Great American Transit Disaster - A Century of Austerity, Auto-Centric Planning, and White Flight

"One of the most enduring American urban myths concerns the death of the Red Car Trolley, an extensive and equitable system in Los Angeles County that some say was weakened and then eradicated by US car manufacturers. Yet as Nicholas Dagen Bloom shows, an array of larger yet less tangible forces together interacted to practically murder public transportation of all kinds in cities nationwide. Most centrally, public transit collapsed because essentially we wanted it to-no conspiracy necessary. Detailing the histories of transportation in Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, and San Francisco, Bloom seeks to set all of our transit myths to rest for the sake not only of accuracy but in order to enrich our conversations about public transportation funding today"--

About the author

Nicholas Dagen Bloom is professor of urban policy and planning, and director of the Master of Urban Planning Program, at Hunter College. He is the author of numerous books, including How States Shaped Postwar America, also published by the University of Chicago Press.

Product details

• Authors: Nicholas Dagen Bloom, Bloom Nicholas Dagen
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 01.06.2023
• EAN: 9780226824406
• ISBN: 978-0-226-82440-6
• No. of pages: 368
• Series: Historical Studies of Urban America; Historical Studies of Urban Am
• Subjects: Guides > Motor vehicles, aircraft, ships, space travel > General, dictionaries, handbooks; Humanities, art, music > History > 20th century (up to 1945); Non-fiction book > History > Miscellaneous; USA, 20th Century, TRANSPORTATION / Public Transportation, 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000, HISTORY / United States / 20th Century, 20th century, c 1900 to c 1999, Urban & municipal planning, United States of America, USA, History of the Americas, Urban and municipal planning and policy, Transport planning and policy, Buses, trams and commercial vehicles: general interest, Transport planning & policy, Buses, trams & commercial vehicles: general interest