Marcus Athaydes
πππππ πΆππππππ π"In a quality city, a person should be able to live their entire life without a car, and not feel deprived."
βPaul Bedford (photo: the bicycle wagon of a train in #Copenhagen's station.)
As Bedford points out, the opposite is also true:
"A good sustainability and quality of life indicator: the average amount of time spent in a car."
(Elevated time car-commuting time also turns out to be a reliable metric of social isolation and general life dissatisfaction.)
climate voter/radical oldie@straphanger I can attest that this is true for me since my mobility is mainly walking or biking. But almost all of the people around me seem fine with the auto thing. When I do drive, however, I am more sensitive to how horrible it is, even without congestion.
Niclas HedhmanWith Internet, society should be able to deprecate the "city". We don't all need to be stacked on top of each other, in homes, in cars, in subways and so on.
Doubt I will see it in my life time...
mnemonicoverload@niclas @straphanger To the extent that there are people who currently live in a city that don't really want to be there, sure. I think you might be underestimating how many people *want* to live somewhere vibrant and exciting with an abundance of choice of 3rd places to spend their time though.
Mans R@mnemonicoverload @niclas @straphanger I live in a small (250k) city, and I wouldn't want it any other way.
vriesk (Jan Srz)@niclas @straphanger with due respect, cities are way more efficient resource-wise than spread-out farmside housing. All those things like water supply, electricity, sanitation, any kind of transport (of which commute is just one aspect of) just don't scale well with lower population densities for the populations we have.
Of course this applies to well designed and well managed cities, so, um, not like most of USA.
Sarah Peper π³οΈββ§οΈπΊπ¦@niclas @straphanger the thing is that cities are a lot more efficient at providing amenities, good transport and 3rd spaces.
Quite funny to hear you say "good transport", with such a photo at the top of the thread.
Only a small handful of cities provide more than a handful of people with "good transport", or amenities for that matter. My current local village (~1500 households, but I used to live in massive cities before) is more than adequate, and provides a higher quality of life, with nature outside the window.
Laust@niclas @jay_peper @straphanger you just need to live in a civilized country instead of a place which has been commandeered by the car lobby :)
And you might be thinking about "car infested hellholes" where most people here (I believe) mean "places to prioritize people over cars".
You might also want to think about how well rural areas and suburbs can actually pay for their own infrastructure (it tends to be difficult).
And you might be thinking about "car infested hellholes" where most people here (I believe) mean "places to prioritize people over cars".
You might also want to think about how well rural areas and suburbs can actually pay for their own infrastructure (it tends to be difficult).
@niclas @jay_peper @straphanger also, how is a train (which allows you to bring your bike) not good transportation?
Sorry, I didn't scroll to "top", but meant the "traffic jam" photo.
Rural roads; Where I live (Sweden) many of the roads around me are private, i.e. we who need them "pay" for the upkeep. There is an association that does the maintenance of mainly gravel roads, by engaging members in the association to do the actual work (many of the members are farmers with the heavy machinery needed) cutting the cost to a fraction of what the State would have to pay.
@niclas @jay_peper @straphanger ah, that makes more sense then :) But the point (I think) was exactly to avoid designing cities for cars and to start designing them for humans instead. Which should mean an end to "car sewers" and a focus on walkable cities with public transit and enabling walking, cycling, and other forms of active transportation.
pafurijaz@straphanger Anyway that remind to me an old #POV-Ray rendering.
https://hof.povray.org/accident_bleu_1200x1600.html
https://hof.povray.org/accident_bleu_1200x1600.html
Calisti π³οΈβππ¦ β πͺ©β¨ 39c3@straphanger That is one gorgeous train livery.
buonweekend
Le Monolecte π·π€¬π§ 
Cβest un peu la sensation que jβai eu Γ Bonn (Deutchland) : tout Γ©tait desservi, je nβai jamais eu lβimpression dβΓͺtre privΓ©e de quoi que ce soit.
Maximilian Overdraft, Esq.I have an 80 year old friend who until the last 2-3 years rode everywhere by bike for about 35 years. Now he can't do it. His roommate is in his 70s and has been biking everywhere, including across country, for at least that long. And this is in America. What you can't do in America is avoid cars.
