While taking a walk near downtown Austin, TX, a police car stopped next to me and the officers started asking weird questions. Including if I know where I am at, where I go, or is there someone who could help me with these apparent struggles in my life.
It took me a couple awkward minutes to realize that I'm the only one standing on my feet and not sitting in a car wherever I was looking. I apologized (???) and told them I was heading to a museum, bc I'm a visitor here and that's what we do right? I added a colleague's address and assured them that I'm not "confused", and will take an Uber now.
This was simply unbelievable in my world; for the next week I observed my colleague, whenever they took me out, or went to somewhere: we never walked outside. From the building to the parking lot, from the destination parking lot to the resto and vice versa.
Today, of course, I know that there are walkable cities too, I enjoy walking from my Chicago hotel to the office building :-) every single time I enjoy my US visits, but after a couple weeks I can't wait to get back to my 98% car free European life.
Living in Southern California, I like to go on walks with my family in the evenings or mornings, but I couldn't imagine having to take public transportation or having to walk everywhere. It seems picturesque, but it also sounds terrible in the sense that you can't just get in your car, go some place, park in a parking lot, go shopping, and then head back home, all on your own terms.
I visited London a long time ago and the public transportation is amazing and it I did want to walk to see the city, which I did. But I imagine even living there, I would want my own car to be in control of my life.
So, visiting a place is good for walking. But living in a place is not. At least that's my experience.
this is the real lie, that cars give you agency and freedom. except that you have to find a place to park, and keep the fueled, deal with minor breakdowns like punctured tires that leave you to deal with them for hours. and insurance. and a drivers license. and a place to keep them at night. the threat that they will be broken into. the constant switching back and forth between inattention and attention while driving. getting delayed by traffic. spending quite a bit of time complaining about traffic even though it is you. the inevitable collision. the abysmal process of purchasing. knowing you're are getting screwed at the repair place. having to deal with rentals when you travel. the complete loss of function when you become old or injured and cannot drive for yourself.
no thanks
And mass transit you have to deal with line failures, the inability to transport more than you can reasonably carry, and the curfew created by the end-of-line time for the evening.
All issues you have listed solvable by improving bus/train service frequency and coverage, and trolleys/electric assist bikes for the last mile.
Which you can wait a lifetime to maybe be built in some diluted state given current pace of things, or resign and take the option the present environment favors. Hate the game, not the player.
For most people they don’t think about these things at all, that’s why they do it still.
As it is, people love to complain about buying gas. If someone were to add up the costs associated with driving, I’m sure it would be insane. And I mean all costs. Driving is subsidized to a level that is incomprehensible, and obfuscated away more than just about anything else.
not much different from a human in the grand sceme of things. Need to maintain energy, treat minor and major injuries, deal with insurance, keep an ID on me (which costs money to renew), and either avoid or accept the risk of night walks. Fights can break out, routes can get deterred, and Just keeping up with living expenses is hell.
Adding a 2nd mechanical maintenacnce isn't as bad as dealing with the flesh skin version.
If you consider night walks a risk you really don't live in a good area. I walk everywhere here in Barcelona day or night. Same in Amsterdam, Dublin etc.
Depends on where you live. In most of the US if you don't have a car you'll be spending hours a day on busses. You have no freedom - you are either sleeping or commuting or working. You can't sleep less, you can't work less. But you can commute fewer hours a day with a car.
Walkable/bikeable places exist in some cities, but are reserved for the rich.
As for the costs of owning a car - these are real, but the cost of not owning a car is much greater. As electric cars filter down to the used market cost of car ownership will also drop a fair amount.
Yes! At least a third of the population can’t drive, because too young, too old, handicapped in some way, or too poor. And we have built an environment that requires driving. That’s pretty messed up.
I’m 40+ years old now and have never needed or wanted to have a driving license. I simply hated America when I had to visit and use taxi or someone else’s help to get anywhere. In Berlin even with a child the need of a car is so rare — sometimes it’s even more pleasant to walk an hour to a museum or a club than use public transportation.
And what's going to happen long term with exploding Berlin rents? The only affordable rents will be out in the suburbs of Berlin, where you'll either have to drive in or spend 2-3x the time on a probably crowded train possibly standing room only. As in the example of Switzerland above, mass transit is a luxury for those able to pay high rents. Previously in Berlin this was subsidized by the rest of Germany and by price controls but the right-wing courts have pretty much gutted Berlin's price protections in favor of billion-euro property developers.
I lived in Germany for years without driving as well, because I could afford to live by the city center. But over half my colleagues drove because that's all they could afford to do, and you should try stepping out of your bubble and understand the pressures that force Germans to drive. They're not all just wanting to spend more time in their Audis.
First, I’m not representing all Germans here, just sharing my own experience which is a good counter-example to “life without a car is impossible”. I’m of course not arguing that car is unnecessary for everyone.
Second, don’t tell me about my “bubble”: you have no idea who I am and what I have experienced in my life. I’m very well aware of many sides of it, maybe more than you are.
Third, do you seriously want to lecture a person who is both a landlord and a tenant in Berlin about local rent controls and price development? We do have some issues here, but it is nowhere close to neither London or NYC where prices are crazy nor Moscow where commuting can be truly exhausting.
