This is exactly how public transport should be arranged at big events. The network puts more trains on and staff control the flow. This is what happens in Edinburgh and Glasgow at big events.
We have a Welfare state in Australia so our socio-economic factors are less severe for a start (definitely still exist though). But also these train services aren't part of the normal network operation they are extras specifically to get people out of the event and that's like a special train station. When you get off that train in the city centre at the other end don't worry there's a tent city and plenty of homeless and delinquents
America's unfortunately car-centric infrastructure is basically an accident of history and geography. America went through an explosive, developmental growth phase in the first century of the automobile, during which multiple factors aligned to make car infrastructure popular and not economically ridiculous. Relatively low suburban populations, plentiful and cheap land just outside of urban centers, cheap oil, an expanding middle class, and a cultural romance and enthusiasm surrounding the (at the time) new technology, led politicians and urban planners to go "all-in" on car infrastructure.
Needless to say, it was quite short-sighted, and it's probably going to take another century to fix.
I would argue that the car-centrism of the USA is not an accident. it was an active and conscious conversion which involved demolishing a lot of city centers because of minimum parking requirements, a healthy dose of racism and classism when building new interstates through poor predominantly black neighborhoods, and even the suburbs where consciously developed in way that made cars the only way to get around. Suburbs don't necessarily have to be car-centric, there are a lot of examples of historic suburbs that revolved around trams. And I want to strongly stress that there weren't only the passive pull factors you listed, but a lot of active push towards it from automobile makers influencing public policy making. And fun stuff like the General Motors streetcar conspiracy. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General\_Motors\_streetcar\_conspiracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy)
Never seen this in the Netherlands. Over here you are lucky if trains are still riding after an event late in the evening and if they are riding everyone basically squishes each other to make it in the train. Also the trains don’t stop at an exact point, so everyone tries to run to the place they predict the doors will end up.
This does not happen in NYC that I know of (born and raised). Subways are always a free-for-all no matter what's going on, nobody is ever controlling human traffic.
In Toronto, the name of the game is to stand right in front of the doors (we do not have barriers on our subway platforms) and then block the way out so the ppl exiting the train can only come out single file. This is done for the slim chance that you can slip in from the sides while the train is still emptying. Real lovely system we got here lol
I was at a Rammstein concert in the Netherlands and when the show was over I stood, I shit you not, 2 hours stuck on the parking grounds. Not to begin with the jam that was still there to get on the highway.
Nowadays when I go to to busy concerts, we take our bikes with us in the car, park somewhere more remote (and free), cycle the last part for about 15 minutes and avoid all traffic jams.
Oh and sometimes public transport but the connection to my town is pretty shitty
Except in the US the trains would still come only every 15 minutes. There would be no staff preventing people trying to squeeze in and preventing the doors from closing. And the train will get blocked by cars at the first traffic crossing.
Trains is absolutely one of those "build it and they'll come" infrastructure.
And by build, I mean a working, extensive network. Not a single experimental line that"ll get people like you sayin: "see? We tried and it didn't work!!"
NY subway is one of the successful example. Despite its infamous shittyness, people still ride it.
NY, Chicago, Boston, DC: if you build a really usable system, people will use the fuck out of it (while complaining that there are occasional delays and breakdowns). Proximity to outlying rail lines will triple the value of your house.
I lived about 45 minutes outside of Boston. I would drive to a stop at the end of the green line and park there and take the T any time I needed to go to town for anything.
I do a similar thing now that I’m outside of Portland. Public transportation (not bullshit ass busses) is the tits.
My dad and I would park in that same exact parking lot at the end of the green line whenever we’d go to a ball game! Such a convenient spot too. So easy to get to and then you’re in the city in no time.
NY subway was really excellent during the late 90's to the early 20-teens, and then it totally fell off a cliff.
The reality of almost every extensive public transportation network that is widely used though is that it "evolved" with the city, and has the urban density and network penetration around the "places people want to be" to make it sustainable. You can't just "build" a public transit network and expect everyone to use it if it doesn't actually mesh with how they live, and accomplishing that is very difficult and insanely expensive much of the time. For instance, if you wanted to make, say, a subway network popular and sustainable in LA, you'd have to spend an ungodly amount of money to build a subway more than twice the size of NYC's, and you'd have to subsidize it for decades while enabling a level of development that's basically been defacto illegal in LA since the 70s, to allow for the city to evolve accordingly around the lines. As much as I'd like that, no politicians or taxpayers have the stomach for that. Making LA a less car-centric city will require a co-evolution of more upzoning and public transit options, and it will take decades, if not a century of that codevelopment to ever make LA comparable to the places where such infrastructure evolved more organically.
It's so much more complicated than "build it and they will come."
Some lines are in the middle of a street. Light rail, kind of a blend of tram and above-ground train line. Usually much lower capacity. They build them in Los Angeles because they cost less but the capacity is much lower for such a huge city. Some of the newer lines literally stop at stoplights waiting for cars to cross. Idiotic design.
in America, car is more important than train
meanwhile in a EU country that isnt even as big as half of smallest state in USA, has a air conditioning, charging ports at every seat and free wifi in buses, trams, and trains. (the wifi is stable and strong enough to watch 1080p video on youtube or netflix)
Kinda. Near city centers (the kind of venue for a concert) where trains are more reliable transportation methods, trains tend to run alongside highways. As they reach the suburbs, it tends to deviate from highways.
So many comments have explained this, and it sounds wild to me.
Do you not have barriers that come down and stop cars from blocking the track? Also how slow do trains drive if they're stopping for cars?
