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Last night I was listening to audio, went outside for a walk, quiet area, but when a car drove by I couldn’t hear what was being said for maybe 6 seconds, from

Last night I was listening to audio, went outside for a walk, quiet area, but when a car drove by I couldn’t hear what was being said for maybe 6 seconds, from the headphones that were pushed right into my ear holes. What had been a comfortable speech listening volume is dwarfed by ordinary cars, not even modded boy racer cars speeding, just basic sedans doing the speed limit. That’s rather anti-human.

cscurmudgeon 3y ago
> That’s rather anti-human. The car was probably driven by someone who needed to do a human thing. Drivers are not evil Captain Planet villains. The anti-human thing is NIBMYs driving everyone out of cities and preventing density.
- jodrellblank 3y ago
  > "The car was probably driven by someone who needed to do a human thing. Drivers are not evil Captain Planet villains." In other situations where someone annoys hundreds of people, harms the health of hundreds of people, primarily for their own benefit, we'd call that bad, undesirable, and socially shame the person doing it, wouldn't we? The situation is anti-human; it's not a nice situation to exist in as an unaugmented human outside a car, not nice to walk in, to talk in, tarmac road isn't beautiful, vehicle fumes don't smell nice, they're harmful to health, and it's not cheap to build cars and roads everywhere and maintain them. Cars take a huge amount of space to move one person compared to the space of one walking human or one biking human, and they push 'places' further apart to make room for vehicles and car parks. It should be that for such tradeoffs, cars need to have an enormous payback - things which absolutely can't be done without them. For example, emergency services - noisy, but needs to move mutiple people and equipment in a hurry. Delivery vehicles needing to move large quantities of goods around, labour needing to move equipment around. However if it's done for travelling 2 miles because urban design gave no thought to walking or biking so that the only safe and convenient way to cover 2 miles is by car, even though owning a car is a huge cost, that's anti-human design. The NotJustBikes YouTube channel linked above has the message that most people are not 'car people' but will use whatever transport is (the cheapest, the quickest, the most convenient). It's a failing of urban design and big picture thinking when individual car driving is the winner for many short journeys when it could be otherwise. It's a bit of a failure when walking and driving are a sidewalk beside a main road and other routes have no (sidewalks, streetlights, bike lanes, safe crossings, etc). Compare for example the NJB videos: - "Why grocery shopping is better in Amsterdam" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYHTzqHIngk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYHTzqHIngk where he compares shopping for food in Amsterdam with driving to an out of town box store in Canada, and having to drive in Canada. - "Safe cycling showdown - Good vs. Bad city design" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8F5hXqS-Ac https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8F5hXqS-Ac which is a 20 minute video, first 10 minutes is NJB cycling from Amsterdam center to a hardware store ~10Km away on the edge of town, voice overlay is him describing what makes good/bad cycling infrastructure along the way. The next 10 minutes is an equivalent ride in Calgary, Alberta, from city center to out of town hardware store a similar distance, and similar overlay commentary. The contrast is stark.
  - cscurmudgeon 3y ago
    > n other situations where someone annoys hundreds of people, harms the health of hundreds of people, primarily for their own benefit, we'd call that bad, undesirable, and socially shame the person doing it, wouldn't we? Annoying for living vs annoying for entertainment.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - jodrellblank 3y ago
      You're suggesting the people in those cars would die if they couldn't drive at midnight on a Friday night? What would they die of?
abdullahkhalids 3y ago
I listen to stuff on my headphones quite a lot when walking. In my previous city, I never had any hearing problems. I am now in a place where the larger your car (truck), the cooler you are. Its impossible to listen to anything because the cars are so loud. The old cities had smaller cars driving slower.

cscurmudgeon 3y ago

> That’s rather anti-human. The car was probably driven by someone who needed to do a human thing. Drivers are not evil Captain Planet villains. The anti-human thing is NIBMYs driving everyone out of cities and preventing density.

jodrellblank 3y ago
> "The car was probably driven by someone who needed to do a human thing. Drivers are not evil Captain Planet villains." In other situations where someone annoys hundreds of people, harms the health of hundreds of people, primarily for their own benefit, we'd call that bad, undesirable, and socially shame the person doing it, wouldn't we? The situation is anti-human; it's not a nice situation to exist in as an unaugmented human outside a car, not nice to walk in, to talk in, tarmac road isn't beautiful, vehicle fumes don't smell nice, they're harmful to health, and it's not cheap to build cars and roads everywhere and maintain them. Cars take a huge amount of space to move one person compared to the space of one walking human or one biking human, and they push 'places' further apart to make room for vehicles and car parks. It should be that for such tradeoffs, cars need to have an enormous payback - things which absolutely can't be done without them. For example, emergency services - noisy, but needs to move mutiple people and equipment in a hurry. Delivery vehicles needing to move large quantities of goods around, labour needing to move equipment around. However if it's done for travelling 2 miles because urban design gave no thought to walking or biking so that the only safe and convenient way to cover 2 miles is by car, even though owning a car is a huge cost, that's anti-human design. The NotJustBikes YouTube channel linked above has the message that most people are not 'car people' but will use whatever transport is (the cheapest, the quickest, the most convenient). It's a failing of urban design and big picture thinking when individual car driving is the winner for many short journeys when it could be otherwise. It's a bit of a failure when walking and driving are a sidewalk beside a main road and other routes have no (sidewalks, streetlights, bike lanes, safe crossings, etc). Compare for example the NJB videos: - "Why grocery shopping is better in Amsterdam" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYHTzqHIngk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYHTzqHIngk where he compares shopping for food in Amsterdam with driving to an out of town box store in Canada, and having to drive in Canada. - "Safe cycling showdown - Good vs. Bad city design" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8F5hXqS-Ac https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8F5hXqS-Ac which is a 20 minute video, first 10 minutes is NJB cycling from Amsterdam center to a hardware store ~10Km away on the edge of town, voice overlay is him describing what makes good/bad cycling infrastructure along the way. The next 10 minutes is an equivalent ride in Calgary, Alberta, from city center to out of town hardware store a similar distance, and similar overlay commentary. The contrast is stark.
- cscurmudgeon 3y ago
  > n other situations where someone annoys hundreds of people, harms the health of hundreds of people, primarily for their own benefit, we'd call that bad, undesirable, and socially shame the person doing it, wouldn't we? Annoying for living vs annoying for entertainment.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - jodrellblank 3y ago
    You're suggesting the people in those cars would die if they couldn't drive at midnight on a Friday night? What would they die of?

abdullahkhalids 3y ago

I listen to stuff on my headphones quite a lot when walking. In my previous city, I never had any hearing problems. I am now in a place where the larger your car (truck), the cooler you are. Its impossible to listen to anything because the cars are so loud. The old cities had smaller cars driving slower.