Sadly, many are. This topic often does turn into one of lifestyle judgement and it isn't very productive when arguments go from practical to personal. As if any one car-goer or bus-goer determines the fate of a city's urban planning.
Agree. Especially when you add bike-goers to the conversation it can get ugly very quickly. A parent with a stroller is the most neglected person in such talks.
I myself believe that personal cars are mobility edge cases and the world will settle on vendor-managed rental fleets eventually, where most people will occasionally use rental cars with autopilot.
Nevertheless this is not going to happen for the next 50-80 years, so we just need at least to stop promoting car-centric lifestyle and find a real compromise between cars, bikers and pedestrians.
In Switzerland, people in villages use trains to get to and from work. Quite literally, they bike to train, park bike, use train to go to work. Some ride car to train, ride train and then go to work.
It is just not true that mass transit is only for those who pay high rents. It is other way round pretty much all round world and historically - rich people were buying cars more and poor used public transport.
That’s strange coming from someone whose country has the famous autobahn. What if you want to get out into the countryside, where busses and trains don’t go? Don’t you need a license to rent a vehicle?
I don’t have any business in such countryside. What would I find there? A good beach on Baltic sea is 15 min walk door-to-water plus 2 hours on express train. The list of tourist attractions and vacation destinations accessible by train, plane and/or taxi within half a day or so is so big here that I cannot imagine going to such inaccessible place. Worst case I will pay a few hundred euro for taxi if such improbable situation occurs.
The best public transport in us is usually worse that bad public transport in most of eu so no wonder you felt that way. Let me tell you a counter point: in Switzerland public transport and trains are so frequent and fast due to own lanes that you don't even need to check the schedule, you just go to the station which is usually nearby and wait at max 5 mins to get into something, usually a tram, for intercity between biggest cities trains are usually coming about each 15 mins. In this regard you are more independent than with a car- you don't care about fuel, about parking, about being focused all the time on the road, you just get in and get out. Even for buying tickets they have an app where you just check-uncheck it and it calculates the fare based on gps. also in many dense eu cities you'd probably have enough shops in sub 5 mins nearby so you can either walk there or go with a bike or take a taxi that would cost pennies for such a small distance - again, no worrying about traffic, fuel, parking and so on
Swiss trains are even more punctual than Dutch ones!
Well that's pretty easy, Dutch trains are unreliable.
In fact all public transport there is pretty bad. Here in Barcelona the metros come every 3 minutes during the day on each line. In Amsterdam it's more like 15.
Yeah and i think cheaper if you consider halbtax that swiss ppl get
It's true for city life in Switzerland.
I haven't owned a car for more than 15 years now. I have city year bus pass but I also frequently just walk to wherever I'm going, there's lots of paths and shortcuts for pedestrians, but if the weather is a bit rubbish, there's bus stop outside my flat that runs every 5-10 mins.
I'm a member of the mobility car share for the rare times hen I do need a car, usually to pick up or move something heavy, or take a bunch of stuff to the decheterie.
Maybe sometimes after a night on the town, I might grab a taxi home, but I do not miss having a car.
FWIW I found the critically acclaimed berlin ubahn to have significantly worse headways compared to most NYC subway lines, as well as not having air conditioning and becoming uncomfortably hot and humid
I used lime scooters considerably more than ubahn when I was in berlin
In the US the issue is the car is just too damn convenient. There are parts of LA where the busses or trains are every 10 mins or so and they interline, so you get a train or a bus every 5 mins or less. People still prefer the car because it can go everywhere on your schedule faster than a bus making stops along the way. Plus cars are much cheaper for Americans than they are for europeans.
Well yes, the US transportation system is utter trash, even in California
In Europe I have three supermarkets in a 800m radius around my place, the closest shopping center/mall/whatever you call it is a 30min walk away (10min by public transport, 8min by bicycle). I can walk to the closest supermarket without even leaving the private ground of my block of buildings and its park, no street to cross, no cars in sight
Are you working for these fine gentlemen ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_lobby
I'm European, spent the first 10 years of my independent adult life without a car, and have always lived in urban areas, within walking distance of supermarkets and other amenities, and with good public transport services. Yet I agree with him
When I finally did get a car, it was a massive QoL upgrade. I can go anywhere, at any time, usually considerably faster than PT, and carry an order of magnitude more than before. I didn't enjoy having to go to the supermarket multiple times a week, but I had to when I could only carry maybe 4 bags (fewer if heavy) in one trip. I still do use buses and trains where it makes sense, e.g. visiting other cities or the centre of mine
Cool, too bad it isn't sustainable. If life was about doing everything you want whenever you want and carry a lot of useless junk around without having to worry about side effects we'd have won the game by now
And the goalposts move again. We were talking about the convenience, not the sustainability. If you want to argue that the inconvenience is a necessary price for environmental sustainability, sure, that's a valid position, but don't pretend that there's no convenience cost
It's interesting that I've been downvoted to -3 for factually detailing how cars are in fact useful. Shooting the messenger won't change the facts
I mean, if we're talking about convenience, I started ordering my groceries online during the pandemic and I'd argue that's an even bigger QoL upgrade. You can still go for produce (or not) and the occasional thing you need immediately, but getting stuff delivered to you is generally cheaper and more convenient than owning a car. The gratification is a bit less instant, but I value my time more than that.