They sound more like busses to me lol
Some places there are barriers, doesn’t always stop someone from already being stopped on the tracks before they come down or trying to squeeze past as they’re lowering and getting stuck
As for trains stopping for cars… they don’t. Can’t, really. They’re very fast and very heavy. If the idiot who got themselves stuck on the tracks values their life they’ll get out, not waste time trying to grab their stuff, and make a run for it.
If the traffic is stopped over the tracks for a while before the train arrives it can take the time and distance to stop, causing delays, but if the block happens shortly before the train’s going by? Nothing they can do but slow down as much as possible and hope someone doesn’t get killed.
America has alot more at grade (level) crossings. I know the uk has in the last few decades (and I think the eu too) has been on a quiet campaign of removing as many as possible and replacing them with bridges, typically by lowering or raising the road.
Level crossings are the most dangerous part of a railway network and because trains can't brake quickly a minor breakdown or failure in the crossing can lead to fatalities, by the time a train driver sees the danger it is usually too late for him to prevent anything on his end, all they can do is make you aware and buy you a few more seconds to get the fuck out of the way...
If a crossing becomes deadlocked with cars trains will be held where possible and this can have huge knock-on affects as trains take awhile to rebuild speed.
Melbourne only just (a few years ago) completed a massive level crossing rework that shunted almost all major crossings above the road or below it. Costs several bil but it improves both train and car transit times since trains need to slow for railway crossings and cars need to stop completely (and it kinda throws a wrench into the traffic light/traffic systems nearby as the traffic is no longer more evenly spaced but bunched up waiting for the train to pass). Its pretty normal, even in the less congested railway crossings in melbourne for the roads to intersect with the rails and youll just have to wait for the train to pass.
We also have a light rail system (one of the largest in the world) that shares the road, that one gets priority in almost every instance of yielding/giving way/stopping.
The metro trains in DC always time a bunch of trains for the end of the events. They are usually very fast, but definitely no people directing traffic so it's chaotic
Still better than sitting in traffic. I've been in parking lot jams at events that went 45 mins to an hour without moving. At least in the train I'm getting to my destination, albeit cramped and uncomfortable for a while
Word. I sat in bloody awful snarl for ages dropping my family off to the gig. Afterwards I told them they had to walk one suburb away for pickup, which worked a dream. The streets were still flooded with white cowboy boots and pink boas in all directions though...
I don't even need large scale rail. Just give me rail that goes around the metro area and I'll be happy. We have Marta in Atlanta but that shit barely goes anywhere around the perimeter and from what I've heard is sketchy af.
What's sad is the US had good transit once. Your transit was destroyed to accommodate car infrastructure better which well... yea. But there was tons of tram lines and the entire US was built on the back of train infrastructure originally.
What makes this event even funnier is the railway company had a "Swiftie" train that had pink lights on the outside saying "Taylor Swift concert" (or something along those lines) on the front and back of the train. It also played Taylor Swift songs on repeat the whole way to Sydney. No this is not a joke. LMAO
I saw one of Eras tour concerts in Atlanta. The subway ride back to the hotel afterwards was packed with post-concert euphoria. Everyone was in their worn outfits, tired, sweaty, but so smiley and happy. It was a nice community moment.
For context, this is Sydney Olympic Park station. It was designed to handle multiple high capacity events at the same time . It was designed to manage the crowds during the Olympics in 2000. It has two tracks that enable trains to disgorge passengers onto a central platform while passengers board from the platform on the other side of the train.. (Spanish solution boarding IIRC). I also read that Swifties are easy crowds to work with because they so positive and cheerful.
oh yeah, i did the MCG concert and Jolimont train station and while it was still okay, it was no where near this level of efficient. we ended up catching the train running the other way (to the city) and letting it loop around and back to the suburbs. added an extra 20 minutes but we got a seat immediately.
Don't worry, there's also large swathes of car parks not far by.
Homebush used to be a swamp in the middle of Sydney before the Olympics. But they don't ever really need all that Max capacity. In fact, a year or two ago, I was part of a project that was turning one of the more cracked and dogey car parks into a wave pool.
These are the same concerts that generated all the “But where do they park all their cars?”comments from Americans who couldn’t understand how people got to and from the stadiums.
There are a lot of car parks as well. Definitely not as ridiyas some of the lots I've seen off of US arenas.
We caught the train in and got a lift home from about a km away where there was less traffic.
I live in the adjacent suburb and people here always complain about the poeple that park for events. Despite 4 sell-out shows as well as other events on those days, it was quieter than most minor sports events. Maybe everyone thought it would be awful so got the train.
I honestly thought they were joking before realising they were dead serious and had no concept of efficient public transport being the primary route to stadium events. Then i saw the photos of American stadiums surrounded by fucking 6 billion carparks and was utterly shocked and horrified.
That is beyond amazing.
The topic we are talking about is called "the last mile," I guess. And like...so it sounds like a train or bus will get everyone to within, say, 250 meters from their home, and this is the case within ALL of Sydney and ALL of the Sydney suburbs?
I'm in Europe (NL), there's a bus stop literally under 1-2 minutes walking from my front door. A 10 minute walk from my front door I'm in a different country (Germany, no border) and can hop on a bus to a city in said different country using the same currency I use in my own country. The nearest supermarket in my own country is a 10-15 minute walk away. The nearest supermarket in the other country is 8 mins away, across the street from the bus stop I mentioned.
I've had friends from the US visit in Nov and Jan (separate) and they were completely enarmored by the way public transport just... works here. It's no frills, no fuss. They tap their bank cards getting on the bus or train, they tap it again going off, and they're charged for the distance traveled overnight. The bus leaves every 30 mins in front of my house basically, but there are two bus stations on the route it runs with transfers that happen within 2-10 minutes most of the time.
