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To me, the central question is whether marathon running is more popular amongst parts of a community with more political clout, and whether this explains the ho
by drcode 7y ago
To me, the central question is whether marathon running is more popular amongst parts of a community with more political clout, and whether this explains the how participants manage to impose inconveniences (and potentially more serious harms, as suggested in this paper) on the rest of the community by staging a marathon.
- maxerickson 7y agoOr just whether the events are imposed on the communities or welcomed by them. There is also likely an opportunity to reduce the harm while still holding marathons.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- drcode 7y agoPeople can just run in a circle in a park, so yes.
- maxerickson 7y agoThe shorter the course, the fewer people that can participate simultaneously. When I said "marathons" above, I was talking about the event still being quite similar to what they are right now.
- ip26 7y agoThis is maybe a tangent but if everything collapses when one road is closed that suggests a system lacking resiliency.
- lettergram 7y agoTypically it’s not one road... it’s a large portion of a city. For instance, in the town I live when a marathon happens I have to drive out of town, then back in, to get to the other side of town.
- ken 7y agoTrue, but you don't need a marathon to tell you that. Just go anywhere downtown at rush hour on a weekday. Every 5 minutes, some driver will enter the box before it's clear, and block the intersection both ways for everybody. A couple months ago, a package truck crashed on the freeway a mile ahead of me, and traffic didn't move for over 3 hours. Our roads are not designed with redundancy as a primary concern.
- cma 7y agoNot exactly what you meant, but I believe the interstate highway system was designed for redundancy for military mobility as a primary concern after WWII because of how easily rail could be taken out.
- dmix 7y agoIt's never just one road... they're long distance marathons not foot races.
- Johnny555 7y agoI always thought it was the sheer number of people that wanted to participate - 10,000 runners and at least twice that number of spectators (assuming that every runner has at least one person interested in watching, some bring a whole family). I don't know what marathon traffic is like in most cities, but I've driven across San Francisco many times during the marathon and it's never been as bad as during normal rush-hour traffic. (edit: I guess I understated the number of runners/spectators, the SF marathon claims 27,000 runners and 80,000 spectators)