Alon Levy

Beliefs Korrents

• Korrents What they believe 34 beliefs — each backed by an exact quote.

  Each is a korrent — compiled by korrents.com, not by them: the one-line wordings are korrents', the quotes are theirs.

  Recent

  • National politics dominates over regional politics in nearly all first-world democracies.

    Politics in virtually all first-world democracies is nationalized.

    The Country is the Natural Unit of Policy Analysis Said 1 Sept 2026

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  • Comparative policy analysis should be done at the level of sovereign countries, not provinces or regions within them.

    But it's not meaningfully possible to understand the world at this scale - macroregions are real but analysis of policy, including transportation but also the usual economic and social topics, has to be down at the level of sovereign states first with no illusion that a province in a large country is comparable to a smaller country.

    The Country is the Natural Unit of Policy Analysis Said 1 Sept 2026

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  • Rich regions having noticeably higher life expectancy than their national average is a common pattern even under universal healthcare, not a US-specific phenomenon.

    And yet, life expectancy about two years more than the national average is rather common in rich regions with selective migration, even in European countries with even access to health care, like France and Spain.

    The Country is the Natural Unit of Policy Analysis Said 1 Sept 2026

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    Europe

  Show 31 more

  • Electrification projects in Germany are typically bundled together with other infrastructure upgrades rather than done as standalone works.

    electrification in Germany is usually bundled with other projects that end up costing that in total

    Electrification Costs and Confounders Said 7 Aug 2026

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  • The cost of major tunnel projects should not be attributed to the cost of surface electrification when benchmarking rail costs.

    one should never apportion the cost of the RER or Stammstrecke tunnels to the cost of surface electrification

    Electrification Costs and Confounders Said 7 Aug 2026

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  • Bus grids cannot function as a city's primary transit backbone at the scale of a very large, low-density city like Los Angeles, no matter how much priority the buses get.

    But in fact, the scale of buses is rather short, and in a Los Angeles-size city they are hopeless, no matter how much priority they have.

    The Failure of Bus Grids at the Scale of Los Angeles Said 30 Jul 2026

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  • On-street separated bus lanes cannot match the speed of grade-separated rapid transit.

    on-street separated lanes don't go at the speed of rapid transit, and the counterexamples you're thinking about right now are either freeways or things that might as well be freeways.

    The Failure of Bus Grids at the Scale of Los Angeles Said 30 Jul 2026

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  • A rail megaproject led by an internationally renowned architect tends to cost too much and end up unlikely to be functional.

    If a subway line or a train station or a similar rail megaproject has an internationally renowned architect in charge, it costs too much and is unlikely to be functional.

    Conflict About the FRA Study on Penn Station Said 25 Jul 2026

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  • Transit-oriented development should be defined by walking distance to rail stations, not by zoning along arterial street corridors.

    The reason is simple: TOD doesn't care about corridors but about the underlying transit, which is a subway, not a bus stopping every block.

    Corridor Zoning is not Transit-Oriented Development Said 15 Jul 2026

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  • Corridor zoning's real purpose is to concentrate density's pollution and social costs onto arterial streets so single-family areas can avoid them.

    the explicit purpose of corridor zoning is to concentrate both air pollution and the perceived social pollution of apartment dwellers in quarantine zones that single-family homeowners can avoid

    Corridor Zoning is not Transit-Oriented Development Said 15 Jul 2026

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  • Building out low-speed regional rail to small towns before intercity rail is fast enough is a waste of money.

    further investment in regional rail in New England - by which I mean RegionalBahn-style service to small towns like Westerly and Manchester, not core commuter rail service in Boston to be turned into an S-Bahn - is a waste of money in the current situation.

