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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

#621

Post by lisper »

jjav wrote: post #617
aesclepius wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jesus it's objectively worse. NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo you can conceivably and easily nip out to a grocer's, bodega, cafe or pub within 10 minutes of where you are. LA? Outside of certain certain pockets like DTLA, KTown, WeHo or similar walking is tough and if your friend is across town you're SoL without a car.

> NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo you can conceivably and easily nip out to a grocer's, bodega, cafe or pub within 10 minutes of where you are. This keeps coming up on HN but it's not as absolutist as it's made to be. There are lots and lots of suburban places in the US where you can walk to things as you describe. NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo do not have a monopoly on walkability. I live in very suburban (approaching…

Also, when grocery shopping using a car, I can carry a shit-ton more than I can on foot, so I don't have to go shopping nearly as often. In a pedestrian-centric town, grocery shopping is a daily chore. Using my car, I only have to go once a week or so.

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

#622

Post by mtalantikite »

sershe wrote: post #489
aesclepius wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jesus it's objectively worse. NY/Chicago/London/Paris/Tokyo you can conceivably and easily nip out to a grocer's, bodega, cafe or pub within 10 minutes of where you are. LA? Outside of certain certain pockets like DTLA, KTown, WeHo or similar walking is tough and if your friend is across town you're SoL without a car.

But I don't want to! I literally just walked to the store and it was in absoute perfect conditions - we wanted to go for a walk anyway, the weather is perfect (sunny but not hot), the store is 10min walk from my house, the neighborhood is nice and not drive-thru so there is ~0 non-local traffic. The plan was we go for a walk, and pop by a store and get one item. But as usual it never ends up being that way, so we had…

> And what if it was 100F, or 32F, or raining, or I didn't want to go for a walk, or I needed to get some large items like sugar or rice or a gallon of milk or a lot of beer for a party?

As a New Yorker, you just described daily life here? It’s really not a big deal — things are so close you can take multiple trips if you need to. Get some canvas bags. Plus since everything is so close you end up just doing smaller trips every day or so. If the shop is longer than 10-15 minutes and I’ve got more than, say, 40 pounds of groceries I might get a car back home, but that’s a rare trip. And honestly I’ll probably just walk it back anyway.

Maybe we just have a higher tolerance for pain here — I’ve certainly had people visit who think of themselves as fit and they get gassed out by regular New York walking life.

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

#623

Post by rconti »

jjav wrote: post #615
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…

> Perhaps some have “nicer” (aka bigger) houses in LA than they would have in Ámsterdam The (insane) cost of housing in LA doesn't exactly lead to people having bigger houses (or often affording any house).

Gotta imagine the cost per square foot is significantly less in LA than Amsterdam. Obviously depends where in "LA".

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

#624

Post by akira2501 »

slothtrop wrote: post #114
akira2501 wrote: post #93

"People should walk!" Pictures of miles long suburban corridors with no services or business along them. Maybe.. people don't walk there.. because there's no _reason_ to be walking there. If you want people to walk, give them a reason other than "I don't like cars."

That's what "15 min cities" is about. The YIMBYs also push for accessible amenities, through zoning changes, to make areas more walkable.

Yea.. I'm sure the "planned economy" will work this time.

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

#625

Post by fnimick »

bluGill wrote: post #583
pdonis wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you read the link you would realize that property taxes don't even cover 25% of the ongoing maintenance cost. I don't see this anywhere in the article.

That general tax pool is funded by people who live in suburbs, so the argument is wrong. Strongtowns is intersting, but they look at a few outliers and make the case those problems apply to all towns.

And by people who live in urban areas who don't get the benefit, since they also pay property taxes that are sufficient to pay for their infrastructure. It's a subsidy for the suburbs.

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

#626

Post by sershe »

sgu999 wrote: post #611
johnnyanmac wrote: post #598

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You have observed the problem yet not doing anything about which is just really weird. They observed the problem and simply have a different solution than you. I'm sure there's a number of other factors they didn't mention that make it preferable to simply use their perfectly working car.

> I'm sure there's a number of other factors they didn't mention that make it preferable to simply use their perfectly working car. I'm sorry but when one is willing to put that much effort to try to justify using a car to avoid a 10 mn walk, that's only because one is way too lazy and privileged...

