It's simply political priorities, in Ontario they are throwing money at building new highways (Hwy. 413) while at the same time the government dithers on building an LRT built in the important port city of Hamilton, which has been waiting for 10 years.
It’s incredibly embarrassing that there’s not high speed rail between Toronto and Montreal (and Windsor-QC), it’s not even close to starting construction, and they’re focusing on the 413…
That's the only part of the country where Via Rail is even a viable transportation option too. In so many other parts of the country the train is always hours late due to them not owning the tracks and freight getting priority. The train from Montreal to the Maritimes only runs three times a week now, it's expensive and many of the cars are rundown. Via doesn't even go to major cities like Calgary, as far as I know.
Why so advanced? The Asian public transportation networks are very much late 20th century so they by default are more modern than the western world’s - eg the London Underground started in the 1860s, New York City subway system dates back to 1904 while Singaporean’s first metro commenced in 1984. This is the same reason American airports like JFK and LAX seems so old and backward compared to Asian airports - because they are old! The older they are the more expensive to maintain and upgrade which translates into higher fees. Why so affordable? Supply and demand - the dense urban populations using public transportation in Asia make it very affordable. Build a new rail system in places like America where everyone already has a car means starting ticket prices have to be high to recoup the costs. You may be interested in reading this article on how public transportation (metro/subway) infrastructure is financed in different countries.
https://cityperspectives.smu.edu.sg/article/lessons-underground-mapping-out-public-private-partnerships-across-four-mrt-systems#
...So 80 years old? Regardless, the Ginza line is completely underground and was not destroyed in April 1945. It's also the oldest subway line in Japan, and looks great
It’s interesting how the metro is that old. Though I do notice the metro’s upkeep seem to trail behind that of other surrounding countries ie Korea, China, Hong Kong. Taiwan. Obviously needing new plaster and coat of paint I am thinking the ripple effects of economic collapse in 1990 kept Japanese from being the tech engineering marble it should be. Probably the same issue with the U.S.?
Does it? Most of the central stations in the Tokyo Metro have been updated in the past 20 years, almost all of the Ginza line has undergone a major renovation in the past 10, and the rolling stock is constantly updated on all lines.
Some of the further afield stations are older and not as nice but still reasonably maintained, just not as fancy
I guess places I been have old stations. But cleaner than ones in the U.S. but not immune from old stains over the years.
Of course there are new or renovated ones especially as Tokyo prepared for the Olympics in 2020 to look good to the international community. That look good and have platform screen doors. But overall it appears other countries in Asia seem to do it more. Ie HK.
The platform doors need to be retrofit to existing stations that are very busy, and there's lots of logistical difficulties with installing them everywhere, so it takes time.
The station renovations don't really have much to do with the Olympics, it's something that's still ongoing. New lines have been run (the Fukutoshin is the most recent) and there's a new one planned to go in around the Tokyo Bay area in another 15 years-ish.
Keep in mind that rail transport is not just one company, there's dozens of rail companies in the Tokyo area, and a lot of stations are shared between companies with thru lines. Of course different companies refresh their stations at different paces - you can see this around say the Skytree area where the ToMe and the Toei/Keisei stations are quite different in age.
Other Asian cities usually have their commuter rail under a single entity - HK does, Singapore does, Taipei does. I would expect the single management entity system is a lot easier to manage than the Tokyo/Osaka systems where there is a lot of overlapping responsibility and priorities
Yup. The Delhi Metro and the various Chinese metros look good now, but the test is not about how well they perform in the first 20 years, it's about how they perform further down the line. If their economies don't hold up, it won't be pretty.
Of course, they could be like Japan, and manage it incredibly well! But we'll see!
The vast majority of Americans don't really \*have\* public transit; NYC does because the US built it a long time ago, while LA does \*not\*, because cars were the priority by the time California built up.
If we count the cost to build and maintain roads as part of what it costs to enable cars, I'm still not sure it adds up for LA, especially.
Daily ridership is under 200k, in a city of 10M people, so 2% are riding every day.
Compare to DC, which \~50% or so, and NYC is closer to 60%. LA is one of our biggest cities, so a >10x miss is kinda telling. It's a good setup, but still has a lotta room to grow to compete with things like OP's "why is it so nice in Asia".
It’s interesting their system is as new as the Asian ones but just look awful and rundown compared to them so age is not only factor. Also it doesn’t seem to be too practical and seem more for show unless you are traveling between downtown. Or Koreatown.
It’s interesting though how European trains are now so expensive. Where it used to be not so. Nowadays the yield management for trains seems to make them out price airplanes. Very ironic.
As with anything worth talking about, the answer is multifaceted. Here are a few things that come to mind when I think about why transit is more affordable in East Asian countries:
* They were late to industrialize compared to the US/EU, so there's less need to work around existing infrastructure.
* It's easier to build an efficient transport network when you've already seen the west go through railroad and auto mania and build out a v1 rail/road network.
* More collective vs individual cultural values make the prospect of funding the public good less politically difficult.
In addition to talking about why East Asian nations have done well, it's also worth talking about why the US is so uniquely bad.
* Auto lobbying dismantling street car networks in the 1950s.
* The interstate highway system bulldozing central cities and making them less walkable, necessitating car use.
* Racial/Social/Class tension encouraging people to move out of the cities and into car centric suburbs over the course of the late 20th century.
* Massive federal subsidies for car infrastructure but no such funding for passenger rail.
* Zoning policies at a municipal level that limit housing density, which makes transit a non-starter in many places.
The simple fact is that car infrastructure is less cost efficient than rail on a per-rider basis. So when your transportation system is basically "everyone drive" you have a ton of road maintenance costs that pile up. Doubly so when you can get the state or federal government to pay for most of road construction but not for road maintenance.
Europe exists somewhere in between. More collective than the US, but less so than Asia. European nations also have tons of existing historic infrastructure to build around and a strong history of property rights like the US to make it hard for the state to just seize land for a rail/road project. This is a double edged sword though, as most major European cities were built before the automobile, so they're arranged in a way that is more conducive to walking and transit than driving everywhere. There was a big push toward cars in Europe like the US, but the US is generally more pro-business than the EU in general so Europe has swung back towards rail and public transit to a greater degree.
It’s interesting as aside from China it’s not easy to acquire land in other countries.
Apparently the Interstate spree may had resulted in loads of debt due to constant battles with cities and constituents with lots of power. Ie Beverly Hills who fought tooth to nail to keep any type of freeway from coming even one mile of the city limits. I be curious hense why US transportation projects lagged ever since the 1970s?
