Then why are there popular cities that aren't congested? (And coincidentally have lower costs of living)

From the linked Wikipedia page.

Restrictions on validity

According to Downs, the link between average speeds on public transport and private transport applies only "to regions in which the vast majority of peak-hour commuting is done on rapid transit systems with separate rights of way. Central London is an example, since in 2001 around 85 percent of all morning peak-period commuters into that area used public transit (including 77 percent on separate rights of way) and only 11 percent used private cars. When peak-hour travel equilibrium has been reached between the subway system and the major commuting roads, then the travel time required for any given trip is roughly equal on both modes."[citation needed]

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So in general, it's entirely unclear whether this effect applies in most scenarios on the road network. In my area of NYC, a poster child for arguments about this effect and why we should never build anything due to "induced demand", it is vastly faster to drive across any borough other than Manhattan rather than taking public transit at all times except certain corridors at the absolute peak of rush hour.

This is a symptom of low road demand for Queens-Brooklyn transit which in turn is because of the relative size of both boroughs, their lower population density and most importantly because there isn't a subway line that truly cuts across the two boroughs.

If there were a proper subway line, running say from LGA, through Jackson Heights, Ridgewood and then cutting east through Brooklyn to JFK there's no way a driver could go faster on Grand Central Parkway anywhere near peak times.

Such as? All of the populous US cities have terrible congestion and high cost of living.

The ones that aren't congested and have lower costs are smaller.

Unless you mean something else by "popular."

Wrong in both counts. The largest US cities are among the cheapest large cities in the developed world: https://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4758/38890153315_bb29ac1b6c_b.....

Commutes are also shorter. Average commutes in London is 74 minutes (round trip): https://www.thekingsferry.co.uk/industry-news/article/commut.... Houston and Dallas are 20-25 minutes less: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/.... DC is the second worst in the US, and still about 10 minutes shorter than London: https://wtop.com/traffic/2017/04/dc-area-has-2nd-longest-ave...

Those are comparing metro areas to cities, though. The DC one, for example, includes exurban areas and literal farmland in its definition of the DC metro area (which comes from the Census). This is the kind of stuff it includes: https://maps.app.goo.gl/kbfrPLDvBaUn7tzo8

I don't think it's quite a fair comparison to compare that vs. Hong Kong or Singapore, especially when the London exurbs are called out separately.

I'd guess that NYC is in the same ballpark of unaffordability and congestion as London, but the deeper suburbs / exurbs of NYC are cheaper than their British equivalents.

I'd also wager that DC proper is cheaper than both NYC and London, both via absolute terms and income relative terms.

>Those are comparing metro areas to cities, though. The DC one, for example, includes exurban areas and literal farmland in its definition of the DC metro area

So if anything average commute should be longer because of all the people dragging their butts inside/out of the beltway every morning/evening.

Possibly, but keep in mind not everyone living in suburbs or exurbs has their job in the city.

"Median house price"

1. Does that actually mean median 'house' price, or does it mean median 'home' price?

2. Is that price to buy, or rent, or what?

So, I think there's a few factors here. One is that recent booming usually leads to higher home prices, as the amount of building going on usually trails the number of jobs and income increases. It catches up eventually, but not until the boom stops.

The other is that it's true that sprawling out can decrease home prices. However, that tends to also increase transportation prices, since you're further out now. Americans spend a LOT on transportation because of the car dependency. Quick googling and math indicate annual household transportation spending of 9.7k for the US, 6.3k for Germany, 5k for Japan.

That's cheapest compared to median income, which is a valid thing to measure but probably not what GP meant.

And also it's only comparing very large cities in ~8 selected countries (no Paris or Rhine–Ruhr, for example).

(Source of your data, 2019 edition since I couldn't find 2017: http://www.demographia.com/dhi.pdf)

How else do you define “high cost of living” except relative to median incomes?

I guess you could compare it between cities but as Mark Twain demonstrated in A Connecticut yankee in King Arthur's court that would be extremely silly.

Look at many of the large/fast growing/cheap cities throughout Texas and the southeastern US that have comparatively light congestion for their size.

What cities are these? Most of the large southern cities I'm aware have terrible traffic. Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Austin, Tampa, Nashville--they all score terribly for traffic.

The only reason they don't rank at the very top is because they are in fairly low population density areas.

Terrible relative to where? Austin has an average commute of 25 min. Stockholm is 34 minutes: https://www.thelocal.se/20120528/41090. London is 37 minutes each way: https://www.businessleader.co.uk/how-long-is-the-daily-work-....

Other US cities. According to this article Austin is the 14th most congested city in the US.

http://www.businessinsider.com/us-cities-with-most-traffic-2...