighborhood public schools and made traffic worse.

A striking example: St. Ignatius Catholic school located on Sunset Boulevard is now undergoing a $200 million campus expansion, while SFUSD is closing public schools due to declining enrollment.

It insane to me that anyone, let alone enough people to actually make it happen, would think that was a good policy. It's bussing, but without the busses.

There's a striking lack of accountability in politics. You don't really need evidence that a policy is going to accomplish it's stated goals, you just need the monkey brain narrative to resonate with voters (and the other elements of the political apparatus)

In the Nordics almost everything that gets passed as law has been thorough studies of impact and consequence first. Takes a long time but means the law has a chance of actually having the intended effect.

Ha, if only!

It's true systematic research on public interventions has historically been valued highly. The Campbell collaboration, Cochrane's sister project dedicated to public policy interventions, is based in Oslo.

But when some politicians wanted to praise and fund "centers of scientific excellence", it overwhelmingly went to the sort of high prestige research you'd expect, like neuroscience and AI. Politicians don't like being told what to do. Especially when the policies with scientific support from controlled studies are unpopular, as they often are (arguably, the study of public interventions against high alcohol consumption was how the Nordic's love of controlled studies in public policy came from).

Even uncontroversial things are decaying. Professor Dan Olweus, through controlled interventions, developed an intervention against bullying in schools in the late eighties. He pushed hard to get them implemented, and pushed back hard against "vibe coded" antisocial behavior prevention programs that didn't have experimental evidence. Bullying went down. But he died in 2020, and guess what, bullying is up again. Keeping government social interventions on the evidence-based path is constant, thankless work.

> Essentially, this was the cheapest solution for our “limousine liberals” to address the problem of racial and economic segregation in San Francisco’s public schools

It is frustrating to see this happen when —while it would be more expensive— they could’ve dealt with that by just

Just what?

Stop saying "the city". The city is a faceless opaque blob. It only cares about things people care about because caring about things is good for it.

There are demographics and individuals who work hard to bring these net negative boondoggles into reality and they ought to take blame.

> in SF, there’s a policy that prevents kids from attending elementary school in their own neighborhoods. Instead, they’re assigned to schools on the opposite side of town. In places that are practically inaccessible without a car. And there are no school buses.

Could you explain this policy a little more, or provide some references? I see SFUSD does some sort of matchmaking algorithm for enrollment, so what happens if you select the five (or however many) closest elementary schools? I can imagine a couple reasons why they would institute such a policy, but I’m having trouble finding documentation.

Children may not attend their neighborhood school in SFUSD because the system prioritizes diversity, equity, and access over proximity. They do that to address racial and economic segregation but basically it was the cheapest way to solve the problem. See Board Policy 5101.

I think in 2027, SFUSD might be transitioning to an elementary zone-based assignment system. I’m not anymore involved in that but I can tell that is a very very politically charged. Very ugly. All they did it make website more confusing.

In the end, only 20% of kids ended up going to their neighborhood schools. [1]

[1] https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/sf-sch...

Okay, I can find this board policy. However, I still can’t square your account with theirs, see https://www.sfusd.edu/schools/enroll/student-assignment-poli...

> Students applying for a SFUSD schools submit a preferred or ranked list of choices. If there are no space limitations, students are assigned to their highest ranked choice.

and also:

> Due to space limitations, not all students will be assigned to one of their choices. Those students will be assigned to a school with available seats closest to the student’s home.

So it seems like proximity does play a role?

The way SFUSD placed kids, after checking whether they have siblings, or pre-K attendance, is:

Test Score Area (CTIP1) Students who live in areas of the city with the lowest average test scores.

Which will tend to fill good schools in good areas from kids in areas with bad schools. After that they look at proximity, but most or all spaces will have been filled.

Attendance Area Elementary school students who live in the attendance area of the elementary school requested

It effectively means a lot of neighborhood swapping, and driving kids to schools.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210204205328/https://www.sfusd...

"the cheapest way to solve the problem"

Which, it should be noted, has not at all solved the problem. Shockingly.

> in SF, there’s a policy that prevents kids from attending elementary school in their own neighborhoods

thats a solid reason to leave the place already

I'm 40 years old and have lived in the Helsinki metropolitan area my whole life. I have a licence, but I have never owned a car because I don't need it. I drive maybe twice a year when I need to go somewhere I can't reach by public transport, I borrow a relative or friend's car for that.

Even places with good public transport have lots of cars. Cars always fill up all space. You need good public transport, and limit cars in other ways for good results.

Public transport in and around Helsinki is extremely good. Both busses and rail are very reliable, comfortable and clean with free wifi everywhere.

The same question could be asked why more cars elsewhere. If only the western municipalities could figure out how to do it without spending decade on a simple tram like they do in Toronto then the public support would very likely match the benefits people constantly claim on the internet. Ditto with high speed rail.

Things which are practical and economically feasible within the established system are much less liable to be controversial or end up DOA after having to survive through 3-4 different political administrations.

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