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And that would make sense if we were talking about Mayberry with a population of 1,500. But in this case, the drop observed in St. Paul was from around 26,000 in July to 2,400 in January. Does the drop have to be from 1,000,000 to 100,000 to make it statistically significant?
This doesn't answer the question of why counts would drop so precipitously when the mercury drops. Is a train, bus or car a more accessible mode of transportation, in several American cities, during the month of January? It seems these alternative modes of transportation would be as accessible in May as they are in February.
I understand the drop, but what are the numbers for the comparative city?
They are probably just as accessible in May as in February. The conditions changed though in February and so if the drop in convenience for biking was about *this* much, then that can be just enough to tip it, but it doesn't tell you an overall magnitude of how much worse it is.
There's no denying that among major cities in the US, the Twin Cities is probably the coldest. Perhaps that's where we're putting "brutal" winter at, so where are we putting "brutal" summers? Is it Phoenix then? Would that be the appropriate comparison? I don't think it's Miami due to the somewhat tempering effects of the ocean, but I am still interested in the cycling counts.
Also, what qualifies as brutal and are we talking about living in these places at just the height of their respective seasons or are we talking about living year round?
I understand the drop, but what are the numbers for the comparative city?
Total numbers are not going to be apples-to-apples for pedestrian counts. Some cities have people stand out and count pedestrians for 2 hours, some count pedestrians for 8 hours, others have sophisticated software that tracks pedestrians for 24 hours, some have 10 counting locations and others have 100 counting locations. So there's not as much value in comparing pedestrian counts between two different cities as there is comparing counts within the same cities during different times of the year.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
They are probably just as accessible in May as in February. The conditions changed though in February and so if the drop in convenience for biking was about *this* much, then that can be just enough to tip it, but it doesn't tell you an overall magnitude of how much worse it is.
I don't understand what you mean by "the conditions changed though in February." What does that mean?
Saying that counts dropped by 90% because different modes of transportation became more accessible to them in January that were less accessible in November or October seems like mental gymnastics to avoid the obvious conclusion that cold weather causes fewer people to go out. We even see this effect outside of pedestrian and cycling counts. Bars and restaurants, for example, experience "slow" season in January and February and have their lowest revenues of the year. Overall, consumer spending goes down in the winter because fewer people leave the house.
There's no denying that among major cities in the US, the Twin Cities is probably the coldest. Perhaps that's where we're putting "brutal" winter at, so where are we putting "brutal" summers? Is it Phoenix then? Would that be the appropriate comparison? I don't think it's Miami due to the somewhat tempering effects of the ocean, but I am still interested in the cycling counts.
I think that's a slightly more subjective question because humidity plays a bigger role in summer. 19 degrees in Minneapolis will almost always feel colder than 29 degrees anywhere else, but 90 degrees in Miami or New Orleans can actually feel hotter than 100 degrees somewhere else due to varying levels of humidity. That really comes down to a "pick your poison" type of situation.
Total numbers are not going to be apples-to-apples for pedestrian counts. Some cities have people stand out and count pedestrians for 2 hours, some count pedestrians for 8 hours, others have sophisticated software that tracks pedestrians for 24 hours, some have 10 counting locations and others have 100 counting locations. So there's not as much value in comparing pedestrian counts between two different cities as there is comparing counts within the same cities during different times of the year.
I don't understand what you mean by "the conditions changed though in February." What does that mean?
Saying that counts dropped by 90% because different modes of transportation became more accessible to them in January that were less accessible in November or October seems like mental gymnastics to avoid the obvious conclusion that cold weather causes fewer people to go out. We even see this effect outside of pedestrian and cycling counts. Bars and restaurants, for example, experience "slow" season in January and February and have their lowest revenues of the year. Overall, consumer spending goes down in the winter because fewer people leave the house.
Yea, I can see the difficulties with counting pedestrians and bicyclists. I missed the count you were giving for Miami-Dade since I'm in and out of the topic. What'd you get for the source?
