The Hitchhikers Guide to Building A Lot of Subways

A Four-Step Playbook for Building Transit Faster, Cheaper, and Smarter

Chances are, you’ll be gone long before you ever see a comprehensive, robust transit system where you live.

Ouch. That reality stings, but it’s true. MARTA hasn’t added a single mile of new rail since 2000, the MTA has managed only a handful of new stations in decades, and Chicago’s Red Line extension has taken decades for just six miles of elevated track. Even when most Americans, and many of our elected officials, agree that transit is inadequate, progress is so slow it feels more like a dream than a plan. Meanwhile, Madrid built 35 miles of new subway in under 12 years (great deep dive here). So how do we get there from here?

There are a lot of federal and state laws we need to reform or abolish, to build faster and cheaper than we do now (will cover more later). But rather than wait for Congress or statehouses to get their act together, I want to focus on how cities, states, and regions can move forward within the system we already have.

To be clear: I’m an engineer and planner first, not a lawyer. The playbook I outline might not perfectly fit every state or city’s statutes, but it’s a framework for building a lot of transit faster. Think of this as a living document, one meant to be debated, iterated, and improved.

So, let’s say you want to build a lot of transit in your city or region.

1. Study and Lay Out a Comprehensive Vision

Every MPO, state, chamber of commerce, and city has done a million studies, and they already know the basics: where traffic is unbearable, where growth is happening, and where transit is most needed. The difference here is to stop studying forever and actually commit to a 20–30 year vision. Put it on a map. Show every corridor: BRT lines, rail extensions, double tracking, accessibility upgrades. Run the public process now, fight out the alignments now, deal with the utility companies, and walk away with a clear plan instead of rehashing it later.

Why does this matter? Because with a defined network, phasing, utilities, ROW, and constructability issues are easier to plan for. Switzerland is the gold standard: they plan capital projects around future service schedules 5–10 years out, so the network and the infrastructure are always in sync.

RAPID Providence Metro System Plan from Reddit (Source)

So imagine Rhode Island and RIPTA spend two years on real outreach and planning, and the outcome is clear: the Providence metro needs 3 light rail lines and 9 BRT routes. The next step? Figure out the phasing and the price tag. Let’s call it $2 billion.

Credit goes to probablyjustpaul on Reddit for RAPID plan used in this example.

2. Lock It In With Voters

To fund both construction and operations, Rhode Island would need about a 1% sales tax increase, enough to cover the $2 billion capital cost and roughly $100 million in annual operating expenses. But the real power of the vote isn’t just the funding. It’s that the referendum itself can codify the plan’s alignments and legally streamline the environmental review.

California High-Speed Rail shows why this matters. Even after voters approved the project in 2008, it slogged through 16 years of environmental clearance, producing nearly 100,000+ pages of review. If the alignment had been codified by ballot, review would’ve been narrowed, and trains might already be running already.

This isn’t hypothetical. The California Supreme Court ruled in 2014 (Tuolumne Jobs v. Superior Court) that voter-approved initiatives aren’t subject to the full CEQA process. Cities have used this tool for housing, stadiums, and even malls. Inglewood’s NFL stadium? Approved in six weeks after 15% of residents signed a petition.

The ballot language might read something like:

“Shall the State of Rhode Island authorize and construct the RAPID Transit Program, a statewide system of three light rail lines and nine bus rapid transit corridors, with financing through a 1/2 cent sales tax increase and state/federal funds, and declare voter approval as satisfying program-level environmental review, with further review limited to site-specific impacts?”

It sounds technical, but the payoff is huge: years saved, lawsuits avoided, and a clear voter mandate. Instead of asking if we should build transit, the ballot locks in the answer: yes.

3. Design and Plan It In-House

Even if the money is secured and the voters have spoken, who delivers the project matters just as much as what gets approved. In the U.S., we rely too heavily on outside consultants, which drives up costs and fragments accountability. Rhode Island DOT, for example, spends more on “external professional services” than it does on its own staff annually That’s upside down.

The fix is a dedicated RAPID Delivery Authority, a permanent, in-house team of engineers, planners, project managers, and contract experts who move from transportation project to project. Think of it like the Société du Grand Paris, which is delivering 120 miles of new automated subway around Paris. They don’t reinvent the wheel each time; they refine processes, carry institutional knowledge forward, and avoid the cost bloat that plagues U.S. projects.

Grand Paris Express Project

Here’s the analogy: if you tell a contractor, “I need a house for five people, maybe three bathrooms, maybe two, I’ll know the style when I see it,” you’ll get an expensive, vague estimate. But if you hand over full blueprints, material lists, and a construction schedule, you’ll get a precise cost and timeline. That’s the difference between 20% design and 80% design being complete prior to bid.

Right now, every U.S. transit project is treated like that first example. Each new line gets its own consultants, its own engineering teams, its own vendors. Imagine if every room in your house was built by a different general contractor with no shared plan. That chaos is exactly how we build transit today.

The RAPID Delivery Authority flips the model. It would own the first 80%, planning, engineering, standards, and procurement, while contractors focus on the final 20%: construction and finishing. Keeping control and expertise in-house ensures continuity, lowers costs, and lets each project build directly on the last instead of starting from scratch.

4. Prioritize the highest impact stuff first

Even with a long-term vision and a strong delivery authority, sequencing makes or breaks success. Politically, people need to see results early. Voters don’t want to wait ten years before the first shovel hits the ground; they want proof their tax dollars are buying real service.

That means starting with the easiest, most impactful projects. In Rhode Island, that could mean launching the first BRT lines. They’re cheaper, faster to build, and highly visible. Dedicated bus lanes can roll out in just a couple of years, delivering immediate wins while the RAPID Authority engineers the more complex light rail system. BRT builds trust with the public and shows that “RAPID” isn’t just a paper plan.

California High-Speed Rail made the opposite mistake. By starting with a politically chosen Merced–Bakersfield segment, the project locked itself into a first phase with limited utility. Even when it opens, it won’t connect the state’s major population centers, and public patience has already thinned. Sequencing matters.

The playbook is simple: get quick wins on the ground, scale up gradually, and keep momentum going. Deliver BRT first, then light rail, then extensions. Build trust, build ridership, and make each phase easier to fund and deliver than the last.

From 30 Years to 12

The Purple Line in Maryland was first studied in the 1990s, but didn’t complete an alternatives analysis and Draft EIS until 2008. It took another five years to finalize, and the line is now projected to open in 2027, nearly 30 years after planning began. One light rail line.

If we cut the red tape, build robust state capacity, and codify holistic plans with voter approval to streamline environmental review, all three light rail lines and nine BRT routes in Rhode Island could open within 12 years, projects that would otherwise take 20+ years under today’s system.

I’m tired of siloed projects, of celebrating a handful of new stations after decades, and of the assumption that great transit can’t happen here simply because we’ve designed our process to fail. We need to cut the red tape that blocks transformative projects, but until reform comes, we must find ways to work around it to deliver the systems our communities deserve, starting with Providence and, hopefully, your city too.