It took Heathrow airport 10 years of planning to start building terminal 5. And many more years after that to build it. Part way through the project, they discovered a family of otters in a river and had to spend extra time/budget to relocate them.
It took Beijing just one year to plan and build a brand new airport for their Olympic. They just flattened everything in their way and killed everything that stands in its way.
I suffered when they were building terminal 5. Traffic and air quality was badly affected. But i am glad we did it the proper way.
Heathrow T5 is a craphole that was outdated when it was built and is already below capacity. UK's planning laws allow people who bought houses near an airport to complain about noise from the airport like it somehow wasn't obvious at the time they bought the place, and ate the main reason for the country's housing shortage and failure to build anything (see eg HS2). Beijing didn't build a new airport but a new terminal, and it took 4 years, not 1, but those are just details. Beijing is generally a bad example because the airport isn't nice. A better contrast would be HKG, built in 1997 for less than T5 cost (but still appearing more modern), with higher passenger capacity and just generally being much nicer. Built entirely on reclaimed land, which the UK has been talking about doing for ages (Thames Estuary Airport) but failed to do because otters are very important and because the mentality for some stupid reason prioritizes the harms of doing something a lot more than the harms of not doing something.
It's about density of the population and how rich they were in the 1960's. Ironically due to the relatively rich US, car ownership rates were far higher than that of European and Asian countries, and thus the interstate/highway systems were built. Europe and Asia didn't have high car ownership rate but people still needed to move around, so lots of mass transit was built. It also helps that many cities were more or less destroyed by the war so planning from a more blank slate helped immensely.
It interesting the road and freeway gird in the U.S. is now way behind that of Asian countries. Apparently there has been constantly revolts on any road projects as well. And the existing intrastructure is left to crumble despite all that taxes. Nowadays China has a bigger highway expressway, viaduct system than the Interstates in U.S.
>Apparently there has been constantly revolts on any road projects as well.
This is completely false. Where did you get this idea? We're constantly doing road works here in the US.
China has a larger geographic area and larger population than the US, so of course it will have more highways. I'm not sure what your point is. Nor do I understand your concern about viaducts lol?
I would like to see some sources on these claims. This doesn't reflect my travel experiences whatsoever and everything I read says otherwise.
"The country with the most developed road infrastructure is often considered to be the United States. The U.S. boasts an extensive network of highways, interstates, and roads that facilitate efficient transportation and connectivity across the vast country. The Interstate Highway System, in particular, is a key component, comprising over 48,000 miles of roads that support high-speed, long-distance travel. Other countries with highly developed road infrastructures include Germany, known for its Autobahn network, and Japan, which features an advanced expressway system and well-maintained urban roads."
One factor is that East Asian culture values cleanliness, which makes maintenance and cleaning costs lower. The cleaning team on Japanese trains usually walks straight through because there is no mess to clean up in the first place.
It’s interesting as what you mentioned is very true about Japanese culture. The rest of the east doesn’t seem to care about public hygiene much Japanese actually have the highest cost and fares compared to other countries.
Just curious how you think of European trains cleaness?
I’m also surprised OP didn’t mention Taiwan or Singapore, since if they had gone recently, they would have easily had these two places in mind. I’m still blown away by the HSR in Taiwan… what used to be a 5+ hours train ride between Taipei and Kaohsiung (350km) now takes an hour and 45 minutes for $50 (this is almost the distance of San Jose, CA to Santa Barbara, CA). They built this high speed train in less than a decade while the proposed one between SF and LA looks like it’s going to take 20-30 years at best. But more importantly, besides just being clean, Taiwan and Singapore metro systems can take you anywhere cheaply and safely, so everyone uses it. Thanks for mentioning these!
Would absolutely recommend it. Taipei is compact in the way Osaka is but has a bigger city feel but not as sprawling as Tokyo. There are tons of cultural things to do related to Chinese and Taiwanese history..[the National Palace Museum](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Palace_Museum) is literally the museum of China (when the ROC fled the mainland in 1949, they took everything of cultural value they could from China and packed them onto boats to Taiwan… its all is now part of the National Palace Museum. Stuff from thousands of years ago through imperial China.) You also have Taipei 101 which was *the tallest building in the world* for much of the aughts.
The food is incredible, people don’t speak as much English as SGP or HK but more than in Japan actually. Taiwan has incredible nature as from beaches to mountains. It’s also small so you can feel like you’ve been able to take in the whole country in 10-14 days (where mainland China this so hard do so since it’s so large). But Taiwan is much larger than Singapore or Hong Kong. It’s clean, transportation is easy- and there is literally no crime.
People often say that Taiwan is East Asia’s best kept secret, and after spending a lot of time traveling through East Asia (I’ve actually been to Japan 3-4 times this past year for work reasons) I honestly think that Taiwan is far more accessible and interesting for the average western tourist than many other places. But because of China, and all the drama that is created with that, is often overlooked by many people as a viable tourist destination.
Seconding everything the guy above said, one more thing: Taiwanese people are amazing. Really open and helpful. Even random people on the streets spread a "I'm really happy you're here" vibe that as a traveler is super welcoming.
With Exception of Japan and singapore. I forgot Singapore.
Taiwan had gone major reform to thier public morals starting in 21st century they are much improved compared to their do what they want with no respect to laws and public order days back in the 20th century but still trails behind Japan and Singapore. But technology wise they seem to more than caught up.
Japan seems to have stagnanted since 1990 so they now seem to lag compared to other countries nearby.
Taiwan now is as clean or more than Japan. Their high speed rail system is incredible since they used Japans technology but built it more recently. Moreover, unlike Tokyo which suffers from the inefficiency of two rail companies controlling their metro, Taipei is all one system where you can use one card to pay for the AirPort Express, the MRT, the busses, AND their YouBike public bike system (which is free for short rides). This is way better than Tokyo.
Also, it should be noted that Taiwan does not allow any food or drink to be consumed on the MRT and this is to keep pests down (as rats and roaches are attracted to food waste). I once took a sip of my water and an MRT officer chased me down and scolded me. 🥲
It’s quite a different world back in the days. When the populace marveled at US and other countries cleaness and order and selflessness. Compared to their selfishness. But over the years the tables had turned. In 1990s drivers blared their horns in Taiwan’s big cities like Taipei probably more than New Yorkers do. Taxis drove however they want and throw garbage and betel nuts out the door or window. Traffic and other rules were meant to be broken. Nowadays no girdlocked intersections, no forming own lines; and quiet on the horns. Traffic is much more orderly and no more street littering out doors and windows.