MadisonMonkey@straphanger but, but, but, but then people would have more money or time, go into debt less and be healthier!
Are you insane man!
Are you insane man!
AleggraUnfortunately, some Americans donβt believe in quality.
It seems most prefer quantity.
FallsMom π»@Aleggra So many people rave over a restaurant on the basis of HUGE portions, not the quality or selection of foods!
Exactly. Using food as an example, the French serve tiny portions that are deliciously high quality. Maybe thatβs why obesity is almost non-existent despite their luscious pastries.
Maybe itβs the combination of all the walking they do in Paris. Thing is I donβt remember seeing any overweight Parisians.
Quantity over quality reminds me of a commercial here for some awful looking burger piled high w/some fried curly things inside. Looked absolutely disgusting.
chukk_beslowair@straphanger Said who?
Bike Walk Alameda@straphanger π―
And why we need this bike and pedestrian bridge between Oakland and Alameda: https://estuarybridge.org/
#BridgeTheGap
And why we need this bike and pedestrian bridge between Oakland and Alameda: https://estuarybridge.org/
#BridgeTheGap
Horror Author Reed Alexander@straphanger But, but, but, if we can't debt-saddle people with car payments, how can we control them?
@AlexBlock has moved
Led By Gilded Fools
REAL GJ Zig π³οΈβππΊπΈ@straphanger i'll take a guess and say this is NOT a quote from Robert Moses.
https://untappedcities.com/2013/12/18/5-things-in-nyc-we-can-blame-on-robert-moses/
Lizzie Crowdagger 
@straphanger I first read "without a cat" and I was like "WTF WAT IS THIS NONSENSE" but yeah without a car it makes more sense
stuxβ‘οΈ
π³π± 
@straphanger I manage to do that quite well here in Southampton.
Blake Leonard 
@straphanger I'd be lucky if even a bus ran in a twenty minute walk from here. The closest passenger rail is about 30 minutes by car and it's Amtrak.
Jeff Smith@straphanger When I lived in Tokyo in the 90s I was absolutely grateful I didnβt need a car. Moving back to the US, to SF Bay Area, and suddenly needing a car was a real shock. Still walked and biked everywhere I could, but then my bicycle got stolen one evening while I was enjoying some live music in Palo Alto. This after Japan where a very simple lock that sticks through the spokes on the front wheel is all that we ever used. Sigh
mklcolvin@straphanger So cool!
Jamie Magee 
@straphanger S-toget β€οΈ
C0ppertop@straphanger very few of those in the US.
Winter Trabex@straphanger I love this, and wish big American cities did this instead of forcing people to clog the air with exhaust fumes from cars.
Badibulgator@straphanger @[email protected] Iβm doing this here in Paris. I donβt even have a driving license. And I know a number of other people like me.
Calvin Arium@straphanger wow this step is way too big to use a wheelchair, wtf, how is this the wheelchair car. And how are we supposed to take our adapted heavy bikes too ?
(I also hate when bicycles are meant to be at the same place as wheelchair users, it always, and I mean always, becomes inaccessible when there are bikes to be stored in trains in the same car as us. I genuenly never saw a train design allowing to store anything big that did not become an accessibility nightmare. Wheelchair spots are just not designed to be used in autonomy/when the train is at capacity. I could talk about this for hours)
PepijnThere's a ramp in every one of these trains, standardised at the front. According to my wheelchair bound coworker who uses it a couple of week it works great.
@Pepijn @straphanger can you use it without an employee of the station ?
Dmitry Kudryavtsev@straphanger I really like this quote: a developed country is not where poor people own cars, itβs where rich people use public transportation.
Michl-Erich@straphanger In europe in big citys this is reality I wonder when you fucked up since it was US cities first with their subways and trams. And for the national trainsystem you could just use busses instead but thats just my 2 cents
Eva-clearly@straphanger Picture from Copenhagen Central Station. Itβs about human scale - when traffic in a city is based on cars, we lose the human scale. Copenhagen has a mix of traffic, and more and more cars for even local traffic now π€·ββοΈ
Anne-Marie de Jong@straphanger Mijn hele leven geen rijbewijs gehad. Was altijd goed te doen. Zeker in Amsterdam. Maar tegenwoordig is het OV wel erg verschraald. Mijn enige overgebleven tante woont net buiten een klein plaatsje in Brabant. Absoluut onbereikbaar met het OV. Na Tilburg CS houdt het op. Geen bus, geen buurtbus. Niets. Ook hier in de NoordKop zijn kleine plaatsen niet meer bereikbaar. En uitgerekend daar zetten de overheid destijds de Covid-19 vaccinatie centra neer. #hoedan
CyclesBecauseSummerIsComingπ@ABtj60 @straphanger tante woont te ver van station te ver om te fietsen met ov fiets?