Conditions changed in February as in it's winter as opposed to early summer / late May. I'm not saying the different modes of transportation are more accessible in January. I'm saying the decision is different since the comparative advantage of biking or walking on the streets changes with the season. This is in line with what you're saying. How "bad" it is though is hard to ascertain because once you hit a "threshold", then people just opt for the alternatives like using transit or walking the skyways. I get what you're saying, I just think pedestrian counts is going to be a hard way to figure out though I do like going with consumer spending. One potential issue with consumer spending, but I'm not sure if can be adjusted is that February is the dead of winter and not part of any holiday season whereas summer is traditionally holiday spending time.
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Originally Posted by BajanYankee
I think that's a slightly more subjective question because humidity plays a bigger role in summer. 19 degrees in Minneapolis will almost always feel colder than 29 degrees anywhere else, but 90 degrees in Miami or New Orleans can actually feel hotter than 100 degrees somewhere else due to varying levels of humidity. That really comes down to a "pick your poison" type of situation.
I think Phoenix is usually pretty high up on top. If we're citing the Twin Cities as the example for brutal winters and Phoenix as the example for brutal summers, then I would generally go with the Twin Cities.
Are we talking about where to live like in terms of year round or are we talking about *solely* being there for the worst of each respective season?
What is easier to tolerate? I'm not elderly yet, but when we move, I hope we stay forever. What do you think is hardest on the elderly?
At 70 years old, I chose the "brutal summers" of Texas over the "brutal winters" of Illinois.
I don't have to shovel heat off my driveway.
I don't have to scrape heat off my windshield.
I'm not going to slip on the heat stepping off my front porch.
I get into the car in Texas and the A/C is blowing cold in 30 seconds; it took my heater 20 minutes to start blowing warm in Illinois.
There is never a day that a Texas so hot that I can't get into my car and drive wherever I want to go...that's not true for Illinois winters.
There is never a day in Texas when the summer weather is so bad that I can't get into my car and drive to a medical appointment...that's not true of the winters of Illinois.
Last edited by Ralph_Kirk; 08-01-2023 at 03:15 PM..
Yea, I can see the difficulties with counting pedestrians and bicyclists. I missed the count you were giving for Miami-Dade since I'm in and out of the topic. What'd you get for the source?
There was no count for Miami. If you look at the source, it tells you how far above or below the annual average cycling and pedestrian counts are. It provides an average number of daily riders on weekdays and weekends, so you can arrive at a total number with some math (67 riders per day x 30 x 75 locations = 150,750 monthly cyclists), but it's tough to get a complete 1:1 comparison because cities use different methodologies.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
Conditions changed in February as in it's winter as opposed to early summer / late May. I'm not saying the different modes of transportation are more accessible in January. I'm saying the decision is different since the comparative advantage of biking or walking on the streets changes with the season. This is in line with what you're saying. How "bad" it is though is hard to ascertain because once you hit a "threshold", then people just opt for the alternatives like using transit or walking the skyways.
One, a number of those people, like the people on the Lakewalk Trail in Duluth or the Beltline in Atlanta, are recreational walkers. These are all cities with low transit rates anyway so it's unlikely there's some massive shift to public transit during the winter. You could probably pull monthly transit stats and find out though I wouldn't be surprised if ridership actually goes down in winter.
Two, the reason we got onto this topic is because we were talking about vibrancy. Not which city is more vibrant per se, but how extreme weather reduces vibrancy. One measure of vibrancy--one that we have often talked about on C-D for years--is foot traffic. The bottomline is that cold weather seems to depress pedestrian and cycling counts more than hot weather.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
One potential issue with consumer spending, but I'm not sure if can be adjusted is that February is the dead of winter and not part of any holiday season whereas summer is traditionally holiday spending time.
You still need to explain why January and February are the lowest. Sure, July is a holiday month, but September and October are not.
In theory, there's no reason why people can't go to bars, restaurants or have outdoor concerts in the middle of January as much as they do in May.
Last edited by BajanYankee; 08-01-2023 at 03:21 PM..
