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Crazy how... (thelemmy.club)
submitted 4 weeks ago by to c/fuckcars@lemmy.world
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crazy how trains take 37 years of committees but a million flock cameras and data centers can go up in a month
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[–] 12 points 4 weeks ago (22 children)

No they don't. I don't have a car. You think I'm gonna walk down the new freeway they build next to My home? Maybe I'll rollerblade down it.

Traditional roads provide transportation to everyone, but those don't need a big government project to build. All you need is a pair of shoes, and you'll wear a road into the dirt over time.

Roads built for cars? They isolate us. They put a deadly barrier between you and your neighbours. Keep your kids inside and give them a phone, it's dangerous out on the street! Pay attention when you're outside and don't wear headphones or look at your phone. And if you have impaired vision or movement? Then fuck you, get run over. Even if you're healthy, you have to wait at a traffic light just to cross the street in some places. Roads slow down movement for people.

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  • [–] 7 points 4 weeks ago (3 children)

    Exactly. Here's a visual representation of what we sacrifice to roads. And that's only the standard 1 lane either direction road. Imagine the chasm if it were depicting a multi-lane highway.

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  • [–] -3 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago) (2 children)

    How much room do you need to walk? Go to any park and the trails through the wildlife is barely a foot wide. The argument doesn’t work, we do what we can to minimize the space we use when out in nature already, yet now we are gonna claim we need everything? That’s hypocrisy.

    Roads are needed to transport goods and services at a reasonable cost.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago

    That's assuming that, first, as a common area, the space roads take up would be only used for walking, and second, that this is a low density area.

    Some streets - mostly commercial ones - have heavy foot traffic and sidewalks are always flush with people. Having the whole street available as a pedestrian is much more comfortable for everyone, and it also give spaces for art, activities, lounging areas, etc.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 weeks ago (13 children)

    How do you think your food and other needs gets to you, what do buses operate on? How does your mail get delivered.

    You use roads.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago*

    I don't think the user implied we should have no roads ever though, no? I may be losing track of who you've replied to.

    I'd say the majority of even the fully car free urbanist crowd, which is a pretty narrow and more radical version, still want roads for access to things like delivery vehicles or emergency vehicles, even if they want a total ban on private cars. They're just pointing out we spend a huge cost on roads in terms of space that we don't often consider and sometimes should when deciding if a full road is really necessary.

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  • [–] 0 points 4 weeks ago (11 children)

    Buses are shit. They're a way to shoehorn transit into a network built for cars, and they can never be faster than the cars because they're in the same traffic. (BRT is a special thing to solve this problem.) It would be a net gain if buses went away along with the cars.

    My mail gets delivered by a guy walking.

    Roads and streets built for food delivery vehicles would need to be far smaller, and less extensive. And all of the land for parking lots and interchanges and turn lanes and drive-thrus and gas stations...

    This "you use roads" argument falls flat when the car industry and drivers arrogated all of the space and forced it upon us.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago* (2 children)

    My mail gets delivered by a guy walking

    How many packages do you think the guy can carry at once? Every block as a box that the guy walks to and collects to deliver before moving onto the next. Do you think that they’ve walked all the way from the postal office to your house with your mail…? You can’t seriously think that do you?

    How do you think those get supplied? Your coffee shop? How did they get the utilities in to provide everything to the block?

    You just don’t understand distribution and concept of scale. The argument only falls flat if you ignore major points along the way, like how the mail gets to your guy that walks. Or how those shops get supplies for the food delivery trucks.

    And instead of that, why not multi use high rises? The bottom floor has a coffee shop, grocery store, and other amenities, how would you supply those without a road…?

    You gotta look past your own nose and see the entire picture dude.

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  • [–] -1 points 4 weeks ago (1 child)

    Actually, I live less than half a mile from the post office. I used to work next to it, doing deliveries myself. The carrier brings mail and packages in a van, and parks it at the end of the block, and walks around the neighborhood. For big packages, he may pull up in front of a house. And to do that, all that he needs is a lane maybe 12 feet wide.

    Yet, the street in front of my house has a standard 64-foot wide right-of-way. The pavement is nearly 40 feet wide, so that two cars can pass in opposite directions, with cars parked on either side. It's stupidly big for a residential street, and of course leads to people speeding like mad while using it as a commuter rat-run. It's noisy and dangerous, and polluting.