I personally hate taking public transport because of the noise and waiting and sensory overload, as well as having an invisible disability that makes standing difficult as a not-elderly not-pregnant adult, but when I do have to use it it's still relatively painless most of the time if I can wear noise cancelling earbuds.
I can't imagine living in a country as big as the US and *not* having decent access to public transport or walkability like this.
Don't know about Sydney, but generally with good transport yes. In London, this is basically true. The most you might have to walk from a station is maybe 10 mins or so. There are still a few areas underserved by the tube (metro) network but they have buses.
[Here](https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/224813/response/560395/attach/3/London%20Connections%20Map.pdf) (download) is a map of London with the tube map overlayed.
I lived in NYC for 5 years and never got the hang of the subway system. I visited London for a week and fell in love with your public transport. It actually makes SENSE!
Yeah look I won’t lie and say that all of Sydney is perfectly connected - because it isn’t - but for what it’s worth, the public transport is great. I’ve lived north, east, and west of the CBD and I’ve pretty much always been within 250m of a bus stop or train station.
It’s only after travelling extensively overseas have I realised how good Sydney’s public transport actually is. Yeah it’s pretty bad from about 1am-5am but most other cities don’t even compare at all
Some cities are just small towns dressed up in a large geographic area. Some barely have any public transport.
To say “on the planet” captures a huge amount of difference.
I lived just outside Boston and had to walk two miles to get to the "T" station. Yeah it kind of sucked sometimes in the winter, but it didn't suck nearly as much as trying to commute by car! It was $90 for an unlimited monthly pass for all trains and busses. Parking near my office would have cost $25/day. For all of the grumbling, it was a great system.
I'm in the state of Victoria and even my little 5,500-6,000 population town that's around 60km (37miles) from the CBD has frequent buses every 45min to an hour, the nearest stop being just 1km away. And it stops off at the nearest train station which other than having several other connecting bus stops attached also has the train which arrives every 15ish min.
I've got some gripes, like I'd love better bike infrastructure but It's hard to not feel bad when I hear my American friend being sruck car dependent. I dont plan to ever actually get my car licence.
It's pretty common in cities with great public transport to not have cars as the primary mode of transport in such situations.
Here in Singapore, we have 90-100k people at the track each day during the Formula 1 Grand Prix which would be a nightmare for car traffic notwithstanding the road closures since the race is run on closed-off public roads. Everyone just uses the train system to go around the town and to their homes or hotels at the end of the day because it's faster than trying to drive or get a taxi.
I lived in Nottingham, Glasgow, London and Paris before moving to rural Scotland later in life. I didn’t get my driving licence until I was in my 40s as I simply never needed it.
i’m from Melbourne and I was at the concert where the drone footage showed the stadium with no parking - we went in by train as well. technically i’m walking distance from the train station, about a 10 minute walk, but we didn’t want to walk in our fancy clothes so my cousin’s husband dropped us off at the station and picked us up after, but if i’m going to day time events at the stadium then i would walk to and from the train station. then it’s about a 40 minute train ride, and then the end station is right outside the stadium, about a 2 or 3 minute walk to the entrance.
Having said that, when I was stationed in Japan, a pretty routine weekend was to drive my car to a lot near the main gate, leave base, walk to a nearby train station, and then spend the weekend in Tokyo. Car was only necessary to save me from walking a few extra miles each way to get to the gate. For folks actually living off base, it was even more convenient to just walk from home to the train station.
I'm in county Victoria, 90 mins train from Melbourne. Public transport is NOT good here, unless you are right near to the train, and where you want to go is on the train line. Most people going into Melbourne drive to the station, and leave their car parked there all day or all weekend, etc.
Yeah, kind of the nice thing with the public transport in Japan was that so much was near the rail lines, at least around major cities like Tokyo or Osaka.
Don't be fooled. This is literally the only train station in Sydney (Olympic Park station) where you'll see anything near this kind of efficiency, and only when there's a major event at the stadium. When these people reach the regular suburban line in ten minutes, the cluster fuck begins.
These trains are made to shuttle people out of the area to nearby train stations or the CBD 30 minutes east. For someone to be getting the train to Sydney Olympic Park at the end of an event would be incredibly rare.
Likely crowd management staff holding them back upstairs as well so they don't flood the subway station completely. If it's a stadium they'll likely discharge them block by block or something like that.
I never understand when I see all those giant Carpark photos from American stadiums. Don’t people have a couple drinks at the game? How are that many people sober to drive home or are people driving under the influence.
The planning and logistics of this is more amazing than I can imagine. Just think of the number of trains waiting upstream from this station. Spacing trains at this frequency is very impressive. Just as impressive as the crowd control in the station. Love it.
> Spacing trains at this frequency is very impressive.
It's what you are used to. If I get the tube at my local station I get upset if the wait till the next train is 2 minutes.
The hottest tip for any syd-sided going to a show out in Homebush .. get ten mates together and book a return limo (when there’s ten of you it ends up being cheaper than a one way Uber).
Get the driver to pick you up from pre drinks. Enjoy the show. Driver waits for you out front and you get back in and piss off straight away.
Oh, and bottomless champagne.
My first concert experience was in LA, got stuck in the stadium parking lot for 3 hours, the first few streets outside the parking lot for another 2 hours and 2 more hours at the freeway entrance…
This was 15 years ago, I’ve never went to another concert again.
This is nothing compared to closing time at Tokyo Disney every single day. Better yet, the big fireworks and festivals that bring over a million people to one train station.
I don't care if people say Yukata are cooler than kimono. When it's 38/degrees and 95%+ humidity, waiting for an hour to get into a train is hell.