    Prioritizing Rail Expansion in New England Said 7 Jul 2026

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  • Transit investment should prioritize raising ridership on already well-used lines over creating minimal service where none exists.

    it's more important to invest in trains that can get more riders than just the railfans; taking a line from 0% to 5% modal split is less important than taking it from 20% to 40%

    Prioritizing Rail Expansion in New England Said 7 Jul 2026

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  • A ridership-estimation model built for typical U.S. transit systems can give unreliable results in a complex system like New York's.

    STOPS is designed for quick-and-dirty calculations and is known to choke on New York.

    Quick Note on Ridership Estimation and the STOPS Model Said 30 Jun 2026

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    America

  • A new transit line still benefits riders it diverts from existing lines, not only the new riders it attracts.

    Riders diverted from other lines still benefit from the project, especially in a case like QueensLink, where the diverted riders would enjoy an improvement in trip time to Midtown of about 10-15 minutes each way.

    Quick Note on Ridership Estimation and the STOPS Model Said 30 Jun 2026

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  • Rapid electrification programs without continuous rolling pipelines can still be built cost-effectively, as in Denmark, Israel and India.

    In truth, rather rapid electrification projects, without decade-by-decade continuity, exist outside the UK and are often quite reasonable in their costs, as in Denmark, Israel, and especially India.

    IFP’s Transit Abundance Playbook Said 29 Jun 2026

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  • China's high-speed rail costs, once adjusted for the amount of tunneling, are not especially low compared to France's.

    Well, PRC HSR construction costs relative to the amount of tunneling aren't particularly low. France's are lower; Germany's are inconsistent, depending on whether money is wasted on excessive tunneling or on other things.

    IFP’s Transit Abundance Playbook Said 29 Jun 2026

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    China

  • A steady pipeline of transit projects does not by itself prevent costly systems-engineering mistakes, as shown by London's Crossrail.

    Standardized systems are important, and there is a systems premium in the US and UK, but it can't be about a regular pipeline because London has that and yet Crossrail engaged in some really dodgy systems decisions that drove costs up.

    IFP’s Transit Abundance Playbook Said 29 Jun 2026

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  • Beyond neighbourhood distances, cars and public transport are substitutes for each other, so a trip taken by rail really is a trip not taken by car.

    Beyond the scale of a neighborhood or maybe a college town, cars and mass transit are substitutes for each other.

    Why Building Metros is Necessary for the Green Transition Away from Cars Said 10 Mar 2026

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  • Spreading jobs into a polycentric region does not cut commuting: transit ridership is weaker there than in cities with one strong centre.

    Nor does polycentricity solve the problem. Indeed, ridership in polycentric regions is weaker than in monocentric ones.

    Why Building Metros is Necessary for the Green Transition Away from Cars Said 10 Mar 2026

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  • Environmental cost-benefit analyses systematically understate what a new metro line is worth, because most of the driving it displaces happens elsewhere on the network.

    This, in turn, creates serious estimation problems for the diversion rate, which is why environmental benefit-cost analyses underrate the effect of urban rail construction.

    Why Building Metros is Necessary for the Green Transition Away from Cars Said 10 Mar 2026

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  • Decentralisation does not explain why Spain builds subways cheaply and Britain does not: the cheap countries include Europe's most centralised ones.

    In truth, the UK shares high costs with more decentralized countries, and Spain shares low ones with more centralized ones.

    Low Spanish Costs are not About Decentralization Said 7 Dec 2024

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    Europe

  • The way to learn how to build cheaply is to find what every low-cost country has in common, not to study one famous city.

    A single case study can lead to overlearning from the peculiarities of one place, where the right thing to do is look at a number of successes and look at what is common to all of them.

    Low Spanish Costs are not About Decentralization Said 7 Dec 2024

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  • There is nothing to learn from any American transit project within living memory except what not to do.

    The truth is that there’s nothing that can be learned from American projects within living memory except what not to do.

    Low Spanish Costs are not About Decentralization Said 7 Dec 2024

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    America

  • A city's first rail line comes in at a reasonable cost and every line after it does not, because the follow-up outgrows the in-house team that oversaw the pilot.

