Elon Musk: “Without tunnels, we will all be in traffic hell forever. I really do think tunnels are the key to solving urban gridlock. Being stuck in traffic is soul-destroying. Self-driving cars will actually make it worse by making vehicle travel more affordable".

http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/25/14391410/elon-musk-tunnels...

> The problem as I see it is that we force everyone onto the freeway. Need to get somewhere a few miles from here? They make it very difficult to get there without getting onto the freeway.

This applies to many American cities, but not really most of LA. The relatively grid-like nature of the surface street network + the level of highway congestion makes short trips do much better on surface streets most of the day.

Of course, the flip side is terrible surface street congestion (to to go east from Santa Monica to UCLA at end-of-day rush hour... or south to LAX on Lincoln). But it reflects that LA's street planning is in many ways much more like an "old" city than a "new" one with lots of intentionally-confusing local road routing and consistent, easy routing to the highways instead.

But when every street going west->east or north->south is backed up, whether they're 1 lane or 3-to-4, I'm not sure there's any room for a denser grid of narrower streets, or that it would improve much.

Maybe we should also consider the concept of mass transit? The increased likelihood of injury or death from increased transit time in automobiles alone is a health hazard.

LA is getting better with mass transit. The problem is it's not running 24 hours. It shuts down around 1am so you it's not really good for doing things at night like in NYC.

Also, there's a TON of crazy people riding, literal homeless crazy people, or kind of thuggish people. There needs to be some sort of loitering code enforcement on the train along with more security. I feel uncomfortable as a dude, I bet women feel even more so.

Also need more train tracks!

Fix those problems people will ride transit way more. Thats the way to solve the traffic problem.

> Also, there's a TON of crazy people riding, literal homeless crazy people, or kind of thuggish people. There needs to be some sort of loitering code enforcement on the train along with more security. I feel uncomfortable as a dude, I bet women feel even more so.

One of the ways to improve the public transit, as a whole, is to make people of all socioeconomic classes take transit. Consider New York, for instance, where millionaires are shoulder-to-shoulder with waiters, and homeless people on their commute... And it works surprisingly well.

Until politically wealthy people have to deal with the problem, they won't support any solutions.

Driving and parking in New York is so incredibly difficult and expensive compared to mass transit, especially the subway. In the cities where that is the case, there isn't the same class division between those who drive and those who take mass transit.

In LA, it is exactly the opposite: mass transit is incredibly difficult, slow, and in some cases more expensive than driving. How can you "make people of all socioeconomic classes take transit" in that scenario?

Tear up all the parking lots, and half the roads.

Or, actually, just tear up the parking lots. You can do it by taxing under-utilized land.

It's obviously never going to happen, so people will keep spending ~$3-5,000/year on vehicles, and ~$1,000-2000/year on parking, for the dubious privilege of spending up to two hours a day in traffic. On the bright side, if you live that far from work, your housing is probably cheap.

> On the bright side, if you live that far from work, your housing is probably cheap.

And that's exactly why things are the way they are. Shockingly, given the choice, most people would happily trade a long commute for the ability to spread out and not pay through the nose for the privilege of being crammed on top of other people.

Only because the costs of that lifestyle are socialized - either someone else pays them, or you can't opt out.

Surburban sprawl is unsustainable, but is paid for by new development, parking is free, or cheap, highways aren't tolled, costs of pollution aren't factored into your bill at the pump... When you live in the city, you still pay these costs, but you don't get to reap any of the benefits.

> On the bright side, if you live that far from work, your housing is probably cheap.

Yeah, your house probably cost ONLY 500k-1mil!

> One of the ways to improve the public transit, as a whole, is to make people of all socioeconomic classes take transit. Consider New York, for instance, where millionaires are shoulder-to-shoulder with waiters, and homeless people on their commute... And it works surprisingly well.

It doesn't work that well. NYC subways are disgusting, especially in the summer. And you can't prevent citizens from utilizing public resources just because they smell bad or are uncouth.

> Until politically wealthy people have to deal with the problem, they won't support any solutions.

We just passed a proposal allocating over $1 billion to house the homeless. I think that qualifies as a solution.

> Also, there's a TON of crazy people riding, literal homeless crazy people

This is pretty true. I'm an occasional metro/bus rider, and I'd guess I've been on more rides where there's someone with a clear mental health issue than rides without. And while most of those occasions it's benign, something everyone can ignore... for enough of them it's been intense enough people on the car/bus have been clearly uncomfortable and it wasn't clear confrontational behavior wasn't going to escalate into violence.

I could imagine some people would decide never to ride again.

Enforcement is probably only part of the puzzle, though. We have the same problem with other public spaces (say, libraries) because we don't have any coherent or effective policy for dealing with people who are suffering from mental illness. Perhaps not coincidentally, there's no straightforward market-based solution to that problem (to an even higher degree than traffic).

When the system is used mainly by society's outliers, this is what you see. When most everyone uses the bus/train/library, this problem - while still existing - is greatly reduced by having a very much lower outlier ratio.

