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American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

usa.streetsblog.org

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Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#71

Post by thatfrenchguy »

narrator wrote: post #46
erikpukinskis wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how we have had such economic growth. We use our own population as a testbed where we disintermediate all of our own cultural support systems so that everything must be hired out. Food, transport, entertainment, self concept, family, all of it has been reformed in the U.S. over the last 100 years to replace community labor with commercial relations. This means we get first dibs on these new industries (Softwa…

The reason that everything is so not integrated is because of the American culture of containment. You have very very different kinds of people living in close physical proximity who often want nothing to do with each other. Think East Palo Alto and Palo Alto for example, especially in the 90s when East Palo Alto had the highest murder rate per capita in the U.S. Nowadays, physical proximity means less and less. Rela…

“You have very very different kinds of people living in close physical proximity who often want nothing to do with each other.”

Knowing that the US is probably one of the most segregated countries, this makes me smile :-)

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#73

Post by rainbowmverse »

extradego wrote: post #60
erikpukinskis wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how we have had such economic growth. We use our own population as a testbed where we disintermediate all of our own cultural support systems so that everything must be hired out. Food, transport, entertainment, self concept, family, all of it has been reformed in the U.S. over the last 100 years to replace community labor with commercial relations. This means we get first dibs on these new industries (Softwa…

Right on the money. Before WW2, America was a culture desert. Europeans fleeing the war are the only reason NYC became an international culture hub. Hip-hop is undoubtedly the most progressive Western art form. (Side note: hip-hop's genius appropriations of commercial symbolisms and it's will to collective empowerment directly underwrite and provide the language of the public engagement of today's millenials. It's in…

Appropriation and disproportionate credit for white people is a real and serious problem, but it's not the whole story. Most of the actual musicians who were inspired by black music fully acknowledged their inspirations and were often annoyed at how no one seemed to care about the people they looked up to.

The actual artists out on the stage doing the music know exactly what comes from where. Culture spreads like that: someone likes a piece and adds it to their own, fusing two cultures. It's how we have American Chinese food that looks nothing like Chinese Chinese food. (the xenophobic policies that led to it is another matter)

You have a very narrow and stereotyped view of American culture. The whole of it is not a few white-majority cities in the north and one over-funded region in the west.

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#74

Post by thatfrenchguy »

jeremyjh wrote: post #63
radiantswirl wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies with an "eco" or "humanitarian" angle are rly just selling newfangled Catholic indulgences.

Except they might also actually be helping some people, or improving the environment, even if its very inefficient.

But they also are a cop out to not solve the real problem.

If you give tuition money to a few poor kids via a non profit, you don’t solve the college debt and education accessibility problem, but it makes people who did it feel better.

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#75

Post by stale2002 »

Derived wrote: post #39
angarg12 wrote: post #2

I visited the US (particularly the bay area) for the first time recently, and I was baffled by the sparsity of buildings. Suburbs and shopping areas are so far away that you need a car to go anywhere, and in turn you need massive expanses to held all those vehicles, which means that stores are even more spread apart, which essentially becomes a snowball. Being used to high density housing and underground parking spac…

America has plenty of cities that are just like cities everywhere else...we're a big country, we hardly have need to pack everyone in like sardines. I live in a major city, downtown. And I'm starting to hate it. No personal space, no yard, shared (or no) garage, and I'm a car enthusiast by the way, which I'm sure is practically a dirty word around most city-dwellers now. I'm seriously considering moving out to the su…

If ONLY your "distopian nightmare" of high density cities were true.

In reality it is the opposite. The vast vast majority of space in the US is reserved for the low density living.

Even the supposedly "high density" cities in the US are nothing compared to what they could be. Even places like New York have difficulty building enough housing to house everyone who wants to live there.

I just want a single city, in the entire world, where everyone said "hey, let's just allow building to be as high as anyone wants, and not put a single building restriction on anything".

The people who want low density living having an entire world to choose from. And yet that's apparently not enough for them.

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#76

Post by btrettel »

jaysonelliot wrote: post #9

Until cities have a better alternative to driving than "use our terrible mass transit in our poorly-designed cities," this will remain a problem. American cities are designed for cars, so that bicycles, scooters, or any other human-scale transportation is not just inconvenient, it's dangerous. Forcing skateboards, scooters, gyros, bicycles, etc., into the road with 4,000 pound cars is insanely dangerous. If you're ri…

> Roads have to be repurposed to make light personal transportation safe. Take every two-way two-lane and split it into a one-way, with a physical separation between a car side and a personal transport side. Remove parking from the curbs, and put it in the middle so one side can be for cars and the other for bikes, scooters, skaters, etc.

