11–20 of 27 posts
> Much like how people now prefer streaming services over cable, these subscriptions may cost nearly the same as leasing or owning a car some months, but they’ll provide a better experience than owning a car, especially if cities prioritize mobility options over private cars. Except now that they've won the war, the streaming services are merrily raising prices, adding advertisements, and enshittifying in various oth…
I always thought be interesting for an app to organize an neighborhood to share its cars with themselves. This gets away from a lot of problems with rentals - the car always lives in the same place, you can get the same set of familiar cars, and you'd have more of a sense of ownership and personal liability. The problem is that people use their cars as storage plus non-linear spikey demand and everyone wanting to use cars at the same time.
As a result I expect cities became a hub of poor and desperate, while those who can have already or will do at an exponentially higher price, flee the city. Those inside will have no cars simply because they will be unable to own one.
I hope she is right, and in a way she may be. The main reason is how expensive it is to buy a car, insure and maintain a car in the US. Insurance rates in many places are raising a lot, people blame the expense of repairing EVs and some blame tracking of people's driving habits via many internet connected autos. With new proposed mandatory "dodads" like automatic breaking, rear cameras I can see Auto prices will cont…
Long story short: it's here that the Green tech fail, not all other the world. As a result people in cities became more and more poor to a point they simply can't own a car anymore. It's not a "nice evolution thanks to" but a "forced regression".
I think public traffic is much more similar to cable TV with its fixed schedule than a car that mirrors on-demand streaming. This is why in truth few people like to use public traffic if there is another feasible choice. I am not interested in car models at all but I like owning a car, even in a city. It solves a lot of problems and I believe a development to less individual traffic is an illusion. Mabybe it happens…
> I think public traffic is much more similar to cable TV with its fixed schedule than a car that mirrors on-demand streaming. This is why in truth few people like to use public traffic if there is another feasible choice. Public transport doesn't work if it's not somewhat punctual and high traffic, meaning it needs to be reliable and run often, not like those "commuter" trains around North America running only morni…
If you try the hybrid model: collective transports just for certain routes in specific hours where they are at least half full then you get a very big investments underutilized, it's not different than the office+apartment model where the apartment get used just a bit less than half a day and the office equally for the other nearly half a day, wasting the rest of time in pointless commuting. Pointless except to farm people forcing them to zero ownership and keeping them consuming anything.
> Much like how people now prefer streaming services over cable, these subscriptions may cost nearly the same as leasing or owning a car some months, but they’ll provide a better experience than owning a car, especially if cities prioritize mobility options over private cars. Except now that they've won the war, the streaming services are merrily raising prices, adding advertisements, and enshittifying in various oth…
And isn’t leasing a car very expensive compared to buying one?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I think public traffic is much more similar to cable TV with its fixed schedule than a car that mirrors on-demand streaming. This is why in truth few people like to use public traffic if there is another feasible choice. Public transport doesn't work if it's not somewhat punctual and high traffic, meaning it needs to be reliable and run often, not like those "commuter" trains around North America running only morni…
Mass transports can't substitute cars simply because of economics: yes, a bus at least half stuffed of people is cheaper than a car per passenger but people need to move from any A to B any time all other the year. If you effectively cover all possible settlements 24/7/365 you'll fail quickly pushing nearly empty or even totally empty mass transports most of the days for most of the routes. If you try the hybrid mode…
Unless I've misunderstood your comment, I'm not sure I'd consider that a hybrid model; if anything, that's kind of how much of our current mass transit system works across North America.
That said, the solution there is increased density with mixed uses. More housing in close proximity to and mixed in with offices, restaurants, schools, shops, etc. means more people living within walking and/or biking distance of their most common destinations. It also gives you better locations for building transit stops, to the benefit of both those who live in that area as well as those traveling to it. Infill can't fix everything or undo our current sprawl, but it can improve a lot of it. For all the damage we've down to American towns and cities, most towns built before the 1950s still have their old bones. They can be restored to their former glories without turning everything into Manhattan, giving communities a solid core capable of supporting them for the long-term.
In any case, you don't have to build out a perfect transit system with stops outside every conceivable destination, including areas that lack any sort of real density. You just need something that's convenient and helps move most people to most places without having to wait an hour for a bus or train. If those whose destinations are outside those areas have to use a car, that's perfectly fine. They aren't any worse of, and in fact, their own commutes would almost certainly be improved by helping get other drivers off the road.
I think public traffic is much more similar to cable TV with its fixed schedule than a car that mirrors on-demand streaming. This is why in truth few people like to use public traffic if there is another feasible choice. I am not interested in car models at all but I like owning a car, even in a city. It solves a lot of problems and I believe a development to less individual traffic is an illusion. Mabybe it happens…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I think public traffic is much more similar to cable TV with its fixed schedule than a car that mirrors on-demand streaming. This is why in truth few people like to use public traffic if there is another feasible choice. Public transport doesn't work if it's not somewhat punctual and high traffic, meaning it needs to be reliable and run often, not like those "commuter" trains around North America running only morni…
Mass transports can't substitute cars simply because of economics: yes, a bus at least half stuffed of people is cheaper than a car per passenger but people need to move from any A to B any time all other the year. If you effectively cover all possible settlements 24/7/365 you'll fail quickly pushing nearly empty or even totally empty mass transports most of the days for most of the routes. If you try the hybrid mode…
But... You don't need to do this? There's no way to cover every settlement 24/7/365 but you can balance a schedule based on the most likely hours of usage, even if keeping occupation low, and for the extremely edge cases where there'd be virtually no ridership you don't need to provide the same availability. It still makes the system very, very useful for the vast majority of the time while the gaps can be covered by other modes of transportation such as taxis, that would still be cheaper than purchasing and maintaining a car.
