People can only think in 100%s. They think it’s either 100% car, 100% transit, or 100% bike. So you have to tell them you want them all. Currently we have cars, we need to add transit and bikes.
I’ve heard it said that Houston’s annual transportation cost for total car-dependency is close to 20% of their budget.
NYC, which has the entire MTA plus a huge number of highways and still shocking amount of car dependency, is 10%.
Amsterdam with all of its trams and bike paths is closest to 4%.
Yet any resident of NYC or Houston will tell you it is fucking TERRIBLE driving in either of those cities. Meanwhile, Amsterdam is ranked one of the best cities for people who love to drive because its roads are maintained, safe, and aren’t congested.
It’s actually not possible to be 100% transit or 100% bike, outside of some weird Swiss vacation communities or Canadian island neighborhoods. But the more you invest in transit and bikeped, the more you address the actual cause of congestion and the more drivable your city gets. Even if you truly love and prefer driving, multimodal cities are still better. Downs-Thompson is inviolable.
Downs-Thompson is inviolable.
The simple truth that a lot of people don’t understand. Cars simply require too much space that you can never possibly meet all the latent demand for car trips within a city, as doing so would mean bulldozing the entire city in the process. The only way to meet latent demand for transit is via an array of vastly more space-efficient means, e.g., public transit, walking, and biking.
Cars simply require too much space that you can never possibly meet all the latent demand for car trips within a city, as doing so would mean bulldozing the entire city in the process.
1970s Houston: “hold my beer”
It’s actually not possible to be 100% transit or 100% bike, outside of some weird Swiss vacation communities or Canadian island neighborhoods.
You don’t even need the caveat. Even in weird Swiss vacation communities and Canadian island neighborhoods, the mode share of pedestrians is >0%.
It doesn’t help that so many people take “fuck cars” as literal and essentially demonize any car use. We’ll always need some “cars”, but let’s get that number nice and low.
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damn lisa really needs to shorten those slides for her presentation and start doing the talking herself
0 cars bad idea. Need less car, need more everything else.
Serious death by PowerPoint vibes
I know right. What are they teaching children at Springfield elementary?
Stonetoss edits manage to be funnier than the original comic even when they’re still mocking the left, that guy really has a talent for being obnoxious.
Scooters. Next argument.
Scooters without the ability to take them anywhere is a stupid solution.
Clearly I’m being misunderstood.
THESE scooters:
Yes, I understand.
leftist_meme.png
Is it wrong though?
It’s not wrong. As is usual with leftist_meme.png
Hey, based on your other “contributions” it’s clear you meant this as criticism, but aren’t aware that grammatically you implied leftist memes are typically correct.
Understandable mistake, right wingers have been cutting education budgets for decades.
woke_derangement_syndrome.txt
This meme pleases comrade Starlight
Capitalism has fallen, billions must be enslaved
Cool but I still am stuck in a car-only area for now. I wish it was better. Anything would be better.
I’m stuck in Houston, but we do still very occasionally succeed in implementing walkable/bikeable/mass transit improvements here and there. Whenever we do, the economy in that corner of the city balloons.
But then the state government steps in and quashes any effort to expand or improve on these developments, and we’re back to spending $10B to wiggle the I-45 a bit so trucks can travel faster.
I think the Katy freeway should be a model for all roads. Every single shop and store should be fronted and backed by a 26 lane monstrosity of a slowly moving parking lot. /s
I find it impressive how stubborn people can be about building more roads. It’s a case of having only a hammer, so everything looks like a nail. Just hit it with more surface road and parking to make a place ‘better’ despite cars never making a city better for people, just briefly more convenient for the first cars until it blocks up the roads and makes being outside a terrible experience.
There’s a little old lady near where I used to live who drives up and down the country roads in her government-provided electric wheelchair every day. Everyone knows her.
On the one hand I think, “you go, girl!” but on the other hand, I feel like her life would be a lot easier if this town were more walkable/bikeable. She can’t walk to ride a bike but what a great benefit it would be for her to live in a place like that.
My sister can’t move her feet at the ankle. She’ll never drive unless we can afford a custom 50k car. She has a 3,000 dollar mobility scooter. We had to spend about a month mapping the city to figure out WHERE THE FUCK SHE COULD GET ON AND OFF THE SIDEWALK.
Edit: Let me elaborate further:
It was so bad, that if we didn’t think ahead, we would have to go back a half a mile. I’m not joking. You ever seen those roads between neighbor hoods with no turn offs? Better make sure that side walk ends with a ramp, otherwise, you have to go ALL the way back. You also can’t lift the scooter, it’s over 100lb. If you’re reading this, please petition your town to add more ramps to the sidewalk.
My sister has to have every bone from her pelvis to her ankle broken, REGULARLY. They have to cut all of her muscles, stretch them, reconnect them, and then inject them with botox. They then set them in a cast. This is just so she can properly grow, due to cerebral paulsy. And then, just to rub dirt in the wound, we can’t even use the sidewalk properly. We’re surrounded by beautiful nature and trails. She doesn’t get to experience that. Please petition your towns to add more ramps to the sidewalk. I’ll get off my soap box.
