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Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

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Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#361

Post by mamon »

abraxas wrote: post #177
maxsilver wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Would you feel "stacked on top of each other" in a Parisian townhouse with a magnificent shared courtyard, 12 foot ceilings, and everything you could possibly want a short walk or subway ride away? No, I wouldn't feel "stacked on top of each other" if I were a multi-millionaire in Paris. But, in the real world, your talking about putting families into 600sqft (at very best) boxes, with audible neighbors on every si…

Nonsense. There are very walkable and affordable cities with pleasant neighborhoods that don't break the bank in all parts of the world (sans North America). Off the top of my head and from first hand experience: - Warsaw - Glasgow - Porto - Lisbon - Athens (Greece) - Berlin - Budapest - Barcelona (OK, this one gets pricey but is superbly laid out)

Warsaw is TERRIBLE place to live. The city is ugly and dirty and always stuck in traffic (and yes, busses get stuck in traffic too), most office jobs are located in two main hubs, and it typically takes at least 30 minutes to get there by car (but then there's usually no place to park) or 45 by public transport. I'm very glad that the pandemic forced my company to go all-remote, because I was wasting a lot of time on my commute.

Yes, small grocery stores are at every corner but for other things, like clothes or electronics you still have to go to a big shopping mall, at least 2-3 miles away. Oh, and did I mention all those are closed almost every Sunday?

As for apartment prices even for really well paid software developer the choice is basically between buying a small (500 sqft) flat close to work, or bigger (800-1000 sqft) far away from it, with the added inconvenience of jet planes waking you up in the middle of the night, because Warsaw is stupid enough to have big international airport located near the city center.

EDIT: Another thing: after more intensive rains some of the subway stations get flooded, so they are out of service for several hours. Not that there are many subway stations in Warsaw - just 34, forming one and half line

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#362

Post by crispyporkbites »

jcranmer wrote: post #280
apacheCamel wrote: post #10

>Siena’s history dates back millennia. Houston, meanwhile, was founded in 1836. Every time I am made aware of just how young the US is, it blows me away. I've never been to Europe, I would really love to go some day, but I can only imagine the feeling of actually seeing these really old places/structures in person.

I'm reminded of this joke: Europeans find it strange that Americans think 100 years is a long time. Americans find it strange that Europeans think 100 miles is a long distance. There really is dichotomy here: Americans are used to a vast geography but don't really have any internalization of just how vast history can be, while Europeans understand their long history but don't have the internalization of just how vast…

Moving further afield, Senegal is closer to Canada than it is to Somalia. I had to look that one up on a map when I first heard it.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#363

Post by Dahoon »

vel0city wrote: post #257
matchbok wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In no way do the suburbs have the quality and diversity of food that any urban core does. 0%. I've been in both, they simple do not compare.

There's little reason why it would be impossible to have though. I live in a suburb. You'd be hard pressed to think of a type of food that I couldn't get within a 15min drive. Rotating sushi restaurant? Check. Lebanese bakery? Check. Canadian poutine? Check. Noodle restaurant - you want Japanese, Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese? Which of the half dozen hot pot restaurants would you want to go to? Don't forget to pick up so…

A 10 minute walk is more realistic to compare the two. Jumping to a 15 minute drive makes it very apparent you are an American.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#364

Post by timbit42 »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #82

Thanks for taking the obnoxious "Yes, this" off the title. Yes, it's one of the weirdest pet-peeve trends over the past 5-10 years. No, I do not like it, thanks for asking. Wait, you didn't ask me? You mean nobody was asking me, it's just something I decided to couch in a response to a conversation that wasn't going on? But seriously, I wonder what's going on when we do this. My theory is that it originally caught on…

I mean, "Yes, this" isn't as bad as starting with, "I mean".

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#365

Post by msla »

CydeWeys wrote: post #297
msla wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And people who need to get somewhere to save lives are suitably invigorated, I'm sure.