You treat the walk as the default and car as something that needs to be justified. That's BS. I think you are too privileged to live in a safe neighborhood, in good climate, to be healthy enough to walk with load, and to own a good backpack :P

To me car is the default solution, it's simply better in every way for most people. Making one's life better doesn't need to be "justified".

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

#627

Post by sershe »

spixy wrote: post #576
sershe wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But I don't want to! I literally just walked to the store and it was in absoute perfect conditions - we wanted to go for a walk anyway, the weather is perfect (sunny but not hot), the store is 10min walk from my house, the neighborhood is nice and not drive-thru so there is ~0 non-local traffic. The plan was we go for a walk, and pop by a store and get one item. But as usual it never ends up being that way, so we had…

Then go there with some backpack. I have a store in same building than my flat (but other side), and it is the best. Dont need to have car, dont need to worry about DUI... 100F (38C) is here twice maybe per year? Cannot you survive 38C for a few minutes? If it is 32F (0C). I just put warm clothes on? 32F is not very cold temperature anyway. Raining = umbrella (but I go without it, 2 minutes of rain wont kill me). How…

Or I could just drive. How is walking with all these inconveniences "objectively better"? :)

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

#628

Post by sershe »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #582
sershe wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well they don't have much car infrastructure either, and operating a car there is much less convenient than a moped or a bicycle, not to mention extremely expensive relative to income. Plus the car is not necessary by definition since most people don't have one. So it's not really massive spending on car infrastructure, or distances created by car-centric lifestyle that's driving the adoption. It really feels like mo…

> Well they don't have much car infrastructure either They have hundreds of motorways -> roads exclusively for car use. They have zero cycle ways. Like this is not subjective, look at the amount of money spent on ‘active travel’ anywhere, it is never even 5% of road budget. > Moscow I’ve cycled in Russia. Drivers stick their hand out of the window to yank on the steering or push you. There is zero tolerance for cycli…

We are talking about in-the-city commuting. The local roads/streets at some stage of poverty are full of mopeds and bicycles, with very few cars. When people have no choice. When they have a choice, they could get better bicycles or mopeds. Instead they get more cars, before these cars are even convenient to use (e.g. you may get stuck behind a bicycle with a produce cart for 10 minutes at 5mph as mopeds stream around both of you).

These cities start out in no way optimized for cars, basically by definition (nobody has cars). The reasons cars do better in them too, before the govt responds with more car infrastructure, is because cars are just simply better in terms of convenience. If people wanted to continue cycling after they get more rich, the govt could have built infrastructure for that much cheaper and easier.

Also btw, no matter what, bicycling is still marginal in most climates and for many people who are not fit. The real thing to discuss is transit... many of the middle-income and even poor cities have great transit, but people don't clog the transit and then grudgingly switch to driving, it's the other way around :)

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

#629

Post by paradox460 »

DANmode wrote: post #480
paradox460 wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's used much the same in NYC and some other than areas. A quick tap to say "hey I'm here and I'm doing something" like changing lanes or pulling out of traffic Aside: I really wish cars had two different horns. A nice little boop horn, to say "hey I'm here" or "lights green buddy" and then the big honking thing that says "you nearly hit me by rolling through that stop sign, pay better attention"

They're 12V contained electronics with a wire, e.g. adding a boat horn to your car is an hour install at most.

I've done it. I've got a little loud speaker that plays a soft awooga sound when I press a button, but it would be nice to have a factory option, or even a standard

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

#630

Post by Karrot_Kream »

axpy wrote: post #563
Gibbon1 wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like the more modes of transportation you mix together the worse the cognitive load on people. And it get rapidly worse the higher the density. Inside of a mall where there are only pedestrians is very safe. Freeways are fairly safe. Protected bike lanes are safe. Light rail is safe. Mix all of those on a strode, rail, buses, trucks, cars, bicycles, pedestrians, not safe.

This seems pretty counter intuitive but this is often the other way around. The safest streets in Europe are where cars, bikes and pedestrian mix together. It force focus on the driving task instead of doing something else. If you are interested, Freakonomics have an episode: "Why the U.S. so good at killing pedestrian". It's an interesting discussion with no simple answer.

It's because US streets are designed much wider than equivalent European streets. US design standards have wider LOS than Europe so they design for faster vehicle travel and higher throughput, which puts pressure on slower modes. This comes at a financial costs (better pavement, wider roads) but the US gladly pays a fortune for roads.
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