5 ms·

These are all great, I love city life and would embrace every single item, but without addressing the dramatic decline in public safety in virtually all US citi

• iambateman 1y ago
  Can you source that fact? I'm seeing both violent and property crime as statistically way down over the few decades.
  • hexis 1y ago
    I would love to live wherever you live so that I could even imagine that this was not obvious to anyone who goes out into public spaces.
    • albedoa 1y ago
      To be clear, your response to the extremely reasonable request for a source of the wild claim that you made is "it's obvious"? Am I reading you correctly?
      • hexis 1y ago
        No, you are not reading me correctly.
    • iambateman 1y ago
      Come on down! Columbia SC is experiencing a bit of a renaissance…there’s growth all over the city and a lot of optimism. Life isn’t perfect, and we have serious problems like any other city, but I took my kids bike riding through downtown yesterday evening and felt safe.
      • hexis 1y ago
        I am glad you are enjoying it, but Columbia, SC has an extremely high murder rate, even for the US which in general has terribly high murder rates.
        • iambateman 1y ago
          Unfortunately, we do. For various historical and demographic reasons, my exposure to this risk is extremely low. But yes, it is a massive problem.
      • gishglish 1y ago
        Is it doing better than 5-6 years ago? I lived there for a few years, and while the river walks were very pleasant, I don’t have much to say about it particularly otherwise. The job market was pretty bad, basically limiting you to State gov or one of the handful of insurance companies around and state government work is rough (easily the most fulfilling job I’ve had, but the salary was just way too low. Seems hard to justify with GA and NC markets nearby unless you’re staying solely for CoL or existing ties.
        • iambateman 1y ago
          Better, yes. The market has grown a ton, and was ranked #1 in the country recently. Our tax base is weak, which makes it hard to compete with GVL and CHS, plus we have worse weather. But the Bull Street district is in a totally different place from when you were here, which creates a feeling of “coming liveliness.” Also Scout Motors is dropping a multi billion dollar plant in Columbia which will help job market Definitely not Greenville, but we are getting there.
    • lazyasciiart 1y ago
      Seattle! Violent crime is way down from the 90s. People don’t think this is obvious because violent crime rate is not actually an immediately visible problem, since the majority of violent crime takes place in or around homes (followed by hidden places like alleyways and parking garages, chosen for not being seen). The actual visible stuff (homeless people, trash, smell of public urination, people on drugs in public, people being mentally ill in public, shoplifting) is up. And both violent crime and rich people are more evenly distributed around the city so the “violent crime near a rich person” is up. And so people react to those.
      • potato3732842 1y ago
        The late 80s early 90s was the all time crime peak for a lot of places. That's like saying the economy is up from the 1930s. Personally I think two things are true, crime ain't that bad and you're basically framing the problem to let you lie through your teeth a politican.
        • lazyasciiart 1y ago
          What insulting shit.
    • marssaxman 1y ago
      Isn't it wonderful that we have people doing actual research on the topic, so we we can know what is actually going on instead of relying on random people's subjective impressions of what seems "obvious" from their necessarily limited viewpoints?
  • eptcyka 1y ago
    My anecdotal experience visiting LA and SF in 2022 was wild - homeless and mentally ill people yelling, being a public nuissance, defecating on the streets, multi-story tents on the same block as the Hollywood stars. It bewildered me that the same state that houses Apple and Google can’t afford to help these people. Whilst I am empathetic and understand that these people need help, I wouldn’t let an 8 year old roam these streets, whereas I was allowed to roam my town when I was 8. Maybe it has been even worse before, and I don’t agree that making the cities walkable before these people are no longer on the streets is somehow usess, I do think that it is a more pressing issue.
    • iambateman 1y ago
      I think this is a dominating perspective for a lot of people. A few neighborhoods in LA and SF get infinitely more news coverage than the thousands of quiet urban places where nothing spectacular is going wrong, which creates an illusion of widespread despair. I’m not saying crime or homelessness don’t exist, but urban LA is just not representative. It is shocking that the richest state in the history of the world can’t figure out how to help the people with nowhere to go.