Yeah, actually. I saw a huge fucking grin on the face of the guy riding shotgun in the ambulance as the crowd of cyclists parted like magic in front of them and they had a personal escort of two vested corkers. Guy was even filming. They got where they were going faster than if the usual stop and go car traffic had been there. The great thing about people on foot or on bike is that they can easily get out of the way…

I'm not talking about emergency vehicles or people who get escorts. I'm talking about the doctors who have to make their own way in their own vehicles.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#366

Post by Kerrick »

macintux wrote: post #358
CydeWeys wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, actually. I saw a huge fucking grin on the face of the guy riding shotgun in the ambulance as the crowd of cyclists parted like magic in front of them and they had a personal escort of two vested corkers. Guy was even filming. They got where they were going faster than if the usual stop and go car traffic had been there. The great thing about people on foot or on bike is that they can easily get out of the way…

If you’ve created a logjam however, how does the ambulance get through the stopped traffic? (I’m not arguing against protesting on the freeway, to be clear, just genuinely curious how often it helps vs hinders emergency vehicles.)

I've experienced this outside of protests. My wife and I were driving somewhere near downtown St. Louis, on a part of the interstate where there are tall concrete barriers between the directions of traffic. There was a complete log jam due to an accident ahead, and we heard sirens coming up from behind us to the left. We were in the left of two lanes. The right shoulder was either filled up or too small (can't remember), so people couldn't really pull right more than a foot or two to allow the ambulance through.

The ambulance didn't let that deter them. They took the foot or two we and the other left-lane drivers could give by getting REALLY close to the car to our right, and used it to careen down the left shoulder, scraping the side of their vehicle along the concrete barrier much of the way.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#367

Post by 205guy »

dreamcompiler wrote: post #47
apacheCamel wrote: post #10

>Siena’s history dates back millennia. Houston, meanwhile, was founded in 1836. Every time I am made aware of just how young the US is, it blows me away. I've never been to Europe, I would really love to go some day, but I can only imagine the feeling of actually seeing these really old places/structures in person.

There are cities in the US that are older than the US, by a large margin. Come to New Mexico and you'll see. Obligatory edit: After COVID, please.

I always found it to be a fun coincidence that San Jose, CA, now the heart of Silicon Valley, was founded in 1777--a year after the US Declaration of Independence. And that was right at the beginning of the colonization of "Upper" California by parties from New Spain (Mexico).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_San_Jose,_Californi...

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#368

Post by robrenaud »

mcguire wrote: post #269
EricE wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Density is by far more climate-sustainable (as well as more environmentally sustainable in other ways) than sprawl." Care to back that up?

Well, certainly bacteria and viruses have an easier time getting around.

Yeah, but there is not going to be a vaccine for global warming.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#369

Post by greenyoda »

ip26 wrote: post #359
binarytox1n wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American in Texas here - maybe this is a behavior encouraged by the very thing we're discussing, but going to the grocery store _every day_ is a big yikes to me. I go once a week and get everything I need for that week. Because I take my car, I can carry that amount of stuff.

Going once a week is efficient, but a little difficult to match up to a diet full of fresh fish, fruits, & vegetables. When grocery shopping frequently, you're also going for five or ten minutes instead of two hours, and the grocery is probably on your way home.

> Going once a week is efficient, but a little difficult to match up to a diet full of fresh fish, fruits, & vegetables.

This has never been a problem for me. Many fresh fruits and vegetables will easily last for a week in your refrigerator (some for longer), and fresh fish or meat can be frozen for later use. Fruits such as berries that degrade rapidly can be eaten first, and fruits that last longer, such as apples or oranges, can be eaten later. Fruits like peaches or avocados can also be bought in varying states of ripeness, which means that different ones could achieve ripeness over the course of a week.

Re: Interchange in Houston is the same size as an entire city center in Italy

#370

Post by jschwartzi »

philwelch wrote: post #243
oblio wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not only jobs. Do you want to watch theater? Opera? Concerts? Major sports events? Do you want to join a club for an obscure African sport? I could go on and on. There is a reason we've been congregating in cities for millennia, despite having to overcome many diseases which are made worse by overcrowdedness.

Much of that has been largely replaced with electronic media, and what remains is a “once in a while” occasion that people are willing to travel to. These days, much of the time, city-dwellers are the ones who have to travel to suburban venues. The main reasons for urbanization were always economic and political. Rome was not built for the Coliseum; the Coliseum was built for Rome.

There are still a lot of us who really enjoy theater, opera, concerts, shows, and the like. And those things can only be had in a city.

It's true that local amphitheaters may book a few good live acts every year but that selection pales in comparison to what you can get every weekend in a reasonably-sized city. There are some fun local theater groups in my suburb too. But sometimes I really want to watch something other than Shakespeare.

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