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To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

nationalgeographic.com

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Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#331

Post by lazyjones »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #58
lazyjones wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More practical than changing Atlanta to some imaginary car-free utopia. But perhaps the advantages of living in a car-free city aren't that great after all?

Or the pros/cons don't stack up to a net difference that is big enough to be worth relocating over.

The point is: for some reason these cities don't suddenly become so liveable that they're a huge success, neither economically nor as a destination for tourism or retirement. Perhaps those who have discovered their love for this fantasy haven't really thought about all the consequences.

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#332

Post by TomMarius »

ajmurmann wrote: post #318
amalcon wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this really surprising? The benefits of driving a large vehicle are all internal (comfort, safety of vehicle occupants, cargo capacity, range between fueling). The costs, however, are mostly external (road maintenance, emissions, safety of non occupants, space consumed for parking). You'd need to substantially incentivize smaller vehicles to overcome these things, but we actually incentivize larger vehicles (throu…

I think you really touch on the core problem. All the negative externalities are eaten up by the community. The obvious solution is to stop subsidizing cars and instead start teaching the negative externalities. Ready first steps: 1. massively increase gasoline tax. 2. Get rid of all street parking. I personally would prefer to just ban all combustion engines, but people seem to think I'm insane when I propose this.

Banning all combustion engines is too extreme, see this chart for reasoning: https://image.slidesharecdn.com/13hja01motivepowermst-141217...

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#333

Post by educationdata »

ak217 wrote: post #191
educationdata wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Car is not just the "culture", car serves our need. If you are young without kids, it may not make much difference for you to ride a car, or take a bus, or a train, subway, etc. But if you have a family, it makes a huge pain without your own vehicle. If the city of future requires families to abandon their own vehicle, it is not the correct city of future. Just design a better one.

Millions of people around America get their kids around the neighborhood just fine without a car. If you continue to insist that cities be designed around your limited vision, then you should be forced to pay for the full externalities of your car-centric lifestyle. The rest of us are tired of paying so you can waste our resources.

How do you know they are "just fine"? How do you know their feeling? Have you asked them?

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#334

Post by educationdata »

adrianN wrote: post #115
educationdata wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Car is not just the "culture", car serves our need. If you are young without kids, it may not make much difference for you to ride a car, or take a bus, or a train, subway, etc. But if you have a family, it makes a huge pain without your own vehicle. If the city of future requires families to abandon their own vehicle, it is not the correct city of future. Just design a better one.

Many families in European cities live just fine without a car. My family never had a car and it wasn't "a huge pain".

How many? How do you know they are "just fine"? How do you know without a car wasn't "a huge pain" to your mother when you were 2 year old?

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#335

Post by educationdata »

sershe wrote: post #327
educationdata wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Car is not just the "culture", car serves our need. If you are young without kids, it may not make much difference for you to ride a car, or take a bus, or a train, subway, etc. But if you have a family, it makes a huge pain without your own vehicle. If the city of future requires families to abandon their own vehicle, it is not the correct city of future. Just design a better one.

That is demonstrably not true. All over the world, people raise families just fine without cars. As a matter of fact, I saw a truly dystopian scene of a group of children, on some school outing I assume, crossing a road at a crosswalk, all holding on to a long ribbon with two flag-waving adults (teachers?) on both end. When I was the age of these children I was walking around and crossing the streets on my own becaus…

Where did you get the "just fine"? You read people's mind on a mass scale, Professor X?

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#336

Post by educationdata »

electricslpnsld wrote: post #121
educationdata wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Car is not just the "culture", car serves our need. If you are young without kids, it may not make much difference for you to ride a car, or take a bus, or a train, subway, etc. But if you have a family, it makes a huge pain without your own vehicle. If the city of future requires families to abandon their own vehicle, it is not the correct city of future. Just design a better one.

I know families in NYC, Seattle, San Francisco, Oakland, Portland, and even Pittsburgh that do great car free! It is 100% doable, even in the US.

I have lived in NYC for two years with 1 small kid. I know how painful it is. Many subway stations do not have an elevator, I had to carry the baby and stroller through stairs. Even with elevator, all elevators smell extremely bad. Would you call this "just fine"?

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#337

Post by jimmaswell »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #63

This is one of the reasons the self-driving craze in tech is so silly: We have vehicles you can commute in and not drive called public transit. Self-driving cars is desire for public transit that doesn't have your rich self sitting next to a poor person on the way to work.

I'd much rather have my own self-driving climate-controlled more private space filled with my own stuff than be packed into a subway or bus every day, yes.

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#338

Post by jniedrauer »

wozniacki wrote: post #229
jniedrauer wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After spending a lot of time in clean mountain air, it's gotten to the point where I can taste the fumes in the air in the United States. It's noxious. I run very early in the morning before anyone starts driving to avoid it.

After spending a lot of time in clean mountain air May I ask where this mountain air was and why you had to relocate to a fume-ridden place in United States? Is it for economic mobility? If that's the case shouldn't you consider taking a hit in that lone aspect, for a better quality of living? I'm sure you will be gainfully employed breathing clean, crisp mountain air provided your skills are in demand. You'll just m…

I usually drive an hour or so to spend the weekend climbing in the cascades. But during the week, I'm stuck in the city. And no, I won't quit my job to go live in the wilderness. Not yet.

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#339

Post by closeparen »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #63

This is one of the reasons the self-driving craze in tech is so silly: We have vehicles you can commute in and not drive called public transit. Self-driving cars is desire for public transit that doesn't have your rich self sitting next to a poor person on the way to work.

Until there’s a politically viable solution to homelessness, reasonable people are going to prefer spaces with basic socioeconomic filters like “doesn’t reek of urine” and “isn’t obviously an untreated mentally ill hard drug user.”

Exposure to human feces is a legitimate factor in transportation mode choice right up there with cost and door to door time. We are all worse off for transit advocates’ side dismissals of its role.

Re: To build the cities of the future, we must get out of our cars

#340

Post by hycaria »

Mister_Snuggles wrote: post #211
hycaria wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about moving ?

Moving requires a significant amount of effort, time, and money. It's not something I would do lightly. Once the new LRT line is up and running I'll adapt to the differences. Yes, it will be worse than what's currently here, but adapting to it won't present nearly the same hardship that moving would. It's the unknown time between the bus routes changing and the LRT line opening that I'm most concerned about. If this…

But moving (to diminish commute, that is) awards a significant amount of free time, money and comfort.

It's rather bad for the user to have such big routes changes with no visibility though... And makes moving a gamble

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