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Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

theatlantic.com

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Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#191

Post by lostjohnny »

afiori wrote: post #148
lostjohnny wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disclaimer: I don't like cars, I love driving, but as a sport, not in urban areas. Biking is like running, playing soccer, playing tennis, swimming, many people don't do it because they don't do any sport. Biking requires skills that normal people usually don't have, but that they believe they have. It is in fact more dangerous than driving (compared to the driver, not pedestrians) As soon as older people could not b…

And I would add, public transport; even better if free for elderly and people with disabilities.

Exactly

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#192

Post by travisoneill1 »

anonymou2 wrote: post #82
Lio wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking personally I'd like to know what those factors are. Is it just location? Is it the type of bike or the clothes we wear? There was this study https://helmets.org/walkerstudy.htm which has some interesting conclusions but the sample size is a bit small to be statistically valid IMHO. Oh and I'd add, if it's not clear already, that most drivers seem to be very nice and considerate people. It's just that there a…

I'd say a lot has to do with cyclist behavior. Hugging the curb does not help, it invites motorists to pass even when it is not safe to do so. It is much safer to take the lane, occupy the middle of it, so other vehicles coming from behind know that they either have to wait or change lanes to pass. Segregating cyclists into cyclists-only lanes do not help either. As they usually force them to ride as if they where hu…

Cyclists seem to want to be treated like a car only when it suits them. I have never seen a cyclist stop and wait his turn in a line of cars at a red light. They always hug the curb and pass all the cars so that they have to pass him again.

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#194

Post by Ididntdothis »

donatj wrote: post #104
chronolitus wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me float you a hypothetical situation: you're in command of a few tons of steel, and your priority is to get to some arbitrary location. Your second priority, I assume, is to not murder anyone. Here's what you know about the environment : it is populated with (harmless fleshly) people who are also going about fulfilling goals 1 and 2. You know with high probability that at any given moment one might quickly cross…

I disagree with it being so black and white. Higher speed travel saves time and energy. 55mph is generally considered optimal for vehicle fuel consumption. Slowing speeds pretty directly affects climate change and pollution. I’d like to see a direct comparison of loss of life vs mph including figures on deaths from increased air pollution and other climate considerations. I think one could also argue time lost in tra…

“55mph is generally considered optimal for vehicle fuel consumption.”

For a while I did experiments with this and the most efficient speed was much slower. 55 is more about safety I would think or it’s possibly totally arbitrary.

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#195

Post by acdha »

u801e wrote: post #157
acdha wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m certain that the police officers the original commented mentioned actually said that they had no grounds even though it is completely incorrect just because the United States is so heavily built around people driving everywhere (and that public transit is for poor, distasteful people). Older people losing their cars is often the start of a decline unto death because there’s so little you can do with driving in ma…

> Older people losing their cars is often the start of a decline unto death because there’s so little you can do [without] driving in many neighborhoods. The solution is to replace their car with a vehicle that's less dangerous for others like an electrically assisted tricycle. That can serve their local transportation needs and won't cause nearly as much damage if they hit someone or something.

Also to invest in things like public transit, sidewalks & protected bike paths for ebikes & trikes, mobility services which will pick you up, etc. Unfortunately we’ve lost our way nationally about funding infrastructure and in many areas the sprawl density is low enough that these are more expensive than, say, much of Europe.

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#196

Post by dsfyu404ed »

desas wrote: post #173
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In most of the US if you lose your ability to drive you lose your ability to be a functional member of society and outside a few cities with good public transit even the poor drive. Europe has good public transit and their regulations increase the cost of driving to the point where mostly only the middle and upper classes do it. Losing your license in Europe is not as big a deal as losing it in the US.

You can't generalise Europe like that. Most people from a working household in the UK (outside of London drive). From supermarket workers to executives. Approximately every rural part of the UK has public transport but it's unsurprising if it is infrequent and doesn't get you to a population centre in time to work.

Of course there's exceptions. That's kind of inherent to all generalizations. I can and did generalize most of Europe like that. The fact of the matter is that a smaller percent of the population drives there for a variety of reasons so losing one's license is less crippling on average.

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#197

Post by drtillberg »

Laws follow practicality, so the first thing to do is make sure drivers pay their full costs on a per-mile basis. Things like gas taxes being earmarked for road construction-- when I buy other miscellaneous stuff I pay a general sales tax that can be spent discretionarily by the government. Not applying that to gas is an inappropriate subsidy to cars. Where autos own the road (most everywhere) road funds should pay for sidewalks; where highways divide communities, there should be liberal allowances for pedestrian bridges. Finally, public transit needs to be professionalized in order to provide a fuller alternative, in the sense that transit organizations can't be run with a 'politics as usual' approach-- the point of the system cannot be simply to kick the can down the road on historic pension obligations. If government wants to require public transit to be better in certain respects-- handicap access and perfect safety come to mind-- these desires should be evaluated against the counterhypothetical of, "if you make the system less useful by only opening one set of doors at the stop (for safety) x number of people will die as a result of being forced back into cars."

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#198

Post by rc_mob »

DarkWiiPlayer wrote: post #40

> traffic violence > automobile supremacy The language of this article just makes me cringe. Other than that, it's really quite reasonable though.

That cuz you got got by the automtive industrial complex to the point where it effects your views on terminology.

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#199

Post by caconym_ »

u801e wrote: post #183
zimbatm wrote: post #108

Jaywalking is also a notion that was created by the car industry, with regulation and a PR campaign to shift the blame from cars to pedestrians. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26073797 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaywalking#Origin_of_the_term

Perhaps this wouldn't be an issue if more intersections had a pedestrian scramble [1] phase. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble

Where I live there is not a signal at every intersection. In some places there are not even any marked crosswalks anywhere nearby. However, every intersection that's not signaled/marked has implicit "unmarked crosswalks" and according to the law drivers must stop for pedestrians in these crosswalks.

The vast majority of drivers seem to be ignorant of this law, or they just don't care. Enforcement is nonexistent. When I step out into the road, I'm sure most of the drivers think I'm "jaywalking". More often than not they do not stop. I am not "jumping" into the road, nor am I generally walking about in low-visibility conditions.

Maybe fancy urban planning can help, but it's a band-aid on a deeper problem, at least where I live: drivers are ignorant and have bad attitudes not suited for the responsibility of operating motor vehicles. I guess it makes sense that enforcement is nonexistent, because "ignorant and have bad attitudes" is also an apt descriptor of police in America in general. Of course, I have been stopped for jaywalking... because obviously that is so much worse!

Re: Cars took over because the legal system helped squeezed out alternatives

#200

Post by bluGill »

anonymou2 wrote: post #82
Lio wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking personally I'd like to know what those factors are. Is it just location? Is it the type of bike or the clothes we wear? There was this study https://helmets.org/walkerstudy.htm which has some interesting conclusions but the sample size is a bit small to be statistically valid IMHO. Oh and I'd add, if it's not clear already, that most drivers seem to be very nice and considerate people. It's just that there a…

I'd say a lot has to do with cyclist behavior. Hugging the curb does not help, it invites motorists to pass even when it is not safe to do so. It is much safer to take the lane, occupy the middle of it, so other vehicles coming from behind know that they either have to wait or change lanes to pass. Segregating cyclists into cyclists-only lanes do not help either. As they usually force them to ride as if they where hu…

But if you don't hug the shoulder the police will harass you for it.
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