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The Decline of the City Grid

economist.com

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Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#181

Post by foepys »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #179
ericmay wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s just not a problem. And even if it were a problem it pales in comparison to the deaths and societal cost to driving. You’re thinking about 99.99999% problems and sacrificing common problems (kids being run over etc.).

> You’re thinking about 99.99999% problems and sacrificing common problems (kids being run over etc.). Kids being run over is not a common problem, by any standard. You'd struggle to argue that it even qualified as "rare". It's more along the lines of "unheard of". The 2016 census reports the population of 0-19 year olds as 81,880,000. According to this article in US News ( https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/art…

You only talk about fatalities but people can get hit by cars without dying and be still in urgent need of an ambulance (often so they don't die later).

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#182

Post by kqr »

msla wrote: post #132
twelvechairs wrote: post #8

The big recent exemplar of street layout for a new place is Houten in the netherlands [0] which is basically focussed on a train station and walkable town square at the centre with a ring road at the edge. Roads are a 'soft grid' for pedestrians and cyclists but stopped up for cars making the car network more of a tree with dead ends rather than a grid. And making road speeds slow at the centre and fast at the edges.…

> Roads are a 'soft grid' for pedestrians and cyclists but stopped up for cars How do emergency vehicles get in and out? If a doctor is called in to an emergency, walking or biking is too slow. How do they get to the case?

Proper bicycle roads are ideal for emergency vehicles, because bicycles are easy to lift out of the way and then they are perfectly clear.

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#183

Post by thaumasiotes »

foepys wrote: post #181
thaumasiotes wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You’re thinking about 99.99999% problems and sacrificing common problems (kids being run over etc.). Kids being run over is not a common problem, by any standard. You'd struggle to argue that it even qualified as "rare". It's more along the lines of "unheard of". The 2016 census reports the population of 0-19 year olds as 81,880,000. According to this article in US News ( https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/art…

You only talk about fatalities but people can get hit by cars without dying and be still in urgent need of an ambulance (often so they don't die later).

It's not going to change the conclusion unless you believe that death is a very rare outcome of being struck by a car.

Think about it. Do you personally know of any occasion on which a child was run over? In what sense could it be a "common problem"?

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#184

Post by ahtihn »

argentier wrote: post #147
epilys wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, plural of cul-de-sac is culs-de-sac. It means bottom-of-the-bag in French, so the plural form would be bottoms-of-the-bag. Like the plural of sibling-in-law is not sibling-in-laws. Worthless fact of the day!

Worthless fact the second: even though cul-de-sac is French, the French do not use cul-de-sac for their cul-de-sacs.

"Un cul-de-sac" is simply a road that just stops instead of going somewhere. It usually has a specific road sign to signal it. It's definitely used in (Swiss) French.

Does it mean something different in the US? And what would be the French equivalent then?

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#185

Post by kqr »

closeparen wrote: post #79
gpvos wrote: post #75

A thing about North-American cul-de-sac suburbs that I don't understand is why there are no footpaths to take shortcuts between the dead-end streets. That would make them much less hostile to pedestrians, would allow you to visit neighbours more easily, and it seems to me that you don't lose anything. Is it just an oversight or is there some reason for that? It should even increase social safety: always an escape rou…

Some of the more humane subdivisions are built with walking trails e.g. behind the backyards. A developer may or may not feel that they need to spend the extra money for that to sell the houses. Customers for these very deeply nested cul de sac homes tend to value privacy a lot. They don’t want people they don’t know passing through, and may be even more suspicious of pedestrians than drivers.

> Customers for these very deeply nested cul de sac homes tend to value privacy a lot. They don’t want people they don’t know passing through, and may be even more suspicious of pedestrians than drivers.

In which direction does the causation go? If I ended up on a partially closed road I would also become suspicious of people and start to value "privacy".

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#186

Post by nobody9999 »

madcaptenor wrote: post #95
kgermino wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Street numbers pivot on 5th Ave and increase in each direction from there, so if you know the street number, you know which two avenues it's between. For example, when I lived at 4xx W 45th St, that was between 9th and 10th, which can be deduced from the first number of the address added to 5 (5 + 4 = 9, so the address is West of 9th). As a logic-minded person used to the Chicago system, this kind of thing drives m…

I share your complaints about Manhattan. I guess when they did Manhattan they had figured out "numbered streets are good" but not "having the addresses work nicely with the numbered streets are good". By the time they put addresses on the streets in Queens they did what you want them to.

>By the time they put addresses on the streets in Queens they did what you want them to.

That is true, but 34-15 61st Street is a very different place than 34-15 61st Road, 34-15 61st Avenue and 34-15 61st Place.

Which is even more confusing and annoying than Manhattan addresses. About which I'd point out that there are other smart things and other confusing things too: On side streets (not avenues), odd-numbered addresses are on the north side of the street and even-numbered ones on the south side. And on avenues, addresses are generally odd-numbered on the east side of the street and even-numbered on the west side.

Where it exists (north of West 4th Street) the East Side/West Side divide is 5th Avenue, so 5 East 23rd Street is just east of Fifth Avenue and 5 West 23rd is just west of Fifth.

And my favorite: Uptown is (generally) north and downtown is (generally) south, so by walking one block and seeing how the street numbers increase/decrease (and remembering the avenue layout from river to river), you can pretty much determine your whereabouts pretty quickly.

Also (with some variation) one city block (say from 43rd to 44th street, rather than avenue blocks, e.g., from Park to Lexington which have much more variable lengths) is approximately 1/20th of a mile.

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#187

Post by citrin_ru »

ghaff wrote: post #99
gpvos wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Four-way stops are yet another American pessimization. You won't find them in any European country.

Not sure why. In low traffic situations in both directions, it seems it's probably safer to have everyone to have everyone stop rather than have traffic in one direction blast through.

If it is a residential area (low traffic and speed) I see no problem with cars on lower traffic street have to stop and yield and on another go without a stop (but within the speed limit).

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#188

Post by Armisael16 »

ahtihn wrote: post #184
argentier wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worthless fact the second: even though cul-de-sac is French, the French do not use cul-de-sac for their cul-de-sacs.

"Un cul-de-sac" is simply a road that just stops instead of going somewhere. It usually has a specific road sign to signal it. It's definitely used in (Swiss) French. Does it mean something different in the US? And what would be the French equivalent then?

The traditional US cul-de-sac is rounded at the end, and usually has a house at the end (the road was never intended to continue)

Here’s a fairly representative picture of the geometry: https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcS8zguy...

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#189

Post by msla »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #168
msla wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't know if Houten has this feature but there are often movable bollards that allow emergency vehicles to take shortcuts. Doctors don't drive emergency vehicles, they drive their own cars.

(In my experience) Doctors also don't get called out to a specific accident site; that's what Ambulances (and emergency vehicles) are for.

That isn't what I'm talking about.

When doctors get called in to hospitals for emergencies, they travel in their own cars. Is that really unknown around here? If it is, none of you are competent to decide who needs a car and how cities should be designed.

Re: The Decline of the City Grid

#190

Post by msla »

humanistbot wrote: post #171
msla wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They just do. On roads where motor vehicles aren't allowed? On roads blockaded so motor vehicles can't access? That's what "stopped up for cars" means.

You can have roads where motor vehicles aren't allowed, but have exceptions for ambulances in emergencies. They turn the sirens and lights on and everyone pulls over to make way.

> You can have roads where motor vehicles aren't allowed, but have exceptions for ambulances in emergencies.

So doctors won't be allowed to drive to the hospital in emergencies.

That kind of thing kills people.

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