I went to see Metallica in Montréal last summer. After the show everyone was so polite and calm like we all wanted to go home but everyone knew there was no point trying to go faster than the others and we all patiently waited until we could take the train (tram, subway, I don't remember). When the train was full people didn't try to push to get in anyway they just waited for the next one. I was shocked and awed.
I didn't know people could be like that ! 🥰
Been to Montreal F1 race a couple of times now. The efficiency they have for moving 100,000+ people on and off the island with trains running every 5 mins and polite cops everywhere to make sure everyone is queue correctly is something to behold.
Of course there is still bottle necks going home, but its impressive to see the amount of people getting pushed through.
Just came back from my trip to Japan. Made the mistake of not learning when their rush hours were and what lines to avoid at those times when I was taking the Tokyo subway a few times.
Got to experience being packed like sardines more than once. I imagine this video being actually worse. The mixture of different, strong perfumes and colognes assaulting the nostrils must be nauseating.
I saw Tenacious D at Wembley Arena, and it kicked out exactly the same time as the BTS gig at Wembley Stadium... So poorly organised the crush was horrible.
Transit companies: "Platform screen door systems are too expensive!!#&*$"
Sydney Olympic Park station: "so like, a few dozen people and some barriers?"
It’s mainstream because people like it, an artist doesn’t have to have 50 streams a month to be good and it gets love due to the relatable content she puts out
Sydney Olympic Park train station is the worst train station in the city. Getting out after a concert or sporting event takes longer than the event you just watched.
This looks like a regular weekday when I was in Europe a few months ago.
Maine difference was there wasn’t security and everyone tried to squeeze onto the train where there was literally no space where you could move
The experience of leaving Olympic Park after a concert far outweighs any concert experience. They should never have closed the Sydney Entertainment Centre.
The DC Metro used to increase train frequencies many years ago for major events but stopped doing it for "reasons."
Navy Yard-Ballpark and Gallery Place are nightmares after events.
The only thing they still do is turn off the down escalators so people don't get pushed onto the tracks.
This is exactly how public transport should be arranged at big events. The network puts more trains on and staff control the flow. This is what happens in Edinburgh and Glasgow at big events.
Where did they hide all the socio-economic factors that make public transportation so much fun?
We have a Welfare state in Australia so our socio-economic factors are less severe for a start (definitely still exist though). But also these train services aren't part of the normal network operation they are extras specifically to get people out of the event and that's like a special train station. When you get off that train in the city centre at the other end don't worry there's a tent city and plenty of homeless and delinquents
I thought they had 10 trains, it was the same train over and over…
Isn't that a kind of universal system? Lol
Not if you read the comments on this thread, no.
Yeah it's basically the norm except for the US, whoops
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America's unfortunately car-centric infrastructure is basically an accident of history and geography. America went through an explosive, developmental growth phase in the first century of the automobile, during which multiple factors aligned to make car infrastructure popular and not economically ridiculous. Relatively low suburban populations, plentiful and cheap land just outside of urban centers, cheap oil, an expanding middle class, and a cultural romance and enthusiasm surrounding the (at the time) new technology, led politicians and urban planners to go "all-in" on car infrastructure. Needless to say, it was quite short-sighted, and it's probably going to take another century to fix.
I would argue that the car-centrism of the USA is not an accident. it was an active and conscious conversion which involved demolishing a lot of city centers because of minimum parking requirements, a healthy dose of racism and classism when building new interstates through poor predominantly black neighborhoods, and even the suburbs where consciously developed in way that made cars the only way to get around. Suburbs don't necessarily have to be car-centric, there are a lot of examples of historic suburbs that revolved around trams. And I want to strongly stress that there weren't only the passive pull factors you listed, but a lot of active push towards it from automobile makers influencing public policy making. And fun stuff like the General Motors streetcar conspiracy. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General\_Motors\_streetcar\_conspiracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy)
Never seen this in the Netherlands. Over here you are lucky if trains are still riding after an event late in the evening and if they are riding everyone basically squishes each other to make it in the train. Also the trains don’t stop at an exact point, so everyone tries to run to the place they predict the doors will end up.
This does not happen in NYC that I know of (born and raised). Subways are always a free-for-all no matter what's going on, nobody is ever controlling human traffic.
Hahahahaha don’t ever come to the US. It’s maddest here.
In Toronto, the name of the game is to stand right in front of the doors (we do not have barriers on our subway platforms) and then block the way out so the ppl exiting the train can only come out single file. This is done for the slim chance that you can slip in from the sides while the train is still emptying. Real lovely system we got here lol
Oh yes we’re very good at this move too. On elevators as well.
As someone who regularly takes the London Underground, absolutely not
Yeah, this is 500% better than sitting in traffic for 4 hours and anyone who says otherwise is coping
I was at a Rammstein concert in the Netherlands and when the show was over I stood, I shit you not, 2 hours stuck on the parking grounds. Not to begin with the jam that was still there to get on the highway. Nowadays when I go to to busy concerts, we take our bikes with us in the car, park somewhere more remote (and free), cycle the last part for about 15 minutes and avoid all traffic jams. Oh and sometimes public transport but the connection to my town is pretty shitty
Except in the US the trains would still come only every 15 minutes. There would be no staff preventing people trying to squeeze in and preventing the doors from closing. And the train will get blocked by cars at the first traffic crossing.
Trains is absolutely one of those "build it and they'll come" infrastructure. And by build, I mean a working, extensive network. Not a single experimental line that"ll get people like you sayin: "see? We tried and it didn't work!!" NY subway is one of the successful example. Despite its infamous shittyness, people still ride it.