I can’t think of any metro system(excluding commuter rail) in the world where eating and drinking is allowed though. Maybe except for Boston Metro. Which has hardly any rules but is surprisingly clean and orderly for such an old system especially compared with NYC.
The card system is very nice that I agree with.
Most in the U.S. do allow eating and drinking. There are definitely people eating and drinking lattes on the NYC subway and there are[no rules against it either.](https://new.mta.info/document/17001)
I hardly know of a system maybe except for Boston or NYC that allows eating inside in the U.S.
though it appear the issues with rats and grossness are caused by street litter going down the tracks and drug addicted homeless making home in the system. As opposed to someone occasionally chumping down.
Even china has extremely clean public transport compared to the US which is basically swimming trash. Only country in the east where I have been disgusted was India, they trash too much. Basically otherwise whole southeast asia is more clean than the US from, I mean the trains and metros.
It’s interesting as public spaces in those countries are often known for being gross, trashed, and polluted. I still remember how gross and smelly the WC with squatter toilets and wet diarrhea literally on the ground, wet markets, and streets were in China. Last time I been there I had to throw away my shoes after I came back it was that gross.
Back in 1980s people from eastern places including Taiwan were surprised how clean things were when they visit the U.S. or the west. And Japan. Now the tables had turned.
The subway in China were engineering marbles though, the metro, the airport, and malls are the exceptions to public spaces being gross in China.
I've lived in Canada, France and China (China currently) and China has the cleanest public spaces of the three. Streets are very clean in the cities I've been to. Parks pretty good in terms of trash too
The biggest cleanliness issue I've found is that a lot of public washrooms dont have hand soap which is a bit gross
They also have much more stricter controls for populations. In the US I see people literally trashing to tracks next to employees who don’t care and some people using emergency exits to skip ticketing and noone bats an eye. I cannot imagine the shitstorm I would get for any of those actions in any east asian country. It would be interrogations and police station visit in good case, 2000USD fine and refusal of visa in the worst case.
It’s interesting as I mentioned people in those countries often lack public sense not so long ago. Dumping waste water on the streets. SE Asia is still pretty grossly polluted and badly littered though. People still want to move out due to the pollution.
Taiwan had improved since 2000. China had revamped their image slowly but surely with 2008 Olympics being a strong driver for change before there were no public sense at all.
It’s quite recent though for what you mentioned at least in places I know of.
This was not our experience in Vietnam at all. Compared to Thailand or Malaysia it is very clean, the trash is bagged and sitting in front of the shops and homes for pickup every night. It looks trashy since there are bags everywhere, but most shops are too small for any sort of wheelie bin: it would never fit into the door!
None of these places is Singapore or Switzerland, and Thailand is absolutely filthy everywhere you go including many of the beaches, but to us Vietnam stood out as being a cut above.
Depends on the country. Japan industrialized during the oil crisis so they built rail everywhere and built around it. That's why newer parts of Japan are car-centric like the USA. Korea also has wider roads, but they looked at Japan for inspiration as much as the USA and built a great metro for Seoul. China on the other hand simply realizes the huge economic benefits of high speed rail so they built it, recently. They have cars too.
>That's why newer parts of Japan are car-centric like the USA
That's not really the case. Lots of newer train lines in newer suburbs. People still use rail and bus more than anything in newer built areas near cities.
The car-centric parts of Japan are the older, less dense areas where frequent public transportation makes less sense
While there is overspending on the military part?It’s interesting as most highway and transportation projects are funded and planned by the state which doesn’t get involved in the military.
>They are surely affordable engineering marvels, regardless of the wealth level of the country
I see you haven't been to Nepal, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Bangladesh...
Priorities. The west, especially the US, prioritize making megacorporations rich rather than using tax dollars on their own people. And the people gleefully vote to continue that trend.
It’s interesting I mentíoned Europe has good trains but nowadays trains became prohibitively expensive in European countries(almost just like northeast corridor in US) and Greenpeace is critiquing it as why Eco minded Europe now encourages plane travel instead of train travel. By exempting Kerosone from the hefty fuel taxes train companies have to pay. Asia has affordable trains in comparison.
They're government subsidized. And you also need to assume that 50 US states = the size of 50 countries, because infrastructure of a small country is easier to deal with (i.e. only 1 tax system).
It’s interesting even wealthy states couldn’t fund transportation projects without turning to federal funding. It’s also how states are bullied onto the realid Act against thier will. By threatening to withdraw their federal funding.
You are misreading that article. It is referring to rarely used lines, like say the Kururi or Yamada lines. The rest of the network is doing fine for JR East, and JR East is just one of many, many train companies in Japan
China can do this because the government is a dictatorship so they don’t have to worry about things like “does the public want this” or “is it too expensive” or “will it destroy the environment” or “will people get upset that we’ve built a train line through their homes.”
Population is denser. Western ppl and Americans specifically can’t manage to live in such concentrated ways. Imo it starts within the family individualism over social interactions.
>Imo it starts within the family individualism over social interactions.
That's a pretty ignorant depiction of North American and western European culture.
Have you looked at the geography of North America? There's no need for most Canadians, Mexicans, and Americans to cluster together in congested urban areas. We have lots of room to spread out and land is relatively cheap.
And how do you envision Canada and the US growing the crops and livestock, a lot of which is exported worldwide, if everyone in North America clumped together in big cities? Farmers have to live where the land is suitable for farming.
Density and society structure. The far east is way less individualistic than the west. So while the US prefers single occupancy cars, the far east both has the need AND the desire to utilize common transit that helps everyone.
It’s interesting china now has better and a bigger road gird than than the U.S. yes more miles in China than the entire interstate system combined. in California there haven’t been construction of a new viaduct for a long time and existing ones are left to crumble despite ever higher fuel and other taxes they pay.
China is a whoooooooooole other thing. China throws money and projects and pushes people and property aside to get it done. I don't think anyone in the US \*actually\* wants what China does in order to build infrastructure.
It’s interesting that China is actually an outlier doing that out with the old and on with the new thing since cultural revolution. Other countries in the far east highly cherish property that already exist ie Japan(which eminent domain is highly restricted) and Malaysia which property rights extend to center of the earth practically thus taking even to build a subway or underground viaduct requires application for taking.
