The American cities with the highest percentages of people commuting by transit all have something in common:

They’re in the Northeast.

This has been true for a while. It’s led to a belief among cities in the middle of the country that transit is not for them, that it is instead the exclusive domain of dense, older cities such as New York or Washington, DC.

However, it is a mistake to believe that transit is inaccessible to others. In fact, many of the largest American cities are not as different from their eastern peers as it is often assumed.

Mobility Lab’s Andy Furillo has covered how to close the suburban transit gap in a series of excellent articles and while it is true that many Americans live in the suburbs or in rural areas, many live in cities with densities to support quality transit infrastructure and yet they still don’t have it.

Transit Center, using the Center for Neighborhood Technology’s AllTransit tool, analyzed 28 of America’s largest cities and found that in every one of the cities, the majority of residents lived within walking distance of a transit stop. The kicker is that most of these transit lines are not high quality, lacking the frequency required to be useful.

What is missing is not the culture of public transit or a large population of car-less people. Building robust transit infrastructure will facilitate these changes. Frequency is a major driver of transit ridership, massively increasing the usefulness of a route by allowing riders to rely on transit: they don’t have to wait for a bus or train and can transfer easily between routes.

Attitudes about a city not being a “transit city” can lead to underinvestment, but it is clear that the reason for people not taking the bus has little to do with the culture of a city, but rather the quality of the infrastructure.

An excellent example of this is Seattle’s transformation of downtown commuting patterns. Once a city dominated by automobile traffic, a recent redesign and reinvestment into buses and bus infrastructure, such as exclusive lanes for buses and off board fare boxes, has dramatically cut down the number of commuters who drive alone.

When people have access to high quality transportation options, they use them.

Those who oppose transit expansion on the grounds that they won’t use it think that since people do not use the transit assets that currently exist, the money spent will be wasted. However, this is a mistake because it assumes that people are choosing not to use transit because they would rather drive. In many cases, the city’s overinvestment in car infrastructure and underinvestment in transit gives people no other choice. If the only transit option is infrequent and inconvenient, it is often not even an option for many people.

With sufficient investment in bus frequency and design, transit will become the choice method of mobility for many. This is good for everyone in the city, even those who will never set foot on a bus. Businesses will be able to attract many more workers and customers without the need to build large parking lots. And everyone, even drivers, will be able to move easier in a city where more people leave their cars at home and take transit.

Perhaps even more important, transit of any quality is an essential resource to many. Cities with infrequent and unreliable transit still see ridership despite the difficulty of use by those who for various reasons cannot afford or drive a car. The Tampa Bay Times found some riders endured 2.5 hour bus rides that would have been less than half an hour by car. With the poor state of transit in many American cities, it is surprising that anyone uses it at all, but many people only do it because they have no other choice. It doesn’t have to be this way.

Luckily, many cities are investing in improvements to their basic transit infrastructure. Houston recently redesigned their network (which increased their ridership) and, they’re not alone. Indianapolis began construction this month on a new network of bus rapid transit lines, the opening of which will coincide with the rollout of a massive bus overhaul.

The overhaul, similar to Houston’s, will greatly increase bus frequency and improve cross-town travel. These efforts, combined with a significant investment in bike infrastructure, have the potential to reduce the amount of single occupancy vehicle trips in the city.

Shedding the idea that only some cities can be “transit cities” is important because this attitude has a direct effect on policy. While a robust transportation network will get used in any city, they don’t necessarily get built in every one. The belief that no one will use a bike network, bus system, or rail line can create a feedback loop where underinvestment leads to a self-fulfilling prophecy because riders are repelled by sub-par infrastructure and those that remain are forgotten or ignored.

There is not something inherent in the people, culture, or even density of cities with high transit ridership: when people have access to high quality transportation options, they use them. With proper investment, any city can become a transit city. We should not see transit as a special amenity that only certain cities enjoy, but rather as a fundamental necessity of city infrastructure just as important as streets and utilities.

Photo by Sam Kittner for Mobility Lab.