As for cars being faster than public transit, sure, but making cars fast often have the side effect of making other modes of transit slower, and vice versa. Buses need reserved lanes to be reliable, bikes need reserved lanes to be safe, which means less cars can go. As a pedestrian, I would get to places significantly faster if I could just jaywalk wherever I please, but naturally this would require very low speed limits. Cars also require parking lots, which make walking less efficient. Cars are only convenient for their own drivers, they are inconvenient for everybody else (including other drivers).
Agreed on supermarket delivery. I've started using it now, and probably should have done so sooner
I also actually agree on prioritizing bus and cycle lanes over car lanes. Instead of being angry at them, which unfortunately many drivers are, I choose to appreciate them as intended - i.e. if I'm going into the town centre I usually go by bus. I'd also like to see more properly-separated bike lanes. I don't blame cyclists at all who choose to ignore the painted ones and take the lane as if they're a car
However the main reason why public transport is slower isn't usually due to traffic or physical constraints, but the longer routes you have to take. Usually the planners have done their job well, and the route is near-optimal in aggregate (and therefore often useful for myself if I'm commuting or visiting the centre), but if I want to visit a friend in another part of town, I've very often got to go in to the centre and change out again. Even if there's a direct route, it can be slow due to how many stops occur (off-board ticketing/proper BRT could help with that in major areas). If I'm visiting a business in a business park/industrial estate further out, it's often a taxi or nothing
The following doesn't change much, but just to nitpick:
That's legal where I currently live (UK). Motorways are essentially the only place you're not allowed to just cross, though drivers aren't generally required to break the traffic to give you passage if you're not at a zebra crossing (or a junction, as of recent code changes). Speed limits definitely do vary based on the likelihood of pedestrians in the area, but I don't think changing the law would change much there. I mean, they'd have to fairly compensate by adding more crossings anyway, and IME those are more likely to slow down traffic due to their poorly-timed and long stops (even with sensor-assisted intelligence), whereas pedestrians making ad-hoc crossings are usually sensible enough to wait for a natural gap instead of forcing one (and those who don't would probably "jaywalk" anyway), essentially making their effect on flow near zero. Even if you do have to slow for a pedestrian, it usually is just a slight slow for under two seconds. Much quicker than a red light. Zebra crossings of course don't have lights, but you do have a hard requirement to stop as soon as a pedestrian presents themselves at the side, and remain stopped until they've completely left the road, resulting in similar interruptions rather than turn-taking in existing gaps
No one is arguing that you would have to take public transportation or walk everywhere. They are just saying that it is good if where you live is walkable. I also live in Southern California and I would say that a lot of most expensive places to live are expensive because they are more walkable. You could live in downtown La Jolla or by the beach in Santa Monica and walk around. You could also own or rent a car and drive to Lake Tahoe. It's not either or.
East hollywood probably sees the some of the most foot traffic in southern california and rents are relatively affordable by LA county standards. Chances are the working class areas in sd are similar I imagine where you see a lot of people walking, biking, or taking the bus to get to work. Of course this isn’t “urbanism” in the way that upper class people consider it, but it exists.
This is a common Internet meme -- the American tourist that goes to Europe and loves their experience of walking around nice, dense cities designed at a human scale and functioning public transit. Then they return to their life of highways and parking lots and strip malls, which, to me, is dystopia.
That's so funny, because in my mind it's the complete opposite: I feel free because I don't have the burden of keeping a vehicle-object. However, where I leave is car unfriendly. People who always late are the two friends of mine who try to use their car
(Actually I tried both lives. I used to have a car in the past. Still prefer being car free)
You may not imagine how it works but plenty of people do ride transit in southern california. LA metro ridership is like 800k people a day. A lot of neighborhoods have a lot of foot traffic in LA county at least.
Having the option to walk doesn't mean that you can't drive. One can have both. Nice weather to walk in? Maybe I'll walk the 10 minutes to the shopping center. Raining a lot? Take the car.
Had a somewhat similar experience in Houston (minus police), which seems to be a city whose infrastructure is comprised of one 9000-lane monstrosity of a freeway. I was staying in a hotel right across the street from the office I was working in, maybe a 3 minute walk. A coworker offered to give me a ride each morning, and when I mentioned I could just walk they said 'the only pedestrians around here are homeless people'. So I guess that's their general attitude about walking, which might explain the attention from police.
When I lived in Houston I would bike to work occasionally but it’s not a pleasant thing to do 4-6 months out of the year. Even walking to the bus stop at 8am in the summer I would be sweating. People who harp on Houston for being designed around cars (notably the “Not Just Bikes” channel on YouTube) usually live somewhere like the Netherlands with moderate weather and never address just how uncomfortable it is to be outside in Houston half the year. It also rains heavily in Houston quite frequently (90 days of rain/year).
I would love more walkable infra but I don’t blame anyone for not wanting to walk in Houston.
Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Montevideo, San Juan (PR) are all tropical cities hotter than Houston, roughly the same size, and are very walkable
I can't even fathom how those people can survive the heat and humidity let alone walk in it.
Agreed. No matter how good the biking infrastructure in major cities in Japan is (and apparently it was good enough for me to see someone biking at almost any given moment, so I assume it was pretty good), I cannot fathom how people did it. You open a door to the outside, and you feel like you got blasted with a human-sized heatgun. Just standing outside for more than a few minutes, and you pretty much gotta take a shower after. And no, I am not ultra-sensitive to it, as I managed to survive 90F summers in Seattle with no AC just fine before.