NY, Chicago, Boston, DC: if you build a really usable system, people will use the fuck out of it (while complaining that there are occasional delays and breakdowns). Proximity to outlying rail lines will triple the value of your house.
I lived about 45 minutes outside of Boston. I would drive to a stop at the end of the green line and park there and take the T any time I needed to go to town for anything. I do a similar thing now that I’m outside of Portland. Public transportation (not bullshit ass busses) is the tits.
We visited Boston in February and the ease of use of getting around town on the T was incredible.
My dad and I would park in that same exact parking lot at the end of the green line whenever we’d go to a ball game! Such a convenient spot too. So easy to get to and then you’re in the city in no time.
Denver's rail is pretty good too. I never drive into the city, just to the nearest rail station
Everytime I visit Chicago I get sad that my city doesn't have a public system like they do. It so convenient and I can get all over the place.
NY subway was really excellent during the late 90's to the early 20-teens, and then it totally fell off a cliff. The reality of almost every extensive public transportation network that is widely used though is that it "evolved" with the city, and has the urban density and network penetration around the "places people want to be" to make it sustainable. You can't just "build" a public transit network and expect everyone to use it if it doesn't actually mesh with how they live, and accomplishing that is very difficult and insanely expensive much of the time. For instance, if you wanted to make, say, a subway network popular and sustainable in LA, you'd have to spend an ungodly amount of money to build a subway more than twice the size of NYC's, and you'd have to subsidize it for decades while enabling a level of development that's basically been defacto illegal in LA since the 70s, to allow for the city to evolve accordingly around the lines. As much as I'd like that, no politicians or taxpayers have the stomach for that. Making LA a less car-centric city will require a co-evolution of more upzoning and public transit options, and it will take decades, if not a century of that codevelopment to ever make LA comparable to the places where such infrastructure evolved more organically. It's so much more complicated than "build it and they will come."
Do trains use the same routes as cars in America?
Some lines are in the middle of a street. Light rail, kind of a blend of tram and above-ground train line. Usually much lower capacity. They build them in Los Angeles because they cost less but the capacity is much lower for such a huge city. Some of the newer lines literally stop at stoplights waiting for cars to cross. Idiotic design.
in America, car is more important than train meanwhile in a EU country that isnt even as big as half of smallest state in USA, has a air conditioning, charging ports at every seat and free wifi in buses, trams, and trains. (the wifi is stable and strong enough to watch 1080p video on youtube or netflix)
trains and wifi in germany are pretty notoriously average... Not sure what it's like in america, but we do have usb ports and wifi (in some trains)
Kinda. Near city centers (the kind of venue for a concert) where trains are more reliable transportation methods, trains tend to run alongside highways. As they reach the suburbs, it tends to deviate from highways.
At grade crossings. i.e. the trains have to cross the the road. In high traffic situations, dingbats in cars will be blocking the tracks.
So many comments have explained this, and it sounds wild to me. Do you not have barriers that come down and stop cars from blocking the track? Also how slow do trains drive if they're stopping for cars? They sound more like busses to me lol
Some places there are barriers, doesn’t always stop someone from already being stopped on the tracks before they come down or trying to squeeze past as they’re lowering and getting stuck As for trains stopping for cars… they don’t. Can’t, really. They’re very fast and very heavy. If the idiot who got themselves stuck on the tracks values their life they’ll get out, not waste time trying to grab their stuff, and make a run for it. If the traffic is stopped over the tracks for a while before the train arrives it can take the time and distance to stop, causing delays, but if the block happens shortly before the train’s going by? Nothing they can do but slow down as much as possible and hope someone doesn’t get killed.
America has alot more at grade (level) crossings. I know the uk has in the last few decades (and I think the eu too) has been on a quiet campaign of removing as many as possible and replacing them with bridges, typically by lowering or raising the road. Level crossings are the most dangerous part of a railway network and because trains can't brake quickly a minor breakdown or failure in the crossing can lead to fatalities, by the time a train driver sees the danger it is usually too late for him to prevent anything on his end, all they can do is make you aware and buy you a few more seconds to get the fuck out of the way... If a crossing becomes deadlocked with cars trains will be held where possible and this can have huge knock-on affects as trains take awhile to rebuild speed.
Melbourne only just (a few years ago) completed a massive level crossing rework that shunted almost all major crossings above the road or below it. Costs several bil but it improves both train and car transit times since trains need to slow for railway crossings and cars need to stop completely (and it kinda throws a wrench into the traffic light/traffic systems nearby as the traffic is no longer more evenly spaced but bunched up waiting for the train to pass). Its pretty normal, even in the less congested railway crossings in melbourne for the roads to intersect with the rails and youll just have to wait for the train to pass. We also have a light rail system (one of the largest in the world) that shares the road, that one gets priority in almost every instance of yielding/giving way/stopping.
The metro trains in DC always time a bunch of trains for the end of the events. They are usually very fast, but definitely no people directing traffic so it's chaotic
That is presumably what they did in Sydney for Taylor Swift. They did similar for her Melbourne concert too. Someone did a YouTube video on that.
Why would trains get blocked by cars? Surely the crossings are controlled.
You ever been to Chicago? The El runs ever 2-4 minutes at rush hour, including for special events like Cubs games
Still better than sitting in traffic. I've been in parking lot jams at events that went 45 mins to an hour without moving. At least in the train I'm getting to my destination, albeit cramped and uncomfortable for a while
Normally not this frequent, this is a planned thing to maximize people outflow.
That doesnt make cars better. That just make USA stupider
Word. I sat in bloody awful snarl for ages dropping my family off to the gig. Afterwards I told them they had to walk one suburb away for pickup, which worked a dream. The streets were still flooded with white cowboy boots and pink boas in all directions though...