    So Portland managed to build one very small line for fairly reasonable costs, but they were not cutting edge; this is a common pattern to Western US cities, in that the first line has reasonable costs and then things explode, even while staying self-funded and self-directed.

    Low Spanish Costs are not About Decentralization Said 7 Dec 2024

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  • Britain has a systemic problem building large infrastructure projects, including reservoirs

    It’s turned entire countries, like the United Kingdom, incapable of building more than about one line per generation.

    Meme Weeding: High Wages and Baumol's Cost Disease Said 22 Jun 2024

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  • High infrastructure costs are not Baumol's cost disease: what a country pays per kilometre of subway barely tracks how rich it is.

    In fact, even though growth in average infrastructure costs over time is documented, there is very little cross-national correlation between GDP per capita and per-km subway construction costs.

    Meme Weeding: High Wages and Baumol's Cost Disease Said 22 Jun 2024

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  • The English-speaking world builds infrastructure expensively because it is behind, not because it is rich.

    It’s not that the Anglosphere is rich; it’s that it’s the Anglosphere and builds inefficiently.

    Meme Weeding: High Wages and Baumol's Cost Disease Said 22 Jun 2024

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  • New York's subway cost premium is overstaffing, oversized stations and procurement, not high wages.

    Well, we’ve divided the New York cost premium into three tranches: labor (mostly overstaffing, not high wages), station and system design, and procurement and soft costs.

    Meme Weeding: High Wages and Baumol's Cost Disease Said 22 Jun 2024

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  • You cannot make America build subways ten times cheaper while only ever talking to Americans.

    You can’t change the United States from a country that builds subways for $2 billion/km in New York and $1 billion/km elsewhere to a country that does so for $200 million/km if all you ever do is talk to other Americans.

    Pete Buttigieg, Bent Flyvbjerg, and My Pessimism About American Costs Said 5 Aug 2023

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    America

  • High transit construction costs are not caused by political precarity; the worst blowouts happen on the projects whose political support is most secure.

    In fact, the worst cost blowouts are for the politically most certain projects; Second Avenue Subway enjoyed unanimous support in New York politics.

    High Costs are not About Precarity Said 12 Jan 2023

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  • Giving a profligate transit agency more political support makes it worse, because it confirms that spending more is what gets rewarded.

    Just giving more support to agencies in their current configuration is not going to help. To the contrary, it only confirms that profligacy gets rewarded.

    High Costs are not About Precarity Said 12 Jan 2023

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  • Britain's construction costs exploded because it privatised planning to consultants and risk to contractors, which multiplies conflict and soft costs.

    Our best explanation is that the UK adopted what we call the globalized system of procurement, privatizing planning functions to consultants and privatizing risk to contractors, which creates more conflict; the UK also has an unusually high soft cost factor.

    High Costs are not About Precarity Said 12 Jan 2023

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  • Countries that build cheaply defer to engineers, even the ones with far more political patronage than the United States has.

    Importantly, low-cost countries with more clientelism and politicization of the state tend to be more deferential to the expertise of engineers.

    High Costs are not About Precarity Said 12 Jan 2023

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    America

  • American transit agencies stay expensive out of incuriosity: the practices that would fix them are written in languages nobody in the room reads.

    This is not about precarity, because this is not a precarious project; this is about total ignorance and incuriosity about best practices, which emanate from a place that doesn’t natively speak English and doesn’t trade in American political references.

    High Costs are not About Precarity Said 12 Jan 2023

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    America

  Beliefs others hold too

  • Britain has a systemic problem building large infrastructure projects, including reservoirs 2 hold this

    It’s turned entire countries, like the United Kingdom, incapable of building more than about one line per generation.

    Meme Weeding: High Wages and Baumol's Cost Disease Said 22 Jun 2024

    Full record — everyone who holds this →

  All 34 beliefs →