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"Scramble" is a funny term for that. I guess it kind of looks like the pedestrians are "scrambling" to an outsider but hopefully most of them know where they're

"Scramble" is a funny term for that. I guess it kind of looks like the pedestrians are "scrambling" to an outsider but hopefully most of them know where they're going and aren't scrambling. I think that author likes to make up words, like "Stroad".

ultrarunner 3y ago
"Stroad" seems like a funny term at first, but watching the video about Stroads is almost as radicalizing as trying to push a stroller anywhere (or, frankly, taking a young child anywhere at all without a car).
- jacobolus 3y ago
  Strollers have their uses, but are radically overused to the detriment of families who become over-reliant on them. They keep the kids dependent, detached from the world, and physically weak. Typical infants can be wrapped on an adult's chest, can be mostly riding on shoulders by 9 months old, and kids can be walking independently most of the time by age 2 or 2.5 and participating in conversation with accompanying adults. By age 4 or so typical kids can continuously walk several miles at decent speed without any issue. I regularly see 4+ year-olds sitting in a stroller playing phone games or just looking bored and disengaged, while the adult pushing the stroller otherwise completely ignores them, and it always makes me cringe.
  - jusssi 3y ago
    > kids can be walking independently most of the time by age 2 or 2.5 One thing I've noticed, they don't walk very well while taking a nap. And you just get so much more out of a day when you don't have to return home in the middle.
    - jacobolus 3y ago
      With my kids it was never a problem to just let them sleep wherever we happened to be sitting (restaurant chairs, museum benches, bus seats, a patch of grass, my lap, ...). Occasionally I was stuck carrying a sleeping kid around for a while, but that was also typically fine. A stroller might be mildly more convenient on rare occasions, but it was never a big deal, and the kids becoming self-sufficient much earlier and more completely (with respect to mobility) than most of their peers was more than worth any trouble. YMMV.
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    A 2 year old walks far too slow to keep up with older people, and is especially a concern while crossing a road. They also get distracted and do not necessarily follow instructions. There is a pretty big difference between using a stroller to help get a toddler (less than 5 years old) around and using it to pacify a 5 year old. In my experience, somewhere between 4 and 5 is when I expect them to be able to walk at a sufficient pace and distance to never need strollers.
    - jacobolus 3y ago
      A 2-year-old can be very easily carried on an adult's shoulders if you're in a huge hurry, but much of the time it's better to just slow down to the kid's speed. If kids get substantial practice walking every day, their speed and stamina improves quite quickly. By age ~3 they are quite able to keep up with a moderate adult pace, and by 4 they'll be running all around faster than you probably want to walk.
Cockbrand 3y ago
Not sure about “scramble” in this context, but “stroad” is an established term to describe certain thoroughfares.
- dagurp 3y ago
  You're right but Strong Towns did make it up. Not Just Bikes popularized it (I think) https://youtu.be/ORzNZUeUHAM https://youtu.be/ORzNZUeUHAM
  - mcv 3y ago
    Turns out you don't need a lot of people to popularise a new word if it fills a need.
- krisoft 3y ago
  > Not sure about “scramble” in this context It is a well accepted phrase too: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble There are many references since the 2010s, but i also found references to it in a 1955 traffic engineering book: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Sqh-alGvdoYC&q=%22pedestrian+scramble%22&dq=%22pedestrian+scramble%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&source=gb_mobile_search&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjpxN2--u2CAxW-gP0HHX83DvgQ6AF6BAgLEAM#%22pedestrian%20scramble%22 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Sqh-alGvdoYC&q=%22pedest...
kagevf 3y ago
In Shibuya in Tokyo, there's a famous "scramble intersection" スクランブル交差点, and I assume the "scramble" part came from somewhere in the English speaking world.
Y-bar 3y ago
I bet you most words are made up.
krisoft 3y ago
> hopefully most of them know where they're going and aren't scrambling I don’t get the sense from “scramble” that the pedestrians would not know where they are going. Scramble can mean a sudden act of motion, like “they scrambled the jets” or “once we have stopped we all scrambled off the coach”. There is an alternative meaning where it is used to signify that something is intentionally mixed up or even encrypted, such as “scrambled egg” or “can’t intercept their plans anymore, they scrambled the signal”. Maybe that is the meaning you are thinking about?
AmpsterMan 3y ago
Stroad is a word that has increasingly come into popular use and is well defined. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroad https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroad You can ignore new terms if you wish, but it is useful for describing a common street pattern in North America. The term is increasingly being used by urban planners.
- dingnuts 3y ago
  We already had a term for that, a four lane, and "street" and "road" are synonymous so combining them doesn't produce new meaning The only people who use that word are insufferable choads who want me to give up my car and live in a tiny apartment because of their misguided belief that if everyone lived like they do in Manhattan global warming would end and the world would be a Utopia "Stroad" is a shibboleth that tells me you're someone with an opinion that is not worthwhile
  - mrmanner 3y ago
    They’re not exactly synonymous though, at least most dictionary definitions differ. Street example[1]: a road in a city or town that has buildings that are usually close together along one or both sides Road example[2]: a long, hard surface built for vehicles to travel along A street in this case is a type of road. A stroad is another type of road (where buildings are not “close together”, f.ex.) 1: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/street https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/street 2: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/road https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/road

ultrarunner 3y ago

"Stroad" seems like a funny term at first, but watching the video about Stroads is almost as radicalizing as trying to push a stroller anywhere (or, frankly, taking a young child anywhere at all without a car).