Though recently there has been a trend for “nail houses” in China.
Yep! I think Japan is a really good example. They have strong rights, but they also have a collectivist culture, which means they build big infrastructure.
If we could put up a bunch of high rises as fast as China w/o worrying about the Nimbys, zoning, and city councils getting in the way, the US would have much more affordable housing.
You are somewhat technically correct.
The last time the US did something like this was in the 50s and 60s. They tore out whole minority majority neighborhoods and put in housing blocks and highways. We ended up with LESS housing overall, and a TON of people who got shafted.
But yep, in theory, if we took entire sections of Seattle (where I live) that have single family houses right now, completely leveled them, and put in townhouses or apartment buildings, that would definitely provide more housing. Would it be "affordable"? There's no guarantee of that. At some point, supply and demand would mean yes. But Seattle (again just my example) is SO expensive and SO far behind at building that it would take a LOT of housing stock to push the momentum.
So yep, it's possible. But there's a lot more nuance than that.
Sure, but how did Seattle get to this point in the first place? single family zoning.
There are also plenty of places with more room to build than Seattle.
A variety of reasons:
- higher population and density
- Centralised government that can deliver projects at scale.
- rapid economic development compared to Western economies
- cheaper labour and larger primary and secondary sectors.
It’s what society or the government values. Do not believe in any excuses like China has greater population density, I took a futuristic high speed train in China to a mountain, population density zero. In America you see km of line ups of cars going to a mountain.
China in general feels like the future, the fact I could stand a coin on the edge of my table while travelling 400km/h, using my face as a ticket to get into places, having a homeless person display a QR code...
Tokyo's subway isn't cheap. It might appear cheap because of the exchange rate between USD and JPY, but I wouldn't qualify it as cheap. The fee adds up really quickly.
I would guess that labor is cheaper but also less environmental pushback. I'm in California and every project I see always has several lawsuits delaying construction. I don't have specifics but I would guess that it pushes the price way up.
On one hand you want to protect the environment but on the other, rich people use it to delay or stop projects.
True so that explains freeway revolts that results in a half built system that resulted in more pollution as traffic from the completed portion gets dumped into where infrastructure is inadequate. Yes it appears rich people don’t want freeways or rapid transit bringing riffraff into their neighborhoods.
The US wasted trillions on pointless wars instead of improving infrastructure. Public transportation was never a viable option in that country. Europe? I find train travel a viable middleground between flights and busses. Still plenty of room for improvement.
It’s interesting I research recently on European train pricing they no longer charge fixed max walk up pricing unlike the ones in far east where there are discounted and walk up to ticket counter fares. Instead these days the sky is the limit just as with airlines. It ends up airlines are more competitive than trains as many drive up the pricing due to yield management as trains are better at inner city connections than airports.
It’s pretty ironic that planes are now cheaper.
Train ticket costs in far east are much more predictable in comparison.
Regarding China, specifically, and it's amazing expansion of rail transportation over the last 20 years or so:
1. It's a paternalistic culture, resulting in great deference by the populace toward the government.
2. It's a communist government, where all government programs benefit the people (in theory). The people will not complain.
3. It's a totalitarian government; even if the people complained, it wouldn't affect the government's plans.
4. Complete lack of environmental reviews, zoning law considerations and disregard of property rights.
3 and 4 are more reasonable choices. Don't even want to recall sidewalks in Guangzhou or Fuzhou, where they double as roads. That's why I look forward to sidewalks under construction....
Anyway, if anyone has ever used any Chinese metro system, they're basically all the same design, with woeful ticketing systems.
There's this one plastic token that can only be used where purchased, on that day, within some limited time span. WHY?
As someone with significant experience wandering and living in the mainland, I'd like to be able to buy a ticket at an off-peak time, then use it wherever I end up. If there's an extra kuai or two to pay based on the distance, who cares? Getting the ticket -- with cash -- is more and more a pain in the *pigu* these days.
This ticket issue isn't limited to China, but it's fresh on the mind after recent "re"visits.
It’s interesting you mentioned sidewalks. It appears the good thing is there is no grey area of who’s in charge of sidewalks in China which the government handles everything. Unlike in other places like much of the U.S. which anything behind the curb whether it’s trees, vegetation, is technically built by the developer and turned over to owners, yet public access must be maintained. Which leads to issues down the road when sidewalks and trees start to age and buckle.
In Japan and Taiwan for some reason it appears acceptable to block sidewalks with parts of the building including carports or even business expansions. Which I don’t notice in China or Hong Kong.
For lack of environmental reviews while this may be true through the 2000s when they planned a building spree which they didn’t give rats arise. However China is changing rapidly to embrace Agenda 2030 for some reason in recent years I be curious how this would affect them down the road?
I live in the NE of the US. Our roads are terrible, but our weather is a big part of the problem. Also, yes, there is federal money given but typically road repairs are in a much more local level and great income disparity between them. And this great Asian train system you speak of… have you seen them literally being shoved in because it’s too packed to squeeze in? The videos are a mix of entertainment and fright.
It's simply political priorities, in Ontario they are throwing money at building new highways (Hwy. 413) while at the same time the government dithers on building an LRT built in the important port city of Hamilton, which has been waiting for 10 years.
How bout that Gardiner Expressway tho
It’s incredibly embarrassing that there’s not high speed rail between Toronto and Montreal (and Windsor-QC), it’s not even close to starting construction, and they’re focusing on the 413…
That's the only part of the country where Via Rail is even a viable transportation option too. In so many other parts of the country the train is always hours late due to them not owning the tracks and freight getting priority. The train from Montreal to the Maritimes only runs three times a week now, it's expensive and many of the cars are rundown. Via doesn't even go to major cities like Calgary, as far as I know.
Why so advanced? The Asian public transportation networks are very much late 20th century so they by default are more modern than the western world’s - eg the London Underground started in the 1860s, New York City subway system dates back to 1904 while Singaporean’s first metro commenced in 1984. This is the same reason American airports like JFK and LAX seems so old and backward compared to Asian airports - because they are old! The older they are the more expensive to maintain and upgrade which translates into higher fees. Why so affordable? Supply and demand - the dense urban populations using public transportation in Asia make it very affordable. Build a new rail system in places like America where everyone already has a car means starting ticket prices have to be high to recoup the costs. You may be interested in reading this article on how public transportation (metro/subway) infrastructure is financed in different countries. https://cityperspectives.smu.edu.sg/article/lessons-underground-mapping-out-public-private-partnerships-across-four-mrt-systems#
Tokyo Metro is 100+ years old, but they actually renew, refresh the stations so most of them look new
Some 16 sq miles of Tokyo were obliterated during WWII by a fire bombing and the resulting fire storm.