Don’t worry, Japanese people complain about it all summer. You’re not alone!
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9281079/
The simple answer is, you adapt (homeostasis)
Heat and humidity comes after the decision to not walk and turn everything into roads and parking lots
I can guarantee you Houston was hot and humid well before cars existed.
Humidity is the worst part, when it's hot but not so humid it's OK.
And at least here in Montevideo we're literally by the beach. I am two blocks away from being able to swim :)
I do complain a lot about the heat+humidity combination and I use A/C a lot.
I don't know the distinct history of those cities but Houston's population didn't hit 1 million until the 1960s, nearly all of its growth has taken place in a car-centric world. At least 3/4 four of those cities have been around for a long time pre-car and I suspect weren't designed with cars in mind.
More to the point, nearly all of that growth has taken place in an air-conditioned world. Urbanization of the U.S. South really only took off once the air-conditioner became mainstream.
Those other cities have a population that is adjusted to the heat - they grew up with it, their ancestors grew up with it, they're genetically and culturally adjusted to the climate. By contrast, the U.S. South includes a large number of immigrants who are only there because air conditioning exists. It's a mystery why anyone would want to walk around in 100 degree heat with 90% humidity, because they certainly wouldn't.
How about Miami, e.g Miami Beach and downtown Miami, both extremely walkable? Like Houston, Miami did not reach 1 million pop until the 60s.
Or Panama City, did not reach 1 mil until the 90s
And "designed with cars in mind" is part of the problem, is it not? Using that as a filter is like saying "there are no parking garages with good canoeing routes"
I'm from Montevideo, I wouldn't call it "tropical" but yeah, compared to an US city it's absolutely a million times more walkable.
We do have humidity and heat and I don't enjoy it and I use A/C several months a year.
There's a big push for more cycling-centric and more cycling lanes, and the bus infrastructure is obviously a lot better than the US. I don't have a car by choice.
I haven't been to Houston but I have been to Dallas and it was an extremely frustrating experience and it feels like an awful soulless city to me.
Dallas’ big criticism from Texans (and especially Houstonians, there is a bit of a rivalry) is that it’s soulless… so you nailed it.
A substantial contributor to that heat is asphalt and concrete though (absorbs heat and releases it at night). And to make it worse there's no tree cover. Winter is also more manageable if you don't have to wait 20 mins for a bus in an uncleared snowbank just because non-car mobility is second-class
True. Another issue with all the concrete is that it doesn't absorb rain and has made the constant flooding worse. Zero tree cover is also a shame, there are hundreds of miles of concrete bike and walking paths along the bayous that would be great for commuting but most of it has zero tree cover so you're just baking in the sun.
The older parts of Houston have massive oak trees that provide a lot of shade (and acorns the size of walnuts). But the older houses aren't large enough for modern Houstonians (roll your eyes here); when you tear it down to build a McMansion the trees also have to go.
The elementary school near my friend's house had a playground that was 100% shaded by just two massive trees. They tore the school down for a modern replacement. The new playground has no shade at all, not even those stretched fabric triangles you see all over the southern US.
As someone who grew up playing in the bayous out in the suburbs of Houston, even away from the concrete the humidity and heat are oppressive in the summertime.
NotJustBikes went to Houston, tried to walk from the hotel to a suitcase shop 1-2km away, and found it too dangerous, not too hot. He doesn't say "everyone in Houston should walk everywhere all the time" he says "Houston is designed so you can't safely walk even if the distance is short and you want to".
But the relevant part is people who do want to, but can't.
I had a similar experience in Mexico City, except it wasn't a cop who stopped me, it was a friendly civilian driving by, and they asked if I was confused because they had observed two men stalking me from 3 blocks back for a while who were likely to jump me.
I don't think anyone stopping to genuinely help is a "bad" thing, or robs one of their dignity. If you do, maybe that is a comment on your internal worldview instead of on that of the person stopping.
Dense cities where passersby ignore you wantonly are decried as impersonal, lacking community, etc and now we are saying we WANT MORE of that? That it brings DIGNITY?
I don't understand what you're arguing. It seems like you're saying you'd rather have a city where cops and concerned citizens stop to ask if you're confused than a dense, walkable city? I also don't understand how you got that dense, walkable cities would be someplace "where passersby ignore you wantonly".
Cities used to be filled with tight knit communities in neighborhoods where everyone knew each other. Kids played outside and roamed around and no one cared.
Then mass suburbanization happened in the 60s/70s. American cities became high crime places. Everyone became anonymous. No one knew their neighbor.
Such is the paradox of modern urban life. Nowhere are you closer physically to your neighbor, but more distant socially. The 5 acre farms outside of town all know each other’s grandkids by name. Does a city dweller even know the name of the resident across the hall?
There are many neighborhoods in cities and towns in the US where this is still true. I know because I live in one, and I've visited others. There are also a ton of US suburbs and exurbs where people barely know their neighbours.
Having a friendly neighborhood has much to do with the strength of community institutions and the existence of "third places". Those can be present (or not) in a variety of community layouts and densities.
