Eliminating car use in cities

[GinandTonic]

You say that like its the tides and the moon. These are just planning decisions, not a fact of life.

 

[Wolfbeckett]

As far as the average citizen is concerned it IS like the tides and the moon. There's nothing I can do about it. I can vote for ballot measures aimed at increasing public transit (and I do), I can vote for a lessening of zoning laws (and I... would, except I don't remember ever seeing it on the ballot), but in the grand scheme of things my voice doesn't matter.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

You say that like its the tides and the moon. These are just planning decisions, not a fact of life.

You say that as if 'planning' has the power to make stuff happen.

 

[Zelig]

Either way, I think we can both agree that SoCal traffic sucks. I'd be a lot happier if didn't have to commute 35 miles each way to work, but in San Diego you're damned if you do, damned if you don't. There aren't any decent jobs in the areas where it's cheap to live, and I don't make enough to live in the areas where the decent jobs are. So it's commuting as the only option.

Sounds to me like SoCal isn't livable and the only actual option is not living there.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Sounds to me like SoCal isn't livable and the only actual option is not living there.

There is more to 'unlivable' than 'having a job requires commuting by car'.

 

[GinandTonic]

You say that as if 'planning' has the power to make stuff happen.

Yes. That's how it works in Europe. That's why mass transit works. TBH the us is an outlier vis "this is how the developed world works".

 

[Wolfbeckett]

Sounds to me like SoCal isn't livable and the only actual option is not living there.

SoCal is very livable if you don't mind driving. At least we don't have to dig our cars out of snow like they do in other parts of the country .

 

[Zelig]

There is more to 'unlivable' than 'having a job requires commuting by car'.

I'd rather be a subsistence farmer than drive an hour to work every day.

Even valuing the marginal cost of your time after already spending eight hours your day job at essentially minimum wage, spending two hours commuting by car per day is costing you nearly $10k/year. If you're working a job for $50/hr, that ratchets up to somewhere in the $25k/year range. Hell, at that point you're better off cutting back to a three workweek and renting a room to sleep in between your 13 hour workdays.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I'd rather be a subsistence farmer than drive an hour to work every day.

Even valuing the marginal cost of your time after already spending eight hours your day job at essentially minimum wage, spending two hours commuting by car per day is costing you nearly $10k/year. If you're working a job for $50/hr, that ratchets up to somewhere in the $25k/year range. Hell, at that point you're better off cutting back to a three workweek and renting a room to sleep in between your 13 hour workdays.

Your argument is irrefutable...as long as you associate the drive with the job.

If you switch the association to where you live it becomes a much different creature. If you have a job in LA proper you can choose to live near work, or you can buy twice the house for half the money and drive ten hours a week, consuming a car every four years. So live in your $200,000 house for twenty years and consume five cars, plus gas, and you are still way ahead of the housing cost game...especially if you shop wisely for the cars.

 

[sophie]

When I was a kid LA was the arch-traffic nightmare. Now it's nothing compared to the [feces]storm that has become San Jose metro area. Whether it's 280, 880, 101, 85, 87, or 81, nowhere is safe. And it's not just rush hour either. San Jose is now in a state of constant rush hour status. Public transit is terrible too. BART hasn't made its way down here yet. VTA light rail can take up to an hour just to get from the airport to Diridon Station, CALtrain sucks and buses...what buses? San Jose has become a very large city that has seriously outgrown the small-city transit options that were built/planned for it back in the 50s and 60s

 

[Zelig]

Your argument is irrefutable...as long as you associate the drive with the job.

If you switch the association to where you live it becomes a much different creature. If you have a job in LA proper you can choose to live near work, or you can buy twice the house for half the money and drive ten hours a week, consuming a car every four years. So live in your $200,000 house for twenty years and consume five cars, plus gas, and you are still way ahead of the housing cost game...especially if you shop wisely for the cars.

Yeah, that only works if you value your time sufficiently little, since time is the main cost of commuting.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Yeah, that only works if you value your time sufficiently little, since time is the main cost of commuting.

I got paid just as much for driving as I got for sleeping, and I didn't fret about the time 'wasted' on either one. The only time that can have a 'value' effectively attached to it is time that is available for sale, and I am notoriously unwilling to sell anything beyond the minimum I can get away with.

 

[Tee Kay]

It's not like the world is a worse place if we get emissionless transport more quickly by funding it sufficiently soon enough

People still needs to be convinced that emissions from transport is even a problem

 

[Zelig]

I got paid just as much for driving as I got for sleeping, and I didn't fret about the time 'wasted' on either one. The only time that can have a 'value' effectively attached to it is time that is available for sale, and I am notoriously unwilling to sell anything beyond the minimum I can get away with.

If you're unwilling to sell your time at any cost, then you're effectively losing infinite value in the time you spend commuting.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

If you're unwilling to sell your time at any cost, then you're effectively losing infinite value in the time you spend commuting.

Not if I enjoy my time. Key word: my.

 

[Zelig]

Not if I enjoy my time. Key word: my.

Your time spent commuting? I don't think anybody enjoys that time. At best people trick themselves into not realizing they have better alternatives.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Your time spent commuting? I don't think anybody enjoys that time. At best people trick themselves into not realizing they have better alternatives.

Well...if you use that time to think about how it should count as work time but you aren't getting paid for it that sounds pretty hard to enjoy.

When I was doing the commute thing it was the bridge between work (where I was required to be nice to people I did not know) and home (where I was expected to solve problems I mostly considered trivial as if they were world shaking because they had been put off pending my arrival)...trust me, I enjoyed the breather.