      • Karrot_Kream 1y ago
        Skid Row has been in LA since the 30s. The problem is largely that there's a lot of vested interest in painting Californian Urban Areas as bad and so negative coverage focuses on the Tenderloin, Union Square, and Skid Row.
    • SoftTalker 1y ago
      Those people are there because of the help. Every time a municipality expands support for the homeless and addicted they get more homeless addicts. Surrounding areas will in fact put people on buses and ship them out to towns where there is more support.
      • zozbot234 1y ago
        This is why Housing First is such a brilliant idea. Give them help, but require them to be stably housed (i.e. on a viable path out of long-term homelessness) before they can access the help.
• harmmonica 1y ago
  There is some evidence/belief that increased foot traffic actually improves crime rates. I'm certainly not saying it's a magic bullet, but there's at least some hope that if these types of changes were introduced it would actually directly decrease crime. I don't have a source handy, but the concept is that the more eyes on the street the less willing people are to commit crimes. I think the exception is that some kinds of petty theft can increase with more people (pickpocketing for instance because more targets).
  • hexis 1y ago
    I completely agree with this, but I think it's more humane to use foot traffic as a way to solidify safe places and not as a way to bring crime down.
    • harmmonica 1y ago
      Can you expand on that a bit? I'm not sure I quite understand, but I'm interested to know how you're thinking about it.
      • hexis 1y ago
        I would not ask normal people to start walking in dangerous neighborhoods in order to increase foot traffic and make it safer, those first folks are at great risk of just getting hurt. I would, however, try to keep any safe area with good foot traffic that way, or even increase foot traffic.
        • harmmonica 1y ago
          I'm not sure downvotes are the right way for folks to disagree with you though I'm thinking some folks think you're trolling. But I'll assume you aren't trolling and since I asked you to reply to my question I thought I would just clarify: I wasn't suggesting that you stick people in harm's way in order to decrease crime (that would very much be the tail wagging the dog). What I was saying is that when increased numbers of people are on the street research has shown that crime decreases as a result. It's not that someone's holding a gun to the head of the new people who show up on the street. It's that those new people choose, of their own volition, to be on the street because something (investment, the government, other residents) made the street more desirable to be on and a byproduct of that increase of people is a decrease in crime (because there are literally more eyeballs watching the street (not watching for crime or to deter crime, but because criminals aren't as likely to commit crime when there are more witnesses)).
• chaps 1y ago
  What are you talking about? Crime rates have dramatically been reducing basically everywhere.
  • hexis 1y ago
    Cool, enjoy your safe space, wherever it is.
    • chaps 1y ago
      Chicago, friend. :) I'm reminded of being on an airplane sitting next to a cop who told me, "Did you know that Chicago is the murder capitol of the world?". It was fun to show her that Chicago isn't actually even in the top 10 of the US in terms of homicide. Where do you get your news from that makes you think crime is going up?
      • hexis 1y ago
        I get my information about dangerous public spaces with my eyes, ears, and memory that it used to be safer very recently.
        • chaps 1y ago
          Confirmation bias is a savory drug, friend.
          • hexis 1y ago
            There is a big difference between confirmation and confirmation bias.
            • supplied_demand 1y ago
              The difference is that confirmation requires evidence. If you had any evidence you would have provided it.
            • 1y ago
• marssaxman 1y ago
  What do you mean by "decline in public safety"? The violent crime rate has dropped to around half what it was in the '90s: https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/us-crime-rates-and-trends-analysis-fbi-crime-statistics https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/us-c... Property crime is down similarly. I understand that some people feel so afraid of homeless people or street addicts that they assume they must be in danger whenever they witness such poverty, but crime statistics do not support this opinion.
  • hexis 1y ago
    Crime is down since the 90s and up since 2018.
    • morkalork 1y ago
      I'm a little suspect of any claims or numbers outside of murder counts nowadays. Unreported crime was an issue before but now that police have embraced a sort of slacker/work-to-rule/soft-strike attitude to their jobs since they don't feel appreciated after civilians dared to protest their bad behavior, there's a feedback loop of: crime happens, cops are called, nothing is done, another crime happens, no one bothers to report it. It's not just the cops that are a problem either, the revolving door where criminals that do get brought in are right back out on bail is demoralizing cops and civilians alike. If real crime rates were decreasing, wouldn't we see the system that handles them also improving? Instead it looks like a shit show, thus the numbers are probably kinda bullshit.