    I never said anything about abolishing all vehicles. But between the postal carrier, the buses, the garbage, and recycling trucks, about 50 vehicles a day through here would be reasonable. Instead, it's closer to 2,500. There's no reason all those people need a 4,500lb. vehicle just because the postal carrier needs a van.

    Oh, the really funny part is that the street is also a bicycle boulevard; somebody's idea of a sick joke, I think, but still better than the arterial streets. Anyway, there's a local roaster, Cargo Coffee, that delivers their product by cargo bike. I see the delivery guy pedal by here all the time. As well as at least one CSA that delivers by cargo bike.

    The coffee shops don't even need cars to get their beans.

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  • [–] 2 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago)

    he carrier brings mail and packages in a van, and parks it at the end of the block, and walks around the neighborhood.

    So they do need roads!

    the coffee shop doesn’t need road to get beans.

    And just how much more do you think your $1 cup of coffee would be than…? It’s gonna be probably $30-50 dollars. Of course if you don’t think about costs or how it can directly affect you, you can argue whatever you want.

    You don’t need a house to live in either now do you? Look past your nose before making asinine comments like this.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago (7 children)

    Ahh yes, the classic 'I live in a city, so obviously everything can be dense and done by human power alone'. Except for the massive amount of people who don't. I have incredibly few areas in the US or even Europe where no cars or no roads are needed. Can you reduce your reliance on them with a lot of changes? Sure. Can you eliminate them? No.

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  • [–] -1 points 4 weeks ago (5 children)

    We didn't need cars 200 years ago and we don't need them today. Has our technology turned our entire society into a finely tuned swiss watch with no tolerance for change? No! We have better technology than ever for living without cars. Look at this stuff:

    It's easier than ever for town planners to design a small rural town that doesn't need cars.

    The only cars I support are fire trucks and ambulances.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago) (4 children)

    If you pay people who deliver that way an affordable wage, it’s not cost effective in today’s world.

    Not having roads only work when slaves are involved and you don’t care about human life. We’ve moved past that point in history, mostly. But some people always seem to point to it and try to say it’s better. This is the people here.

    Yes there is absolutely other ways to move stuff, no one is saying their isn’t, but are you prepared to pay $50 for coffee or to have nothing other than corn and corn byproducts to eat….? Because that’s the world without the benefit and efficiency of mass hauling on roads. And sure, use slaves to still deliver, because that’s the only way it’s affordable for you. It’s not how the worlds worked for a long ass time now. That’s all we are trying to get people like you to comprehend. If you support slaves so you can have your coffee, you’ve lost it.

    Roads make things more affordable, when people are paid a living a wage instead of being in poverty or slaves, yes there is other ways to move stuff, but… yeah see above lmfao.

    Do you think people would rather haul stuff out of the mountains on foot? Or just have a central place to drop it, they could probably haul out 5x as much in a single day. Instead of 2 baskets. Because one is only doable with roads. But sure, work that guy to the bone so you can have cheap coffee. It’s called the scale of economics, it’s been known for centuries at this point, but when you don’t need to pay….

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  • [–] -1 points 4 weeks ago (3 children)

    You're full of shit. 300 years ago, My neighbourhood didn't have roads, slaves, or even money. Everyone was equal.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago) (2 children)

    Were they free to go elsewhere? Could they without the transportation to make it? How many died while doing so? How could they afford it or afford something like a bike or a boat? Did they even know other places existed and what was there? It probably wasn’t the best life either.

    There’s more than way to be slaved to a place, if you don’t make “money”, or can’t move elsewhere because various reasons. You’re not free.

    You’re not looking at this broad enough. You’re too fixated on yourself. The rose colored glasses some people have of the past is just astounding.

    And without money, what are you? A slave, you contradict yourself in your own statements. Every community has a currency of some sort, everyone’s time is valued, or you are the textbook definition of a slave dude.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 weeks ago

    You don't have a car. Do you receive packages? If you called for medical help, how would it get to you? Most folks if they don't have a car at least want option for a bus, which requires roads. We can't build rail to reach every household (you said freeway next to your home, so that doesn't sound like it's a very downtown situation).

    Perhaps there shouldn't be as many cars on it as you deal with, but the roads themselves..

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  • [–] 0 points 4 weeks ago

    I mean so to trains or any other transportation system. And without those transportation systems, you wouldn't be able to live the life you currently have. Are vehicles the best way to do it? Probably not. Are trains the best way to do it? nope. The best would be to have a blend of all things, and one that works for the majority rather than the minority, but thats difficult especially when one form gains traction over others.

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