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If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

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Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#141

Post by beebeepka »

vorpalhex wrote: post #47
moomoo11 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't that be safer? I would rather the drunk driver hit the tree and deal with his/her consequences, than hit my house or my neighbors during our sleep.

You've discovered a core disagreement point in safety, "good for everyone" versus "good for the individual". Yes if I live near a road I want trees/big fence/whatever so drunks don't take out my house. Yet if everyone does that, the number of traffic fatalities increases. Of course it's a much harder stat to deliver who died and why versus just optimizing a single fatality count. This problem ruins a lot of really ni…

How is increase of drunk driving suicides a bad thing? I hate this argument. Let's cut the trees because certain people just can't help themselves. Infuriating for all sorts of reasons

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#142

Post by swexbe »

evandale wrote: post #82
davidktr wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that so? The most dignified, people with the most money, are also causing the most desctruction. I find it odd to say people are fighting climate change if they actively contribute to climate's destruction. Doing it for a short time with a clearly stated end date would be one thing. However, almost nobody emits less than the crucial threshold of 2 t CO2/year. At some point you have to admit that if you aren't doin…

Right? A friendly reminder that Gates shorts Tesla and that Washington state has the most regressive tax system in the USA. I'm nearly at my wits end when it comes to rich people preaching nonsense they don't believe in to everyone. https://time.com/6208632/celebrities-climate-impact-private-... Carbon credits are the equivalent to murdering an innocent person and thinking that raping 2 women and supporting the offsp…

Tesla won’t save the world. This is probably not problem we can solve with more growth, sadly.

Also, TSLA has by far the highest P/E of any major car manufacturer…

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#143

Post by inconceivable »

xtracto wrote: post #58
goda90 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have literally seen people scoff at biking or riding the bus as something for poor people. It is a common sentiment.

Anecdote time. Ten years ago I (Mexican, living in Mexico, a bit "white-er" than the average Mexican skin color) worked for a Silicon Valley startup with HQs in Mountain View. One time I was visiting said HQ, I met several people, I got to talk with one of them (Chinese/Asiatic looking woman) about how I was moving while I was there, and where was I staying (she didn't know where I was from). At some point I told her…

that's about the equivalent of calling someone 'asiatic', a term used for animal species lmao. of course you probably don't give a shit, and neither do we really care about calling you names either.

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#144

Post by voisin »

mlinksva wrote: post #90
voisin wrote: post #9

If we want a shift to walking, we need cities to plant around 100x the number of trees they have. Ever walk through an old, mature neighbourhood? Usually there are tons of people on the sidewalks, and a primary reason is that there are mature trees providing plenty of shade. Then try walking in a new neighbourhood with barely any shade. It is awful.

I like mature trees and love walking among them (e.g., downtown Sacramento). In 99% of the US more trees would be better (and I try to contribute by planting an acorn or other tree seed when I spy a place a sapling might not get mowed, wherever I go). But I still consider more trees a distant second to buildings closer together, without room for trees (or, as typical, empty space or junk). If there's room for many ma…

You can have buildings close together but have wider pedestrian paths with densely planted trees in front of the buildings. That’s the ideal.

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#145

Post by inconceivable »

RealityVoid wrote: post #116
Macha wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I had a similar experience as a European travelling to the US. My coworkers were horrified at the idea that I'd take a bus.

The one time I had visited and hadto travel longer distance in the US I took a greyhound and boy, it was a interesting experience. Back home, going by bus was the norm but in the US it's... Really different.

greyhound literally is for poor people.

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#146

Post by paulcole »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #69
paulcole wrote: post #4

The thing is we (as an American society) really don’t want a shift to walking. We like the idea of walking more but won’t actually do it. Instead we’ll make up a million excuses about why we just can’t walk. I say this as someone who at 40 years old has never learned to drive and who has walked/bicycled/taken the bus virtually everywhere I’ve needed to go. And I’ve lived in very rural and very suburban areas, as well…

> We like the idea of walking more but won’t actually do it. Wrong. The reason people don't walk is simply because walking mostly really sucks in like 95% of urban or suburban contexts in the states. Even crossing the street once can be a huge pain in the ass sometimes (e.g. strip mall to strip mall across two giant parking lots and an enormous stroad). It is astoundingly rare to find an actual nice, not-tiny area to…

People can still do things that suck if they want to do those things enough.