There was no count for Miami. If you look at the source, it tells you how far above or below the annual average cycling and pedestrian counts are. It provides an average number of daily riders on weekdays and weekends, so you can arrive at a total number with some math (67 riders per day x 30 x 75 locations = 150,750 monthly cyclists), but it's tough to get a complete 1:1 comparison because cities use different methodologies.
One, a number of those people, like the people on the Lakewalk Trail in Duluth or the Beltline in Atlanta, are recreational walkers. These are all cities with low transit rates anyway so it's unlikely there's some massive shift to public transit during the winter. You could probably pull monthly transit stats and find out though I wouldn't be surprised if ridership actually goes down in winter.
Two, the reason we got onto this topic is because we were talking about vibrancy. Not which city is more vibrant per se, but how extreme weather reduces vibrancy. One measure of vibrancy--one that we have often talked about on C-D for years--is foot traffic. The bottomline is that cold weather seems to depress pedestrian and cycling counts more than hot weather.
You still need to explain why January and February are the lowest. Sure, July is a holiday month, but September and October are not.
In theory, there's no reason why people can't go to bars, restaurants or have outdoor concerts in the middle of January any less than they do in May.
Vibrancy makes sense as a measurement. I think it makes more sense than cycling since nightlife areas in most of the US also have other modes of getting there. I think with that, what you said about revenue during winter months ties into that well. I think I'm still not sure about the vibrancy part in terms of brutal summers and brutal winters. Twin Cities as brutal winter makes sense. So what then is a brutal summer? It's not South Beach since those bodies of water do temper it a bit. Is brutal summer then Phoenix this past month? I think if we can try to get an idea of measuring how that went in comparison to say December or January in Phoenix, then that's pretty good.
I think the larger question is still where are we benchmarking cold weather and where are we benchmarking hot weather, and I also think for vibrancy at the worst of each for each respective entry, the winter will probably have lower vibrancy, but I don't think cycling numbers are a very good way to do it because the numbers are small compared to the overall population and most people will have alternative means to get around. St. Paul's numbers are supposedly good for a US city and they don't amount to very much, and I don't think Miami's counts are going to be so high that they would be a particularly good representative either though I reckon it's probably good in Miami Beach, but I also don't think that counts as having brutal summers.
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Originally Posted by BajanYankee
Actually, here's transit ridership by month in the Twin Cities for 2019.
Vibrancy makes sense as a measurement. I think it makes more sense than cycling since nightlife areas in most of the US also have other modes of getting there. I think with that, what you said about revenue during winter months ties into that well.
It all factors in. When people think of vibrancy, they think of lots of different things, but a big one is going to be people walking around and even cycling. Those two things generally go hand in hand and likely correlate with other things such as attendance at public parks. I doubt there are many days where you have 10K cyclists with empty parks. Conversely, I doubt there are many days where you have 3 total cyclists and pedestrians with full parks.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
I think I'm still not sure about the vibrancy part in terms of brutal summers and brutal winters. Twin Cities as brutal winter makes sense. So what then is a brutal summer? It's not South Beach since those bodies of water do temper it a bit. Is brutal summer then Phoenix this past month? I think if we can try to get an idea of measuring how that went in comparison to say December or January in Phoenix, then that's pretty good.
The pedestrian numbers were for Miami-Dade and only a few locations were actually in Miami Beach. That aside, a "brutal" summer is still a bit subjective since some people can take dry heat but can't take humidity and vice versa.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
I don't think cycling numbers are a very good way to do it because the numbers are small compared to the overall population and most people will have alternative means to get around.
Yeah, but cycling and pedestrian counts were provided.
And really, if we're going to discard cycling counts, then we might as well discard pedestrian counts too because they are also small compared to the overall population and trips taken.
The number of people who just ride a bike for pure recreation is significantly larger than the number who ride a bike to work. Yet I think earlier in this discussion you were more focused on the latter, hence your comments about people switching over to different transit modes.
Last edited by BajanYankee; 08-01-2023 at 04:22 PM..
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