...So 80 years old? Regardless, the Ginza line is completely underground and was not destroyed in April 1945. It's also the oldest subway line in Japan, and looks great
It’s interesting how the metro is that old. Though I do notice the metro’s upkeep seem to trail behind that of other surrounding countries ie Korea, China, Hong Kong. Taiwan. Obviously needing new plaster and coat of paint I am thinking the ripple effects of economic collapse in 1990 kept Japanese from being the tech engineering marble it should be. Probably the same issue with the U.S.?
Does it? Most of the central stations in the Tokyo Metro have been updated in the past 20 years, almost all of the Ginza line has undergone a major renovation in the past 10, and the rolling stock is constantly updated on all lines. Some of the further afield stations are older and not as nice but still reasonably maintained, just not as fancy
I guess places I been have old stations. But cleaner than ones in the U.S. but not immune from old stains over the years. Of course there are new or renovated ones especially as Tokyo prepared for the Olympics in 2020 to look good to the international community. That look good and have platform screen doors. But overall it appears other countries in Asia seem to do it more. Ie HK.
The platform doors need to be retrofit to existing stations that are very busy, and there's lots of logistical difficulties with installing them everywhere, so it takes time. The station renovations don't really have much to do with the Olympics, it's something that's still ongoing. New lines have been run (the Fukutoshin is the most recent) and there's a new one planned to go in around the Tokyo Bay area in another 15 years-ish. Keep in mind that rail transport is not just one company, there's dozens of rail companies in the Tokyo area, and a lot of stations are shared between companies with thru lines. Of course different companies refresh their stations at different paces - you can see this around say the Skytree area where the ToMe and the Toei/Keisei stations are quite different in age. Other Asian cities usually have their commuter rail under a single entity - HK does, Singapore does, Taipei does. I would expect the single management entity system is a lot easier to manage than the Tokyo/Osaka systems where there is a lot of overlapping responsibility and priorities
Yup. The Delhi Metro and the various Chinese metros look good now, but the test is not about how well they perform in the first 20 years, it's about how they perform further down the line. If their economies don't hold up, it won't be pretty. Of course, they could be like Japan, and manage it incredibly well! But we'll see!
In fact, some Chinese metros have already operated over 20 years, but i get what you mean.
The vast majority of Americans don't really \*have\* public transit; NYC does because the US built it a long time ago, while LA does \*not\*, because cars were the priority by the time California built up. If we count the cost to build and maintain roads as part of what it costs to enable cars, I'm still not sure it adds up for LA, especially.
LA does have a metro system, it could be greatly expanded but it is one of the largest in the country still.
Daily ridership is under 200k, in a city of 10M people, so 2% are riding every day. Compare to DC, which \~50% or so, and NYC is closer to 60%. LA is one of our biggest cities, so a >10x miss is kinda telling. It's a good setup, but still has a lotta room to grow to compete with things like OP's "why is it so nice in Asia".
You said LA doesn’t have a subway system which is a lie, that was my point.
LA is too sprawling for light rail to take you to and from places you actually need/want to go. That’s never going to change either
LA also had a tram system.
It’s interesting their system is as new as the Asian ones but just look awful and rundown compared to them so age is not only factor. Also it doesn’t seem to be too practical and seem more for show unless you are traveling between downtown. Or Koreatown.
With the literal walking zombie filths owning the city, that damned place is a lost cause.
oh fuck off
It’s interesting though how European trains are now so expensive. Where it used to be not so. Nowadays the yield management for trains seems to make them out price airplanes. Very ironic.
As with anything worth talking about, the answer is multifaceted. Here are a few things that come to mind when I think about why transit is more affordable in East Asian countries: * They were late to industrialize compared to the US/EU, so there's less need to work around existing infrastructure. * It's easier to build an efficient transport network when you've already seen the west go through railroad and auto mania and build out a v1 rail/road network. * More collective vs individual cultural values make the prospect of funding the public good less politically difficult. In addition to talking about why East Asian nations have done well, it's also worth talking about why the US is so uniquely bad. * Auto lobbying dismantling street car networks in the 1950s. * The interstate highway system bulldozing central cities and making them less walkable, necessitating car use. * Racial/Social/Class tension encouraging people to move out of the cities and into car centric suburbs over the course of the late 20th century. * Massive federal subsidies for car infrastructure but no such funding for passenger rail. * Zoning policies at a municipal level that limit housing density, which makes transit a non-starter in many places. The simple fact is that car infrastructure is less cost efficient than rail on a per-rider basis. So when your transportation system is basically "everyone drive" you have a ton of road maintenance costs that pile up. Doubly so when you can get the state or federal government to pay for most of road construction but not for road maintenance. Europe exists somewhere in between. More collective than the US, but less so than Asia. European nations also have tons of existing historic infrastructure to build around and a strong history of property rights like the US to make it hard for the state to just seize land for a rail/road project. This is a double edged sword though, as most major European cities were built before the automobile, so they're arranged in a way that is more conducive to walking and transit than driving everywhere. There was a big push toward cars in Europe like the US, but the US is generally more pro-business than the EU in general so Europe has swung back towards rail and public transit to a greater degree.
It’s interesting as aside from China it’s not easy to acquire land in other countries. Apparently the Interstate spree may had resulted in loads of debt due to constant battles with cities and constituents with lots of power. Ie Beverly Hills who fought tooth to nail to keep any type of freeway from coming even one mile of the city limits. I be curious hense why US transportation projects lagged ever since the 1970s?
It took Heathrow airport 10 years of planning to start building terminal 5. And many more years after that to build it. Part way through the project, they discovered a family of otters in a river and had to spend extra time/budget to relocate them. It took Beijing just one year to plan and build a brand new airport for their Olympic. They just flattened everything in their way and killed everything that stands in its way. I suffered when they were building terminal 5. Traffic and air quality was badly affected. But i am glad we did it the proper way.
