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Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#71

Post by delta_p_delta_x »

robnado wrote: post #59
yrro wrote: post #2

Car size should be regulated and a maximum should be enforced. Pavement parking (and other antisocial forms of parking) should also be banned. In the UK, local authorities are in charge of parking enforcement. In Oxford they largely don't bother: I see vehicles parked on yellow lines every day. I can't fathom why, this is an opportunity to raise revenue!

I feel that all those people who talk about reducing car size and use probably don’t have a family. I have twin 6 month olds and the only cars we currently use is the Toyota Corolla from a local car sharing service. Two car seats in the back leave basically just enough room between for my wife to fit sideways inside the middle seat. She can’t stay in there for longer than a few minutes and if we get in a car accident…

> a major North American city that is known for having good public transit

Compared to most large East and Southeast Asian cities (Shanghai, Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, Singapore), public transport in American cities is generally lousy, especially if a 15-minute drive (that's about 10 – 15km, maybe) turns into a multiple-hour affair. At that rate, one might as well walk.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#72

Post by yrro »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #14
yrro wrote: post #2

Car size should be regulated and a maximum should be enforced. Pavement parking (and other antisocial forms of parking) should also be banned. In the UK, local authorities are in charge of parking enforcement. In Oxford they largely don't bother: I see vehicles parked on yellow lines every day. I can't fathom why, this is an opportunity to raise revenue!

Parking issues are caused by number of vehicles on the road and lack of planning. Many roads in the UK are very narrow with narrow pavements: There is no space to 'properly' park even if all cars are small-ish. I have rarely seen roads with parked cars blocking half the road in Europe (at least in France) whereas this is common here in the UK.

All the more reason to reduce the number of cars on the road: prioritize active and public transport (so that people choose to use them where possible instead of driving a wasteful private vehicle).

Other measures should also be considered but our Tory government will never contemplate them.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#73

Post by yrro »

arethuza wrote: post #24
secretsatan wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure narrow roads in old cities are due to lack of planning, they didn't have crystal balls

And some of the "planning" that was done to make our cities car friendly was absolutely horrific - look at what someone thought was a good idea for Edinburgh: https://www.gcat.org.uk/blog/?p=682 Edit: thankfully never built!

See Glascow's M8 which did get built!

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#74

Post by tonyedgecombe »

yrro wrote: post #2

Car size should be regulated and a maximum should be enforced. Pavement parking (and other antisocial forms of parking) should also be banned. In the UK, local authorities are in charge of parking enforcement. In Oxford they largely don't bother: I see vehicles parked on yellow lines every day. I can't fathom why, this is an opportunity to raise revenue!

>In Oxford they largely don't bother

Funnily enough I saw a traffic warden issuing tickets in Oxford last week.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#75

Post by tonyedgecombe »

austinjp wrote: post #48
moomin wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems a good time to drag up this ad that demonstrated how much space cars take up again: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYn8aQIpNH4

Wow, I watched that with the sound off and was surprised it's actually a car manufacturer's ad. What a misfire. In turn, that reminded me of this legendary ad misfire: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strand_(cigarette)#Marketing

This Fiat advert from the seventies is remarkably honest:

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/22/8e/70/228e700a28f190746ea9...

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#76

Post by JambalayaJim »

odiroot wrote: post #35
danw1979 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great idea and would handily deal with the escalating “momentum war” between selfish drivers who buy the biggest, heaviest vehicle they can afford in order to be safer than their counterparts in a collision. I’d propose we make the tax highly non-linear too…

You're right on the money. I've heard it a few times from my associates (in UK), who don't feel comfortable driving. They want to go for the big car so they can be safe. But what about other road users? You can also notice how pushy all these Range Rover drivers are on our very narrow roads.

Safety is a reason why many people claim to purchase these cars but frankly I’m not convinced. These cars are comfortable and luxurious - appealing to safety is a way to tell themselves their purchase is practical and not frivolous.

In any case I agree; these vehicles do not in fact make us more safe, overall.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#77

Post by JambalayaJim »

Pet_Ant wrote: post #4
yrro wrote: post #2

Car size should be regulated and a maximum should be enforced. Pavement parking (and other antisocial forms of parking) should also be banned. In the UK, local authorities are in charge of parking enforcement. In Oxford they largely don't bother: I see vehicles parked on yellow lines every day. I can't fathom why, this is an opportunity to raise revenue!

An article shared recently said that road damage is weight^4. Make a car tax based on vehicle weight and the market takes care of itself. For the right classes (such as wheelchair accessible) it can be a tax write-off.

It’s my understanding that personal vehicles are irrelevant compared to large trucks for this very reason.

Where even the most innocuous residential street will have a garbage truck that damages the road far more than cars do.

Not that their aren’t many more problems with large cars in terms of pedestrian safety, congestion, waste of parking space, etc.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#78

Post by tstrimple »

secretsatan wrote: post #19
mytailorisrich wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parking issues are caused by number of vehicles on the road and lack of planning. Many roads in the UK are very narrow with narrow pavements: There is no space to 'properly' park even if all cars are small-ish. I have rarely seen roads with parked cars blocking half the road in Europe (at least in France) whereas this is common here in the UK.

I'm not sure narrow roads in old cities are due to lack of planning, they didn't have crystal balls

Narrow roads should be a sign of planning. They do a far better job of restricting vehicle speeds than a nice wide open straight road with a 25mph (or equivalent) speed limit sign. My US city would benefit from far more narrow roads. But even the “quaint and quiet” residential streets are so wide that cars feel comfortable flying through at double the speed limit. And I’m not talking about the occasional reckless driver. This is how the standard traffic flows because they have so much space and open sight lines. We have nothing in the way of traffic calming for pedestrian interactions. Posted speed limits are the only mechanism used to designate road speed. It doesn’t work.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#79

Post by robnado »

hotpotamus wrote: post #70
robnado wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel that all those people who talk about reducing car size and use probably don’t have a family. I have twin 6 month olds and the only cars we currently use is the Toyota Corolla from a local car sharing service. Two car seats in the back leave basically just enough room between for my wife to fit sideways inside the middle seat. She can’t stay in there for longer than a few minutes and if we get in a car accident…

Isn't the answer to this a minivan?

We are still deciding between an SUV and a minivan. What might make us choose the SUV is the ground clearance. Where we live there is a lot of snowfall in the winter, and the extra ground clearance can mean the difference between getting beached on packed snow or ice.

Re: Britain's roads can't keep up with our cars

#80

Post by tstrimple »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #41
orwin wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can. Paris have less roads (or rather has closed roads to cars) and upped the public transit system frequency in the area despite a small population augmentation. I know one person living in the area, the QOL is now way, way higher.

Comparing a very dense urban area with a whole country is nonsensical, not least because even in your example road access is still needed and still exists.

Having well designed cities and transit isn’t just something that can be done for dense urban areas. Our car centric belief system is more of a cultural artifact than an indication that nothing else is possible.

https://youtu.be/ztpcWUqVpIg?si=DZ9p1cQgSUpvKWnl

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