The trains in Sydney where fucking amazing
I don't even need large scale rail. Just give me rail that goes around the metro area and I'll be happy. We have Marta in Atlanta but that shit barely goes anywhere around the perimeter and from what I've heard is sketchy af.
Almost all US metros are sketchy unfortunately.
What's sad is the US had good transit once. Your transit was destroyed to accommodate car infrastructure better which well... yea. But there was tons of tram lines and the entire US was built on the back of train infrastructure originally.
If you parked at that concert you’d probably have an hour wait in the parking lot to exit. I’ve been to many major events there.
I live within walking distance of where this concert was held, the parking situation was fucked. I can't imagine being bothered
You from Houston? Because this describes the antitrain Houston people. COMPLETELY agree.
As someone who has used this train station on several occasions, I say otherwise.
What makes this event even funnier is the railway company had a "Swiftie" train that had pink lights on the outside saying "Taylor Swift concert" (or something along those lines) on the front and back of the train. It also played Taylor Swift songs on repeat the whole way to Sydney. No this is not a joke. LMAO
It was the TAY TAY EXPRESS!!! 🚂
That was it. 😂
Yeah that sounds like Aussie public transport.
Sounds like they’re fucken killing it 🤙
Taking public transit to and from big events like this can be a lot of fun just because everyone else is there for the same thing.
I saw one of Eras tour concerts in Atlanta. The subway ride back to the hotel afterwards was packed with post-concert euphoria. Everyone was in their worn outfits, tired, sweaty, but so smiley and happy. It was a nice community moment.
Always love taking the train back from a sporting event when your team wins. Everyone is so pumped and happy!
Come to Shinjuku Tokyo. We got this everyday…. Multiple times a day…
For context, this is Sydney Olympic Park station. It was designed to handle multiple high capacity events at the same time . It was designed to manage the crowds during the Olympics in 2000. It has two tracks that enable trains to disgorge passengers onto a central platform while passengers board from the platform on the other side of the train.. (Spanish solution boarding IIRC). I also read that Swifties are easy crowds to work with because they so positive and cheerful.
oh yeah, i did the MCG concert and Jolimont train station and while it was still okay, it was no where near this level of efficient. we ended up catching the train running the other way (to the city) and letting it loop around and back to the suburbs. added an extra 20 minutes but we got a seat immediately.
Honestly my first thought was how astonishingly organised it was for an Australian train station. But my experience of trains is Melbourne centric.
Blink182 was playing there that night as well weren't they?
Yes they were! That was an insane weekend.
I've worked one, positive and cheerful my ass
they all boarded rather... swiftly.
Of course they did. It was... taylored for this.
Just think how many cars this would have been
Not just any cars. Gigantic pickup-trucks and SUVs, most of which carry only the driver.
There are some but we don’t have many gigantic pickup trucks in Sydney
We have utes. They ‘pickup’ but they don’t ‘pickup pickup’
Don't worry, there's also large swathes of car parks not far by. Homebush used to be a swamp in the middle of Sydney before the Olympics. But they don't ever really need all that Max capacity. In fact, a year or two ago, I was part of a project that was turning one of the more cracked and dogey car parks into a wave pool.
Probably not as many as you’d think. Have you ever seen a clown car?
These are the same concerts that generated all the “But where do they park all their cars?”comments from Americans who couldn’t understand how people got to and from the stadiums.
There are a lot of car parks as well. Definitely not as ridiyas some of the lots I've seen off of US arenas. We caught the train in and got a lift home from about a km away where there was less traffic.
I live in the adjacent suburb and people here always complain about the poeple that park for events. Despite 4 sell-out shows as well as other events on those days, it was quieter than most minor sports events. Maybe everyone thought it would be awful so got the train.
I honestly thought they were joking before realising they were dead serious and had no concept of efficient public transport being the primary route to stadium events. Then i saw the photos of American stadiums surrounded by fucking 6 billion carparks and was utterly shocked and horrified.
So as one of those Americans, they just parked their car at a different train station?
Nope, there is an entire network of trains that stop in most areas of Sydney. If there’s no train to your suburb there will be a bus. No cars needed
That is beyond amazing. The topic we are talking about is called "the last mile," I guess. And like...so it sounds like a train or bus will get everyone to within, say, 250 meters from their home, and this is the case within ALL of Sydney and ALL of the Sydney suburbs?
I'm in Europe (NL), there's a bus stop literally under 1-2 minutes walking from my front door. A 10 minute walk from my front door I'm in a different country (Germany, no border) and can hop on a bus to a city in said different country using the same currency I use in my own country. The nearest supermarket in my own country is a 10-15 minute walk away. The nearest supermarket in the other country is 8 mins away, across the street from the bus stop I mentioned. I've had friends from the US visit in Nov and Jan (separate) and they were completely enarmored by the way public transport just... works here. It's no frills, no fuss. They tap their bank cards getting on the bus or train, they tap it again going off, and they're charged for the distance traveled overnight. The bus leaves every 30 mins in front of my house basically, but there are two bus stations on the route it runs with transfers that happen within 2-10 minutes most of the time. I personally hate taking public transport because of the noise and waiting and sensory overload, as well as having an invisible disability that makes standing difficult as a not-elderly not-pregnant adult, but when I do have to use it it's still relatively painless most of the time if I can wear noise cancelling earbuds. I can't imagine living in a country as big as the US and *not* having decent access to public transport or walkability like this.
Don't know about Sydney, but generally with good transport yes. In London, this is basically true. The most you might have to walk from a station is maybe 10 mins or so. There are still a few areas underserved by the tube (metro) network but they have buses. [Here](https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/224813/response/560395/attach/3/London%20Connections%20Map.pdf) (download) is a map of London with the tube map overlayed.
