Foraker

Imagining a post-car future https://www.salon.com/2023/04/09/is-a-post-car-future-actually-possible-experts-say-yes-heres-how-we-could-get-there/

I saw a maybe-I-can-roll-through-without-fully-stopping cyclist almost get creamed by a driver turning right on red. Driver was probably looking left, and suffered from that all-too-common "broken turn signal" syndrome that so many drivers these days are experiencing. Car was stopped, cyclist rolled up and stood on his pedals to see over the cars, front car suddenly turned right across the cyclist's path. Cyclist stopped very suddenly and fell over. Cursing up a storm, no doubt. Be careful out there. Are you saying that the use of traffic lights is what has made cycling unpopular? I would agree that ebikes could make biking (particularly within a city) much more practical and useful -- getting up hills, more consistent speeds, lovely instant torque at stops (but I still think the US is going to go for overkill and keep increasing the speed and power far beyond what is necessary and safe).

If we're specifically talking about red light cameras, isn't running a red light a pretty clear violation? This isn't a speeding issue and calibrating speed guns or whatnot. Just a camera, reviewed by a police officer, and video evidence of a vehicle running a red light. Contestable in court like any other ticket, but probably a tough reverse. Running a red light is a clear safety issue. They already levy a fine against the car, not the driver (no points on license). How about "any car that runs a red light must pay $400 or get a tire boot for three days"? Your objection to an due process might be the "automatic" nature of a fine levied without an assigned court date. That's easily fixed and is a process objection not an objection to using traffic cameras.

I understand your point. But class 1 and class 2 ebikes that are limited to 20mph accelerate just as quickly as class 3 ebikes, and you'll go farther at slower speeds. If you mean you need to go faster because people need to cover longer distances in less time, sadly you're riding on some pretty bike-unfriendly streets in 'merica. We should work together on changing that.

Yes, having traffic going at the same speed is safest, but as @Lazarus noted there are reasons for cyclists not to be driving 30mph. Even fast cars still get in accidents, and they're a lot more stable than a bike. I'm certainly in favor of finding ways to lower car speeds to 20mph and increasing cycling speeds to 20mph in urban zones. But only raising the cycling speed to 20mph isn't going to help grandma or my five-year-old bike to the grocery more safely.

I understand the feeling, but it's not rational. If even a small car hits a cyclist (or a parked driver opens a car door in front of a cyclist's path), the speed of the cyclist, whether 5mph or 30mph, is pretty much irrelevant -- the cyclist is going to lose.

And this is why we advocate for bicycle highways and separated bike lanes -- you definitely wouldn't want a cyclist (particularly your kid or your elderly parent) "sharing the lane" with a heavy vehicle with both users distracted by their cell phones as everyone seems to be these days. The Dutch can give a masterclass on cycle highways. On the other hand, the US always thinks that more power is better, so in the US electric bikes can go much faster than is permitted in much of Europe -- too fast for a path shared with pedestrians but still slow compared to the much larger vehicles on the road. Electric scooters are losing some of their luster. https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/02/paris-votes-overwhelmingly-to-ban-shared-e-scooters/ But larger electric Vespa-types, with more power than an electric bicycle (and better brakes in most cases), but less power than most motorcycles, may be more popular if they can keep up with traffic (and at least on city streets that should be the case).

Yet part of the reason why automakers made the move to SUVs is because they are classified as "trucks" and therefore are not held to the same CAFE standards as cars -- so it's hard to believe that fuel economy requirements are behind the trend of higher prices in what most people are buying -- SUVs and trucks. I suspect that the relatively low price of gasoline, which when adjusted for inflation has remained relatively steady except for a few periods of high prices that we simply "weathered" until now, has meant that consumers care more about "what extras can I get" than a few extra mpg in gas mileage. And automakers were happy to oblige. https://www.offgridweb.com/transportation/infographic-a-history-of-gas-prices-adjusted-for-inflation/ And adding batteries is adding a lot of cost to future cars. The average person is soon going to be paying a huge proportion of their income to have and drive a personal car. Lack of investment in transit infrastructure is going to bite the poor and middle class in the A$$, and they don't (want to) see it coming.

The We'd Rather Just Have A Park people are going to burst into flames when they see this....

The fact that the Ohio Constitution can't be printed out and read by the average citizen is something that really bugs me. Too much that should be legislation has been incorporated into the state constitution. But as much as I'd like to see a simpler constitution replace it, given the current minority rule by gerrymander, executive and legislative polices of ignoring the judiciary on such things as DeRolph and redistricting (and the public when public opinion is inconvenient), I would not trust our legislators to craft a constitution that would reflect the will of the people of this state.

And maybe some of us will want to travel before we're old enough to drive, and after we're too old to drive!

Go read the whole article. I plan to buy the book it is excerpted from. https://harpers.org/archive/2023/04/henry-grabar-paved-paradise/

I was in Europe recently and flew several budget airlines once across the pond -- Ryanair and easyJet. Zero first-class or business-class seats. Slightly more legroom than economy in most US airlines, but the seats were "normal" comfort compared to economy class seats on the major US airlines. And yes, you paid for every bag and the cost differential started at smaller, lighter bags than in the US. Lots of people brought only one bag and it went in the overhead bin but was 2/3 the size of an American carry-on. I will have no hesitation to use budget airlines for my next intra-European trip. (the trains were a lot nicer than the airlines and that will always be my first choice, but east-west travel isn't as easy)

I agree, incremental investment is how Europe grew its network so we know it works -- but I need to clarify that I was not talking about the Texas HSR but Elon Musk's plans for Hyperloop -- the train in a vacuum tube -- that was supposed to be up and running already but is still in "prototype" stage, at best.

