Taras Grescoe Profile picture
Jul 4 21 tweets 11 min read
#Switzerland has the best public transit in the world.” 🇨🇭

That’s what many transport experts told me when I was researching my book #Straphanger.

After 6 weeks of getting to know the country’s network, I’m beginning to think they have a point. Here’s why… 🧵🪡
I'd been to Switzerland a few times before, and was duly impressed with its rail network, and the transit in its larger cities... Image
...esp. #Zurich, with its trams. "There's little reason to travel in an automotive cocoon when, for a fare of only a few francs, an efficient, stately tramway will provide transportation from point A to B at a level of comfort an emperor might have envied."
—Alain de Botton Image
Exactly one of the reasons I decided not to include #Switzerland in #Straphanger:
🇨🇭It's a rich nation.
🇨🇭With its mountains, and lack of coastlines, it's a geographical oddity. Central, but also isolated.
🇨🇭Small: 8m people, about the pop. of #Quebec.
🇨🇭 Few immigrants.
For those reasons, and others, I considered Switzerland an anomaly, hardly a model to be extrapolated to other nations. But I see its fantastic non-car transport options have a lot to teach the world.
I was staying near a village with a population of 780 in the canton of Vaud, in the foothills of the Jura Mountain. To get there from the #Geneva airport, I hopped on to a high-speed train, an escalator ride away from the baggage carousel... Image
Departures every 10 minutes or so, along the lakeshore of Lac Léman, to #Lausanne, #Vevey, #Montreux. Downtown #Geneva is *six minutes* away from the airport by train. Many of the trains have kids' playrooms on the upper levels. And of course you can take on a bicycle... Image
I changed trains in #Morges, leaving the SBB network (state rail) for a smaller, private network called MBC, which stands for Morges-Bière-Cossonay, after 3 towns it serves. This is the system I got to know best, and it astonished me... Image
I changed trains in Apples, which has a population of 1,220. It's a branch point for trains to L'Isle (pop. 900) and Bière (1,400)... Image
This train stops at villages along the way, spaced about 2 to 3 miles apart…but many stops are request only. If you don’t buzz, the driver skips the stop…
I arrived in the station of Montricher, which is straight out of the 1950s...and has a quite useful outhouse... ImageImageImage
The train went on to L'Isle. Here's the thing: there was a bus waiting for me and the handful of passengers on the train, which then took us uphill about a mile to the village of Montricher, making a half dozen stops + delivering me to my door... Image
You could also get off at the Parc Jura Vaudois, the regional park in the Jura Mountains, where you can hike (or cycle) for hours. As the late Paul Mees pointed out in Transport for Suburbia, transit in #Switzerland serves places whose population density is essentially 0... ImageImage
The crazy thing, for a North American, is the reliability, frequency, and esp. *span* of service. I could get on the train from 6 in the morning to almost 2 am. Here's the schedule: Image
This overachieving rural transit company, MBC, also ran buses to local schools, in the morning and afternoon... Image
Often there weren't many people on the trains. Farebox obviously wasn't a big revenue generator. I asked how they kept going. Turns out they make a lot of money transporting goods and supplies, for example, feed to farms, loads of gravel... Image
They also serve a village near one of Switzerland's larger military bases. I often rode the trains with soldiers in fatigues carrying machine guns. The trains also transport tanks to prevent wear-and-tear on local roads. Image
They also generate revenue by running vintage trains where you get served wine, burgers and beer, alpine cheese...I took one, it was a fantastic three-course meal in vintage carriages, some from the 1890s... ImageImageImage
As I said, #Switzerland is a rich nation. People can afford cars. But car ownership is surprisingly low: 604 vehicle per 1,000 population, vs. 756 in Italy and 837 in the US. With transit options this good, you don't need to rely on cars. And gas is now $8.65/gallon here... Image
There's more to this 🧵, but I've got to run...à demain.
One last point though—an active rural public transportation network also feeds and maintains a healthy, vibrant, and prosperous farming system—and makes it possible for people of all ages to live, work, and go to school in a rural setting.

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More from @grescoe

Jul 4
For those reasons, and others, I considered Switzerland an anomaly, hardly a model to be extrapolated to other nations. But I see its fantastic non-car transport options have a lot to teach the world.
I was staying near a village with a population of 780 in the canton of Vaud, in the foothills of the Jura Mountain. To get there from the #Geneva airport, I hopped on to a high-speed train, an escalator ride away from the baggage carousel... Image
Departures every 10 minutes or so, along the lakeshore of Lac Léman, to #Lausanne, #Vevey, #Montreux. Downtown #Geneva is *six minutes* away from the airport by train. Many of the trains have kids' playrooms on the upper levels. And of course you can take on a bicycle... Image
Read 33 tweets
Feb 14
This week, Covid deaths in the US are routinely surpassing 3,000 day (avg. is 2,465).

For much of this week, that's been a 9/11, day in, day out.

Some of the highest death counts are happening in the states with the lowest rates of full vaccination.
Contrast this with states like Rhode Island, Vermont, Maine, which have highest vaxx rates, and the lowest death rates.
None of this is surprising: the figures are flagrant. The unvaxxed are dying; the vaxxed are living.

No matter whether you're Republican or Democrat, whether you live in the south or north, that's got to be alarming.
Read 7 tweets
Sep 27, 2021
By 1920, the network of interurbans in the US was so dense that a determined commuter could theoretically
hop interlinked streetcars from Waterville, Maine, to Sheboygan, Wisconsin—a journey of 1,000 miles—exclusively by electric trolley.
The video above shows a vintage 1932 trolley from Scranton, the "Electric City" of Pennsylvania.
The wires extended deep into forest and farmland,
making the electric railroads de facto intercity highways; after nightfall in the countryside, some farmers would signal the motorman to stop by burning a rag next to the track. ImageImageImage
Read 8 tweets
Aug 16, 2021
Even greener transit, continued: #Barcelona
#tramonthelawn
And let's not forget #Bordeaux #France
Read 4 tweets
Apr 28, 2021
It's been a long time coming—four months of fermentation, in fact—but my homemade garum, made under the supervision of the world's leading archaeological authority, is ready. And today is the day I'm going to taste it!
(I've got the phone in front of me, speed-dial set for 911.)
Before I try it—not that I'm delaying the taste-test, ahem—I'll tell you how I made it. (Garum, btw, is an ancient fish sauce that was used in almost all Roman recipes to add "umami" flavour.)
I started with whole Portuguese sardines, aka sprats...
Then I added salt, "Pope's Salt" from Cervia in #Italy, but any sea salt will do: 20% of the weight of the fish, or 77 grams. #garum
Read 18 tweets
Apr 26, 2021
This will sound unbelievable to most people. (Not to me!)
A Danish study followed 30,000 people of all ages for 15 years.
Those who cycled to work were 40% less likely to die (of all causes)
over the study period.
buff.ly/3nl4K3D
In his new book, @peterwalker99 shows how even modest amounts of exercise, built into the daily routine, are a "Miracle Pill."
But car-centered, convenience-oriented cities make this very difficult.
We've engineered exercise out of our environment.
treehugger.com/in-praise-of-s…
Astonishing stats from his book: avg. Canadian adult walks only 4,800 steps a day. (Avg. car-free Amish averages 18,500, without thinking of it as "exercise.")
Read 6 tweets

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