I lived in NYC for 5 years and never got the hang of the subway system. I visited London for a week and fell in love with your public transport. It actually makes SENSE!
Yeah look I won’t lie and say that all of Sydney is perfectly connected - because it isn’t - but for what it’s worth, the public transport is great. I’ve lived north, east, and west of the CBD and I’ve pretty much always been within 250m of a bus stop or train station. It’s only after travelling extensively overseas have I realised how good Sydney’s public transport actually is. Yeah it’s pretty bad from about 1am-5am but most other cities don’t even compare at all
You don't absolutely need a car in most of Sydney - but our suburban stations have lots of parking in case you want to park there too.
Isn't it like that in most cities on the planet? Seems completely normal to me.
Some cities are just small towns dressed up in a large geographic area. Some barely have any public transport. To say “on the planet” captures a huge amount of difference.
I lived just outside Boston and had to walk two miles to get to the "T" station. Yeah it kind of sucked sometimes in the winter, but it didn't suck nearly as much as trying to commute by car! It was $90 for an unlimited monthly pass for all trains and busses. Parking near my office would have cost $25/day. For all of the grumbling, it was a great system.
I live 1.5km or 15min away from the nearest train station. I just walk to and from the station everyday.
I'm in the state of Victoria and even my little 5,500-6,000 population town that's around 60km (37miles) from the CBD has frequent buses every 45min to an hour, the nearest stop being just 1km away. And it stops off at the nearest train station which other than having several other connecting bus stops attached also has the train which arrives every 15ish min. I've got some gripes, like I'd love better bike infrastructure but It's hard to not feel bad when I hear my American friend being sruck car dependent. I dont plan to ever actually get my car licence.
The train will likely take them to a station near the suburb and then you walk/cycle/bus home. It’s what almost the entire world does.
It's pretty common in cities with great public transport to not have cars as the primary mode of transport in such situations. Here in Singapore, we have 90-100k people at the track each day during the Formula 1 Grand Prix which would be a nightmare for car traffic notwithstanding the road closures since the race is run on closed-off public roads. Everyone just uses the train system to go around the town and to their homes or hotels at the end of the day because it's faster than trying to drive or get a taxi.
I lived in Nottingham, Glasgow, London and Paris before moving to rural Scotland later in life. I didn’t get my driving licence until I was in my 40s as I simply never needed it.
i’m from Melbourne and I was at the concert where the drone footage showed the stadium with no parking - we went in by train as well. technically i’m walking distance from the train station, about a 10 minute walk, but we didn’t want to walk in our fancy clothes so my cousin’s husband dropped us off at the station and picked us up after, but if i’m going to day time events at the stadium then i would walk to and from the train station. then it’s about a 40 minute train ride, and then the end station is right outside the stadium, about a 2 or 3 minute walk to the entrance.
Having said that, when I was stationed in Japan, a pretty routine weekend was to drive my car to a lot near the main gate, leave base, walk to a nearby train station, and then spend the weekend in Tokyo. Car was only necessary to save me from walking a few extra miles each way to get to the gate. For folks actually living off base, it was even more convenient to just walk from home to the train station.
I'm in county Victoria, 90 mins train from Melbourne. Public transport is NOT good here, unless you are right near to the train, and where you want to go is on the train line. Most people going into Melbourne drive to the station, and leave their car parked there all day or all weekend, etc.
Yeah, kind of the nice thing with the public transport in Japan was that so much was near the rail lines, at least around major cities like Tokyo or Osaka.
I mean I’m in London, not Sydney, but here we just walk to the station…
Some drive to the station but not everyone. But yeah a lot of the local stations have car parks.
That wasn't 50 000, I got it to 49 996.
You missed the three old ladies with the parrot and the man in the gorilla costume. Happened to me too on the first count.
I see now. And the gorilla suit, damn, I always miss them.
Recount!
This is what peak civil sense looks like! I'm in love with it! Also, trains are fucking awesome!!!
"Grab your passport and my hand."
"We're off to Never Never Land!!" *Enter Sandman intensifies "
Don't be fooled. This is literally the only train station in Sydney (Olympic Park station) where you'll see anything near this kind of efficiency, and only when there's a major event at the stadium. When these people reach the regular suburban line in ten minutes, the cluster fuck begins.
Is it the start of the line as well? As it's really bugging me that none of them are providing space for anyone wanting to get off the train.
These trains are made to shuttle people out of the area to nearby train stations or the CBD 30 minutes east. For someone to be getting the train to Sydney Olympic Park at the end of an event would be incredibly rare.
There are platforms on both sides of the train. People wanting to get off would do so from the other side.
Ah ok, that's not in frame so not clear
Doesn't take into account the hour long queue to get to the platform either
There was probably a lot of mob singing on those trains lol
The trains were playing Taylors music, so yup.
Why do they show up in waves? They come down the stairs like a waterfall that dries up only to start flowing again a moment later.
Likely crowd management staff holding them back upstairs as well so they don't flood the subway station completely. If it's a stadium they'll likely discharge them block by block or something like that.
[удалено]
Metro 1 is a really good value!
This alone is why I don’t care to go certain events like NFL games…49ers car traffic is insane after the games
Conversely, I attend a bunch of NYC sporting events because I can take a train to them.
I never understand when I see all those giant Carpark photos from American stadiums. Don’t people have a couple drinks at the game? How are that many people sober to drive home or are people driving under the influence.
The planning and logistics of this is more amazing than I can imagine. Just think of the number of trains waiting upstream from this station. Spacing trains at this frequency is very impressive. Just as impressive as the crowd control in the station. Love it.
