public transportation

Added: 2026-05-17

[00:00:00]People who talk about what population density is necessary to justify a rail system are wrong, but they're wrong in the opposite way from how they think.

[00:00:06]Even in Japan, which has more than twice the population density of China, the rail system isn't profitable. Japan Railways makes most of its profit by operating malls and collecting rent from vendors. If you blindly follow profit instead of considering the broader social benefits, the result will always be putting your rail system into a death spiral of rationalization. Stop expecting public transport to turn a profit. That's not what it exists for.

[00:00:27]The profit transit turns is in what it avoids. Car driven development, the potty scheme of the suburbs, and in the economic and human opportunity that it creates in the areas it serves. It's a circulatory system. Imagine saying your lungs weren't turning a profit because all they do is move air around. They make everything else in your body possible.