That’s the logical result of decades of car-centric policies.
Sidewalks with ramps on them are a technology that has existed for a very long time. The only reason they aren’t there, is because somebody didn’t want to pay for them. I’m not blaming cars. I’m blaming politicians that are lazy as fuck about actually helping their people. And to an extent, many of those people, for not recognizing this as an obvious issue and pushing for it to be fixed.
We had to spend about a month mapping the city to figure out WHERE THE FUCK SHE COULD GET ON AND OFF THE SIDEWALK.
Wow. It even worse than my shithole.
For a second, I thought you had quoted a different paragraph.
Dude it gets worse. They installed decorative boulders on our sidewalk instead of adding ramps. The stones were SANDSTONE AND IMMEDIATELY ERODED.
It was pointless, got in the way, and cost tax payer money.
The boulders used to take up 1/3 of the walk way, so I’m happy they’re being weatherd.
Jesus christ who is in charge of this, lol. I’m so sorry. That sounds frustrating as hell, I really have no good words.
Just make it national law to follow an industry standard that includes ramps everywhere a intentional transition between roads or entrances to properties are.
Germany has DIN 18317 and DIN 18318 for that. DIN = Deutsche Industrie Norm (German industry standard)
Same with GOSTs here.
GOST = ГОСТ = (Меж)государственный Стандарт = (Inter)national Standard
Was just National Standard during USSR.
Wait you used both Latin and Cyrillic scripts to describe that.
Are they both used in former Soviet countries? Are the Cyrillic words phonetically closer to what GOST would sound like?
Are they both used in former Soviet countries?
I’m trying to understand your question. Latin and Cyrillic scripts? Depends on language. In Russian only Cyrillic. Polish I think uses Latin.
Are the Cyrillic words phonetically closer to what GOST would sound like?
GOST is transliteration of ГОСТ. International Standard is translation. Or Interstate Standard if “государство” is translated as state.
I am a healthy adult and I’m also continually enraged at the state of sidewalks in my area. When I walk my dog there are some routes I simply cannot take because the sidewalk just… ends. I think some lots extend all of the way to the street and it’s up to the property owner to put in sidewalks and many simply don’t. If I walk across their lawn to get to the next private sidewalk I get yelled at for messing up the grass that they spend “so much time and money” maintaining; fine, it’s your property and I’ll stay off, but what a waste of resources. Unless it’s a particularly quiet road, I shouldn’t have to walk in the street. The city-maintained sidewalks that do exist are a travesty: no curb cuts as you noted, tree roots that create huge steps, holes, and some have no curbs so people just drive on the sidewalk. The city doesn’t want to do anything about it because these are either privately “maintained” and they can’t, or it costs money and they don’t want to.
I do think that mobility scooters should come in off-road versions because I’ve never seen one. I don’t see why $3000 can’t buy something closer to an electric ATV with knobbly tires, full suspension, and a torquey motor that can mount curbs like a boss, but it’s a chair format and is limited to fast-walking speeds so that it isn’t a car. It’s probably a low-volume issue.
Probably don’t see any off road chairs because people often only have 1 chair and it has to stay tiny enough to get through a doorway.
It never ceases to amaze me, as a child and care giver of a parent with physical disabilities, how much this world is designed with no regard for people. It’s incredible. Fuck city planners.
My mom had a similar issue in our town, though no where near as bad. Her wheelchair is quite a bit heavier, but we got a small folding ramp that we bungee to the back of her chair and take with us everywhere. Whenever we find somewhere that she can’t go because of a step of less than 12 inches/30cm we can use that. It it’s more than that, we just have to figure something else out or not go there. It’s not okay the way everything is designed. And it doesn’t make sense. Everyone, regardless of mobility, can use a ramp, not everyone can use a step. Why is it so hard to get the fucking ramp?
Maybe the real one-size-fits-all solution is the car-dependent city planning we made along the way
/s
A walkable city means everything is closer for everyone, so if you have mobility issues you can just use a slower, safer, more efficient vehicle like a scooter or a cart that still suits your needs since you don’t have to go as far as to need a car.
I think the part that is often lost on people who don’t live in large cities but have to visit them for doctors appointments and specialized shopping and whatnot is that in such a walkable city would involve parking once in a municipal lot then walking a shorter distance to what they’d currently have to walk when parking in every business’s private lot and move between parking lots
That’s why I always have a cart in my pocket for my handicapped wife. Just in case we have to go to the city to access resources not available elsewhere. /s
I am all for walkable, bikeable cities with good public transport. The next city, though, is just gutting accessability by car without doing the necessary changes to make it more accessible by other means.
Sounds easier to fit in your pocket than a 2 ton vehicle. Cars are only seen as convenient due to their ubiquity.
Yes, but with a car I could actually reach the city and get somewhere there. Using a golf cart or similar vehicle would require that those were available in the city, so I could get to the city by e.g. public transport, and continue the way in such a cart. Sadly, the public transport there is f-ed up, and there is no golf cart rental there, anyway.
I do support bike- and pedestrian friendly cities, but they have to actually work, and that’s were things simply fail.
