Urban Development is one of my interest. I have been a Real Estate Analyst and have tracked real estate across EM and select developed markets.
Transportation is critical for development of cities. It is, however, not always profitable. Most policy advisors have resigned to the fact that city transportation must be subsidized. I disagree. I think it is possible to run city transportation profitably. (City may CHOOSE to subsidize the transportation but that is different aspect).
I wrote an extensive policy/strategy report for Mumbai's bus transport service BEST. It was summarized in series of 7 articles. The links are here -
Improving BEST: Making City Transportation Profitable - Part1,
Improving BEST: Revenue Generation of Mumbai’s public transporter –Part2
Improving BEST: How to cut running cost of Mumbai’s public transporter? Part 3
Improving BEST: How better coordination helps increase usability and relevance –Part4
Improving BEST: Why none of the routes of Mumbai’s public transporter is profitable–Part5
Improving BEST: Fleet Re-Configuration to improve efficiency –Part 6
Improving BEST: Strategy for making the public transporter ‘Best for Mumbai’ –Part 7
This book presents a hypothesis explaining WHY urbanisation happens, the stages of urbanisation and HOW it happens. It highlights ideas from Ronald Coase, O.E. Williamson, etc. It posits that there are transaction costs to set up the firm itself, and those costs are higher in rural areas than in urban areas. It highlights the relevance of Elin Ostrom's ideas on commons as critical. It also talks about Urban Commons as different from Commons. It says that Jane Jacob's communities were, in fact, urban commons.