Originally Posted by SkiAdcock
Ditto what he said - I would add and have the time. While rudimentary and keeping in mind that the Greater Los Angeles Area is substantially larger than some of the cities w/ well-established metro systems, ...
Make that STATES... LA & Orange County alone are 6084 square miles of territory. Connecticut & Rhode Island together are 5888. The city of Los Angeles alone is 470 sq. miles. Contrast that to NYC at 321, San Francisco at 47, and Washington DC at 61 square miles, and yes all of them have "greater metropolitan areas," but consider how spotty the public transit is "out of town." All of urbanized London is 1600, Paris a puny 1051; only the greater Tokyo-Yokahama area is close at 5230 square miles... But it's population is nearly twice that of Los Angeles (30 vs. 17 million).
Traditional urban public transit relies upon high population densities to be frequent and cost effective, yet the historic spread of the communities and lack of real hub for circulation in the greater L.A. area doomed most urban transit plans.