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nobody seems to be walking much in the bottom picture.
it looks like a nice climate (palm trees). This isn't practical in many places due to weather. Here in Missouri it's too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter to walk anywhere. LOL
nobody seems to be walking much in the bottom picture.
it looks like a nice climate (palm trees). This isn't practical in many places due to weather. Here in Missouri it's too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter to walk anywhere. LOL
20yrsinBranson
Missouri isn't colder than large cities that do have lots of pedestrians. NYC is similar or slightly colder. Boston colder. And people walk and deal with the weather because it makes sense. I used to walk (along with many others) in undergraduate in a location colder than Missouri.* To be shielded from the weather is just a creature comfort that many there neither expect nor are used to.
And not sure about Montreal, but it seems a bit of a walking city, even if the winter is brutal. As for heat, there aren't really any really walkable cities in hot climates, but elsewhere in the world they exist.
*If I didn't dry my hair before walking to class, I'd discover my hair was hard — cause it had froze!
Oh cool, thanks for the info dude...I didn't know cars were autonomous beings, last I checked (which was about 20 minutes ago when I drove somewhere) PEOPLE USE CARS.
I understand that I'm just going to get the canned response of "well pedestrian walkable scale vs auto centric scale", but to compare the two as one being for "people" and one being for "cars" is by far one of the most idiotic arguments that anyone can make on these forums (or any forum for that matter) and makes it sound as if cars are some alien species that are taking over our habitat or something. Now come to think of it, I bet there'll be a few people here who actually would argue that...please don't, because you'd sincerely have to be the epitome of a moron to believe something that far out there.
I emphatically agree .
Quote:
Originally Posted by chirack
I am different, I think drive thru's are useful modern inventions that have an place and an use. It allows you to pick up the food and take it somewhere else to eat(like home). Drive thru ATMS as well as banking windows very useful when you are not doing an complex transaction. Drive thru pharmacy perfect when you need to pick up something on the way to do something else or drop off an prescription.
True. Drive-thrus are also useful when you're on your way to somewhere else, i.e. cashing a check at the bank before going to the grocery store. The presence of drive-thrus also thins out the lines for those who choose to park and go inside.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ohiogirl81
Modern cars are not very comfortable to sleep in, and, as the demise of the drive-in theater has proven, not very comfortable to watch a movie in, either. A subcompact is a whole different animal from Dad's 1966 Ford station wagon.
Most modern cars are quite cramped, and are only good for getting to point A to point B before your joints feel lock up. A big, full-size car has a lot more "utility" than a contemporary compact or mid-sized; I also feel that quite a few people would better understand auto-centrism if their baseline was a full-size car on the open highway rather than a subcompact on a congested street. When you have a vehicle that can pretty much do anything and go anywhere as long as the gas tank is filled up, it makes (or made) walking and train rides seem antiquated and limiting by comparison. It doesn't make car dependency into a good idea, but it does make it more understandable.
Missouri isn't colder than large cities that do have lots of pedestrians. NYC is similar or slightly colder. Boston colder. And people walk and deal with the weather because it makes sense. I used to walk (along with many others) in undergraduate in a location colder than Missouri.* To be shielded from the weather is just a creature comfort that many there neither expect nor are used to.
And not sure about Montreal, but it seems a bit of a walking city, even if the winter is brutal. As for heat, there aren't really any really walkable cities in hot climates, but elsewhere in the world they exist.
*If I didn't dry my hair before walking to class, I'd discover my hair was hard — cause it had froze!
We have Charleston and Savannah (bith hot both walkable) and DC can be horrible in mid-late summer withh unbelievable humidity and is one of the best cities in the US from walkability standpoint. and many old cities have quite walkable districts (Miami Beach, French Quarter, etc.
In hot cities they use to be extra wide shaded areas for pedestrians such as colonnades in central and South America or galleries like you see in Galveston and New Orleans. This provided protection from brutal sun and offered a place for people to duck under and continue business in the event of sudden powerful rainstorms (common in the tropics). Now of course those deep shaded sidewalks are home to some of the best cafes in the world.
Most modern cars are quite cramped, and are only good for getting to point A to point B before your joints feel lock up. A big, full-size car has a lot more "utility" than a contemporary compact or mid-sized; I also feel that quite a few people would better understand auto-centrism if their baseline was a full-size car on the open highway rather than a subcompact on a congested street. When you have a vehicle that can pretty much do anything and go anywhere as long as the gas tank is filled up, it makes (or made) walking and train rides seem antiquated and limiting by comparison. It doesn't make car dependency into a good idea, but it does make it more understandable.
Maybe if you're on the large side. If there's no one in the back seat, you can always push your seat back a bit. The mid-size cars aren't that big, but the largest cars just seem harder to manuever, I'd personally prefer a compact.