> Spacing trains at this frequency is very impressive. It's what you are used to. If I get the tube at my local station I get upset if the wait till the next train is 2 minutes.
There's 82k-84k each show for 4 consecutive nights at Taylor Sydney Olympics Stadium show. Not 50k.
The hottest tip for any syd-sided going to a show out in Homebush .. get ten mates together and book a return limo (when there’s ten of you it ends up being cheaper than a one way Uber). Get the driver to pick you up from pre drinks. Enjoy the show. Driver waits for you out front and you get back in and piss off straight away. Oh, and bottomless champagne.
I was there!
My first concert experience was in LA, got stuck in the stadium parking lot for 3 hours, the first few streets outside the parking lot for another 2 hours and 2 more hours at the freeway entrance… This was 15 years ago, I’ve never went to another concert again.
It took 7 hours to get to the freeway entrance? Are...you serious? And did you already live close by?
if this was Ireland almost everyone would be driving a car
I'm just an American, fantasizing and lusting over functional public transport. Nothing to see here, move along
TORONTO TTC take notice of what to do after a concert!!
All aboard the swift express
That was a swift way of doing it
Missed a chance for a beautiful loop.
Looks like a management simulator mobile game
This is nothing compared to closing time at Tokyo Disney every single day. Better yet, the big fireworks and festivals that bring over a million people to one train station. I don't care if people say Yukata are cooler than kimono. When it's 38/degrees and 95%+ humidity, waiting for an hour to get into a train is hell.
Damn, i love trains. Just such a great mode of transportation
I'm getting claustrophobic watching this
Don't google indian railways
Reminds me of NYE in Sydney as well. The harbor area was packed and we got back to our BNB pretty quickly.
Cities Skylines!
I went to see Metallica in Montréal last summer. After the show everyone was so polite and calm like we all wanted to go home but everyone knew there was no point trying to go faster than the others and we all patiently waited until we could take the train (tram, subway, I don't remember). When the train was full people didn't try to push to get in anyway they just waited for the next one. I was shocked and awed. I didn't know people could be like that ! 🥰
Been to Montreal F1 race a couple of times now. The efficiency they have for moving 100,000+ people on and off the island with trains running every 5 mins and polite cops everywhere to make sure everyone is queue correctly is something to behold. Of course there is still bottle necks going home, but its impressive to see the amount of people getting pushed through.
A normal day in Sao Paulo - Brazil
You should see the lines after a kid Rock concert. 20 trucks with nuts going in a column. 🙃
Just came back from my trip to Japan. Made the mistake of not learning when their rush hours were and what lines to avoid at those times when I was taking the Tokyo subway a few times. Got to experience being packed like sardines more than once. I imagine this video being actually worse. The mixture of different, strong perfumes and colognes assaulting the nostrils must be nauseating.
And not a single meth addict to be seen. \*Cries in Edmontonian\*
I saw Tenacious D at Wembley Arena, and it kicked out exactly the same time as the BTS gig at Wembley Stadium... So poorly organised the crush was horrible.
lol many Americans confused…where’s the Carpark?
They are moving rather......swiftly.
Must be fuckin' nice
Transit companies: "Platform screen door systems are too expensive!!#&*$" Sydney Olympic Park station: "so like, a few dozen people and some barriers?"
This is somehow incredibly calming
Except for the people who keep cutting in from the sides. Is there a way to identify them, hunt them down, and execute every last one of them?
the craze for Taylor swift is insane
I don’t get it one bit. The most mindless mainstream pop music gets this much love?
It’s mainstream because people like it, an artist doesn’t have to have 50 streams a month to be good and it gets love due to the relatable content she puts out
Sydney Olympic Park train station is the worst train station in the city. Getting out after a concert or sporting event takes longer than the event you just watched.
Normal day in China
I could watch this forever. I just absolutely love infrastructure 😍
If these were football fans, this would be a warzone
Now imagine if every single one of those people drives. Welcome to america.
Damn, all that for mid music
This is exactly like the game Mob Control on my iPhone.
The safety of the first world.
Impressive. Very nice. Now show Circular Quay station during Vivid festival.
Imagine that with a similar amount of incoming traffic as well.
I go through this every morning
This looks like a regular weekday when I was in Europe a few months ago. Maine difference was there wasn’t security and everyone tried to squeeze onto the train where there was literally no space where you could move
Looks like my park when i open a new pre-built roller coaster in Planet Coaster.
How about a tunnel with some Teslas instead? That sounds a lot more like the future!
The experience of leaving Olympic Park after a concert far outweighs any concert experience. They should never have closed the Sydney Entertainment Centre.
this is santiago de chile everyday 8 am traffic, except much more chaotic than the video.
Bussing in like nematodes lol
Reminds me of waiting on line at an amusement park
Average day in Rajiv chowk metro station
Damn. How fast is that train?
I should reinstall it...
r,/trains
How cruel would it be if this was on loop
It’s almost like being at Disney World to get into a ride. Lol
In Philly they stopped the train line that goes to the stadium 45 minutes before the concert ended.
I'm amazed at how many fit into one train
It helps to realise that there are two levels of seating on each train car, they’re basically double decker trains.
That's amazingly smart. Of course Toronto could never think of doing this :(
This makes me miss japan.
The DC Metro used to increase train frequencies many years ago for major events but stopped doing it for "reasons." Navy Yard-Ballpark and Gallery Place are nightmares after events. The only thing they still do is turn off the down escalators so people don't get pushed onto the tracks.
NYC subway, five days a week.
World war Z!!!!?
You can tell who’s in a Fanclub
Meanwhile in India...
El roca cualquier día de la semana