If you want to walk and have two legs that work, don’t whine about wishing walking didn’t suck. Get out and walk.

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#147

Post by voisin »

b112 wrote: post #104
voisin wrote: post #9

If we want a shift to walking, we need cities to plant around 100x the number of trees they have. Ever walk through an old, mature neighbourhood? Usually there are tons of people on the sidewalks, and a primary reason is that there are mature trees providing plenty of shade. Then try walking in a new neighbourhood with barely any shade. It is awful.

Then try walking in a new neighbourhood with barely any shade. It is awful. Love how south-centric this statement is. In Northern countries, that's true for a month typically, otherwise "oh god please I hope the sun will shine on me". In December, I see 4 hours of sun, where the light gets above tree tops. And that's in Southern Canada! Not a hatred of trees, but a dislike of shade trees. edit: until I visited Texas,…

On the contrary, not south centric at all (note my spelling of neighbourhood!) - I lived in southwestern Ontario for most of my life and now live in southeastern BC. I have yet to see a new neighbourhood where I’ve thought the tree coverage was too much at any time of year! In fact, the same is true for old neighbourhoods. I just cannot imagine feeling oppressed by the shade from trees.

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#148

Post by plagiarist »

goda90 wrote: post #36
gruez wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Even a lot of the anti-cycling stance comes down to, “What am I, poor?” I agree with the overall point that people don't want to cycle because the experience sucks, but your description feels like an unnecessarily inflammatory way to say "people are willing to pay for a more pleasant experience". Nobody says "a lot of the anti-cheap laptop stance comes down to, "what am I, poor?".

I have literally seen people scoff at biking or riding the bus as something for poor people. It is a common sentiment.

The sentiment that having money makes one "above" a form of transit is a bit despicable, but it absolutely is the case. I think particularly with public transit. "Hey, would you like to take a multi-leg two hour journey with at least ten minutes of waiting between each leg, or drive fifteen minutes?"

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#149

Post by skrebbel »

arrowsmith wrote: post #40
skrebbel wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain this to me? For example, my local supermarket is a 8 minute walk from my house. Driving there would take about 5 minutes, due to one way streets etc, so including the hassle of parking etc it takes about as long. Driving there seems positively insane to me, except if I’m shopping for a party or something and need to fill the trunk. Are you saying that Americans would choose the car here? Or that in Am…

Have you spent much time in the US? American cities are nothing like Europe. Everything is far more spread out with more empty land in between buildings, so all the distances are longer. And the concept of what we Brits call a "corner shop" hardly seems to exist in 'Murica - you get these huge residential zones where it's nothing but homes, homes, homes for miles and miles with no shops or anything commercial. So if…

> Have you spent much time in the US?

I have not, which is why I asked. The commenter I replied to suggested that the problem was that Americans prefer to drive, intrinsically, and not that the problem was road layout. This surprised me because reading HN I got the idea that road layout very much is the key problem, so I asked.

Re: If we want a shift to walking we need to prioritize dignity

#150

Post by paulcole »

skrebbel wrote: post #13
paulcole wrote: post #4

The thing is we (as an American society) really don’t want a shift to walking. We like the idea of walking more but won’t actually do it. Instead we’ll make up a million excuses about why we just can’t walk. I say this as someone who at 40 years old has never learned to drive and who has walked/bicycled/taken the bus virtually everywhere I’ve needed to go. And I’ve lived in very rural and very suburban areas, as well…

Can you explain this to me? For example, my local supermarket is a 8 minute walk from my house. Driving there would take about 5 minutes, due to one way streets etc, so including the hassle of parking etc it takes about as long. Driving there seems positively insane to me, except if I’m shopping for a party or something and need to fill the trunk. Are you saying that Americans would choose the car here? Or that in Am…

> are you sure it’s American psyche

Yes. Many Americans would absolutely choose a 5 minute drive over a 5 minute walk.

“I have too much stuff to carry. I have to take the kids. It’s too hot/cold/windy. I’ll be late to… I have to…”

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