@CyclesSmiles @straphanger Van Tilburg met de ov-fiets met bagage, want je blijft natuurlijk een nachtje over na zoβn reis, is het nog zeker drie kwartier fietsen. Dus niet echt handig of comfortabel nee. Voor ouderen of mensen die slecht ter been zijn niet te doen. #RedtHetOV
@ABtj60 @straphanger niet handig en niet comfortabel, dat snap ik.
Al fiets ik liever drie kwartier (als ik het van tevoren weet, heb ik een tas en een spin bij me) dan een uur of meer in de bus- die altijd op onhandige momenten gaat . Maar dat is idd een mentale kwestie waar nog niet iedereen op die manier in zit.
Ik gun iedereen trws echt wel behoorlijk ov, huist hierom
Al fiets ik liever drie kwartier (als ik het van tevoren weet, heb ik een tas en een spin bij me) dan een uur of meer in de bus- die altijd op onhandige momenten gaat . Maar dat is idd een mentale kwestie waar nog niet iedereen op die manier in zit.
Ik gun iedereen trws echt wel behoorlijk ov, huist hierom
@CyclesSmiles @straphanger
Het n dit geval is er echter geen keuze.
Er rijdt namelijk geen bus op de plaats van bestemming.
Het n dit geval is er echter geen keuze.
Er rijdt namelijk geen bus op de plaats van bestemming.
Hans@straphanger Those trains are seriously underequipped if everyone would carry their bike
Tom Ritchford@straphanger I'm 61, never owned a car, and never missed it for one second.
Cities: London, Vienna, Montreal, Ottawa, NYC, Amsterdam.
Marcin Juszkiewicz πI crashed my car 2 years ago and sold what's left. Never bought a new one as turned out that I need car for 2-3 weeks per year (vacations and Xmas).
Rental car costs less than I had to pay per year for my own one. Shopping places are in 15 minutes walk distance, 5 minutes to public bus stop which I can use to travel around the city.
In case I would need to transport something bigger there are friends with cars or carsharing.
γ·γγ’γγΌγ« 
@straphanger I desperately wish this was true for the UK. I live in the middle of nowhere and depend on volunteer drivers if I have to go to the nearest hospital (20+ miles away)
Nino Kadic@straphanger The only city that ever felt like that for me was London
Julian Andres Klode π³οΈβπ@ninokadic @straphanger I've only visited but I think Paris, Montreal have decent public transport too. Prague is a bit less frequent and well connected.
In the US I've only been to Portland and they had trams every 15 minutes only I think which is a bit of a shit show.
I mean basically if you need to plan around the transport rather than the transport being frequently enough for you to just show up that's a problem, so you want connections every 5 minutes really, maybe 10.
@ninokadic @straphanger My small town here in Germany has pretty annoying public transport but it's mostly because walking would take the same time.
So Bus to train station takes 10 minutes, but then you gotta walk 5 mins to the bus station and want to calculate in 15 mins of buffer time, so you end up same speed as walking for 30 minutes.
Bike is faster.
Car? Forget about it, car traffic is a horrible mess in such a historic town.
@juliank @straphanger Sounds very much like Zagreb, except that everyone wants a car (even though you can barely park in the city centre anymore).
Travis Scott@straphanger no dogs in public places unless you are blind. No exceptions
Marius DAVID@straphanger
Well... Problem with me is not inner-city travel (where I live is small enought than walking is not a big deal, and big city near me is... Well, not too big for walking on small travel, and has good bus service). The problem is going from my small town to the big town.
There is a bus line, but with usual timetable, I need to start going to the bus 30min before what I would do when I take the car, and same for waiting the bus when going home.
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