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this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2023
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Fuck Cars
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Cars fulfill a very self-indulgent narrative. 'I get to decide where and when I travel', makes people feel "free" snd "important" even when millions of them are silently coming to the same decisions-- like going downtown at 09:00 on weekdsys-- that allow huge efficiency plays.
Notice how many ads feature fantasies of open roads and trips to faraway attractions, not the real world of "I need to sit in rush hour traffic from 6:30 on to get to the Work Factory"
Maybe public transit needs to focus its message on the freedom from drudgery it offers-- you don't have to be staring at the driver in front of you, scanning the traffic reports
Exactly! This is why I love micromobility and quality public transit so much. With micromobility like electric scooters or bikes, I can zip past traffic in the protected cycle lanes in my city. With the frequent metro service in my city, I know I can show up to the metro station at basically any time and know it'll be a max 5-minute wait for the next train. And when I'm on the train, I can just chill and scroll on my phone or read a book instead of stressing about traffic. The freedom to think about something that isn't traffic.
Unfortunately as it stands in some places the infrastructure is awful. Take England for example; catching a train to London takes about 20 minutes for me, however there are often 10-15 minute delays that you now have to start accounting for, you also have to sit in a cabin with someone blaring their music that isn't to your taste. Hopefully you're not in a cabin with a toilet, because it's going to stink of shit.
Now the return journey, fingers crossed it's not cancelled otherwise you have another 40 minute wait for the next train! Last train home is a real anxiety inducing experience, will you be getting that train home or has it been cancelled? This is unfortunately all too common here. Sadly because public transport is for profit rather than a necessary service we have someone trying to do the bare minimum to make that money, and then pay the bare minimum to their staff who don't give a shit. It all begins to unravel and people just have a better experience sat in that morning traffic which is a more consistent and pleasant experience to the public transport.
The problem is once they started to turn public transport into for profit, there is little way to turn back. They invite private companies to build the network, do the operation, now how can they go back to be non profit to be a public service to the people ? Unless they do subsidise fares which will look like they are siphoning money from government to private companies. It’s a no winner situation. If the government wants to nationalise the public transport they will have to spend a significant amount of money to buy them off , which may or may not be affordable to them.
I'd say it is more about ~~convince~~ convenience. You decide when you leave and you leave from your door. You don't risk being late to work because you missed the train by 1 minute (baring queues, but you get the point).
This can also be achieved by high frequency transit.
Yeah, if the train comes every five minutes, that's going to be way more consistent than traffic over time.
Every five minutes is not enough, every minute is definitely needed for rush hour. Thankfully, I live in London where tube trains come every minute, yey!
Really depends where you live. In my town I also decide when I leave, and I don't risk being late because I missed the train by one minute. I'll just take the next one. More risk of being late because of car traffic.
The problem when people compare cars to public transport is that they compare the current state of public transport in their area. We need to compare what would happen if we were spending as much billions as we do on cars.
If I'm doing a short trip locally in the city, I get that convenience out of my bike. There are times I would have taken a taxi somewhere, but when the app told me how long it would take for my driver to arrive, I just end up cycling there (often rolling past some long lanes of traffic in the process). That process can be even better if a city is built with safe biking paths.
Unfortunately that's super weather dependent and seasonal. Plus, some of us would be a sweaty mess by the time we biked to where we needed to go.
Bikes don't have to be seasonal. Some Nordic countries have well maintained and plowed biking networks and they see significant use throughout the winter.
I get heat warnings every other day lately, and unless it's the rare cloudy day my UV index is at the top of the scale. I don't worry about snow here, I worry about heat and sun. I don't see a good solution for that unless you want to build covered bike routes with ventilation fans all through the metroplex?
That's an unfortunate aspect of global warming I don't see talked about a lot, as more places approach wet bulb, any kind of physical activity outdoor will become deadly.
For me it's moreso the cold. But the act of biking should warm you up anyway. I think it really depends. The pathways are definitely clear, the question is if the weather would make someone drive vs bike.
I would've expected winter time to invalidate options of bike transport, but in city areas where the snow doesn't stay down, it doesn't end up happening as much. You'd of course want to bundle up for the weather, but then it's not so bad. NJB has even talked about how there are some areas of the world that have permafrost under them, and they still prefer bikes. Rain, in my experience, is just miserable either way, so I'd usually prefer the flexibility to go when a downpour has halted rather than keeping a dedicated roof-mobile around to force my way through. That said, buses have been great for rain too, so again, flexibility.
The sweaty mess remark matches with my experience when I was unused to cycling, and when going uphill. The former becomes less true after even just a week or two of experience on the pedals; I didn't even need a ton of acclimation after recovering from a leg injury. The latter may be a symptom of poorer city planning - which prefers bikes treading flatlands for long distances. It shouldn't end up being tiring when you're basically moving your legs in a walking motion at a low pace (traveling for chores is naturally going to be very different from the Tour de France).
Hang on, the sweating goes down with more experience? I was under the assumption it'd just stay that way.
What it really comes down to for biking in the winter is how cold it is vs how much biking itself warms you up. I think most of the time it's probably fine, but there are definitely conditions where it'd be unsafe but a car wouldn't be.
What bothers me is that climate change is making those conditions more frequent, but biking is a good solution to combat emissions too.
At my old job we had showers there, so in the morning I'd just grab a quick bite and pedal off with my change of clothes in my backpack, and shower when I got there.
I still would love to see a YouTube channel that takes the audio of car ads, and re-edits it with shots of the car in question just sitting in traffic.
Not to mention that well built mass transit achieves the same level of freedom. You'll wait 5 minutes for the train and away you go.