In the last quarter-century, both Bogota and Jakarta built bus rapid transit systems. Bogota’s is widely credited as a success; Jakarta’s not. To understand why, we look back more than a century to the roots of initial transit investments in these two cities. We credit Bogota’s current success in large part to pre-existing land use patterns – commercial streets, residential density, and pedestrian-friendly infrastructure – determined by its streetcar system of the 1910s that remain hospitable to successful transit today. Similarly, we suggest that Jakarta’s struggles stem from the difficulty of adapting areas built for private transport, particularly the car, to public transit. We conclude by using these insights to look forward and contemplate more generally whether and how transit can succeed in areas constructed during the period of auto hegemony and its pedestrian-unfriendly land uses.

在上个四分之一世纪中，波哥大和雅加达都建立了公共汽车快速运输系统。波哥大的成功是广受赞誉的；雅加达不是。为了解原因，我们回顾了两个多世纪以来最初的过境投资的根源。我们将波哥大的当前成功归功于先前存在的土地使用模式-商业街，住宅密度和行人友好的基础设施-由其1910年代的有轨电车系统决定，今天仍然对成功的过境热情好客。同样，我们建议雅加达的斗争之所以困难，是因为难以将为私人交通工具（尤其是汽车）建造的区域改编为公共交通。