My take is that it requires a sweet spot of economic security where people aren't struggling so much that they can't/don't trust in community, but also aren't so wealthy that they don't need/rely on their community. Beyond that, it also helps to have physical layouts that enable friendly unintentional encounters between residents.
The problem is that none of these places will be cheap to live in, because all else equal, the existence of that lifestyle will drive up demand (and therefore housing prices).
Thats the narrative thats popular but I find it doesn’t pencil out. I know plenty of neighbors living in an urban area. More than when I lived in a suburban area that’s for sure. You have much higher chance of coming about someone on foot in earshot in the urban area. When your neighbor takes out the trash in the suburbs they are doing it 100 yards away from you.
What city do you live in? Which cities are you thinking of?
Here in Tokyo, it's still like this: kids play outside and roam around, taking the subway by themselves, etc. But people don't know their neighbors here either, since it's a city with tens of millions of people; it's just safe because it's built into the culture, just like petty theft almost never happens here and when you drop your wallet, it's almost certain to be turned into the nearest police box, with all the cash still inside.
Yeah it’s interesting. The kids in the upper peninsula know everyone else their age within a 150 mile radius by the time they graduate from high school (usually via sports). Many of them live on roads that share their last name. Very, extremely rural with small towns sprinkled around.
Were they trying to stay that you will get stabbed by a homeless person but in a nicer way?
This is not uniquely an American thing. Go to the Middle East in summer.
That is why cultures in such climates tend to have a mid-day siesta when no one goes out, and a lively late night when the temperatures become bearable, the sun no longer tries to murder you with its rays, and people go outside to eat, shop and meet friends.
Nah, as someone who lives somewhere with actual humidity “mid day” is basically “whenever the sun is up”.
85 and humid here is worse than -00 and dry in Phoenix. It’s so humid your sweat can’t evaporate because the air is already saturated. It’s beyond miserable, and actively unhealthy to many.
Yeah, hot and humid areas have never been particularly friendly to human civilization. Prior to the industrial era, they were mostly covered by rainforests.
North Carolina is hardly rainforest, nor has it ever been.
The map of US rainforests shows an active rainforest along the western side of North Carolina. It is not all that hard to believe said forest could have been much larger before the human touch.
Western part of the state is farther from where I am than LA is from SF, just for the record.
The easternly side of the forest to the easternmost points of NC is not further than LA from SF, though. Unless you live way out in the ocean, but still consider that to be North Carolina for some reason, you are closer than said distance to the forest.
I do I. Fact live almost at the Coast. Just to get to Asheville, which is hardly the westernmost point in the state, is over 6 hours.
Los Angeles to SF is 381 miles. My town to the Cherokee, which is about where the rainforest zone starts, is 383. North Carolina is a much bigger state than most people realize.
You do live out in the Ocean? Fair enough.
Nobody has ever thought North Carolina was small, though. Where did that idea come from? In fact, it is not clear why the record needed a distance in the first place.
It’s not a tropical rainforest though. Temperate/subtropical rainforests aren’t as bad.
You might be thinking "tropical rainforest". Even today parts of North Carolina (and even Alaska) are classified as temperate rainforests: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fe/Temperat...
Very small parts. We just have lots of water and swampland down where I am.
I don't know much about NC, but the only parrot native to the US used to live there [0], which indicates that it must have been pretty heavily forested prior to the Colombian exchange.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolina_parakeet
Sicily? Rome? Angkor Wat?
Portable wearable air conditioning and sun protection, that's what you'd need to make it comfortable. Maybe like a robotic exoskeleton, we can't be far from making that affordable.
Singapore has covered walkways everywhere to beat the heat.
Also I would love to see more covered bikeways.
Air conditioned suits could be a thing for E-bikes. Onboard power source.
we can also have wheels to make it energy efficient. We can call it "the mobile" or maybe the auto-mobile.
Wheels might make it energy efficient but engines powered by oil from deep under the Gulf of Mexico shipped to refineries, then shipped hundreds of miles to gas stations, then people driving a ton or two of steel and plastic and rubber to the gas station so they can “efficiently” get one person 4 miles to a shop isn’t so efficient.
A bicycle on flat asphalt is more efficient than a person despite person+bike moving more total mass; but still the cost of mining iron ore, making steel, making a bike for every customer, compared to just building the store and the homes close enough to walk and not doing any of that…
Energy.gov says “In 2021, 52% of all trips, including all modes of transportation, were less than three miles, with 28% of trips less than one mile”, it’s daft either way that people want to use a car for such short distances or that urban spaces are designed so that things are relatively very close but juuuust too far for convenience.
cars are just suburban power armor
if there was a dictionary of "american urbanism" they would define humans as having four wheels rather than two legs
they really do act like it whenever the USA plans a city or a neighborhood. why wouldn't everybody have a car? except we actually have plenty of reasons now that we didn't before
You’re confusing yourself with suburbs. Most American cities are highly walkable. Safety is the limiting factor.
Having cities arranged on grids with huge wide roads is generally a recipe for non-walkable environments. If you are having to wait ages for a light to change every time you go from one block to the next, you lose much of the efficiency of walking.
There's no problem with grids or wide roads as long as there is infrastructure in place for pedestrians. Bridges can allow people to cross over wide streets/traffic without having to wait for a light for example. Tunnels can be an option as well. Grids can really help a city be more walkable since it becomes dead simple to navigate and you aren't wasting time on long winding roads or labyrinthine paths which increase the distance between two points and make it easier to get lost.
