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> Private automobiles do not belong in cities. They are guests there. But they've invited themselves in and taken over the place. You seem to be ignoring what

> Private automobiles do not belong in cities. They are guests there. But they've invited themselves in and taken over the place. You seem to be ignoring what actually happened. A huge number of the people in those cities wanted automobiles. That's why governments taxed people to pay for the roads for those cars. I think I agree with the rest of your post.

slifin 3y ago
https://roadswerenotbuiltforcars.com/ https://roadswerenotbuiltforcars.com/
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  Um... somebody wrote a book, and here's an ad for it? OK, so? I mean, it does have a catchy title, but no, I'm not going to go order the book, and read all 170,000 words it boasts of, in order to try to figure out how you think that refutes my statement. If you've got an argument, make it.
  - smokel 3y ago
    I for one would like a system where I could simply cast FHQWGADZ as a combination of tokens that each support my stance on complex matters. It can be tiresome to have to repeat facts and opinions. It seems that grandparent has read a book, and found its contents convincing enough to share it here. A bit terse, but still relevant, no?
    - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
      No, not relevant. They read a book. They could have summarized the relevant points of the book... but they didn't. They could have given the gist of the argument of the book... but they didn't. They gave a link to a 170,000 word long book - and nothing more. Seriously, how many people are going to go read it? Very few. How many are going to read it in time to say anything relevant to the discussion here? Zero. So dropping a link to a book that size functions as an end-of-conversation move. It says "you can't argue with my unstated position until you've read this" (whether or not that was the post writer's intent). That doesn't make for a healthy conversation. For that reason, I call it out when I see it. [Editing to add: It's even worse if you think in terms of time. How long would it take the poster to give a summary? Ten minutes? Well, how long would it take me to read the book? But it's worse, because more than one person read the post. How long would it take, total, for all of them to read the book? So it's really, really, really wasteful of peoples' time to just drop a link instead of writing the summary.]
djrobstep 3y ago
That is not how it works. What people want is a function of the choices available. When the government builds a ton of car roads, people want cars. When they build great rail, bike lanes and walkable streets, people want cars much less.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  > What people want is a function of the choices available. > When the government builds a ton of car roads, people want cars. When they build great rail, bike lanes and walkable streets, people want cars much less. Is there evidence of that? I haven't seen an American city where bike lanes are utilized more than sparsely, even when an extensive network is built.
  - bedobi 3y ago
    Everyone from kids to phd urban planners and traffic engineers know that viable alternatives to driving lead to people switching modes. This isn’t controversial.
    - wolverine876 3y ago
      I'm not claiming it's controversial. Do you happen to know where I can track down the factual basis? My many but anecdotal observations of bike lanes do not support it (I wish it did).
      - ghaff 3y ago
        You see more bikes in Cambridge MA than you did before a lot of the bike lane work (probably intermixed with some changes in attitudes/preferences). But still a tiny fraction of both pedestrians and cars.
      - zip1234 3y ago
        Bikes need a network, not just lanes. Also many bike lanes just randomly end, aren't protected/separated properly, etc.
wolverine876 3y ago
> A huge number of the people in those cities wanted automobiles. That's why governments taxed people to pay for the roads for those cars. What is the basis of that? Perhaps, having the option of roads; and being led, to a degree by leaders' belief in roads, they wanted cars. Seeing public transit and seeing leaders' belief it it, they might have used that.
bedobi 3y ago
Akshully it’s you who need to read up on first thing about the history of the invasion of cities by the automobile. Complete, total regulatory capture of the government by the automobile and oil industry, purchase of transit only to rip it to shreds etc etc. The funny thing is, traffic in general and life for ardent motorists in particular would be better the better alternatives to driving are. Instead, they shoot themselves in the foot by shutting down anything other than adding more and more traffic, making things worse and worse for themselves.
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  I know about the purchase of transit lines. Where did they get the money to do that? By selling cars, that's where. Who was buying the cars? People who wanted them, not just people who had no choice. (Because the money to buy the transit lines was there before the choice disappeared.) Why did people want cars instead of transit, or bicycles, or walking? The alternatives work great... until it's a blizzard or 10 below. Then people don't actually want to wait at a trolley stop or ride a bike. (Yes, I know, you can dress for it. They still don't want to.) So akkkkshully, people weren't the helpless sheep being run over by the invading automobiles that you claim they were. Autos are not an invasive species, overheated rhetoric notwithstanding. People brought those cars to the cities, and built the roads, and paid for them, and not just because the evil auto companies forced them to.
  - burnished 3y ago
    Did early autos even work in inclement weather? I'm under the impression that cold weather fuels and oils are relatively modern and I wouldnt be surprised if pre-heating systems came years after the vehicles first gained traction.
    - devilbunny 3y ago
      Not many places - and really not many big places in the US - need engine block heaters. Cold weather doesn't need special gasoline, although diesel fuel does have to be formulated differently (modern winter gasolines are formulated to meet various states' emissions requirements, not because it gels in the cold). I'm from the South, so I've never had a car with a block heater, but I've driven in temps down to 0 F/-17 C without a problem. They had been that low persistently for about 4-5 days. Perhaps I did untold damage to the car by not having low-viscosity oil, but it worked well for the four years I drove it and the two after that when my sister did (until she wrecked it), and it was seven years old when it became mine. 13 years for a mid-eighties GM car was pretty good. Given that the auto industry in the US and Canada was basically founded around the Great Lakes, I can't imagine that they wanted to sell things that wouldn't work in the cold weather of that region.
waterTanuki 3y ago
> A huge number of the people in those cities wanted automobiles. No. A huge number of people wanted an easy way to get from point A to B. Many people don't really care about cars, but when you design a city to accommodate only them with no viable alternatives, they will flock to the automobile. Case in point: Tokyo has a car ownership rate of 0.32 cars per household. Why? Because you can take the subway/bus/bike to anywhere in the city, it's clean, it's safe, it's invested in.

