Driving my dad's (small, comfy, electric) car around Glasgow yesterday I realised how much of a joke urban motorways are, even for drivers. Most of my life I've been a pedestrian, car passenger or user of public transport, so I've seen these huge roads mostly as an obstacle to cross, or a thing to passively tolerate while someone else drives along them.

And I've heard and read all the stories of them destroying communities in the heart of Glasgow (and many other cities) by breaking areas of the city in two. Of course they also reduce the air quality and destroy the peace and quiet.

But: driving one, especially one half-finished where not all the roads join together properly, even on a quiet Sunday in the in-between-days, is a nightmare. You have to cross four lanes of traffic in a few hundred metres, or come off and do a U-turn to go the right way. Or perhaps (because junctions have been shoehorned into spaces where they shouldn't exist) the slip road you're joining from will just stop abruptly.

In other words, they're awful.

Similarly in Helsinki I avoid driving along kehä I for the same reasons, but it is not quite as terrible...

[Image: M8 Glasgow Charing Cross interchange, CC-BY-SA MSeses, from Wikimedia Commons]

#UrbanMotorways #CarsSuck

No matter how fervent or enthusiastic my faith in the promise of the human experiment is (and it is pretty devout), any time I have to drive a car, I begin to find myself firmly on Team Extinction-Level Asteroid Strike.

#carssuck #carculturesucks #drivingsucks #commutingbycarsucks

Trams are Great! So why are the Streetcars SO BAD!?

TL;DW: it's cars.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=HhQxNHrD6fA
#Toronto #NotJustBikes #UrbanDesign #PublicTransit #CarsSuck #BadDesign #HowNotToDesignTransit

When it comes to visiting cities, my primary criteria is that a city without excellent public transit will always be near the bottom of my list, no matter how interesting it is otherwise, while cities that have a lot of attractions I don't care about, but fantastic transit, like Vienna, for example, are right near the top, because I love riding trams. When I travel, the last thing I want to do is drive a damn car.

#transit #trams #subways #travel #antibucketlist #waroncars #carssuck

Why were Black people so angry in the Sixties? Among other things, wrote Dr. King:

"It is disappointment with some Negro clergymen who are more concerned about the size of the wheel base on their automobiles than about the quality of their service to the Negro community."

#CarsSuck

I guess somebody should have told this bollard to wear high-viz and a helmet. Send thicker #bollards.

#schoolStreets #FuckCars #BanCars #CarsSuck #DriverAccountability

Cars suck. 🚗 💩

#carssuck