 

[El_Machinae]

People still needs to be convinced that emissions from transport is even a problem

Chop chop

(CO2 isn't the only pollutant, so it's a broad target to attack. Buncha noxious stuff that doesn't work with urban concentrations. )

Edit: not like you didn't know. I'm posting narcissistically I guess

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Deliveries: Another big one. It is difficult to imagine a city where trucks cannot make deliveries.

It helps if the delivery people know how to read maps. Or just read, period. Seriously, I've had drivers ask me "which way is north/south/east/west"? All they know is how many traffic lights between Point A and Point B, whereas I, as someone who has never driven, have no idea. That's not something I ever pay attention to.

Emergencies: Or semi-emergencies. Let's say you, I don't know, break your arm. That sort of injury may not be the kind of thing that warrants getting an ambulance, but you also may not want to take public transit which would be a fair bit longer.

In Red Deer, we have several buses (small ones that seat about 6 people at most) for disabled people. They are willing to take you to emergency medical appointments that don't require an ambulance... as long as you book your emergency in advance.

Which is why I ended up enduring an excruciating 50-minute bus trip to a clinic. I only had enough cash for a one-way taxi ride, so I had to take the bus to get there.

Visitors and tourists: Any public transit system would necessarily need to be readily understandable by a visitor. That's a burden that can be overcome, but it does take some consideration. At the same time, do we want to allow tourist buses and the same moving through?

I haven't heard serious complaints from tourists around here, other than confusion because our streets and avenues are the reverse from everywhere else in the province and sometimes the named streets don't start with the same letter as the subdivision they're in. Even some newer taxi drivers get confused because when they hear the name of my apartment building, they think it's across town from where it is.

As for me taking public transit in other cities... In Edmonton I asked directions and landmarks from someone, and we got where we were going. In Calgary, I figured out which route I should be on, told the driver where I was going, and asked him to drop me at the nearest stop. He did, and again there was no trouble.

Taking the train in Calgary, though... I never tried it alone. Instead, I opted to walk the extra blocks, and once I figured out which way was south (hard to navigate by the Sun when it can't be seen for all the skyscrapers in the way), I got to my destination fine.

It is a must that a public transit system would necessarily be clean and efficient.

Most transit systems I've seen are reasonably efficient... as long as nobody uses them. Once you add people (waiting for them to get on and off, coping with weather conditions, dealing with screaming schoolkids, drivers who can't wrap their minds around the fact that some people would rather ride longer so they don't have to risk getting flattened by getting off earlier and walking across a busy highway), efficiency is much less.

I have to disagree here: I do all my grocery shopping either on foot, on public transit or by bike. The only compromise I make is that I rely on tap water instead of bottled beverages for quenching my thirst. For everything else I can fit the supply for a week into a backpack. If I had to supply more people, I would just make more trips. The walk to the nearest store is only 3 minutes (there are stores, where it takes longer just to cross the parking lot). Frequently buying groceries fresh (well as fresh as they tend to be in a grocery store) is better than stockpiling them, anyway.

If the use of cars was heavily restricted in cities, customers would prefer stores that are easy to reach over those that are marginally cheaper. This is a problem the Free Market can solve: You would quickly have lots of small stores all over the city.

It used to be here that each subdivision had a school, playground, and some kind of convenience store. Some subdivisions had a small strip mall. But the newer ones tend to lack at least one or more of these amenities, and I get the impression that the planners just assume that people who don't drive wouldn't be able to afford living there anyway.

As for stockpiling, there are times when it's essential to do that. We've already had our first snow of the season, several weeks ago. That's a reminder to make sure to have a two-week supply of non-perishable food for me, and all essentials for the cats. So as long as I've got food, they've got food and litter, and I've got emergency supplies like batteries, matches, and candles, we're set. If I don't have to go anywhere or have anything delivered during a blizzard or cold snap (any prolonged period of -30C or colder), the weather can do what it likes.

Also, it helps to grow your own garden.

Where do you suggest people grow them, if they don't have a yard? And keep in mind that some who do have yards have to contend with local bylaws or condo association rules that forbid gardens.

Can I hire you to do my grocery shopping? My last trip entailed a 35lb container of scoopable kitty litter, a 12-roll of paper towels, two gallons of milk, and around 13-14 plastic bags of groceries. You're clearly superior in long haul carrying skills than I am, so I would love to contract for your services as I confess I would struggle with all of that on a bus OR bike.

What brand of cat litter do you use? If you have a Walmart in your region and they carry that brand, you can get it delivered for free.

I decided to stop putting up with clerks who argued with me about the most efficient way to get cat litter home on the bus ("no, you don't need more than one bag, see, you've got a handle on the pail!" and never considering that bags are not as strong as they used to be and neither is the handle). So now I wait until the cat litter is on rollback and then order enough to last a few months. It makes it hard on Canada Post to deliver it, but that's not my problem.

In overall efficiency terms, in makes more sense for a truck to make a circuit delivering groceries than it does to have everyone making individual trips.

However, having tried it myself, I wouldn't recommend it for fresh fruit, vegetable, meat and fish purchases. But for cat litter and toilet rolls? Ideal.

Once upon a time we had this service. The people who provided it were the milkmen and the breadmen. I don't remember when the bread deliveries were stopped, but we had milk deliveries (plus other dairy products like yogurt) as recently as the early '80s. I remember being in high school and making sure to get my two yogurts twice a week, because I'd share them with my cat.

I'm almost sure that I have never lived within two miles of where I worked...ever. Under ten would be a very rare exception...if I think of any...but I haven't thought of any yet.

There was one year when the City added a question to the census: How far do you have to travel to get to work?

My answer: About 15 feet. I had a home-based business, and 15 feet was approximately the distance from my bed to the computer.