      • hexis 1y ago
        I agree, this is also clear when looking at how often traffic laws are broken with no police reaction.
      • Filmatic 1y ago
        Every serious study of this was done by people entirely aware of that problem, who use multiple data sources to mitigate the effect. And yet every time this comes up on HN a bunch of posters are all “well I push buttons on keyboards for a living, so I know better than experts in every other field, even about their own field!” I’ve seen posters complaining about unreported crimes on here in response to posts citing studies that directly and prominently address that exact problem, because I guess they just assume everyone in the social sciences is a total dipshit who can’t possibly have thought of this obvious thing (and didn’t bother to read the study and perhaps learn something). Victimization surveys agree with police report data. Crime’s down in general, way down in some cities, and violent crime especially is down, versus the 90s, and very much so versus any decade before that. There’s been a little bump post-Covid but it’s not ongoing and last I checked it was trending back down again, and it wasn’t anywhere near wiping out the progress from before.
• enaaem 1y ago
  Interesting thing is that cars are never considered to be threat to public safety. People have simply accepted that cycling/walking is unsafe (because of cars), so parents have to drive their kids everywhere. During the 70s in the Netherlands there were massive protests called 'Stop the Child murder', because cars were killing too many children on bicycles. This was actually a conservative protest, because people were used to safe streets and simply did not accept that cars started killing their children.
  • hexis 1y ago
    I think in the US we've done a great job educating a subset of the population about how dangerous cars are. In the wealthy, walkable neighborhood I live in, everyone is very sensitive to the dangers of cars. Cycling and walking are common, with many kids being involved too. That said, this understanding is very unevenly distributed, in large part because our neighborhood also gets more police attention and is generally very safe.
    • enaaem 1y ago
      I don’t think it is just about awareness. Americans have simply accepted that cars are dangerous and thus traffic is dangerous and people have adjusted their whole lifestyle around it. For example, it’s normal to drive your kids everywhere.
      • hexis 1y ago
        Cars are dangerous. When crime began to decline after the early 90s, American cities had a renaissance with huge numbers of people moving to them. Now, with the rampant public disorder, we are back to suburbs dramatically outgrowing the center cities.
  • rickydroll 1y ago
    One under-mentioned hazard for pedestrians and bicyclists is poor outdoor lighting at night. I cannot tell you the number of times high-glare lighting has blocked my ability to see a pedestrian or cyclist. One thing I've noticed that makes biking/walking in conjunction with cars much safer is the construction of road-sized sidewalks with clear delineators, where pedestrians and cyclists can safely pass. In Helsinki, biking was a joy, despite the busy streets nearby. I saw the same organization in many parts of Israel—big sidewalks with a section designated for bicycles, scooters, and e-mobility devices. In many of the small cities surrounding Stockholm, dedicated bike paths with their lighting were located adjacent to the main roads. Around where I live, there is a three-lane main thoroughfare that has two lanes for travel and one lane for turning. There are sidewalks along this road, but they are functionally destroyed by the roots of trees growing near them. This could become more bicycle-friendly if roundabouts were installed at major intersections and the sidewalks were expanded to accommodate pedestrian/bicycle use. Although if they did, I could hear the screams about how the roundabouts are impeding traffic flow for commuters and removing all the sidewalk-destroying trees. I agree with the people who say it's not that we can't do it, it's that we won't do it.
• CalRobert 1y ago
  But drivers slaughter 40,000 people a year (give or take) in the US. A driver is the biggest risk to your kids.
  • hexis 1y ago
    I have never had a car try to run me down, but I have had multiple vagrants chase me and my family through the streets.
• supplied_demand 1y ago
  == without addressing the dramatic decline in public safety in virtually all US cities== Can you expand on this? What timeframe? Which cities? Which crimes? Violent crime is down precipitously in pretty much every US city right now.