Infrastructure for pedestrians would be you cross as soon as you get there, cars wait. Bridges are not pedestrian infrastructure they’re “cars are the priority” infrastructure, “cars mustn’t be delayed or inconvenienced, pedestrians can be” infrastructure.
I don't see a problem with bridges that allow people to access without slowing anyone down. something like https://i.redd.it/m62z7ovxkpg81.jpg or https://media.gettyimages.com/id/1230021650/photo/women-wear... works very well without inconveniencing pedestrians who often appreciate the view
If you are in hurry, you will avoid those. They add more time to your trip then one would guess intuitively.
What do work for pedestrians is a network of smaller roads that you can "just" cross safely without waiting or taking detours. Basically, a few big roads you cross once in a while and the rest being smaller roads where cars are forced to go slowly.
Those add substantial crossing time and are quite costly.
None of the world's great walking cities heavily uses bridge crossings like that.
It's inconvenient to climb a set of stairs every time cross a road. What about pushchairs, wheelchairs, the elderly, people with walking sticks, shopping trolleys, arthritis, gammy knees, people carrying heavy shopping or wheeled luggage? In general if you're going to slow down anyone then slow down drivers who have engines to accelerate them back up to speed with no effort. Making people climb stairs so drivers don't have to wait is not good pedestrian infrastructure, the view (of a road full of cars who have priority over you) is hardly a great trade off. Nor is paying the extra taxes for bridge maintenance so that car drivers can have a better life at your expense.
When you consider that drivers are generally wealthier (because they own cars) and the pedestrians are breathing car exhaust and tyre dust while working their lungs harder climbing to give cars the priority, listening to car noise while drivers pass in low effort comfort, the mild unfairness of it is more starkly contrasted.
Ideally good pedestrian design would tempt people out of their cars because walking is so quick, convenient, cheap, pleasant, interesting - with shade and shops and short distances and quiet clean surroundings. Big steel bridges don't contribute to that very much. [Have you seen how often Americans comment on the price of gas? Yet what people campaign for is the government to lower the price of gas, not for the government to make life without cars so pleasant that cars are not a necessity. What sense does that make? Most living Americans have never lived in a walkable place, and have no film, tv, or cultural reference for one to use for a basis for such a campaigh - maybe Disneyland (which visitors tend to love)? 120 years ago everywhere was walkable because there wasn't much other than walking. 70 years ago places were bulldozed for cars. Now multiple generations have grown up and lived their adult lives with car dependent urban design].
" without slowing anyone down. " - but the very first image you provided will slow down pedestrians, it's harder to cross compared to a simple direct crosswalk and it's less friendly to ppl with mobility problems. Such bridges are relatively ok to implement outside cities where you have highways/roads with cars driving high speeds but these are bad solutions inside cities where the priority belongs to pedestrians and cars must drive slower
Grids are better than culdesac but worse than randomness for a human brain so that it would be interesting to walk there. Wide roads aren't good for walkability in any sense: even if we ignore huge noise and pollution created by lots of cars, wide roads are more dangerous to cross and since it's wide you as a pedestrian need to walk more on non pedestrian infra to get to points of interest. Walkability isn't just about being able to walk
"Highly walkable" means many people would choose to walk even if able to take a car.
To be walkable a city needs to be quick to walk between destinations and pleasant to do so.
Most US cities are too spaced out, require waiting at each block, or are not all that pleasant for walking.
The fact safety is a limiting factor means those places don't have social control, meaning these are not places ppl tend to hang out in so probably not that walkable. P.s. walkable in this context doesn't mean it's just possible to walk, it means it's a nice experience to walk with nice environment/shops/othwr points of interest
I own the domain AmericanUrbanism[.]org - I've been thinking of setting up some kind of advocacy group (501c4) or even political party there focused on changing this reality.
Cars made more sense in the industrial age, when people needed to commute to a factory for work. But, in the age of knowledge work and especially remote work, we aren't commuting as much. So, walkable neighborhoods become far more important and impactful.
I think there should be just many types of neighborhoods. Those who need a car for longer distance travel should accept living further away from city center, where there's enough space for parking slots, while the rest can enjoy pedestrian-first neighbourhoods closer to services. Public transport should of course reach all areas, so that the car owners have no real need to use their car much to reach the denser areas.
Strongly feel this acceptance will be difficult to actualize sans coercion.
How so? We've built huge amounts of infrastructure (parking being the obvious one) to explicitly enable people to have cars in city centers- stop doing that and my gut (scientific, I know!) says that'll get you most of the way there.
The least coercive way to do it is probably by making areas closer to the city center worse for driving — narrow roads, no parking, etc — and better for walking and biking. Then people will naturally sort themselves based on their preferences. The problem being that establishing the needed urban environment is itself a political struggle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compact_city
97% of Americans' daily trips are done via automobile. Walking, biking, and bus riding tend to be associated with low socioeconomic status. There is heavy policing of low SES populations. In Kaplan, Louisiana it is explicitly illegal to walk at night. https://www.klfy.com/local/vermilion-parish/kaplan-starts-pe...
