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Bus stops here: Shanghai lets riders design their own routes

(www.sixthtone.com)
491 points anigbrowl | 4 comments | 14 May 25 04:33 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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zaptheimpaler ◴[14 May 25 05:21 UTC] No.43981102[source]▶
China is the only modern country that has both the capability and the lack of bureaucracy to just do things like this. It's simultaneously amazing to see and a depressing reminder of how badly western societies are crippled by rules of their own making. It would take years to make a single new bus route in any city, I don't think I've ever even seen that happen.
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1. codingdave ◴[14 May 25 11:45 UTC] No.43983328[source]▶
Last time I lived in a city was a while back, but at that time Denver updated routes a few times a year. I'm not saying they are the speediest, but I don't know how you are claiming that no new route can be created in any Western city without years of work. That simply is not true.

Or, if you want to go small, my school district changed bus routes with a 48 hour turn around time when we moved to our home in the country, and again when our teenager's schedule changed and he could no longer drive the younger sibling home.

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2. bluGill ◴[14 May 25 12:04 UTC] No.43983497[source]▶
Routes should not be created or changed often. People need to rely on transit, if they can't be sure their route will still be there for long they should buy/drive a car even if there is good transit today since they will need that car when the routes change to something that doesn't work.

changing routes is needed of course. Cities chanre and you need to follow that. They don't change fast though. long term routes also drive change as people adqust their life to what they can do.

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3. nocoiner ◴[14 May 25 13:19 UTC] No.43984202[source]▶
I went down a rabbit hole a couple years back, and it blew my mind to learn that many modern bus routes just replicate streetcar service that was discontinued (and the tracks torn up) 70-80 years ago.
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4. bluGill ◴[14 May 25 14:05 UTC] No.43984715{3}[source]▶
That isn't a surprise as people build their life around what they can do. If can make a trip they will and so those routes tend to stay useful/busy. There are sometimes better routes we could use instead today, but often the existence of those routes 70 years ago set how the city grew and so those are still useful routes.