Better enforcement is a good idea. Seems to be worth the money.

Or carry concealed permits. You'll have to repeal California's action that requires all new semi-auto's to have a unique firing pin. But then you don't have to worry traveling.

I carry. I keep odd hours in a small town. I walk every night .25 miles to my office at 8 PM and then back again around 2 AM. Never had any problem (probably the same as most people on the train). If I do, I've got protection.

> Or carry concealed permits.

Um, no. The crazy people won't care, the gangbangers will be better armed and generally in a group, and the single mugger will now take your wallet AND gun AND may shoot you if he gets the drop on you instead of just taking your wallet.

> in a small town

It shows. Your assessment of the probability of crime and how you will interact with it is completely wrong.

Actually for the small town I'm in, muggings occur at night between 12 AM and 3AM. My office is down an unlit blind alley. As a result I carry a flashlight and a gun. Should be fairly good at defense. Also train to draw quickly for both. Light stuns; shot stops.

For the gangbangers, they don't really like to involve civilians in a gun fight. They save that for only the most extreme circumstances in territory protection/expansion. Honestly, not too afraid of them. A woman would benefit from a revolver in that situation. That's what my wife carries: Ruger LCR. No hammer so easy to pull from a purse (which is carried crossed over her). If she can't pull from the purse, she'll fire within it (taking the flash burn over rape, for example). In this instance the revolver will operate without catching the purse like a semi-auto would. At that point, they'd most likely run given the noise and possible loss of their friend.

As for the crazies, the point isn't to prevent them from being crazy by themselves. That's their right. It's to defend yourself if they turn that on you. When we go hiking, I carry a gun knowing the gators don't care. Doesn't mean it's useless.

'bsder you seem pretty confident here, despite the fact that everything you've said contradicts what I've heard from LEOs and other trained firearms users.

> despite the fact that everything you've said contradicts what I've heard from LEOs and other trained firearms users.

Really?

1) Muggers

The LEO's I deal with are normally "Just give them your wallet and phone. Do not fight back."

Now, admittedly, most of this advice is from the US and being near big cities. In the US, we don't tend to have kidnappings--normally muggers will take your wallet and phone and run unless you are stupidly in some dangerous area.

2) Gangbangers

Generally will leave you alone unless it is a target of opportunity. However, teenagers are stupid and can consider truly bizarre things "disrespect". Combine this with drugs and you can get some exceptions.

3) Crazy/homeless

Generally the stuff they do never rises to the level of "I can shoot him" until it's too late for you to react.

And, this is, in fact, the crux of the situation. By the time the situation escalates to the level of "I am legally allowed to shoot this person" the situation is often too far gone for the gun to be helpful.

Now, I'm not a tiny female, so I don't present a "target of opportunity". However, women are more often the victim of the gun in the house from their partner than from random strangers.

Finally, my only interactions with concealed carry in my family are accidents where someone almost got shot unintentionally. Nobody in my extended family has ever had to use a gun to defend themselves, but there have been a handful of mishaps (thankfully, nobody harmed).

The statistics are against concealed carry except in fairly exceptional circumstances (jewelers, for example).

Certainly, a wallet (or a jewel!) isn't worth anyone's death, even a criminal's. One doesn't carry in order to defend a wallet. Any decent person would gladly lose $100 and some credit cards, not to have a death on her conscience. A criminal should know, however, that by violating the norms of polite society, he places himself in a fraught situation. It's very easy to cross the line between credibly threatening property and credibly threatening safety.

One carries in order to defend lives. One's own life, the lives of family, and if the situation warrants the lives of other innocent people. It's true that defending life with deadly force will get one in trouble in some jurisdictions. That's why it's better to live in the vast majority of jurisdictions where justified uses of deadly force prompt handshakes rather than criminal charges.

Deadly force absolutely must get one in trouble, in order to determine whether the force was appropriate or not. That much we owe to the deceased and their family.

The best jurisdiction is one where it's hardly considered necessary to carry arms, or use deadly force. Gun ownership and the murder rate (and gun murder rate) seem roughly correlated here:

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

This is "guilty until proven innocent". That isn't how law is supposed to work. We are supposed to assume that the force was appropriate. Of course, this doesn't mean we don't bother investigating, but the proper assumption is that a person is innocent.

In states that endorse "innocent until proven guilty", the police won't even lock you up or take your gun if you can make a plausible claim to have properly used force.

When the force is appropriate, we owe nothing to the deceased and their family. The deceased was a hazard, and the family set that hazard loose upon society. They owe us:

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

I see that your article does not distinguish legal gun ownership from illegal gun ownership. I suspect that "murder" might not be the obvious. (suicide? shot by cop? vehicular homocide?) Medical care varies greatly by state, changing survival odds. You may also be making a backwards assumption about cause and effect: people in places with lots of murder might feel a greater need to have a gun.