Adding to the sibling comment to mine, I will give you my personal example which I think covers a few of these points:
- Living 15-20km away from the city centre, in a suburb of about 13k people on an area of around 2,35km2
- Bus service connects to nearby suburbs via local routes
- Scheduled every 10-15 min between 06:00-21:00, every 20 min from 21:00-00:00, every 30 min from 00:00-06:00
- Bus service via express routes connects to more distant suburbs (about 8-10km) including a major hospital
- Scheduled every 10 min between 06:00-20:00, every 20 min between 20:00-22:00, every 30 min between 22:00-06:00
- Metro connects to the city centre, travel time in train of about 30-35 min
- Scheduled every 15 min between 04:30-06:00, every 10 min between 06:00-08:00, every 7 min between 08:00-11:00, every 10 min between 11:00-15:00, every 7 min between 15:00-20:00, every 10 min between 20:00-22:00, every 15 min between 22:00-00:00. Weekends it runs overnight from 00:00-04:30 every 30 min.
- All houses in the area have access to the metro in 15 min or less walking.
- All houses have access to the metro through a bus connection in 7 min or less.
Having a car has no benefits to me given the cost for purchase, maintenance, insurance, winter tyres, parking, fuel, etc.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Mass transports can't substitute cars simply because of economics: yes, a bus at least half stuffed of people is cheaper than a car per passenger but people need to move from any A to B any time all other the year. If you effectively cover all possible settlements 24/7/365 you'll fail quickly pushing nearly empty or even totally empty mass transports most of the days for most of the routes. If you try the hybrid mode…
> If you try the hybrid model: collective transports just for certain routes in specific hours where they are at least half full then you get a very big investments underutilized, it's not different than the office+apartment model where the apartment get used just a bit less than half a day and the office equally for the other nearly half a day, wasting the rest of time in pointless commuting [...] Unless I've misund…
This is a common narrative but no, it's not a viable solution except in the short term, witch means a way too costly solution in the mean and long term. Intermixing homes, restaurants, schools, shops, yes it's a MUST, yes, it's why here in EU spread areas works well even today, but not density.
Take as an example the classic paper mail: any condo have a dedicate area with a wall of mailboxes, a wonderful dense solution, anyone get the mail, the postman have a very shorter trip to delivery them. Ah, yes, they do not work much for parcels but BACK THEN parcels was very rare and mails very common. After a bit of time on-line retail flourish while mails became emails. In dense city, EU level density, it's a nightmare. First delivery vehicles need to be bigger and there is no place for them to stop and deliver, delivery to single home can be quick enough for a stop&go but for a condo where you might have 5-8 parcels and the delivery man it's not alone, another have also some parcels to deliver in the very same place at the very same time it's a big issue. It's an even bigger issue inside: the mailbox area is just a wall, there is no room for enough space for parcels, so it's next to impossible delivering them in a common place in an already built condo. Few might be adapted but most simply can't. Single family homes with a bit of ground around on contrary have no issues, switching from a small mailbox to a bigger parcel box is just a matter of cutting a bit more fence and insert the new "big box". It's a very simple change in society and dense cities can't adapt. Drone delivery? Try to imaging a flying drone delivering to a balcony in a condo, it's can't work, while there is not much issues having on the same big parcel box a "special" roof for drone delivery with a very visible address mark for them. Flying cars? Well, if you have a garden adapting a place for landing it's not really an issue, in a dense city? I'm curious those who have written https://www.easa.europa.eu/sites/default/files/dfu/uam-full-... what they have in their head... Even if we had eVTOLs today they are ALL but urban. They would be a perfect match for a spread area where there is room for take off and landing, and the quick run by air help to be "dense" while being spread. Back to today just see how much metros costs and how limited they are, how many parking issue, how impossible is to convert multi-storey buildings to the Green New Deal: no room for enough p.v., no root for proper heat-pump heating and so on.
Long story short: a dense city is like a factory, very effective wen you live inside during the period it was designed for, a nightmare when things change. A nightmare to change it to adapt. That's why today thanks to modern logistic and remote work we can achieve city-like efficiency without being dense, the new right density for the economy of scale is a spread population living and working in small buildings, intermixed, not too spread, but with enough space around to change them completely, to being able to evolve at the minimum cost and maximum flexibility. That's is not advertised, even denied, because is such a society git economy can't exists. There is no room for ready-made food in a spread population where WFH is the norm for all eligible jobs, there is no room for Uber et al. for cars, there is no room for public laundry and other service, such spread society know the value of ownership and instead of owning nothing living like slaves at the mercy of few paying the slaves just the bare minimum to allow them pay services they needs to live, enough to avoid riots and revolutions, it's a society like the classic desktop model of individual interconnected and in full control of themselves, moving in a peer to peer society.
Not try looking at modern cities, from Neom to Arkadag, Innopolis, Prospera etc, they are distopic realities where people are slaves AND they cost so much that's impossible to create smart cities for all.