Bus riding I can sort of understand, that tends to be the case everywhere outside of manor metros IME (and not without a certain amount of truth to it) - but to think of walking or cycling like that seems really sad, what a way to live, shielded from the natural environment, shuffling from one air conditioned box to the next.
I'm not going to blame anyone in Houston for wanting to move from one air conditioned box to the next :p.
Sure but if you decide that's not a way you want to live then you also don't want to live somewhere where it's uncomfortable for you otherwise.
(And while I'm here 'manor' in GP was a typo for 'major', in case that's not clear to anyone.)
well, our living choices aren't necessarily choices these days. Nor comfortable. More like compromises for suvival. Already had more than a few friends priced out of California and needing to move out of the state in its entirety.
Of course; it's for that reason that I said 'you don't want to live' rather than 'you don't live'.
I am not a lawyer, but that does not seem like a law that could pass a constitutional test. You can say you have to be in a car to be on a freeway for safety reasons, but you can't ban people from being in a place because they are not in a car because you don't like the people who aren't in cars. From reading the article the intent seems to be that you suspect people who aren't in cars.
Nor am I, but a constitutional test used to cost about $250,000 or so over a decade ago (does inflation affect these things?). For someone who can't afford a car, that's a tough bill to eat.
As someone who has litigated a ton of constitutional challenges, you can definitely do it without representation if you want. I would think pretty much anyone on HN is educated enough to figure it out. (Attorney fees being your biggest cost; costs you'd have to swallow are deposition fees and filing fees if you're not indigent).
[Usually you can make two separate attacks on these kinds of constitutional cases since most states have their own constitutions that are practically identical to the federal one, so you can sue in both state and federal court separately if you want two tries at it -- this is good if you screw it up the first time and want to use the arguments the defendant fired at you in the first case to bolster your retry]
With representation though, I have a current case I finally settled today with the government and my legal counsel ran up a bill that was north of $500K for a very simple constitutional case. His firm swallowed it because it was part of their yearly pro bono requirements.
Right, and you couldn't carry dozens of illegal weapons or 1000 pounds of cocaine by foot. It's car drivers that should be the suspects here.
Walking / using public transportation is associated with low status when it is done for cost savings reasons. When it’s done for convenience it doesn’t convey much.
Using a bus in a ski resort is higher status than a car in a large city.
Yeah I live in the Boston area. All the neighborhoods that have easy access to public transit or are walkable neighborhoods are very desirable and expensive.
That law sounds illegal.
I had something similar happen to me in Miami about a decade ago. As a New Yorker I'm just used to walking and taking public transit everywhere. I was down there for some data center work I needed to do out of the NAP of the Americas, and one night I decided to go to see a friend of a friend DJ at some bar in downtown Miami. So I took the free Miami elevated train to a stop near the club (The Vagabond) and started walking over. I get a block into the walk and someone pulls up on a bike and is like "wtf are you doing? are you lost? you should not be walking right now, do you need help?". It was a totally fine walk, maybe 5 minutes at NYC walking speeds, if maybe a bit desolate. The guy proceeded to slowly ride next to me while I walked to make sure I was ok. Ended up buying him a beer in the club and chatting for a while, he just thought it was dangerous to be walking.
Maybe it was a dangerous (i.e. high-crime) area? A lot of areas can look OK but are not someplace you want to be at night especially alone. And if you're from out of town you might not know.
Similar happened to me. I was at The Oaks Card Club on the border of Emeryville and West Oakland. I needed to get to BART, and it was just a few blocks on one street, so I thought I'd just walk. About half way down, a taxi driver actually pulled up without me hailing him and said "Man, what the fuck are you doing walking here? Get in and I'll drive you wherever you need to go!" It was either a great sales pitch or I was actually in danger and didn't know it.
My SF story: Chinatown, near the convention center. My wife wanted me to pick some stuff up while I was there. I had been there by day, seemed perfectly reasonable. I get done with the trade show, head over there near closing time to get what she wanted (perishable, so I left it to the last minute) and coming back I realized the character had changed considerably and it was a place I didn't want to be. I hadn't gotten a car because the hassles of parking made it a negative to me.
We solved that problem for you by closing everything at 9pm now, or earlier.
I think this was a bit before 7pm. It surprised me because I didn't expect the character to change that much while the stores were still open. The undesirable elements usually only show up once the legitimate people leave.
I only have one friend who's been mugged - and it was in Emeryville.
If you were walking to the West Oakland station, he's absolutely right.
You'd be crossing a couple highway on-ramps which aren't the most pedestrian friendly.
Yeah, that's what he was saying. I mean it didn't look the safest, but that's never something that has bothered me. A large part of my 20s were spent being places I probably shouldn't have been all around Brooklyn in the early 2000s. As soon as I got on the Miami metromover and noticed I was the only one not strung out I knew what I was getting myself into. The palm trees were maybe throwing me off -- as a New Yorker palm trees meant vacation.
I dunno about metromover but I took metrorail in miami every day during ultra music festival and the clientele seemed about on par with the clientele on the nyc subway
Strange. I have been to Austin a number of times for work and I find the city to be very walkable. I also enjoy the riverfront parks and pay a visit to SRV (may he rest in peace). I stay in downtown or at UT so I don't really know what it is like beyond there. I've also used their b-cycle system with great success. In addition, I remember their public transport system to be decent for an American city. That's how I get to the airport for something like $1 from downtown.