Brightline wins again! (So sorry, Hyperloop.)

So the first statement is only sometimes true, and I agree with the second. Lots and lots of random unpredictable events can wreck a lot of hard work and good intentions. An accident caused by an uninsured motorist. A car that breaks down at the wrong time. Cancer. Natural disasters. Building a business only to see the market shift. Being the last guy or the first guy laid off from a good job -- maybe right after you bought your first house. A lot can wreck years and years of hard work. So sure, you should work hard. But there is zero guarantee that hard work is all you need to escape poverty. And sure, not working hard means you will never escape poverty. Because it's so much fun, why leave the party?

I'm all in favor of not demanding perfection when something good enough comes along, but we have to push for something better or we'll just get more of this. In thirty years all this investment will be trashed rather than loved. Hooray.

Whew. Thank god they didn't forget the parking. Without it they might not have had the desired But at least there's a nice bus stop, right? Somewhere?

Absolutely, there were both Democratic and Republican mayors in the 1980s who would do anything to stop the crack epidemic. But "progressives" were not in anything close to a majority in the Democratic Party then or now. It is laughable to suggest that mayors at the time were seeking to adopt "progressive" policies. Yes, crack was cheaper (and more so it was just the new kid on the block), but it was decidedly not cheaper to manufacture. Crack is made from powdered cocaine -- you make powdered cocaine, then you add a strong base and water and heat it to remove the water and produce a solid form of cocaine. Extra steps, extra energy -- crack is more expensive to make than powdered cocaine. What made crack cheaper was not the manufacturing process. And in fact it might be a myth that crack was significantly cheaper. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9519487/ While crack was creating an epidemic in poor African-American communities, and those communities (and the people who cared about them) were desperate to find a solution, there certainly were some politicians who were more than happy to crack down on those populations in ways that they would not have approved of if applied to white populations. That may be why there was such widespread bipartisan support for those policies. At the same time, I agree that it was far from universal -- mostly people were just desperate to end the epidemic, no matter what. So while I agree that overall the policies of stricter enforcement of crack vs. powder were not primarily initiated for racist reasons (these policies were not put in place primarily out of racist intent), a racial-biased impact certainly resulted and the consequences persist.

As the legislature looks to cut taxes again, a look back at tax cuts in the past 20 years and a question about whether Ohioans are better off. https://www.cleveland.com/news/2023/03/ohio-has-been-cutting-income-taxes-for-almost-20-years-are-ohioans-better-off.html The article's conclusion is that "looking at it from both sides, no conclusions are certain" -- but from the charts presented it sure seems like the wealthy are better off and the poor are worse off, and on almost all measures Ohio is below the national averages.

Ah, that damned "progressive groupthink" again!

Yes, but it also was tailored to more significantly impact minority communities. With greater penalties for African-Americans who were using crack, compared to the whites using cocaine. Same drug, different treatment. "Coincidentally?" Also, by focusing on the supply side and not the demand side there was a greater impact on the poor, mostly minority people desperate enough to sell and distribute, rather than the relatively wealthier and whiter users (particularly of marijuana, cocaine, ecstasy). And by criminalizing drugs coming north but not guns going south (and in fact making it easier to buy lots of guns in the US) there was a disparate impact on armed violence in Mexico and Latin America, and arguably the money and guns from the US destabilized Mexico and countries in Latin America -- which added to the scary MIGRANT CARAVANS issue. We have recently started using drug courts to divert addicted to treatment rather than jail. States have in some cases eliminated the distinctions between crack and powdered cocaine. And we have legalized marijuana (some places). Baby steps, but progress both in reducing the disparate treatment of minorities and more effectively in combating drug crime. The impact of drug use and huge numbers of African-American men with felony drug convictions will impact minority communities for a generations. Like the housing discrimination, the problem is not solved overnight. The effects linger for a long, long time.

Don't underestimate those "lingering results." Redlining depressed real estate values and investment in some neighborhoods for generations. When redlining ended (maybe not completely gone until 1970s or 1980s), it did not suddenly increase the value of those neighborhoods to match the neighborhoods with similar development patterns but where investment did occur. We have neighborhoods in the Cleveland area where all the houses are very reasonably priced (and often very poorly maintained), but you can hardly get a loan because the entire neighborhood looks like crap and the bank is s**tting itself thinking of the losses they'll take if they have to repossess. That lingering depressed home value is keeping banks from investing in neighborhoods still today.

Seems long overdue for the fiscal-responsibility pro-life party to get behind this issue.

Sure, you live in the US, which is built with the car in mind. You cannot get around most US cities without a car. You can't get to work or the grocery or to school or to church without a car. It's a cost-of-living-tax that we pay in the US (and the sprawling infrastructure that goes along with it -- more miles of roadway, water lines, sewer lines, gas lines, power lines, phone lines, etc., all of which has to be built and maintained) and lots of other countries don't. Congratulations. You get buy and maintain a car and have to drive to the gym to get exercise, the Dutch get their exercise walking and biking to work, get free medical care and education, and 20+ days of vacation a year. U.S.A for the win? If you lived in a city built around walking and later modified for the car -- most of Europe, lots of Asia -- even owning a car would be far more expense and hassle than it would be worth for a lot of people. We should better fund transit and re-think how we build our cities to lower the cost of living. (Sure, you can still live out in the outer outer burbs and drive your car -- but you shouldn't HAVE to have a car.)