As a cyclist, I'd argue that most separated lanes as implemented are less safe than taking the main travel lane.

These lanes seem to be based around the idea that intersections don't matter for safety, and in practice they tend to greatly increase the number of problems at intersections.

In Austin, TX, where I live, the city had added several fully separated cycle tracks near where I live. The only reason I ever use any of them is if I'm stopping at a location on them. If I'm continuing further down the same road, I instead take the regular travel lane. I do this because so many drivers turn directly into the cycle track without checking for oncoming cyclists. This is despite the signs placed prominently on every one of these to look before turning. (In my view, signs like that are strong evidence that a particular location is dangerous for cyclists. They don't noticeably change driver behavior in my view, and seem to exist more for the city to cover their asses than anything else.)

I'm not the only cyclist who has a problem with these cycle tracks either. A friend of mine has additionally pointed out that the city tends to put the cycle track on the downhill side of the road, but not the uphill side, which is exactly the opposite of what they should do because cyclists go much faster downhill than uphill.

If I had to guess, I'd say the problem comes from politicians and bureaucrats who are not cyclists being the driving forces behind the construction of these lanes. You don't need to talk to too many cyclists before you'll hear my views about cycle tracks.

I'm okay with separated facilities when done well, but the vast majority I've seen are poorly designed and amplify problems.

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#77

Post by vanattab »

extradego wrote: post #66
narrator wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason that everything is so not integrated is because of the American culture of containment. You have very very different kinds of people living in close physical proximity who often want nothing to do with each other. Think East Palo Alto and Palo Alto for example, especially in the 90s when East Palo Alto had the highest murder rate per capita in the U.S. Nowadays, physical proximity means less and less. Rela…

> throughly modern American You baby-boomers need to speak for yourselves only and keep me out of it. (Assuming you mean "modern" as in contemporary. If you mean the more canonical "modern", sorry for the react.)

Are baby-boomers some how too old to be allowed to consider themselves as part of our contemporary society?

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#79

Post by deagle50 »

Derived wrote: post #45
mattlondon wrote: post #34

I always thought it was weird how there is so much parking in the centre of US cities. When I talk to colleagues in various US cities and they say they drive to work it just Does. Not. Compute . In central London, driving to work is essentially unheard of unless you are the Prime Minister. There is parking available in London, but the prices are fairly high - I just had a quick look on parkopedia [1] and it looks lik…

It's that expensive because of the population density and government meddling. There's no need for that in the US...are you saying we should artificially charge the pants off of everyone driving to work just to force them to use public transport? Why? I like my car. I like driving my car. I don't want to ride a train, or a bus. If I can work to the office, I will. I'll drive everywhere else.

This is why we need higher gas taxes. Driving is much more pleasant than the alternatives to most Americans, until the true cost of their behavior is reflected at the pump we'll keep going in circles.

Right now my outrageous urban rent and taxes are subsidizing your driving privileges. Real estate for garages instead of housing/retail and road lanes for cars over pedestrians/cyclists. Those costs need to be passed on to the suburban drivers and not the car-less city dwellers.

Unfortunately the political will for gas taxes is null and we'll be left with draconian measures like car holidays and congestion tolls which won't alleviate the need to provide car infrastructure for peak demand, which is artificially high due to the distorted market.

Re: American Cities Are Drowning in Car Storage

#80

Post by beefalo »

mattlondon wrote: post #47
ryanSrich wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A few points: 1.) A lot of employers offer some percentage of parking reimbursement. 2.) A lot of employees live 1+ hour away. The bus doesn't work in these situations. 3.) Often times the bus is extremely dirty and dangerous. Risking injury or confrontation isn't worth saving a few dollars a day on driving.

Here in the UK, employers offer things like interest free loans for season tickets or buying a folding commuter bike etc. 1+ hour away is fairly common in London, even on public transport. Not only is London itself pretty large, but it has a big catchment area for people coming in for work from elsewhere. Buses can be made safer and cleaner and more comfortable with investment. Would I prefer to drive in my own car i…

The people commuting 1 hour in the US usually don’t even have a public transit option or it would take 4 times as long. In my city, a trip that would take 1 hour by train/bus would probably be 20 minutes by car and parking is plentiful and cheap.
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