661–670 of 770 posts
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Yeah, they're shifting the goal posts. Here in city (Seattle) most people drive because transit tends to be spotty and slow for most people. So, what's the solution? Make driving worse of course. Speedbumps everywhere . Change 4-lane roads to 2-lanes. Remove parking. Lower speed limits to absurd levels. Make through streets dead ends. Transit still mostly sucks, but now driving sucks too. Success! I love transit and…
You can't make transit great if cars are also great, because the two are mutually exclusive. For cars to be good you need lots of space for parking lots and highways. Otherwise, the car is getting you nowhere fast, and there won't be anywhere to park it when you get there. But that also means those parking lots and highways need space. In all but the densest urban metros, that space is two-dimensional, which means al…
I disagree. Regardless of your preferred mode of transit, look at the hours just before and after peak. Roads flow smoothly. Trains run at tight intervals and aren't too crowded. It's great for everyone.
Peak demand time will always be a clusterfuck but with enough infrastructure (ignoring petty ideological bickering about which mode should have what market share) we can probably have a system that's pretty damn decent the other 22hr of the day.
There are a lot of comments here about why public transit in the DC area doesn't work, but nobody that I've seen has put their finger on it. The biggest issue is that the area covers two states, at least ten counties depending on what you count as the “DC area”, plus the District of Columbia, which isn't a state, doesn't have control over its own budget, and has no representation in Congress. Oh, and in Virginia citi…
I lived in the DC area for 20 years (1999-2019) and commuted daily on the Metro for many of those years. The things you say are true, but they were also true 15-20 years ago when the Metro was leaps and bounds better than it is today. They were true in the 1970s when the Metro was first built. So it can't be the whole story. There's much more to it. It's not just that the Metro is bad, it's that it keeps getting wors…
> It's not like public transit in DC is impossible. It used to work, if not perfectly, much much better than it does today.
> DC needs to be a state. It's unconscionable that it isn't and the rights of 680,000+ US citizens are ignored because it isn't politically expedient to give them the representation they're due. That would help a lot.
Wasn't DC also not a state for the last 20 years, and in the 70s?
There are a lot of comments here about why public transit in the DC area doesn't work, but nobody that I've seen has put their finger on it. The biggest issue is that the area covers two states, at least ten counties depending on what you count as the “DC area”, plus the District of Columbia, which isn't a state, doesn't have control over its own budget, and has no representation in Congress. Oh, and in Virginia citi…
The current Johnson govt didn't like this so decided not to continue with it.
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Not a joke. It was the intent that populous states should not be able to steamroll less populous states in the Senate.
In other words, rigging the Senate towards people in empty states. (Land ownership shouldn't matter in a democratic republic, people should.)
Land ownership has nothing to do with anything. Everyone gets to vote for their Senators (except people in DC). We did away with the requirement to own land a long time ago.
A good reminder to keep some warm blankets/coats/gloves/hats in your trunk, along with some non-perishable snacks and a first-aid kit & flashlight. Water is harder to store in the winter since it will freeze and burst containers if full, but snow can be melted given a container to put it in. Also a good to refuel often. I try treat 1/2 a tank as empty and stop accordingly. On longer trips it lines up well with bathro…
In my experience, filling a PET bottle to the brim with tap water and freezing it is fine. The bottle won’t burst, but, I guess, be stretched a bit. Some water will be forced out when you open it, but that’s all.
I use this on hot summer days. Freeze water overnight, take it with you, and you’ll still have cool water in the afternoon.
Warning: I haven’t tried this in outside temperatures. Those can get a lot lower than you garden variety freezer unit inside a fridge.
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It would be the only state with no agricultural interests, the only state with no ports, the only state where the majority of the residents work for the federal government... The last one alone is pretty scary and a bit of a conflict of interest.
> the only state with no ports Huh? What about, IDK, Idaho?
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I didn't disagree that sometimes it makes sense to get out of your vehicle if the road is all iced up and one is worried about a trucker crushing into you due to fog. Rather I'm more refuting the following statement: > unless you're truly in no mans land without any reachable alternatives for shelter, it's best to lock up the vehicle with a note on the dash and make your way to a shelter out of harms way The presence…
If there is this much confusion in a online community like this about what to do in such situations, either a more thorough study needs to be done by the Feds or a better job communicating what definitive study results recommend, with easy rules of thumb like “if you can see the lights of a shelter on the road from your vehicle and you haven’t seen a vehicle on the road in the last hour, then walk to the shelter’.
For what it's worth, every time I've seen first responders talk about adverse weather conditions, they say to stay with the vehicle if possible. Obviously if you're on the interstate outside of Los Angeles, you probably want to get the heck off the roadway no matter what. But if you're lost or trapped, a vehicle is much easier to spot than a pedestrian. If you're lucky enough that there's helicopters looking for you, being near the vehicle is going to drastically reduce the time it takes to find you.
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I hear this all the time from clueless rich DC residents who get wrapped up in all sorts of granfalloons. You don't think "Arlington" is its own place with its own identity separate from the rest of Virgina? Moreover, anacostia residents probably have more in common with residents of pg county than residents of palisades, who have more in common with bethesda residents than anacostia residents.
If the residents of Arlington want to form their own state and secede from Virginia, I'll support them. As it stands, they already have representation in Congress. > Moreover, anacostia residents probably have more in common with residents of pg county than residents of palisades, who have more in common with bethesda residents than anacostia residents. Sure, and residents of Manhattan probably have more in common wi…
This idea doesn't get enough application. NYC should be its own state. LA should be its own state. Most big cities should be their own states. They are not similar to the area around them.
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All civilizations in decline because they can’t accommodate the basic human function of conveniently raising 2.1 new humans per couple. What’s the point of technology that doesn’t serve human needs? Go to Dallas and look at all the families with 3-4 kids. That’s what the future looks like. (Except the minivans and pickup trucks are probably electric.)
We're moving to a future where fewer humans are necessary to run economies. The trend of the future is smaller and more prosperous populations doing more meaningful activities, rather than a future of slum-ponzi-ism where an ever increasing amount of bodies are needed to fuel economic growth.