The Los Angeles example pretty much proves that spinning out employment into multiple areas does not mean people will just move to the closest area to their job; it just adds another destination to the list of "places people drive an hour to."
It is not really that people living in Stockton already are commuting into the Bay, but Bay Area workers are being displaced into Stockton. The Bay Area has added more jobs than housing for a while now.
LA _could_ be much more like Tokyo if USA cared to make mass transit work.
# Service accurate enough to set a clock by.
# Service mesh that provides walk-able freedom.
# Safety and cleanliness (both a culture and enforcement issue)
Yes, there would need to be a slight increase in density as well as much more transit service; but that metro area could scale up were there enough water.
