The winner is . Not what you think

[craneplaneguy]

One thing about modern cars, electric or ICE powered, they are WAY safer then cars even 10 years ago, much less 20, 30 or more. The added safety features are a major cause of weight gain though. I read the accident reports religiously, and it's pretty amazing the spectacular wrecks that people more or less walk away from nowadays.

I think the thing that would make human-driven cars safer for those who aren't in one is to make them radically less safe for the driver. Let the passenger have an airbag, sure. But the driver should only have a long pointy spike sticking out of the steering wheel. That's basically the situation they put the rest of us in, and we don't even get a say in it.

Giving so much protection to the very people who choose to make the roads deadly is unethical.

Well then, if that's how you think, take all the food out of your fridge, the clothes off your back, and just about everything else in your home, and throw it all out in the street. In fact, move out of your home INTO the street, no.... that street was built by a vehicle society and infrastructure, so you have to move into a field somewhere. You have just wished death and injury on the infrastructure that brought you all of that. from now on, just buy and use the items delivered to you (and your local providers of EVERYTHING) by bicycle.

Don't get me wrong, things need to change, but wishing cars and trucks were more dangerous to achieve that is just wrong. If you want the lifestyle that entails, maybe you should consider moving to a grass hut in Africa somewhere, as some there can along just fine without the dependence on ICE powered vehicles, but they don't have the standard of living, the mod cons, we do. You bitch about it, but I bet you wouldn't give up much. You seem like a pretty sharp guy, but that was just an asinine statement. I enjoy your posts, and really respect your bike knowledge, but until you're living in a field, (with no shelter, as even a plastic tarp is a product of what you hate and wish ill towards) carrying your water in a bucket ( oops, no bucket either, you'll have to weave one) and only eating what you personally gather, you are just being a hypocrite. Again, it's a screwed up system, but its the one we have to deal with, and I don't pretend I am somehow out of it like you seem to do. I'm driving 60 miles tomorrow, to do crane work on a grain mill that supplies wheat for edible uses, and I'm damn glad to have air bags. Some of that wheat might end up in your mouth, you're welcome.

 

[Chalo]

Our society transformed from agrarian to industrial without cars. They were never necessary, only something that people opted into because they didn't care about the harms they do to others and the commons.

My hope is that the something better now on the horizon (autonomous cars) will lead to something even better than that (no cars).

 

[billvon]

Our society transformed from agrarian to industrial without cars. They were never necessary, only something that people opted into because they didn't care about the harms they do to others and the commons.

No, they opted into them because they were better (easier, faster over a long distance, more useful load) than horses, and were cheap enough to buy. Back when cars first came out people didn't even understand the risks they posed to the environment, and the first cars had a top speed less than a horse's.

 

[MadRhino]

Nothing is stronger than a habit. Cars will need to be replaced with a better solution, or become useless, to be abandoned. I have no doubt that it will happen, but how and when, nobody knows right now.

Homo Sapiens has disapeared already. We just don’t know it. In a very far future, we will be considered another step in mankind evolution and have another name, something like Homo Perniciosius.

 

[Chalo]

Our society transformed from agrarian to industrial without cars. They were never necessary, only something that people opted into because they didn't care about the harms they do to others and the commons.

No, they opted into them because they were better (easier, faster over a long distance, more useful load) than horses, and were cheap enough to buy. Back when cars first came out people didn't even understand the risks they posed to the environment, and the first cars had a top speed less than a horse's.

Cars were originally for hobbyists only, then for rich fux only, but later for "everybody" (meaning everybody who didn't care about the safety and welfare of others, and could afford one). The fact that Tin Lizzies weren't much heavier than a horse and cart, nor much faster than a bicycle, made them somewhat acceptable by the standards of the time. I doubt that people of the day would have tolerated jackasses in SUVs zooming down their neighborhood streets at 40mph while texting and blasting their subwoofers back then.

Trains in their various incarnations had already outperformed cars on speed/load/distance/convenience/cost-to-benefit capabilities by the time cars showed up. I cross several old tram tracks every day in my neighborhood (which up until recently hasn't been the kind of place you think about when you think of trams). We already had better choices available than cars, until the car folks decided we shouldn't have those choices. I think the market might have settled on different options, if the market had been allowed some of those different options.

