The Transit Metropolis: A 21st Century Perspective

In The Transit Metropolis, written in 1998, I identified two ways which transit services and urban development patterns have been integrated globally: by adapting cities to transit and by matching transit services to urbanization patterns. This chapter revisits the transit metropolis models in light of powerful and unfolding megatrends—aging societies, shifting demographics, changing employment structures as well as changing lifestyles (e.g., collaborative consumption), public policy agendas (e.g., decarbonizing cities), and technological advances like autonomous mobility. Collectively, such forces buttress arguments for adaptive cities that are resourceful and efficient as well as adaptive transit that offers a more diverse, often-atomized set of mobility choices. It is argued that both models of sustainable mobility and urbanism can, and indeed should, coexist in any metropolitan context. International case experiences are highlighted in this regard.