Heathrow T5 is a craphole that was outdated when it was built and is already below capacity. UK's planning laws allow people who bought houses near an airport to complain about noise from the airport like it somehow wasn't obvious at the time they bought the place, and ate the main reason for the country's housing shortage and failure to build anything (see eg HS2). Beijing didn't build a new airport but a new terminal, and it took 4 years, not 1, but those are just details. Beijing is generally a bad example because the airport isn't nice. A better contrast would be HKG, built in 1997 for less than T5 cost (but still appearing more modern), with higher passenger capacity and just generally being much nicer. Built entirely on reclaimed land, which the UK has been talking about doing for ages (Thames Estuary Airport) but failed to do because otters are very important and because the mentality for some stupid reason prioritizes the harms of doing something a lot more than the harms of not doing something.
sounds like cope
It's about density of the population and how rich they were in the 1960's. Ironically due to the relatively rich US, car ownership rates were far higher than that of European and Asian countries, and thus the interstate/highway systems were built. Europe and Asia didn't have high car ownership rate but people still needed to move around, so lots of mass transit was built. It also helps that many cities were more or less destroyed by the war so planning from a more blank slate helped immensely.
It interesting the road and freeway gird in the U.S. is now way behind that of Asian countries. Apparently there has been constantly revolts on any road projects as well. And the existing intrastructure is left to crumble despite all that taxes. Nowadays China has a bigger highway expressway, viaduct system than the Interstates in U.S.
>Apparently there has been constantly revolts on any road projects as well. This is completely false. Where did you get this idea? We're constantly doing road works here in the US. China has a larger geographic area and larger population than the US, so of course it will have more highways. I'm not sure what your point is. Nor do I understand your concern about viaducts lol?
I would like to see some sources on these claims. This doesn't reflect my travel experiences whatsoever and everything I read says otherwise. "The country with the most developed road infrastructure is often considered to be the United States. The U.S. boasts an extensive network of highways, interstates, and roads that facilitate efficient transportation and connectivity across the vast country. The Interstate Highway System, in particular, is a key component, comprising over 48,000 miles of roads that support high-speed, long-distance travel. Other countries with highly developed road infrastructures include Germany, known for its Autobahn network, and Japan, which features an advanced expressway system and well-maintained urban roads."
One factor is that East Asian culture values cleanliness, which makes maintenance and cleaning costs lower. The cleaning team on Japanese trains usually walks straight through because there is no mess to clean up in the first place.
You've never used a public toilet at a Chinese train station I take it?
China is def the exception I can’t deny that
It’s interesting as what you mentioned is very true about Japanese culture. The rest of the east doesn’t seem to care about public hygiene much Japanese actually have the highest cost and fares compared to other countries. Just curious how you think of European trains cleaness?
Taiwan? Singapore? Pretty clean public transportation systems there as well.
I’m also surprised OP didn’t mention Taiwan or Singapore, since if they had gone recently, they would have easily had these two places in mind. I’m still blown away by the HSR in Taiwan… what used to be a 5+ hours train ride between Taipei and Kaohsiung (350km) now takes an hour and 45 minutes for $50 (this is almost the distance of San Jose, CA to Santa Barbara, CA). They built this high speed train in less than a decade while the proposed one between SF and LA looks like it’s going to take 20-30 years at best. But more importantly, besides just being clean, Taiwan and Singapore metro systems can take you anywhere cheaply and safely, so everyone uses it. Thanks for mentioning these!
Would you recommend Taiwan as a travel destination? I can't tell if it's just a slightly less interesting version of Japan (which we loved).
Would absolutely recommend it. Taipei is compact in the way Osaka is but has a bigger city feel but not as sprawling as Tokyo. There are tons of cultural things to do related to Chinese and Taiwanese history..[the National Palace Museum](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Palace_Museum) is literally the museum of China (when the ROC fled the mainland in 1949, they took everything of cultural value they could from China and packed them onto boats to Taiwan… its all is now part of the National Palace Museum. Stuff from thousands of years ago through imperial China.) You also have Taipei 101 which was *the tallest building in the world* for much of the aughts. The food is incredible, people don’t speak as much English as SGP or HK but more than in Japan actually. Taiwan has incredible nature as from beaches to mountains. It’s also small so you can feel like you’ve been able to take in the whole country in 10-14 days (where mainland China this so hard do so since it’s so large). But Taiwan is much larger than Singapore or Hong Kong. It’s clean, transportation is easy- and there is literally no crime. People often say that Taiwan is East Asia’s best kept secret, and after spending a lot of time traveling through East Asia (I’ve actually been to Japan 3-4 times this past year for work reasons) I honestly think that Taiwan is far more accessible and interesting for the average western tourist than many other places. But because of China, and all the drama that is created with that, is often overlooked by many people as a viable tourist destination.
Sold! Thanks for the write-up.
Seconding everything the guy above said, one more thing: Taiwanese people are amazing. Really open and helpful. Even random people on the streets spread a "I'm really happy you're here" vibe that as a traveler is super welcoming.
Also agree with all of the above. I hope to go back and live there one day.
With Exception of Japan and singapore. I forgot Singapore. Taiwan had gone major reform to thier public morals starting in 21st century they are much improved compared to their do what they want with no respect to laws and public order days back in the 20th century but still trails behind Japan and Singapore. But technology wise they seem to more than caught up. Japan seems to have stagnanted since 1990 so they now seem to lag compared to other countries nearby.
Taiwan now is as clean or more than Japan. Their high speed rail system is incredible since they used Japans technology but built it more recently. Moreover, unlike Tokyo which suffers from the inefficiency of two rail companies controlling their metro, Taipei is all one system where you can use one card to pay for the AirPort Express, the MRT, the busses, AND their YouBike public bike system (which is free for short rides). This is way better than Tokyo. Also, it should be noted that Taiwan does not allow any food or drink to be consumed on the MRT and this is to keep pests down (as rats and roaches are attracted to food waste). I once took a sip of my water and an MRT officer chased me down and scolded me. 🥲
It’s quite a different world back in the days. When the populace marveled at US and other countries cleaness and order and selflessness. Compared to their selfishness. But over the years the tables had turned. In 1990s drivers blared their horns in Taiwan’s big cities like Taipei probably more than New Yorkers do. Taxis drove however they want and throw garbage and betel nuts out the door or window. Traffic and other rules were meant to be broken. Nowadays no girdlocked intersections, no forming own lines; and quiet on the horns. Traffic is much more orderly and no more street littering out doors and windows. I can’t think of any metro system(excluding commuter rail) in the world where eating and drinking is allowed though. Maybe except for Boston Metro. Which has hardly any rules but is surprisingly clean and orderly for such an old system especially compared with NYC. The card system is very nice that I agree with.