 

[Sunder]

Edit: post was reply to billvon. Thought I quoted a bit of his post.

Ugh. You're picking fights for the sake of it. Even you can't be dumb enough to think cars are more efficient than trains.

Average co2 per kilometer for trains 28g

Average co2 per kilometer for cars 100-143 depending on assumptions.

https://www.delijn.be/en/overdelijn/organisatie/zorgzaam-ondernemen/milieu/co2-uitstoot-voertuigen.html

And whats the obsession with old trains? If it was the most efficient the technology of the time, then todays technology had no bearing on it, or we may as well start estimating the gas coming out of a horses rear.

The fact of the matter is, even on the more optimistic end of the assumptions, trains are 4 x as efficient as cars. It stands that it is wasteful for everyone to use a car when far more efficient and viable transport is available. No point saying older technologies were just as wasteful when there was nothing better available at the time.

 

[Sunder]

I'm really trying to think from your point of view... Because as I said, I don't really believe that you think that cars are more efficient than trains. The best I can come up with, is that you're fixated on the weight, because I used a throw away number as an example, and you thought it was key to my argument.

To be clear, my argument is not how many kg per person, or how much Co2 per kilometer. Those two figures are a necessity of their time. What I am appalled at, is wastefulness.

Most people are buying SUVs now. They are rarely full of people, they are rarely full of gear that genuinely need to be transported (I recall one study of how much fuel carrying a set of golf clubs around for a full year would consume), and they are much larger than we need.

A guy at work drives a 25 year old Nissan Patrol, belching out fumes, because he enjoys off-roading and camping. That's great, good on him. But he drives it everywhere. As a sales guy, he racks up over 70,000km a year, and goes off-roading maybe 4 or 5 times a year. He's hauling 2.4 tonnes of inefficient, 25 year old, badly worn engine, when he could have a smart car for 2 (or even 1 - though they were only released in Japan), instead of burning thousands of litres of petrol without need.

If a tradie needs a truck. Drive one. No issue. If a family usually travels together, sure, get a big 5 seater. But as I said... 9/10 cars are for single people. All just because we want to carry around an air conditioner, sound deadening, and because everyone else's cars are so heavy, airbags, etc. etc., until we surround ourselves with 1.8 tonne cars, because every other car is 1.8 tonnes.

Maybe in 100 years time, we'll all be flying our 100 tonne houses around as our primary mode of transport, and we leave them "running" (floating?), and not give the 21st century a thought, because we've mastered anti-matter... But I suspect no. I suspect we'll be seen as a golden era, that squandered the future generation's resources.

 

[billvon]

Cars were originally for hobbyists only, then for rich fux only, but later for "everybody" (meaning everybody who didn't care about the safety and welfare of others, and could afford one). The fact that Tin Lizzies weren't much heavier than a horse and cart, nor much faster than a bicycle, made them somewhat acceptable by the standards of the time.

Agreed. Many were made to look like horse-drawn carts. One even had a fake horsehead on it, so as to not spook other horses.

I doubt that people of the day would have tolerated jackasses in SUVs zooming down their neighborhood streets at 40mph while texting and blasting their subwoofers back then.

Yep. And people today would not tolerate rotting horse carcasses and ten foot tall piles of horse manure in their cities - nor would they tolerate being shat on or dealing with the flies, noise and disease that surround horses. They would also be quite averse to being run down by spooked horses, which was a significant threat in cities that used horses as the primary means of transportation.

I think the market might have settled on different options, if the market had been allowed some of those different options.

What different options would those be? Today we have rail (long distance, commuter and light rail) in over 150 cities. 36 cities have light rail, 22 have rapid transit rail systems and over 100 have Amtrak stops. Almost every city and large town in the US has bus service. We have cities and towns with good bike infrastructure. We have over 5000 airports, 100,000 miles of rail line and 164,000 miles of highway. It sure seems like ht market is allowing all those options.

 

[billvon]

I'm really trying to think from your point of view... Because as I said, I don't really believe that you think that cars are more efficient than trains. The best I can come up with, is that you're fixated on the weight, because I used a throw away number as an example, and you thought it was key to my argument.

