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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

#401

Post by reducesuffering »

vivalasvega wrote: post #368
Kye wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I doubt cops like pulling people they can't see over. They could be shot dead and never see the gun.

Perhaps, then, those officers could get safer jobs doing something else, if they are unable to perform their duties. Or perhaps it could be harder to drive around freely with and conceal a deadly weapon. We have a lot of options other than "just let people break the law, I guess".

> Perhaps, then, those officers could get safer jobs doing something else, if they are unable to perform their duties.

Do you have this same energy for every hazardous occupation? Like when workers protest dangerous working conditions? Do you also advocate they "could get safer jobs?"

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

#402

Post by mrtreeman »

patothon wrote: post #158
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't agree with this at all. On one hand, it's kind of a tautology - sure, if you're in a city that is very car-dependent, it's a disadvantage to the working poor because owning a car costs money. But in the US there are also (usually older) cities with relatively great public transportation that are more walkable that also have enormous amounts of wealth inequality. Doesn't really have anything to do with inequalit…

Poor people can’t live in the places you’re describing so they’re going out of the public transit coverage

[dead]

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

#403

Post by klardotsh »

simfree wrote: post #237
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).

Some cities like Portland, Oregon have made it a violation of city code to refuse to serve pedestrians and bicyclists through the Drive Through window if the lobby is closed. There are still some businesses that violate this, but at least you can report it and they will be fined, and threatened with revocation of their business license.

Good. Let's make this federal law. These restrictions are ridiculous and we stand no chance of eliminating car culture without eliminating them. I wish I was kidding, and I wish it were just a trollish joke to say "you should be able to bike through Taco Bell at 2am", but if we're gonna eliminate car culture in the US, we can't just do it in the downtown cores of Chicago, NYC, Seattle, SF, etc. We gotta do it everywhere, and a lot of "everywhere" in the US is drive-thru this and drive-thru that, especially once you get out into the boonies (which of course need more infrastructure work to become bike friendly in their current states, but also, rural bike trails can and should exist, but there'll be little reason to use them if you can't stop anywhere along the way to take a break - and the rabbit hole continues from here)

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

#404

Post by sershe »

closeparen wrote: post #3

This lens is underutilized in the discourse, but people feel it acutely. Even a lot of the anti-cycling stance comes down to, “What am I, poor?” When you are using transportation infrastructure that’s designed with contempt for you, you know, and you don’t want to be there. See also: rail slow zones, buses that shimmy and rattle violently on imperfect pavement, how Muni trains close their doors and pull one foot out…

The cause and effect might be reversed.

1) Most people prefer to drive... look at any country that is getting richer - people want to buy cars.

2) It is only when people cannot afford to drive or driving is too inconvenient (traffic, or narrow streets/lack of parking in Europe, or outright restrictions ), they will use alternative modes of transportation.

3) The more people are thus inconvenienced, the more public support there is for the alternative modes (simply by the numbers); moreover, an average person biking and taking transit becomes richer/nicer, so the political will to improve the experience increases even faster than the number of people; plus the experience becomes nicer even without extra investment.

It's a flywheel either way.

Now, you could argue that global warming is bad / enough freeways cannot be built / etc., sure. Maybe we cannot have nice things.

But don't argue that people want to live in urban paradise and some contrived system is simply not giving them what they want. Most people everywhere, when they can, want to drive and live in houses. Except in some places many can afford that and have the infrastructure, and in some only a few do. It's not like car ownership and traffic is that low in Europe, given how admittedly convenient it is to not have one and how relatively expensive car ownership is, esp. in relation to incomes.

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

#405

Post by nojvek »

Guvante wrote: post #38
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.

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.

Drunk driver dies hitting a tree. Whose fault is that really?

Could have easily hit a person, a traffic pole, another car on sideways.

I don’t understand the argument why trees are at fault here.

Trees are the ultimate carbon capture, they produce oxygen and humidity, they provide shade, something beautiful to look at. They bring in birds and tree dwelling animals like squirrels.

Trees are a magical invention by nature.

That’s why we feel amazing walking in a neighborhood with trees.

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

#406

Post by reducesuffering »

vivalasvega wrote: post #372
closeparen wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had multiple professional-managerial friends tell me they personally won't bike because that's something they left behind in their childhood or broke-student days. It's beneath them now. But you're right, people also complain about bike infrastructure projects taking space from working-class drivers to benefit white yuppies. We see this often with urbanist topics. New multifamily construction is gentrification a…

Leftwing radicals and rightwing septuagenarians both joining hands to oppose new development was absolutely not on my bingo card for this decade.

Why? It's the basis of WW2. Their raison d'etre are the other side, both enflaming each other, giving a scapegoat and a simplistic good/evil worldview.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseshoe_theory

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

#407

Post by nojvek »

angusturner wrote: post #222

I’m an Aussie, and after living 3 months in LA I think it was the most poorly designed city I’ve ever been to for this exact reason - I felt unable to walk practically anywhere! It felt like my options were drive or taxi. And we know what LA traffic is like. I can’t speak to other US cities, and it is possible that certain areas of LA are less terrible than where I stayed. (But I will say, I was in quite an affluent…

What part of australia are you from?

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

#408

Post by badtension »

sershe wrote: post #396
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…

Subjectively worse, not objectively worse. I think driving is much more convenient and nice for most things I like to do. The only exceptions I can think of are if I were a kid in a car-centric area (strangely, the thinking in the US is usually reversed, kids supposedly need to be in the burbs), or if I was drunk. I don't often get drunk, so I'd prefer to drive for everything from minor groceries to outdoor activitie…

Objectively we are still animals that need at least some movement. The environment described by the parent is hostile to our most basic needs.

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

#409

Post by reducesuffering »

msla wrote: post #391
hfgjdssaghj wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have a pretty strong anti-cycling stance, because I watched my New York neighborhood that was a pedestrian paradise significantly degraded by bike lanes. A car driver, a cyclist and a pedestrian walk into a café and order ten cream cakes. When the waitress places them on their table the car driver grabs nine of them and scoffs them in his face, then he leans over to the pedestrian and whispers: “don’t let the cyc…

I've been all but shoved aside by cyclists on sidewalks. Don't try that crap with me.

If that was a car you'd have been dead. 20 people in the US died today because of that.

https://www.npr.org/2023/06/26/1184034017/us-pedestrian-deat...

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

#410

Post by sershe »

badtension wrote: post #408
sershe wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Subjectively worse, not objectively worse. I think driving is much more convenient and nice for most things I like to do. The only exceptions I can think of are if I were a kid in a car-centric area (strangely, the thinking in the US is usually reversed, kids supposedly need to be in the burbs), or if I was drunk. I don't often get drunk, so I'd prefer to drive for everything from minor groceries to outdoor activitie…

Objectively we are still animals that need at least some movement. The environment described by the parent is hostile to our most basic needs.

I find I'd much rather drive to the mountains, or a lake, or at least a nice big park, and recreate there. Walking to a store in Amsterdam or Munich or Vancouver or Moscow was neither much fun nor a lot of exercise.
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