I was in Austin for work in the 1990s and there was a mall, which I could see from my hotel so I figured I'll just walk to the mall. Nope.
I think either an older colleague (I was not old enough to rent a car, this is a long time ago) ferried me across or maybe the hotel took pity and sent me in their minibus ? There was no practical way to walk that short distance, the infrastructure is designed only for cars.
I mainly remember that mall because I found a (possibly mislabelled) copy of the version of Tori Amos' "Under The Pink" which is actually 2CDs, so "More Pink" is inside the case too but it was the same price as the regular album, and that was an amazing bargain for teenage me. But yeah, it was staggering to me that these Americans just expected to drive everywhere. I have grown up in an English village where I walked everywhere, to school, to the shops. to a friend's house, everywhere. I guess I was old enough to realise that most English villages aren't also served by the London Underground, but the choice to build only car infrastructure seemed very strange indeed.
The hire bikes are great but if you don't have a North American phone number you can't sign up in their app! (I relied on a friendly stranger who offered her phone number for the confirmation code.)
Great city to ride around! Surprisingly good facilities.
There are places in Austin where you can go for pleasure/scenic walks. (eg think the green belts). But it's hard to use walking for utility in Austin. Not to mention socially you'll consistently be invited to places >5 miles away and the presumption is you have a car and you'll all drive separate.
An old roommate moved from the Bay Area to Dallas years ago and on a nice day in the park he decided to lay down on the grass, as he would normally do in the Bay Area. Pretty soon cops arrived.
They're just trying to save your from the fire ants.
and the chiggers.
"normally do in the Bay Area" i.e. he was naked as the day he was born. Yeah, that's not gonna fly in Texas.
I heard the same from a Scot who visited Texas and decided to go for a 45 minute stroll to his destination. In summer. He regretted it 15mins in and luckily a local stopped and gave him a ride, saying that he could die in this heat (not sure if that was a joke)
For a Scot it would be a bit of an extreme change. For a Spaniard it wouldn't.
It's important to pace and hydrate oneself and people from hot climates know that because they deal with it all the time.
Probably not a joke. Heatstroke is very real. Many underestimate hot weather and don't drink nearly enough water.
People living in Austin will drive > 10 miles to go for a 3 mile run.
I have known people in Washington, DC, who lived with a quarter mile of a hiker/biker path in Rock Creek Park, and would drive ~7 miles to Fletcher's Boathouse (or 10 to Carderock) to run on the C&O Canal towpath.
I confess that I have been one of those people (I didn't live quite there)--but when meeting with friends for a run. My preference was always to lace on the sneakers, walk to the end of the block, and run.
I guess my own biases excuse the idea of driving a good distance for a hike or trail run that are "one offs" (though in aggregate are regular), but the idea of going for a weekly (or multiple times a week) social run seems to be wasteful. In terms of the atmosphere they're equivalent.
It's pretty wild. I'm in a very car-centric city in Canada, and there have been days where I drive across the city and not seen a single pedestrian (across multiple types of areas). Usually in the winter, but still a very weird thing to not see people in a city.
What city?
Calgary
I’m a transportation activist in Austin. Where did this happen?
I think it was around Waterloo park and capitol; I was on my way to the Texas State History Museum.
I looked around now on Google Street View, but can't recognize the slight hill I was walking on (it happened around 10y ago). Funnily enough, also street view shows streets with no pedestrians anywhere :-)
How close were you to downtown Austin? Were you walking on the side of a freeway?
Except for the very hottest of summer days, I see a lot of pedestrians in downtown Austin.
I don't know if this is true of Austin, but trying to convince people to get off the street in the afternoon can be part of the city's heat management plan in some parts of Texas.
FWIW, I live near downtown Austin, haven't owned a car in over a year, walk/bus everywhere, and have never been questioned by police. I typically see quite a few pedestrians out. As far as Texan cities go it's the most walkable, though it's still not very good.
Yes, I've lived here 17 years and see pedestrians most places I go - although to be fair there are many roads where pedestrians don't go (say, the service road alongside 71). Perhaps OP was in such a place.
I also did not own a car for years, commuting only by bicycle, and never had a problem.
Indeed, Austin's core is only about 5 square miles (the entirety of the East Side to the Greenbelt, Hyde Park down to far South Congress, say). Fairly compact.
It is no New York or London but it is walkable and bikeable.
Yeah this is so weird for us. I'm so glad i didn't need to own a car in the last 7 years and I haven't even driven any car in the last 6.
It's perfect that way. I hate driving.
I wouldn't let the cops bully me into taking an Uber though. Afaik it's still legal to walk in the US?
What month was it? Because if it's summer in austin and you're standing around downtown then you probably are struggling in one way or another.
Also downtown austin is disgusting; maybe they were just stunned someone would be there on purpose before the sun goes down.
Hope you enjoyed the museum/trip though
Almost this exact situation happened to author Ray Bradbury in Los Angeles, where he lived without a car. He wrote several short stories memorializing the incident, including a scene in Fahrenheit 451.
Texas is ground zero for the car centric mass psychology.
South Florida and the north suburbs of Detroit are #2 and #3 in my direct experience.
The south is very well suited to the e-bike. It will probably take the total die off of the boomers before anything really changed though