Zach Anner recently did something similar showing just how long it takes to get across New York when in a wheelchair https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhpUJRGrZgc
New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
121–130 of 142 posts
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
And also the delivery of goods.
In Finland, everything is wheelchair-friendly from our Helsinki metro, to trains, to buses. I am kinda shocked to read Americans think it's not important to allocate the money to enable those with limitations to live their lives as freely as they, the able-bodied do. The mentality "it does not apply to me, why should I fine two fucks?" is all too common in the American ethos. Quite pathetic really.
I'm impressed anyone who's ever seen so much as a picture of a full NYC subway car would try and compare them to trains in Finland...
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
> So "lousy" NYC has almost double the number of wheelchair accessible stations as "great" Boston, and 8 times the total number of stations. That's comparing apples to watermelons. Boston has a population of 650,000; New York, 8.5 million. So in Boston there is one accessible station per 13,500 residents. In New York, one per 92,400 residents. (The total residents per station is much more comparable, at 12.2k and 20k…
Thanks, that's an interesting calculation, and I didn't take population into account. The 650k to 8.5M sounds like a higher ratio than I'd expect though. If we take the MSA from rrdharan's post, NYC metro population is 4x greater rather than 13x with your numbers. If we use those numbers, then we'd get accessible pairs per thousand residents of 0.2093 for NYC, and 0.2256 for Boston, which makes Boston about 8% better…
A someone working with MBTA data I can chime in.
The story is rather complicated. Boston's subway system serves a population of around 2 million, including administratively separate cities like Somerville, Cambridge, Brookline and Newton that are more like boroughs than separate cities. The rest is served by the commuter rail system and bus system, which do a good job of covering most people (probably about 4 million of 5 million).
There's actually 145 subway stations (though that includes a few underground stations on the silver line, technically BRT for now), but the article didn't the green line (America's first subway, 1898), because it's a "light rail" subway, not a "heavy rail" subway. Those stations all got retrofitted with wheelchair access or else were already above ground stations with access.
It's fair to say that those 145 stations serve about 1/4 the population of the MTA in New York.
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#124I highly suspect it is plain cheaper (and more convenient) to just subsidize private car rides for disabled people than making entire transit infrastructure in huge city to account for them. Better yet, take the money that government would otherwise spend on building all the wheelchair accomodations, and just distribute that between wheelchair users. I am sure many of them would prefer that over subway improvements w…
it's not really just disabled people, actually they are pretty irrelevant group compared to families with children in stroller and elderly, you will understand this once you will have child, that while until then you thought all those ramps everywhere are useless for those few disabled people there are tons of parents work children in strollers, heck i would say majority of population is dealing with this at least once in life, so good luck subsidizing these people
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
And also the delivery of goods.
In Finland, everything is wheelchair-friendly from our Helsinki metro, to trains, to buses. I am kinda shocked to read Americans think it's not important to allocate the money to enable those with limitations to live their lives as freely as they, the able-bodied do. The mentality "it does not apply to me, why should I fine two fucks?" is all too common in the American ethos. Quite pathetic really.
will better don't look okay American banking, trains and internet either
there is some odd perception flying around world that US is particularly developed country, while reality about their infrastructure contradicts this
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#126I highly suspect it is plain cheaper (and more convenient) to just subsidize private car rides for disabled people than making entire transit infrastructure in huge city to account for them. Better yet, take the money that government would otherwise spend on building all the wheelchair accomodations, and just distribute that between wheelchair users. I am sure many of them would prefer that over subway improvements w…
The thing with accessibility elevators is it just not people in wheel chair that benefit from them. Elderly people, people that have sports injury and can't climb stairs, having groceries, or kids and strollers etc, etc... Even in the sidewalks, the lips of the sidewalks that slope towards the street in intersections, it is just not people with wheelchairs that benefit from them, but anybody with carrying a stroller,…
i am not native speaker, but you meant carrying stroller as in pushing or literally carrying it folded?
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
The thing with accessibility elevators is it just not people in wheel chair that benefit from them. Elderly people, people that have sports injury and can't climb stairs, having groceries, or kids and strollers etc, etc... Even in the sidewalks, the lips of the sidewalks that slope towards the street in intersections, it is just not people with wheelchairs that benefit from them, but anybody with carrying a stroller,…
They conditions in station elevators are usually such that I could not imagine using one if it wasn't physically required. Underground station bathrooms, if they were ever built, have been locked down since 9/11. Elevators have substituted as a private, out-of-the-way place to attract the worst of the worst in terms of piss, shit, and homeless people in various stages of crisis. Kind of degrading that we expect/requi…
dirty elevator is still better than no elevator is you ask me, one can't be too picky if one wanna get to some place
i am much more annoyed when somewhere they install that special wheelchair stairs lift instead of proper vertical elevator anyone with small children can use
i would be curious, people make these decisions don't have children that they think that wheelchair lift usually locked by special key is enough? because by my experience zero parents will call stuff to use this list for stroller and rather ask strangers to help them
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#128I highly suspect it is plain cheaper (and more convenient) to just subsidize private car rides for disabled people than making entire transit infrastructure in huge city to account for them. Better yet, take the money that government would otherwise spend on building all the wheelchair accomodations, and just distribute that between wheelchair users. I am sure many of them would prefer that over subway improvements w…
I don't want this to come off as harsh but it's a huge city with lots of money that has a pretty large disabled community. They've been really slow upgrading their train stations but their lack of action doesn't make it OK to never fix the problem. Keeping people from riding the subway because they're disabled is a form of discrimination under ADA. IANAL but I think cities like NYC need to have a plan for upgrading a…
could parents with strollers sue them? i guess it would be much bigger group than disabled people
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think I buy this as a viable alternative. The first problem that pops into my head is transportation for disabled people who are visiting the city or that commute in for whatever reason. Providing them access to the disabled-taxi-program is problematic.
How so? Order Uber/Lyft ride, send a CC receipt to NYC gov with a disability proof. Get money back. Any complications I am missing?
what about everyone with cold in stroller? they should ask for refund too or be jailed at home first 1-3 years?
Re: New York Has a Great Subway, If You’re Not in a Wheelchair
#130Given that 1 in 10,000 people in NYC are in wheelchairs, I really think it would be orders of magnitude more cost effective for the government to pay for disabled persons cab fares than to make public transit accessible. Has anyone run the numbers?
how many of those 9999 have one or more children once in a life? you will understand this one day when you will push stroller