jacobolus 3y ago
Strollers have their uses, but are radically overused to the detriment of families who become over-reliant on them. They keep the kids dependent, detached from the world, and physically weak. Typical infants can be wrapped on an adult's chest, can be mostly riding on shoulders by 9 months old, and kids can be walking independently most of the time by age 2 or 2.5 and participating in conversation with accompanying adults. By age 4 or so typical kids can continuously walk several miles at decent speed without any issue. I regularly see 4+ year-olds sitting in a stroller playing phone games or just looking bored and disengaged, while the adult pushing the stroller otherwise completely ignores them, and it always makes me cringe.
- jusssi 3y ago
  > kids can be walking independently most of the time by age 2 or 2.5 One thing I've noticed, they don't walk very well while taking a nap. And you just get so much more out of a day when you don't have to return home in the middle.
  - jacobolus 3y ago
    With my kids it was never a problem to just let them sleep wherever we happened to be sitting (restaurant chairs, museum benches, bus seats, a patch of grass, my lap, ...). Occasionally I was stuck carrying a sleeping kid around for a while, but that was also typically fine. A stroller might be mildly more convenient on rare occasions, but it was never a big deal, and the kids becoming self-sufficient much earlier and more completely (with respect to mobility) than most of their peers was more than worth any trouble. YMMV.
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  A 2 year old walks far too slow to keep up with older people, and is especially a concern while crossing a road. They also get distracted and do not necessarily follow instructions. There is a pretty big difference between using a stroller to help get a toddler (less than 5 years old) around and using it to pacify a 5 year old. In my experience, somewhere between 4 and 5 is when I expect them to be able to walk at a sufficient pace and distance to never need strollers.
  - jacobolus 3y ago
    A 2-year-old can be very easily carried on an adult's shoulders if you're in a huge hurry, but much of the time it's better to just slow down to the kid's speed. If kids get substantial practice walking every day, their speed and stamina improves quite quickly. By age ~3 they are quite able to keep up with a moderate adult pace, and by 4 they'll be running all around faster than you probably want to walk.

Cockbrand 3y ago

Not sure about “scramble” in this context, but “stroad” is an established term to describe certain thoroughfares.

dagurp 3y ago
You're right but Strong Towns did make it up. Not Just Bikes popularized it (I think) https://youtu.be/ORzNZUeUHAM https://youtu.be/ORzNZUeUHAM
- mcv 3y ago
  Turns out you don't need a lot of people to popularise a new word if it fills a need.
krisoft 3y ago
> Not sure about “scramble” in this context It is a well accepted phrase too: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble There are many references since the 2010s, but i also found references to it in a 1955 traffic engineering book: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Sqh-alGvdoYC&q=%22pedestrian+scramble%22&dq=%22pedestrian+scramble%22&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&source=gb_mobile_search&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjpxN2--u2CAxW-gP0HHX83DvgQ6AF6BAgLEAM#%22pedestrian%20scramble%22 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Sqh-alGvdoYC&q=%22pedest...

kagevf 3y ago

In Shibuya in Tokyo, there's a famous "scramble intersection" スクランブル交差点, and I assume the "scramble" part came from somewhere in the English speaking world.

Y-bar 3y ago

I bet you most words are made up.

krisoft 3y ago

> hopefully most of them know where they're going and aren't scrambling I don’t get the sense from “scramble” that the pedestrians would not know where they are going. Scramble can mean a sudden act of motion, like “they scrambled the jets” or “once we have stopped we all scrambled off the coach”. There is an alternative meaning where it is used to signify that something is intentionally mixed up or even encrypted, such as “scrambled egg” or “can’t intercept their plans anymore, they scrambled the signal”. Maybe that is the meaning you are thinking about?

AmpsterMan 3y ago

Stroad is a word that has increasingly come into popular use and is well defined. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroad https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroad You can ignore new terms if you wish, but it is useful for describing a common street pattern in North America. The term is increasingly being used by urban planners.

dingnuts 3y ago
We already had a term for that, a four lane, and "street" and "road" are synonymous so combining them doesn't produce new meaning The only people who use that word are insufferable choads who want me to give up my car and live in a tiny apartment because of their misguided belief that if everyone lived like they do in Manhattan global warming would end and the world would be a Utopia "Stroad" is a shibboleth that tells me you're someone with an opinion that is not worthwhile
- mrmanner 3y ago
  They’re not exactly synonymous though, at least most dictionary definitions differ. Street example[1]: a road in a city or town that has buildings that are usually close together along one or both sides Road example[2]: a long, hard surface built for vehicles to travel along A street in this case is a type of road. A stroad is another type of road (where buildings are not “close together”, f.ex.) 1: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/street https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/street 2: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/road https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/road