New York is the most European of America’s big cities in at least one way. The city depends on public transport to a far greater extent than does Los Angeles, or even Chicago. Just over 50 per cent of New York City’s working population travel to work by public transport. Like London, where the figure is around 40%, it began building its transit system in the 19th century and experienced an explosive period of growth in the first half of the 20th century fuelled by suburban railway lines, also like London.

But then New York had Robert Moses to build the parkways, while London produced Frank Pick, to usher in the golden age of London Transport’s unified system of busses and tube trains, tied together with a network of elegant station architecture, its specially designed typeface, and its iconic system map. Both cities struggled to live up to those glory days throughout the 1970s and 1980s when they appeared locked in a downward spiral of decline, with poorer standards and dwindling passenger numbers. They struggled to follow the flow of people to the edge of the new car based suburbs, Paris and Tokyo managed to integrate their suburban railway networks with rapid transit underground lines. London has seen what such lines have to offer but has so far failed to match them. New York has not even tried.

Public transport is not only an issue of numbers: operating it efficiently requires skill and sophistication, and an urban structure which favours it. New York for example, may have substantially more buses than London, but London makes better use of them; they carry more people, for more miles than in New York. The early archaeology of the underground lines left its mark on New York, as did the gaps between them. The same holds true for its three separate commuter rail networks – Metro North, the Long Island Rail Road, and NJ TRANSIT. While the system shrank substantially from the 1950s to the 1980s, the possibility of re-opening previously abandoned lines, especially in New Jersey is now an option while Metro North has plans to extend their Harlem and Hudson lines farther into Duchess County.

It is only through the investment of vast sums of money in New York’s transit systems that decades of decline were reversed. Since the early 1980s $30 billion, or more than $1.5 billion per year, 5,600 subway cars, upwards of 1,000 commuter cars and 4,300 buses have been either purchased or overhauled. The subway system has restored over 500 miles of track and refurbished over 60 stations. Of the $30 billion, just over half has been spent by the MTA for the NYC subway system, almost $1 billion per year for the 16-year period. The Port Authority has spent over $1.3 billion on PATH and the three commuter rail networks have used almost $10 billion to upgrade their capital plant. Over $3.1 billion has been spent on the bus networks in the two states.

London is currently in the midst of an equally ambitious bout of investment in its transit services, though it has already achieved tasks which have thus far eluded New York such as connecting its main airport to the mass transit system. The questions both cities face are where to invest next – in terms of achieving the greatest return in urban terms – and how they will meet the long-term costs of financing these projects.

Author: Deyan Sudjic