Advocates of conventional transit usually see it as part of a multimodal system. And we are eager to see new forms of transit extend to places/times where old transit doesn’t go. And we are not taken in by divide-and-conquer tactics.

But Gary, why wouldn’t some drivers defect to it as well? The people who favor it certainly see it as an alternative to car dependency.

Gary, since neither of us is able to provide data to support our assertions, this is all speculation.

I don’t think your speculations will convince transit advocates that there are too many transit options in America. Transit ridership — those old-fashioned buses and trains you deride — is now at levels not seen in decades. We have more bodies than ever and few new seats to put them in. People are also driving less, despite the recent pullback in gas prices. All that is certainly backed up by data.

Given the fact that energy will only get more expensive as peak oil, the forms of transportation that will probably shrink the most are the most energy-intensive ones. Thus paratransit would gain ground over private cars and taxis.

“The population has of course grown dramatically since transit ridership was last this high, so ridership per capita has fallen dramatically.”

A provocative thesis, and I congratulate you on that. Now, data, please?

“Obama is proposing to spend billions of dollars in investments and incentives to accelerate the shift to more fuel-efficient automobiles.”

Exactly how Obama plans to balance investments in cars and car infrastructure vs. transit and transit infrastructure remains to be seen. I will admit that his opening stimulus move — throwing money at the states with no guidance — is not promising. But his campaign website frankly advocated a more balanced approach. By the end of his (first?) term, we’ll see what he really has in mind.

Excellent try, Gary, but the only thing you’ve demonstrated is that the growth of transportation in the U.S. since shortly after the end of World War II has been largely car-dominated. We knew this — we knew the interstate highway system was built in the 1950s — we knew about single-use zoning and the metastasizing of suburban sprawl. All this is old news.

Here’s what’s happening now: Car sales are plummeting. Both domestic and foreign carmakers are losing money. People are driving less. Demand for transit is up. Our liquid fossil fuel supply has peaked. Exurban real estate is rapidly losing value and population — and the most car-dependent places are the ones suffering most. You don’t seem to have assimilated any of these provable and well-documented facts.

Gary, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, people who exchange views on this blog are generally interested in promoting transit, walking, biking, or some combination of those things (the first two in my case). Admittedly, what we discuss often arises as much from our hopes and aspirations as from provable facts. But exactly what are your hopes and aspirations — what do you hope to achieve here?

Here’s what’s happening now: Car sales are plummeting. Both domestic and foreign carmakers are losing money. People are driving less. Demand for transit is up. Our liquid fossil fuel supply has peaked. Exurban real estate is rapidly losing value and population — and the most car-dependent places are the ones suffering most. You don’t seem to have assimilated any of these provable and well-documented facts.

Real estate prices are down almost everywhere because we’re still coming out of a housing bubble and because we’re in the worst economic recession since the 1980s. Possibly since the 1930s. Suburban/exurban housing has fallen the most because that’s where most of the housing growth occurred prior to the collapse of the bubble in 2006. The problem was compounded by record high gas prices in the summer of last year. From 2000 to at least 2006, over 90% of the population growth in the United States occurred in suburban/exurban areas. Less than 10% of it occurred in central city areas. Transit use has increased somewhat over the past few years, but transit provides such a tiny share of our total transportation that that increase has had virtually no impact on overall transportation patterns.