How is this different from having to walk to each of those different locations to perform a the simple tasks? It's not just autocentric design that's scattered destinations across wide swatch of the city; economic factors also weigh in. For instance, my credit union moved from downtown Cincinnati to a commercial/industrial neighborhood near downtown for cheap rent. If I lived downtown, I'd have to make a special trip via bus to get to the credit union. Doesn't matter if it's via bus or car, it's still a special trip. I couldn't stop for milk and Tylenol on the way.
Oh, and you can pick up milk and Tylenol in the same location in the 'burbs thanks to those big ol' sprawling supermarkets; my bank even has a branch at my favorite grocery store. So that's just one trip ... which I make on my way home from work, when the car's already up and running.
But, hey, if you need milk for a recipe, better get in your car because that big box hypermarket ran almost all the convenience stores out of business. Even if you go to a convenience store, chances are it's too inconvenient to not drive to.
But, all that being said, your solution, then, isn't to re-focus on making cities more walkable, but to hyper-concentrate uses?
The unintended consequence of which would be an increased reliance on the automobile as residents would, on average, live further away from destinations, which would result result in further construction of car-centric infrastructure, which would depress pedestrian rates, which would support the idea that people don't walk anyway.
I say walkable neighborhoods. That means having things (not everything, just a valuable plurality of things) that are close enough and comfortable enough (almost no-one walks along or across an expressway or other major high-speed thoroughfare) to walk to. I don't say we should outright replace cars with transit for PT's own sake.
Last edited by darkeconomist; 08-26-2013 at 02:59 PM..
Most modern cars are quite cramped, and are only good for getting to point A to point B before your joints feel lock up. A big, full-size car has a lot more "utility" than a contemporary compact or mid-sized; I also feel that quite a few people would better understand auto-centrism if their baseline was a full-size car on the open highway rather than a subcompact on a congested street. When you have a vehicle that can pretty much do anything and go anywhere as long as the gas tank is filled up, it makes (or made) walking and train rides seem antiquated and limiting by comparison. It doesn't make car dependency into a good idea, but it does make it more understandable.
As most people live in and around cities, and not out in the boonies in Podunkville, the idea of the "open highway" is fiction. Congestion is the natural result of the concentration of uses--jobs, entertainment, residence. If you start from fiction as your baseline, you get absurdity as your expectation.
And, considering that most people drive alone with an empty car (or truck or SUV) most of the time, the net benefit--comparing total benefit to you and society vs. the costs borne by you and society--is negative for full-sized vehicles.
But, hey, if you need milk for a recipe, better get in your car because that big box hypermarket ran almost all the convenience stores out of business. Even if you go to a convenience store, chances are it's too inconvenient to not drive to.
But, all that being said, your solution, then, isn't to re-focus on making cities more walkable, but to hyper-concentrate uses?
The unintended consequence of which would be an increased reliance on the automobile as residents would, on average, live further away from destinations, which would result result in further construction of car-centric infrastructure, which would depress pedestrian rates, which would support the idea that people don't walk anyway.
I say walkable neighborhoods. That means having things (not everything, just a valuable plurality of things) that are close enough and comfortable enough (almost no-one walks along or across an expressway or other major high-speed thoroughfare) to walk to. I don't say we should outright replace cars with transit for PT's own sake.
Now that gave me a laugh. Supermarkets have driven the convenience stores out of business? 7-11 did close both its stores in my suburban city, but good heavens, you can buy milk at the gas stations, milk at Walgreen's, Target, Walmart, and just about everywhere else. Hey, it's a free market. If 7-11 wasn't making it, tough darts.
Yup, plenty of convenience stores still around. There's two within walking distance. Sure, it's much more convenient for me to drive to them rather than walk, but what's wrong with that? You invent the wheel and then ban its usage because it's better than just dragging stuff in a sled? Talk about stupid. There's really never any serious amount of congestion on my way to one of the several hypermarkets (I feel so European) let alone the even greater number of convenience stores at any time of the day. Now, if you're talking about my driving (or really everyone having to drive) in to and from San Francisco, then there's some really negative costs due to congestion. Simply put, there's inadequate road capacity going into and out of San Francisco for 6-8 hours out of the day, and probably more. The greater Bay Area has insufficient freeway capacity for much of the day as well, although if you're talking short trips such as to the grocery store those are often not that congested even if the freeways since the roads are properly designed to avoid people using neighborhood streets for traveling long distances.
In the Bay Area, maybe the answer isn't more roads. It's really at the density where the car alone just isn't going to cut it and a comprehensive regional transit system would make more sense. But yeah, that's extremely costly not just to build but also to maintain. BART has only funded half of the $15 billion in necessary maintenance to the existing infrastructure. Nothing new, Bay Area roads are probably even worse for funding than BART is. Fix what you got before building more when you can't even maintain the existing infrastructure. Cheaper in the long-run since you can only defer maintenance for so long. With SF Muni operations account of more than two thirds of San Francisco's transportation budget (exceeding spending on road maintenance by nearly 10:1), so there's really not much left over for improvements.
Last edited by Malloric; 08-26-2013 at 07:35 PM..
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