Quote:
Originally Posted by llamaorama
I think what makes LA different from Chicago, is that LA is choking on traffic. And it always has.
Chicago has new high rise construction caused by young professionals migrating from the suburbs and smaller towns in the region to live downtown, but otherwise it is stagnant and there's not a lot of pressure.
I have this theory that Southern California represents the upper limits to how big a city can get and still be mostly reliant on cars. It's also built out. I mean, we are talking about 23.8 million people living on every last square inch of flat land surrounded by mountains. At some point roads don't scale up in capacity like transit does, but like you said the killer is the distance. By now LA is just so massive that there is no cheap land that can be developed into new homes that are affordable to the middle class within an acceptable commute distance even assuming the absolute best case scenario of the route being entirely freeway from start to finish and zero traffic congestion with the ability to drive 75 mph unencumbered by speed limits.
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It's actually amazing that L.A. has gotten to this point as basically a car-only metro. But the warning lights are blinking bright red. Heck, they were blinking 30 years ago.