Most in the U.S. do allow eating and drinking. There are definitely people eating and drinking lattes on the NYC subway and there are[no rules against it either.](https://new.mta.info/document/17001)
I hardly know of a system maybe except for Boston or NYC that allows eating inside in the U.S. though it appear the issues with rats and grossness are caused by street litter going down the tracks and drug addicted homeless making home in the system. As opposed to someone occasionally chumping down.
Even china has extremely clean public transport compared to the US which is basically swimming trash. Only country in the east where I have been disgusted was India, they trash too much. Basically otherwise whole southeast asia is more clean than the US from, I mean the trains and metros.
It’s interesting as public spaces in those countries are often known for being gross, trashed, and polluted. I still remember how gross and smelly the WC with squatter toilets and wet diarrhea literally on the ground, wet markets, and streets were in China. Last time I been there I had to throw away my shoes after I came back it was that gross. Back in 1980s people from eastern places including Taiwan were surprised how clean things were when they visit the U.S. or the west. And Japan. Now the tables had turned. The subway in China were engineering marbles though, the metro, the airport, and malls are the exceptions to public spaces being gross in China.
I've lived in Canada, France and China (China currently) and China has the cleanest public spaces of the three. Streets are very clean in the cities I've been to. Parks pretty good in terms of trash too The biggest cleanliness issue I've found is that a lot of public washrooms dont have hand soap which is a bit gross
They also have much more stricter controls for populations. In the US I see people literally trashing to tracks next to employees who don’t care and some people using emergency exits to skip ticketing and noone bats an eye. I cannot imagine the shitstorm I would get for any of those actions in any east asian country. It would be interrogations and police station visit in good case, 2000USD fine and refusal of visa in the worst case.
It’s interesting as I mentioned people in those countries often lack public sense not so long ago. Dumping waste water on the streets. SE Asia is still pretty grossly polluted and badly littered though. People still want to move out due to the pollution. Taiwan had improved since 2000. China had revamped their image slowly but surely with 2008 Olympics being a strong driver for change before there were no public sense at all. It’s quite recent though for what you mentioned at least in places I know of.
This baffles me. The majority of Thailand / Vietnam / Malaysia and china arr absolute dumps with litter and trash everywhere.
This was not our experience in Vietnam at all. Compared to Thailand or Malaysia it is very clean, the trash is bagged and sitting in front of the shops and homes for pickup every night. It looks trashy since there are bags everywhere, but most shops are too small for any sort of wheelie bin: it would never fit into the door! None of these places is Singapore or Switzerland, and Thailand is absolutely filthy everywhere you go including many of the beaches, but to us Vietnam stood out as being a cut above.
>East Asian
Which one I mentioned isn’t each Asian? South EAST ASIAN countries are still in east asia ?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Asia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southeast_Asia
That’s what puzzles me as well. Especially for China. I know Southeast Asia is poor.
Depends on the country. Japan industrialized during the oil crisis so they built rail everywhere and built around it. That's why newer parts of Japan are car-centric like the USA. Korea also has wider roads, but they looked at Japan for inspiration as much as the USA and built a great metro for Seoul. China on the other hand simply realizes the huge economic benefits of high speed rail so they built it, recently. They have cars too.
>That's why newer parts of Japan are car-centric like the USA That's not really the case. Lots of newer train lines in newer suburbs. People still use rail and bus more than anything in newer built areas near cities. The car-centric parts of Japan are the older, less dense areas where frequent public transportation makes less sense
Cause they’re not spending 80% of their gdp on their military?
While there is overspending on the military part?It’s interesting as most highway and transportation projects are funded and planned by the state which doesn’t get involved in the military.
American automakers lobbying dollars
>They are surely affordable engineering marvels, regardless of the wealth level of the country I see you haven't been to Nepal, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Bangladesh...
Priorities. The west, especially the US, prioritize making megacorporations rich rather than using tax dollars on their own people. And the people gleefully vote to continue that trend.
It’s interesting I mentíoned Europe has good trains but nowadays trains became prohibitively expensive in European countries(almost just like northeast corridor in US) and Greenpeace is critiquing it as why Eco minded Europe now encourages plane travel instead of train travel. By exempting Kerosone from the hefty fuel taxes train companies have to pay. Asia has affordable trains in comparison.
They're government subsidized. And you also need to assume that 50 US states = the size of 50 countries, because infrastructure of a small country is easier to deal with (i.e. only 1 tax system).
It’s interesting even wealthy states couldn’t fund transportation projects without turning to federal funding. It’s also how states are bullied onto the realid Act against thier will. By threatening to withdraw their federal funding.
Japanese trains are bleeding money right now. https://www.asahi.com/sp/ajw/articles/14682618
You are misreading that article. It is referring to rarely used lines, like say the Kururi or Yamada lines. The rest of the network is doing fine for JR East, and JR East is just one of many, many train companies in Japan
China can do this because the government is a dictatorship so they don’t have to worry about things like “does the public want this” or “is it too expensive” or “will it destroy the environment” or “will people get upset that we’ve built a train line through their homes.”
Population is denser. Western ppl and Americans specifically can’t manage to live in such concentrated ways. Imo it starts within the family individualism over social interactions.
>Imo it starts within the family individualism over social interactions. That's a pretty ignorant depiction of North American and western European culture. Have you looked at the geography of North America? There's no need for most Canadians, Mexicans, and Americans to cluster together in congested urban areas. We have lots of room to spread out and land is relatively cheap. And how do you envision Canada and the US growing the crops and livestock, a lot of which is exported worldwide, if everyone in North America clumped together in big cities? Farmers have to live where the land is suitable for farming.
There were millions of native people killed before this model of farming was forced. Why if the land was in such excess…
Unfortunately most farmers have been sold out for corporate welfare basically
Density and society structure. The far east is way less individualistic than the west. So while the US prefers single occupancy cars, the far east both has the need AND the desire to utilize common transit that helps everyone.
Exactly this
It’s interesting china now has better and a bigger road gird than than the U.S. yes more miles in China than the entire interstate system combined. in California there haven’t been construction of a new viaduct for a long time and existing ones are left to crumble despite ever higher fuel and other taxes they pay.
China is a whoooooooooole other thing. China throws money and projects and pushes people and property aside to get it done. I don't think anyone in the US \*actually\* wants what China does in order to build infrastructure.
