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

streets.mn

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

#321

Post by [deleted] »

InertBrake wrote: post #306
laserlight wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you reply to the wrong thread? Where did defense subsidies come from?

Without really reading the article, I think maybe the parent's point is that the US basically pays for large portions of defense and security of Europe, especially when it comes to the need for blue water navies to protect trade. That frees up a lot of time, money, and manpower for them to spend on not defense, and spend instead on infrastructure and nice things. It's also nice that another effect Pax Americana has c…

[deleted]

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

#322

Post by Guvante »

beebeepka wrote: post #141
vorpalhex wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Only recently has the traffic safety community started ignoring drunk drivers.

Historically we measured efficacy by measuring fatalities. If you treat all deaths as equal your minimizing function will be narrow viewed.

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

#323

Post by PaulHoule »

grecy wrote: post #310
tvaughan wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I often find myself trying to explain to people back home just how miserable and even humiliating the pedestrian experience is here. Same. I’ve lived in Los Ángeles and Amsterdam, and it is impossible to explain to my friends and family just how awful the quality of life is in LA precisely because of the difference in attitudes and priorities over cars. Perhaps some have “nicer” (aka bigger) houses in LA than they…

Every time a politician anywhere in the world suggests adding more freeways or more lanes to freeways, I think they should be forced to live in LA for a year and do a ~1 hour commute each way in traffic. They need to see first hand what happens when you just add more freeways and more lanes. It's not good.

Try Massachusetts. You drive just as far, there are hardly any businesses to patronize on your commute (except for maybe two Dunkin Donuts), sometimes traffic is going 95 mph at 1am in the morning on Rt 128 in heavy rain, and it snows.

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

#324

Post by carlob »

JackFr wrote: post #172
whimsicalism wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Failing to yield to pedestrians where? e: Actually, not going to get into it but c'mon - cars kill pedestrians in a way that bikes rarely do and removing the cars from your NY neighborhood would have an obviously better impact on pedestrians compared to the bikes.

Cyclists in NYC are positive menace. They don’t need to be but they choose go the wrong way down one way streets, routinely ignore all traffic signals, ride on busy sidewalks and eschew bike lanes to weave in and out of heavy traffic. Well under 50% wear helmets. As a pedestrian in NYC I feel far more endangered by bikes than I do by automobiles. There is room for cyclists, but there has got to be some compliance wit…

> Well under 50% wear helmets.

> As a pedestrian in NYC I feel far more endangered by bikes than I do by automobiles.

how do you make those two follow?

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

#325

Post by Guvante »

mc32 wrote: post #51
Guvante wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We had trees, they ripped them out in the name of safety. "A drink driver might swerve off the road" killed so many old growth trees in the US.

It wasn’t one reason. Some of it came down to liability (buckling sidewalks, falling limbs in storms, pruning), public safety (baddies can hide under trees and away from choppers before FLiR), impact on utilities (100+ years ago maybe there was a sewer line and maybe a water line, but not much else in most places).

It can cost tens of thousands to remove a single tree.

No shot those reasons would justify millions in tree removal fees.

However the huge budgets for roads could do it trivially.

You underestimate the impact of measuring fatalities as the only way of verifying success of transportation policy...

Certainly if other benefits were weighed properly it might not happen but if you ignore the upsides... (certainly we historically ignored shade for pedestrians).

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

#326

Post by brightlancer »

DangitBobby wrote: post #265
ben_w wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was drive-thru the only late night food option in that bit of Czechia? That felt like the pertinent part, not being able to get any in some places. (Here in Berlin I have to plan around Sunday trading rules in a way I didn't back in the UK, but we have Spätis, so there are options).

After 9 or 10 PM that's exactly how it is here in TN, USA. Dine in is closed and the drive through won't take you on foot or on a bike. I think most franchises have a blanket policy against serving people without a car to intentionally exclude... Certain People.

> I think most franchises have a blanket policy against serving people without a car to intentionally exclude... Certain People.

Bicyclists?

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

#327

Post by dymk »

ytdytvhxgydvhh wrote: post #286
degrews wrote: post #106

I moved from Spain to the US, and I often find myself trying to explain to people back home just how miserable and even humiliating the pedestrian experience is here. Here are some other examples of things that I think contribute to the hostile walking experience in the US: * Cars parked in short driveways often extend all the way across the sidewalk. Even if you can easily step off onto the road to walk around them…

Tinted windows are such a pet peeve of mine. I get it in the tropics but in most of America the individual benefits of dark tint seem like they’d be outweighed by the collective good of better visibility through cars, enabling eye contact with drivers, etc. The SUV craze is really to blame - in general many US states don’t allow dark tint on traditional cars but do on SUVs. And since rear windows on vans and light tr…

In most states (all?) it's illegal to have a tinted front window, yet people still have them, because it's not enforced. IMO cops should be citing people left and right for tinted windows and tinted license plate covers. You'd think they'd already be taking advantage of such an easy revenue source.

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

#328

Post by Sharlin »

tremon wrote: post #316
InertBrake wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without really reading the article, I think maybe the parent's point is that the US basically pays for large portions of defense and security of Europe, especially when it comes to the need for blue water navies to protect trade. That frees up a lot of time, money, and manpower for them to spend on not defense, and spend instead on infrastructure and nice things. It's also nice that another effect Pax Americana has c…

So the argument is actually that the US can't have livable cities because they spend all that money defending Europe? Because of the implicit assumption that European-style cities are more expensive in upkeep than current US cities?

I think the assumption is more that us Europeans can afford such decadent, livable cities because we don’t need to spend as much money on defense (?!) So car-oriented hellscapes are somehow the default, "normal" situation, because of course what you have accustomed to feels subjectively normal to you! Then Europe is some sort of a fairy-tale Disneyland that doesn’t need to face the Realities thanks to the US. Anyway, a nice claim but building and maintaining all that sprawling infrastructure is actually vastly more expensive than a denser, more sustainable urban fabric…

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

#330

Post by brightlancer »

elric wrote: post #247
cstejerean wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first one doesn't seem unique to the US. I just spent the last 2 months i Europe and on many side streets there is no place to safely stop a car which means pulling into the sidewalk is the only option. So I frequently had to step into the street to walk around a stopped delivery van or similar.

You're probably not supposed to stop a car in those places, and when you do, you're supposed to stop on the road, never on the sidewalk. Steep fines for that in Belgium at least, though the odds of getting caught are slim.

It's illegal in the US to block the sidewalk with a car and it's one of the few things cities will actually enforce aggressively -- if they don't, they can be sued for discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act.
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