The LEOs you've dealt with are clearly not Florida sheriffs from non-urban counties. Brevard County sheriff Wayne Ivey is well-loved for his stance on the matter: good people should be prepared to shoot bad people. His department offers a tactical shooting course. BTW, this is a "Stand Your Ground" state, so there is no duty to retreat or otherwise let an evildoer control you.

I try to imagine a San Francisco or Berkeley police chief telling people to shoot bad people dead. It's... not working. :-)

His assessment is exactly why teenagers in Britain are told not to carry knives -- they're worse than nothing when a bad situation arises.

But I have no idea if that could carry over to guns -- for one thing, they're more difficult to run away from.

[1] http://safe.met.police.uk/knife_crime_and_gun_crime/pressure...

One wouldn't expect press-ganged children ("If you find yourself involved in a gang...") and independent law-abiding adults to face identical situations.

However, it is true that many situations don't call for firearms, and knowing when and how to de-escalate are really the first things an armed citizen should know. Discretion is the better part of valor, keep it in your pants, etc.

This. The homeless crazy problem has gotten much worse with the introduction of spice. They were much more harmless before but now you don't know when one will just start stabbing you without warning.

Also doesn't help that now everyone has expensive cell phones which attract thieves.

Once I was telling my friend about how I saw a woman pass out and start seizing on the subway at 5pm on a weekday. I pressed the emergency call button and people were all staring daggers at me, how dare I delay the train. My friend then said he had the same experience at 11pm at night and he was worried about physical violence.

It also doesn't help that the sheriffs only bother to stand at the turnstiles checking tickets and if you want to evade the fare, you just can just run.

@MrLeap

"Synthetic weed" is a misnomer. Spice/K2/etc. are plant material that has been soaked with one or more "research chemicals" in clandestine manufacturing facilities. The research chemicals are drawn from a pool of partially identified but poorly understood substances that have very little in common with cannabinoids.

It's a crapshoot what chemical a spice user will end up ingesting and it may be a completely different compound than the last time they used the stuff.

What's spice? I'm assuming you're not talking about the substance from Dune, but following up with knife combat makes me wonder a little. Quick googling says it can refer to synthetic weed. I struggle to imagine something like that turning people violent.

It's soaked in essentially arbitrary chemicals that really have nothing to do with weed and its negative correlation with violence.

Almost no cities have 24 hour mass transit including many that are considered to have good transit systems. That's a very high bar you're setting.

24hr service would be very expensive, but it seems that they should run the transit services until a little after the majority of bars and clubs close. It was nice here in Boston when they ran the T until a little past 2AM; they've since pulled that back to 12:30 or so. It can be kind of a pain, but Uber/Lyft are well established here.

It's certainly usable for that in LA, where last call is also 2am. I believe every train runs until 2 or 3 AM (on Fridays/Saturdays), and starts back up again by 5. Not quite 24 hours(except on NYE, when they don't stop), but still very usable.

It's pretty much enough to run some lines till 4am on Fridays and Saturdays, so people can go and party.

Because it's much more important to address the needs of late night partiers than nurses, convenience store clerks, and so forth who have work shifts at odd hours.

I have to agree with the homeless bit, ride on the red line and after a certain point it becomes a mobile homeless shelter. Have heard stories of the blue line, and I'm just glad I don't need to ride that one often at all.

Sympathetic to those without a home, but it almost makes one want to never ride on the metro or bus again. Which is especially hard since I have no other means of transportation.

From a NorCal perspective, that is sad because BART stops around 12:30, seven days a week. But I suppose there are MUNI lines that run all night, which is slightly better.

I'm certainly not writing mass transit off but I've simply never seen it work in practice. I know that my 7 minute commute is well over an hour by bus.

I'd rather just pay the aforementioned tolls than waste 2 hours of my day on a bus, every day. That would add up to years of my life wasted pretty quickly.

I'm far more hopeful for self driving cars than mass transit.

Self-driving cars are, unfortunately, an expensive half-assed solution to transportation in the US.

Buses (And really, any at-grade transportation that has to share the road with cars) are, unfortunately, not mass transit. 7 minutes vs an hour sounds atrocious.

NYC is an abnormality in the US, but it's certainly better than almost all the rest of the cities in the states. Western Europe also has fantastic mass transit that definitely works in practice.

> I'm certainly not writing mass transit off but I've simply never seen it work in practice.

You've never been to New York, London, Tokyo? Or any 0.5m+ city in Europe or Japan?

Every time I see this SMAC video [1], I think of Hong Kong.

[1] https://paeantosmac.wordpress.com/2015/08/31/secret-project-...

Waze will get you anywhere in LA without a freeway.

Once you learn the side streets, there's always a faster way when the freeway is backed up.

Yup, and most people speed on "side streets", which are actually residential streets and people actually walk on these...

Can't tell you how many times I almost got run over by such a fine motorist glued to yet another app...

I agree, general disregard for pedestrians is a big problem. Crosswalks are either a test of bravery or stupidity

Both? :)

Ok fountain and venice are not going to save anybody from the free ways. People know about side streets, they're not really that much help. This problem isn't going away just like the cities revenue problem which is the only reason this is happening.