You literally need a license to drive and be over legal age. Compared to that, everyone can cycle or use public transport.
All transportation-modes matter! ATM
The 4 down votes are from Tesla, GM, Ford and that guy in a denim tank top at a BBQ that says that bikes are just for children.
Heck yeah! Me and my GF I feel like are a good example of this.
I use an escooter because I work from home, and my favorite grocery stores and dr office are within a mile. I’m also about 3 miles from a train station that goes up and down utah valley, so I see no reason for a car. I uber once every other month like when I needed to get something large to the post office.
My GF is a CNA that does free lancing. So it’s not unusual for her to have to drive an hour to the middle of nowhere with a shift that ends/starts in the middle of the night. A car just makes sense for her.
But people like me using micromobility/public transit means there are less cars on the road, less cars taking up parking, and even reducing the price of cars.
Why can’t cars be the solution? What if we developed cheap, electictric vehicles? You know, like electric bikes, or scooters. This is all theoretical, but some day these could be seen all over!
Maybe with solar power, and other renewables, we can forge a future with cheap tech at the forefront!
No? Okay. I’ll see myself out. Don’t worry, dreamers like me can just find the nearest ditch to die in, rather than you all be wrong about “cars”.
You would still have to develop good biking infrastructure.
Also, what if people aren’t physically able to take the roughness that can come with riding a bike/scooter (I ride my bike as my main form of transportation and bad roads can be really aggressive) In that case you would also want to throw in a good transit system people could reliably use and get to places at a reasonable time (my local transit system is so bad that it would take an hour and a half to get to school, whereas it takes about 40 minutes by bike)
And at the end of the day, supporting a multitude of different transport methods from walking to high speed rail is beneficial for everyone regardless of thale situation we end up in.
Why can’t cars be the solution
Why would they be? You entirely missed the point of the meme lol there is no one solution. Sure it would be great to have cheap electric vehicle for some usage. It should not be the default and especially not a requirement. How hard is it to understand?
Also the pre-emptive strike doesn’t help to express sympathy towards your idea.
Let’s look at the reasons car-owning motorcyclists (me) don’t ride their motorcycles:
-Weather exposure. Piling on gear in the cold sucks, sweating through your clothes sucks, and riding in the rain sucks. In addition to this: tempurature changes are really annoying because your gear needs change.
-Effort. Getting ready to leave takes more effort and longer than hopping in the car. Also driving a car is effortless compared to riding a motorcycle.
-Utility. Simply hauling my boots to work is super annoying because i don’t currently have my box installed.Solutions:
-Weather. Having the proper gear. Better, high-end gear will be better adaptable to wearher changes. Expensive, though.
-Effort. Preparing in advance due to not deciding at the last minute would help here. Riding will always take more effort than driving.
-Utility. If i didn’t own a car i would simply have a sporty moto and a cargo moto so hauling the basics wouldn’t be an issue however obviously hauling anything sizeable would still be an issue.How do these apply to cycling?
-Weather. Cycling in the cold and rain is not as bad as moto in the cold and rain howver cycling in the heat is much worse. Proper gear for cold and wet will make it suck less (it still sucks) but I would rather die than cycle in the heat.
-Effort. Cycling takes the same effort to get ready and more effort to ride (especially mentally due to the current road situation)
-Utility. Cycling and moto offer similar utility but there are less opportunities to strap boxes and bags to a random bicycle. You would probably need a large pannier or a cargo bike for most things. Hauling anything sizeable is, again, not realistic.The final problem: travel time. Cycling takes like triple the time to get anywhere in my situation and experience.
Seems most of the complaints are related to comfort.
This was a thought experiment done for my own benefit for my specific situation that i decided to share. Obviously other situations would lend similar yet different results.
I’m aware travel time in large cities is highly dependent on traffic—traffic is not something that I personally deal with.This comes from my experiences as a car driver, motorcyclist, and former cyclist.
Cycling takes longer bc the trip is not optimized for a bicycle.
Should I check the cycling data I have of me traveling in a straight line down the main street of my town without stopping and compare it to the drive time for the same distance?
Go, measure the land dedicated to cars in a circle the distance to the end of main st. All that area is distance you wouldn’t need to bike if cars didn’t exist.
Not sure why i would do that. It’s clearly not within the scope or the stated context of my comment.
Then you failed to understand my point.
I get what you’re saying for shorter trips, but once you get into the 20km range that’s an hour bike ride (unless you’re really going for it) no matter how optimised
So my commute is on the order of 20km, and that’s quicker by bicycle than bus (on my specific bus route), and much cheaper than parking a car
As a bonus I can park my bike in the office basement parking, versus walking from the nearest bus stop, or parking a car and walking from however far away your budget allows
Yeah, that’s where multimodal really makes sense. Like, take the bike to the train, take the train close, ride the bike the rest of the way. There are train cars marked specifically for bikes. Here in the Netherlands. I still haven’t tried it, but I see people using them all the time.
![[meme] There is no one-size-fits-all solution to transportation](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/0bfe1df9-1b6b-414f-88b3-4e7d57514682.webp){kind=link}