331–340 of 459 posts
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There were quite a few other factors that led to the decline of streetcars: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp... One of the biggest is that people actually like living in suburbs, and they could afford to do so after WWII. The promise of the suburbs is a detached house, with some private outdoor space like a back yard, in a quiet area: essentially what the rich had always preferred and been…
Oh man, am I glad to be European. Walk to the bar, cycle to work, take the tram if it rains. American cities built for cars are just so sad.
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Yeah right. Except that if you drive around the country enough you’ll find out that speed trap towns are usually small towns with nothing better to do. One pharmacy, a subway, 2 gas stations but 5 cruisers waiting for you to go over the silly 30mph limit imposed right after the crest of a bridge.
What is WITH that subway? Military bases, small towns, everywhere.
We in the US do an absolutely horrific job of recognizing and compensating for the externalities of our automotive culture. The criminalization of jaywalking is one major aspect, but also consider: 1. The construction of highways through poor (read: minority) urban areas, causing mass respiratory disease and premature deaths[1]. 2. Allocation of free public space (car parking) to drivers, effectively subsidizing (dis…
> 1. The construction of highways through poor (read: minority) urban areas, causing mass respiratory disease and premature deaths[1]. Isn't this kind of leap? I've lived plenty of expensive places (e.g. downtown San Diego, Boston, Los Angeles) that had free/highways close to expensive property. What is leading you to believe highway construction targets the poor areas, other than those real estate markets are alread…
https://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/article237167884.html
Many other examples:
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/03/role-of...
https://www.dispatch.com/in-depth/lifestyle/2020/12/03/black...
https://catalyst.independent.org/2020/04/02/how-the-u-s-gove...
https://www.facingsouth.org/2020/06/bitter-history-behind-hi...
https://archive.thinkprogress.org/top-infrastructure-officia...
https://marketurbanismreport.com/blog/urban-renewals-shamefu...
etc
Specifically, the word "jay" colloquially referred to a country bumpkin.
Traffic lights were first installed in cities. People from rural areas were not aware of the traffic light system and it was the country folk, not the city people, who were most originally associated with perpetrating jaywalking. Hence, "country walking".
[can't read the article because it's blocked in the EU, not sure if they covered this]
This is entirely about the same politics of safety we're seeing play out with the pandemic. If jaywalking was legal, the sacrifice is that we'd have to drive slower to watch for pedestrians. As Americans our priority has been individual convenience, over collective safety of our neighbors. Its shifting slowly, but for the most part this is a battle we're grappling with as a society on multiple fronts right now.
> If jaywalking was legal, the sacrifice is that we'd have to drive slower to watch for pedestrians I'm not too well-versed on the various American speed limits. But I can tell you the Danish ones. Here there's no concept of "jaywalking". There's simply "crossing the street", and that's functionally never illegal. We drive 50 kph in cities, towns, and villages. That's 31 mph. On wider roads that speed is 60 kph, or 3…
Directly across the street, with no marked crossing, was a gas station with a 24/7 mini-mart. It's a miracle I was only hit crossing that street once.
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Don't forget.. 4. Auto makers conspired to kill or cripple mass transit. http://www.brooklynrail.net/NationalCityLinesConspiracy.html
There were quite a few other factors that led to the decline of streetcars: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp... One of the biggest is that people actually like living in suburbs, and they could afford to do so after WWII. The promise of the suburbs is a detached house, with some private outdoor space like a back yard, in a quiet area: essentially what the rich had always preferred and been…
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I don’t know for London, I wouldn’t describe Tokyo as full of cars. There are major axes to accross the city with constant traffic and most bigger blocks are accessible by car (even just for deliveries). But there are pretty large areas with no car entry, and small residential parts are often shared car/bike/pedestrian zones were cars are not privileged. I also think the goal shouldn’t be car-free, but to have clear…
That layering takes place only in the densest urban core, primarily around significant train junctions. In the rest of the sprawl, there's no separation, some parts of residental greater Tokyo (particularly those still using pre-war streets) don't even have sidewalks.
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> I think there should be some provision for Police to officially detain someone if they think there's an issue (but can't quite find a legal reason of doing so...). But at the same time, "abusing" the Jaywalking laws to do so is certainly the wrong way of doing it. why exactly? it's hard for me to imagine a situation where a cop reasonably needs to detain someone but can't come up with even one possible charge.
We all agree with random DUI checks, right? They're pretty effective at scaring off DUI-attempts.