Theme; public transit

"You should go with bus 513. You'll catch it at some minutes past from Korsvägen, where you go by tram 6. The bus drives then over the mountain to Björndammen, or by the way; catch the bus at Svingeln, but then you have to go now and take a tram 1, or, well, we can go together to Heden with 765 and then take the bus in either direction. Or change in Partille Centrum at '45" from bus 510, which goes from Centralstation."

Maps as well as simplicity are the necessity to get a well working Public Transportation. Imaginary maps of routes and time schedule, glues into our heads, especially if routes have to fit to each other to not get stuck in a boring place with nothing to do, except of waiting. To make it easier nowadays, the transit companies often have software so we, the people can check best way between two points. Public transit seems to have endless of solutions both as a visual system, nodes to change between buss, train, tram and subway, as well as the vehicles in itself, as these double buses in Luzern and the triple -buses in Hamburg.

Today's theme is about public transit and the variation between.

In the book from 2007, Transit Maps of the World, Mark Ovenden and Mike Ashworth collected all urban rail systems on earth. Some for billions of people in the megacities and some for some houndred thousand in the smaller cities makes it interesting to see how the systems became what they are today. In the picture above from Geneva; the street is a mix between cars, trams, walking people and bikes.

Trams in the city of Freiburg have the space in the middle of the road, and cars at the sides, where the cars have to cross some. In the neighbourhood of Vauban where cars are limited and ground covered with grass to reduce the sound (left above), the tram takes most of the transportation to the city center, as well as bikes. City center in Freiburg is also car reduced and it's only the tram you have to watch out for.

Heidelsberg is one of the most beautiful cities in Germany, but not so beautiful in the new part as in the old part. In this picture it seems as it is the rail's false -some more green maybe?

Funny sign in Stockholm, just a reminder for pedestrians of the new line. The city runs a big subway system, light trains from the city center to suburb and buses.

Like as in Geneva, Olso offers a mix between pedestrian, busses, cars and trams. A little bit caotic. Oslo also got their subway under the ground. But what can be done at the picture above?











Old trams uphill/downhill for the turists in San Fransisco and a more modern sort of tramsystem, Muni were it's more flat in the surroundings. The city uses buses mostly in town and BART, Bay Area Rapit Transit (shown in picture, taken at the web), a mix betweeen subway and train, for the longer distances in the San Fransisco Bay area. But for most, they use cars. To to find the bus routes is hard in SF if you don't know them, as they don't allow people who are not in the system to go to the system; bus stops do have no schedule information.

Warszawa in Poland has a tram system from 1865 when it was draged with horses, the system converted to electric trams in 1907. The system is the second largest in world, and with that- one of the most used. Warszawa have 1/4 green space in the city, see more pictures from the city here.

Above; Göteborg runs with both several tramslines and buss routes. In the picture, one of the old tramcars together with cars on the side. Göteborg has plans to make Västlänken, a subway with a wish to reduce the car commute to the city. But what to do with the car commuters in the city?

In the picture is a tram road without cars, and pedestrian on the sides. Cars have to turn another way (right picture). A very common sight were the trams are, the feeling is different, it is a little bit more harmonic, with people walking and not so many cars as in Geneva center, Freiburg center and shown above in Istanbul. But were the cars are in Istanbul.. it's a lot of cars. And even if traffic jams are a fact, people have to take the car anyway. A city were they had a successful change was in Bogota in Colombia. From a city in chaos; frequently car jams and accidents; to a city with a bus system that works as a subway, and that with less money invested than for a subway. You can find a complete list of Light Rail, Light Railway, Tramway and Metro systems throughout the World, at their homepage.

What can we expect from future? Bigger and more systems for public? In this picture, Lausanne in Switzerland, the new metroline; "the mountain goat", straight up the hills.

And Zermatt with no cars, used the lift system to go to the mountains.

What do we see more of in future? More public transit is a yes by sure, but more roads and cars? Take a look at this video in another future before you say yes.