They have a subway in San Francisco that goes underwater in a serious earthquake zone. I think Houston could build a safe one if the desire was there. The desire and the money. As another Austin resident and former native of Houston, spend your money and get serious about mass transit!
Subways in Houston and people thought I was whacked suggesting Gondolas! The article says overhead trains would be unsightly...yea just like they are at Disneyland; And that they would block street traffic. Well if your taking a lot of traffic off the streets you can maybe afford to move the auto traffic one block over. As the 47th, obviously 'just a bad driver' gets hit by a train running down the road, our moron planners move on to the next idiot idea. Are they finally admitting that trains on roads maybe wasn't such a good thing? Gondolas baby. Fast, easy and cheap to construct; flexible routing, they can come down to the platform for the handicapped and then up over roadway conflicts, they won't flood, they are clean and energy efficient, and they are scenic, like having Switzerland in Houston.
Mac, Actually I believe Moscow is generally thought to have the greatest subway in the world serving over 3 billion riders per year. And London is probably second.
Just playing Gene! Yes, I've heard Moscow is pretty cool! I liked the Metro and Amsterdam's was cool! I love subways and try to check them out anytime I go to a city.
I'd like to point out that mass transit, including rail, is well on its way. We're in the genesis stages here in Houston, but the last referendum for Phase II passed easily. So this isn't a "build a subway or we'll have no rail at all" here. I too would like an elevated system that doesn't conflict with traffic. That just makes sense to me, particularly for these extensions. But a subway is just too big a risk, I think, given sea level!
I've been to Moscow, and it's by far the nicest subway system in the world. You take the escalator a few hundred feet underground, since they were also used for fallout shelters during the Cold War. The entire subway stations are marble, and there are still some beautiful statues of Lenin and Marx leftover. Moscow blows away London, Paris, and NY. It's not even close. I haven't been to Tokyo, but I hear that there's is nice too.
A good friend of mine created an enormous digital image combining all the world's subways into one map. It's nicely done and incredibly fun to look at if you like maps. You can sit there and trace your (completely impossible) path from stops in Helsinki to New York to Paris. he's thinking of trying to sell nice prints of it.
Coincidentally enough, I was just in both of these cities (as well as Kiev and St Petersburg). I've been to several of the major European cities as well as American cities with subway systems, and I can say that Moscow's subway is probably the most efficient I've ever experienced. First of all, we never waited longer than 2 minutes for a train. Never. Second of all, if you look closely at that map, you'll see that you're almost never more than 3 stops from anything in the city center. That circular brown line makes all kinds of transfer permutations possible to keep your trip short. So do the transfer stations that have 3 or 4 different lines. Really quite amazing. Oh, and that doesn't include that fact that Stalin built many of the subway stops to be like the "people's palaces" with elaborate chandeliers, huge statues, and detailed mosaics. Of course, most of the art has to do with Communism, but that's another story. Before I used to think London's Tube was the best, but Moscow blew me away. Edit: Agh! Baqui99 beat me while I was typing this!
I will take Paris' metro over London's tube any day. I love the metro in Paris. I haven't been to Moscow though. The NY subway is fairly effective as well.
I'll see if I can at least get a postable image, but I'm afraid it would be useless, since all the stop names are so small unless you have a poster size. I've told him I think it would sell if he found the right way to distribute it. If it goes on sale somehow, I'll let you know!
Oh ya, they did have some crazy chandeliers in there too. Sanct Peterburg had an okay subway line, but nothing like Mockba.
Showoff! If you really want to sound like a local, call it Peterburg -- they leave out the Sankt in casual conversation.
Seeing as though I visited only once during a summer vacation in 2000 while in college, I'd hardly call myself a local.
What's funny is that a lot of people in Russia still call St. Petersburg "Leningrad." Old habits die hard, I guess. OK, back to the proposed subway in Houston ...