slifin 3y ago

https://roadswerenotbuiltforcars.com/ https://roadswerenotbuiltforcars.com/

AnimalMuppet 3y ago
Um... somebody wrote a book, and here's an ad for it? OK, so? I mean, it does have a catchy title, but no, I'm not going to go order the book, and read all 170,000 words it boasts of, in order to try to figure out how you think that refutes my statement. If you've got an argument, make it.
- smokel 3y ago
  I for one would like a system where I could simply cast FHQWGADZ as a combination of tokens that each support my stance on complex matters. It can be tiresome to have to repeat facts and opinions. It seems that grandparent has read a book, and found its contents convincing enough to share it here. A bit terse, but still relevant, no?
  - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
    No, not relevant. They read a book. They could have summarized the relevant points of the book... but they didn't. They could have given the gist of the argument of the book... but they didn't. They gave a link to a 170,000 word long book - and nothing more. Seriously, how many people are going to go read it? Very few. How many are going to read it in time to say anything relevant to the discussion here? Zero. So dropping a link to a book that size functions as an end-of-conversation move. It says "you can't argue with my unstated position until you've read this" (whether or not that was the post writer's intent). That doesn't make for a healthy conversation. For that reason, I call it out when I see it. [Editing to add: It's even worse if you think in terms of time. How long would it take the poster to give a summary? Ten minutes? Well, how long would it take me to read the book? But it's worse, because more than one person read the post. How long would it take, total, for all of them to read the book? So it's really, really, really wasteful of peoples' time to just drop a link instead of writing the summary.]

djrobstep 3y ago

That is not how it works. What people want is a function of the choices available. When the government builds a ton of car roads, people want cars. When they build great rail, bike lanes and walkable streets, people want cars much less.

wolverine876 3y ago
> What people want is a function of the choices available. > When the government builds a ton of car roads, people want cars. When they build great rail, bike lanes and walkable streets, people want cars much less. Is there evidence of that? I haven't seen an American city where bike lanes are utilized more than sparsely, even when an extensive network is built.
- bedobi 3y ago
  Everyone from kids to phd urban planners and traffic engineers know that viable alternatives to driving lead to people switching modes. This isn’t controversial.
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    I'm not claiming it's controversial. Do you happen to know where I can track down the factual basis? My many but anecdotal observations of bike lanes do not support it (I wish it did).
    - ghaff 3y ago
      You see more bikes in Cambridge MA than you did before a lot of the bike lane work (probably intermixed with some changes in attitudes/preferences). But still a tiny fraction of both pedestrians and cars.
    - zip1234 3y ago
      Bikes need a network, not just lanes. Also many bike lanes just randomly end, aren't protected/separated properly, etc.

wolverine876 3y ago

> A huge number of the people in those cities wanted automobiles. That's why governments taxed people to pay for the roads for those cars. What is the basis of that? Perhaps, having the option of roads; and being led, to a degree by leaders' belief in roads, they wanted cars. Seeing public transit and seeing leaders' belief it it, they might have used that.

bedobi 3y ago

Akshully it’s you who need to read up on first thing about the history of the invasion of cities by the automobile. Complete, total regulatory capture of the government by the automobile and oil industry, purchase of transit only to rip it to shreds etc etc. The funny thing is, traffic in general and life for ardent motorists in particular would be better the better alternatives to driving are. Instead, they shoot themselves in the foot by shutting down anything other than adding more and more traffic, making things worse and worse for themselves.

AnimalMuppet 3y ago
I know about the purchase of transit lines. Where did they get the money to do that? By selling cars, that's where. Who was buying the cars? People who wanted them, not just people who had no choice. (Because the money to buy the transit lines was there before the choice disappeared.) Why did people want cars instead of transit, or bicycles, or walking? The alternatives work great... until it's a blizzard or 10 below. Then people don't actually want to wait at a trolley stop or ride a bike. (Yes, I know, you can dress for it. They still don't want to.) So akkkkshully, people weren't the helpless sheep being run over by the invading automobiles that you claim they were. Autos are not an invasive species, overheated rhetoric notwithstanding. People brought those cars to the cities, and built the roads, and paid for them, and not just because the evil auto companies forced them to.
- burnished 3y ago
  Did early autos even work in inclement weather? I'm under the impression that cold weather fuels and oils are relatively modern and I wouldnt be surprised if pre-heating systems came years after the vehicles first gained traction.
  - devilbunny 3y ago
    Not many places - and really not many big places in the US - need engine block heaters. Cold weather doesn't need special gasoline, although diesel fuel does have to be formulated differently (modern winter gasolines are formulated to meet various states' emissions requirements, not because it gels in the cold). I'm from the South, so I've never had a car with a block heater, but I've driven in temps down to 0 F/-17 C without a problem. They had been that low persistently for about 4-5 days. Perhaps I did untold damage to the car by not having low-viscosity oil, but it worked well for the four years I drove it and the two after that when my sister did (until she wrecked it), and it was seven years old when it became mine. 13 years for a mid-eighties GM car was pretty good. Given that the auto industry in the US and Canada was basically founded around the Great Lakes, I can't imagine that they wanted to sell things that wouldn't work in the cold weather of that region.

waterTanuki 3y ago

> A huge number of the people in those cities wanted automobiles. No. A huge number of people wanted an easy way to get from point A to B. Many people don't really care about cars, but when you design a city to accommodate only them with no viable alternatives, they will flock to the automobile. Case in point: Tokyo has a car ownership rate of 0.32 cars per household. Why? Because you can take the subway/bus/bike to anywhere in the city, it's clean, it's safe, it's invested in.