Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Stroad

strongtowns.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 351 posts

Re: The Stroad

#341

Post by burlesona »

masklinn wrote: post #144
burlesona wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The popularization is more likely the other way around: Strong Towns has been around 12 years, has a huge audience, and is a sponsor and promoter of Not Just Bikes. I agree it’s an exceptional YouTube channel though. :)

> Strong Towns has been around 12 years, has a huge audience, and is a sponsor and promoter of Not Just Bikes. St might have a huge audience amongst professional city planners, but in the “public consciousness” NJB is what popularised both ST’s concepts and knowledge of ST as an organisation. NJB is closing in on half a million subscribers and has 11 vids above a million (one above 3), by comparison ST’s youtube chan…

Posted the same on a sibling comment: I didn’t mean YT audience, I meant audience across all media. ST is not active on YouTube.

Re: The Stroad

#342

Post by mitchdoogle »

acdha wrote: post #259
GordonS wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Currently the 15mph / 20mph disjunction means that some idiots still try to squeeze their cars past relatively fast-moving e-bikes (which then often catch up with the car at the next set of lights...) To be fair, this behaviour isn't one-sided. Often bicycles, e-bikes and motorcycles squeeze through small gaps between cars moving slow'ish in packed traffic. Now, of course car drivers should remain vigilant and cont…

> To be fair, this behaviour isn't one-sided. Often bicycles, e-bikes and motorcycles squeeze through small gaps between cars moving slow'ish in packed traffic. This is conflating two different activities: when a bicyclist or motorcyclist is moving in space between cars, they're using space which is already open and it doesn't impose a risk to the driver of the vehicle or require the cars to move. That's distinct fro…

By that logic, even people in cars should be driving up on the shoulder, driving in unused bike lanes, squeezing in wherever they want, utilizing the unused space. I don't think it would work that well if everyone operated like that. Thankfully they don't.

But you're on a bike, so you deserve special treatment. An award for sacrificing comfort and safety in the name of efficiency! You demand deference when drivers see you, for them to slow down and fall behind as you sit up proudly on your bicycle in defiance of modern technology. You shout to the heavens, "I don't need infrastructure! I have yours already! I'll ride wherever I want!" The thought makes you chuckle at the plebs still riding in comfort and safety in their automobiles, capable of carrying a drunken friend, an elderly parent, or a new piece of furniture. What a bunch of fools. Don't they see how efficient they could be?

Re: The Stroad

#343

Post by quadrangle »

refurb wrote: post #334
quadrangle wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems we're talking past one another. The point isn't that people can afford whatever they want, the point is that people don't directly want car-dependent suburban sprawl. Sure, people want the impossible: quiet beautiful wilderness where you can also walk to school, groceries, concerts, and medical centers. But the question at hand is actually how much of all the good things we are capable of having. And we really…

People want the impossible, but if they can't have it they will make trade-offs. And it's pretty apparent the trade off is "I'll put up with having to get a car in order to get more space at an affordable price".

Yes, but that's not an argument for anyone wanting car-dependent life. It's an argument for people being willing to tolerate car-dependent life (in order to have some benefits like affordability and more space), and that was never a disputed claim.

Incidentally, car-dependent affordable space is a farce. It's not actually more affordable, it only externalizes the costs. The huge infrastructure costs to support sprawl-style development are subsidized by denser parts of town. This is laid out bluntly in the articles on https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme and that's not to mention the externalized costs of the pollution of all the car traffic and many other things we could bring up.

In short, the car-dependent suburbs are artificially more affordable. And yes, tons of people will accept car-dependency in order to get the benefits and affordability of those places as we know them.

Re: The Stroad

#344

Post by TessHM »

mitchdoogle wrote: post #342
acdha wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To be fair, this behaviour isn't one-sided. Often bicycles, e-bikes and motorcycles squeeze through small gaps between cars moving slow'ish in packed traffic. This is conflating two different activities: when a bicyclist or motorcyclist is moving in space between cars, they're using space which is already open and it doesn't impose a risk to the driver of the vehicle or require the cars to move. That's distinct fro…

By that logic, even people in cars should be driving up on the shoulder, driving in unused bike lanes, squeezing in wherever they want, utilizing the unused space. I don't think it would work that well if everyone operated like that. Thankfully they don't. But you're on a bike, so you deserve special treatment. An award for sacrificing comfort and safety in the name of efficiency! You demand deference when drivers se…

I don't understand how it could be at all controversial that different vehicles require different regulations. 18 wheelers are not allowed to go everywhere cars can go and cars should not be allowed to go everywhere cyclists and pedestrians can go. Cars are an order of magnitude heavier and faster than a bicycle and significantly restrict the visibility of their operator - they are far more dangerous and the law should reflect that.