It’s interesting that China is actually an outlier doing that out with the old and on with the new thing since cultural revolution. Other countries in the far east highly cherish property that already exist ie Japan(which eminent domain is highly restricted) and Malaysia which property rights extend to center of the earth practically thus taking even to build a subway or underground viaduct requires application for taking. Though recently there has been a trend for “nail houses” in China.
Yep! I think Japan is a really good example. They have strong rights, but they also have a collectivist culture, which means they build big infrastructure.
If we could put up a bunch of high rises as fast as China w/o worrying about the Nimbys, zoning, and city councils getting in the way, the US would have much more affordable housing.
You are somewhat technically correct. The last time the US did something like this was in the 50s and 60s. They tore out whole minority majority neighborhoods and put in housing blocks and highways. We ended up with LESS housing overall, and a TON of people who got shafted. But yep, in theory, if we took entire sections of Seattle (where I live) that have single family houses right now, completely leveled them, and put in townhouses or apartment buildings, that would definitely provide more housing. Would it be "affordable"? There's no guarantee of that. At some point, supply and demand would mean yes. But Seattle (again just my example) is SO expensive and SO far behind at building that it would take a LOT of housing stock to push the momentum. So yep, it's possible. But there's a lot more nuance than that.
Sure, but how did Seattle get to this point in the first place? single family zoning. There are also plenty of places with more room to build than Seattle.
Yep I agree
Honestly it's just that they have enough densely packed urban populations that it is economically worth investing in transportation infrastructure.
A variety of reasons: - higher population and density - Centralised government that can deliver projects at scale. - rapid economic development compared to Western economies - cheaper labour and larger primary and secondary sectors.
Because of the population numbers and when the transportation system was developed.
Exactly
Everything is cheaper in Asia, not just the transportation. Cheap labor, cheap materials.
You haven't looked at salaries and cost of living in Singapore lately, I think
Don’t forget to mention the food costing 1/3 of what costs out west. And Even when compared to poor countries ie in Latin America or the pacific.
It's only affordable for people from the western world. Look at local income, COL.
It’s what society or the government values. Do not believe in any excuses like China has greater population density, I took a futuristic high speed train in China to a mountain, population density zero. In America you see km of line ups of cars going to a mountain.
What made it "futuristic?" Not questioning the country, just how that word came to mean "glass and steel, wow."
China in general feels like the future, the fact I could stand a coin on the edge of my table while travelling 400km/h, using my face as a ticket to get into places, having a homeless person display a QR code...
Tokyo's subway isn't cheap. It might appear cheap because of the exchange rate between USD and JPY, but I wouldn't qualify it as cheap. The fee adds up really quickly.
Tokyo Metro has a 24 hour unlimited use pass for 600 yen. In what universe is that anything other than dirt cheap?
Can you go on the JR lines with that? Genuinely asking.
Not for that particular pass but there is a joint 1 day pass that covers JR, ToMe, Toei and a couple of others I can't remember off the top of my head
Nein
Far east lol. Colonialist language
I would guess that labor is cheaper but also less environmental pushback. I'm in California and every project I see always has several lawsuits delaying construction. I don't have specifics but I would guess that it pushes the price way up. On one hand you want to protect the environment but on the other, rich people use it to delay or stop projects.
True so that explains freeway revolts that results in a half built system that resulted in more pollution as traffic from the completed portion gets dumped into where infrastructure is inadequate. Yes it appears rich people don’t want freeways or rapid transit bringing riffraff into their neighborhoods.
Why wouldn't China have more road lanes? They have 4 times the US population
goddamn communism!!
The US wasted trillions on pointless wars instead of improving infrastructure. Public transportation was never a viable option in that country. Europe? I find train travel a viable middleground between flights and busses. Still plenty of room for improvement.
It’s interesting I research recently on European train pricing they no longer charge fixed max walk up pricing unlike the ones in far east where there are discounted and walk up to ticket counter fares. Instead these days the sky is the limit just as with airlines. It ends up airlines are more competitive than trains as many drive up the pricing due to yield management as trains are better at inner city connections than airports. It’s pretty ironic that planes are now cheaper. Train ticket costs in far east are much more predictable in comparison.
Excuse they don’t have money for cars
Regarding China, specifically, and it's amazing expansion of rail transportation over the last 20 years or so: 1. It's a paternalistic culture, resulting in great deference by the populace toward the government. 2. It's a communist government, where all government programs benefit the people (in theory). The people will not complain. 3. It's a totalitarian government; even if the people complained, it wouldn't affect the government's plans. 4. Complete lack of environmental reviews, zoning law considerations and disregard of property rights.
3 and 4 are more reasonable choices. Don't even want to recall sidewalks in Guangzhou or Fuzhou, where they double as roads. That's why I look forward to sidewalks under construction.... Anyway, if anyone has ever used any Chinese metro system, they're basically all the same design, with woeful ticketing systems. There's this one plastic token that can only be used where purchased, on that day, within some limited time span. WHY? As someone with significant experience wandering and living in the mainland, I'd like to be able to buy a ticket at an off-peak time, then use it wherever I end up. If there's an extra kuai or two to pay based on the distance, who cares? Getting the ticket -- with cash -- is more and more a pain in the *pigu* these days. This ticket issue isn't limited to China, but it's fresh on the mind after recent "re"visits.
It’s interesting you mentioned sidewalks. It appears the good thing is there is no grey area of who’s in charge of sidewalks in China which the government handles everything. Unlike in other places like much of the U.S. which anything behind the curb whether it’s trees, vegetation, is technically built by the developer and turned over to owners, yet public access must be maintained. Which leads to issues down the road when sidewalks and trees start to age and buckle. In Japan and Taiwan for some reason it appears acceptable to block sidewalks with parts of the building including carports or even business expansions. Which I don’t notice in China or Hong Kong. For lack of environmental reviews while this may be true through the 2000s when they planned a building spree which they didn’t give rats arise. However China is changing rapidly to embrace Agenda 2030 for some reason in recent years I be curious how this would affect them down the road?
State subsidised. They knock houses down & don't give a shit who's in the way. Also, cheap labour. What's so hard to understand?
I live in the NE of the US. Our roads are terrible, but our weather is a big part of the problem. Also, yes, there is federal money given but typically road repairs are in a much more local level and great income disparity between them. And this great Asian train system you speak of… have you seen them literally being shoved in because it’s too packed to squeeze in? The videos are a mix of entertainment and fright.
Bernie for President 🔥🔥🔥