Re: The Stroad

#345

Post by TessHM »

bluGill wrote: post #308
knorker wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Using the concept of induced demand to justify building fewer roads is bullshit Well, you don't have infinite money, or space. Adding a bus lane and a car lane clearly will add more capacity than doing just one of them, but adding a bus lane will likely reduce traffic so much in the other lanes that you don't even have to add another car lane. And adding just a car lane means people would rather be stuck in their c…

> Adding a bus lane and a car lane clearly will add more capacity than doing just one of them, but adding a bus lane will likely reduce traffic so much in the other lanes that you don't even have to add another car lane. The first is true, but the second doesn't follow. For a bus lane to make a difference you need more than a lane, you also need good bus service using that lane. Bus service in many cities horrible an…

Speed and convenience is part of service. Speed and convenience are greatly elevated when you don't have to stand on the side of a stroad for 45 mins to catch a bus that's constantly going to get stuck in traffic.

Re: The Stroad

#346

Post by 1123581321 »

Upvoter33 wrote: post #210

I've been a fan of "strong towns" for a while. I was wondering if anyone in the know here could answer: has it made much difference?

Absolutely. Those of us who have been fighting for better downtowns and doing away with zoning problems and flawed arguments ad business development have so much more ammunition thanks to Strong Towns, and our opponents haven't for several years been able to pretend we're crazy or advancing unexamined novel ideas.

Re: The Stroad

#347

Post by [deleted] »

treis wrote: post #231
xmprt wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have it completely backwards. Suburbs aren't scalable. That's why back in the 50s-70s when they were first built, they were amazing, but today, they are rife with traffic problems, noise pollution, and crumbling infrastructure.

The percentage of the population living in the suburbs is growing, not shrinking.

[deleted]

Re: The Stroad

#348

Post by TessHM »

asdff wrote: post #114
dghlsakjg wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cognitive dissonance is wild. The busiest and most economically vibrant areas in the US are the ones that deprioritize cars (main streets, downtowns, outdoor malls, bar districts). But if you try to change an existing area into a less car friendly area people absolutely lose their heads

There's no cognitive dissonance here really. People are just self interested. They don't want a bunch of bars because that means people will drive drunk and piss and puke all over their property stumbling back after last call. They don't want fewer lanes because its just going to turn their commute from work into even more of a bottleneck. They don't want a mall built near them because of the traffic bottlenecks it w…

You're afraid people will drive drunk, so you want people to put all the bars so far from the homes that everybody has to drive to them?

Re: The Stroad

#349

Post by GordonS »

frereubu wrote: post #217
GordonS wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Currently the 15mph / 20mph disjunction means that some idiots still try to squeeze their cars past relatively fast-moving e-bikes (which then often catch up with the car at the next set of lights...) To be fair, this behaviour isn't one-sided. Often bicycles, e-bikes and motorcycles squeeze through small gaps between cars moving slow'ish in packed traffic. Now, of course car drivers should remain vigilant and cont…

With respect, this feels like whataboutery. "To be fair" makes it sound like cars speeding past cyclists is a response to cyclists whipping between lines of cars, but they're entirely separate issues and can both be wrong at the same time without needing to be compared to each other.

"Whataboutery" gets banded around waaaay too much - I see nothing wrong with pointing out apparent hypocrisy and/or discussing comparable situations.

Also, it was not my intention (and I honestly don't see it in my words as hard as I look) to suggest there was any kind of "tit for tat".

Re: The Stroad

#350

Post by bobthepanda »

Baeocystin wrote: post #136
quantumwannabe wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those exist in some areas of the country. Here's an example: https://www.google.com/maps/@33.5823608,-111.9504203,3a,75y,...

Lots of them in San Diego, too. Here's an example in Clairemont, which is an early post-war suburb. Note that the homes pictured are also 'missing middle' construction. https://www.google.com/maps/@32.8276267,-117.2033566,3a,75y,... https://missingmiddlehousing.com/

My problem with this is that it is the exception and not the rule. Even this is the case; that type of service road access is only on one side of the road.

This ofc doesn’t solve everything, like how crossing a super wide stroad is terrible for both cars and non-motorized users given the large number of conflict points, the long cycle times needed to move cars through fat intersections, etc.

Post reply on HN