To be clear, there are many places where trains are far more efficient than cars. The LIRR, for example, runs mostly-electric trains at or over capacity for most of the day; that is efficient in nearly every sense of the word. More energy efficient, more weight efficient, more efficient use of real estate.

There are also cases where cars are the far more economical solution. My wife and I have driven from San Diego to Portland several times in a variety of vehicles (2005 Prius, 2002 Honda hybrid.) We've also taken the train (Amtrak) a few times. Driving in the Prius was far more efficient than taking the mostly empty train.

o be clear, my argument is not how many kg per person, or how much Co2 per kilometer. Those two figures are a necessity of their time. What I am appalled at, is wastefulness.

There's the problem right there; an emotional reaction (being appalled) is rarely the best foundation to base decisions on transport on.

I know a few people in LA who are appalled that people walk places when they could drive. What if someone mugs them? What if they get hit by a car? What if it rains? Who walks in LA, anyway? Homeless people?

Needless to say, that's not a good approach to the problem either. A better approach is to choose the metrics you want to optimize for (land use? initial resource use? operating resource use? pollution? energy use? CO2 emissions?) and then do the math to figure out what works best.

Most people are buying SUVs now. They are rarely full of people, they are rarely full of gear that genuinely need to be transported (I recall one study of how much fuel carrying a set of golf clubs around for a full year would consume), and they are much larger than we need.

Yep. Around here about a third of the vehicles used to commute to work (single passenger) are SUV's. That's the bad part. On the good side, over 400 drivers here drive EV's - and the Fiat 500e is one of the most popular here (because it's cheap.) And our rideshare program carries over 300.

A guy at work drives a 25 year old Nissan Patrol, belching out fumes, because he enjoys off-roading and camping. That's great, good on him. But he drives it everywhere. As a sales guy, he racks up over 70,000km a year, and goes off-roading maybe 4 or 5 times a year. He's hauling 2.4 tonnes of inefficient, 25 year old, badly worn engine, when he could have a smart car for 2 (or even 1 - though they were only released in Japan), instead of burning thousands of litres of petrol without need.

Yes, that's a problem. Solutions include:

-higher gas prices
-PHEV systems for SUV's
-small, cheap EV's for commuting (like the Fiat 500e)

 

[Chalo]

What different options would those be? Today we have rail (long distance, commuter and light rail) in over 150 cities. 36 cities have light rail, 22 have rapid transit rail systems and over 100 have Amtrak stops. Almost every city and large town in the US has bus service. We have cities and towns with good bike infrastructure. We have over 5000 airports, 100,000 miles of rail line and 164,000 miles of highway. It sure seems like ht market is allowing all those options.

By the 1920s, there were tram systems in every city of note. They were bought up by General Motors and switched over to buses, or shut down altogether; or they were closed for lack of profit while roads for cars were being heavily tax subsidized. Those were transportation choices people were exercising that were taken away.

There are a few places where you can still take the trolley. But as the ghost tracks in my neighborhood attest, not nearly as many places as have already demonstrated a demand. And even those few places where you can still do it are not served as well as they were ninety years ago.

During the intervening years, we've developed urban sprawl, parking lots on everything (minimum parking requirement zoning), living environments slashed through by freeways, traffic signals that only change for cars, dangerously high speed limits that no car driver obeys, traffic jams that stop public transit too, pervasive victim blaming, etc., etc. Cars and trucks make our cities insufferable, but their operators are not held responsible for the damage.

You'll get hassled by the cops for playing live music on the sidewalk, but not for running a loud refrigerator truck around the clock, or taking the muffler off your car. You'll go to jail if you punch someone in the nose, but not if you run him over in a crosswalk with your car. You can't burn your garbage a few times a year, but you can chug out diesel smoke for hours a day, every day. The physical and institutional layout of our society pushes people into cars as a default, and penalizes not using one.

This isn't really a matter of cars being the most practical way. Other modes of transportation are shut out by design. Cars are promoted by design, and subsidized.

 

[billvon]

By the 1920s, there were tram systems in every city of note. They were bought up by General Motors and switched over to buses, or shut down altogether; or they were closed for lack of profit while roads for cars were being heavily tax subsidized. Those were transportation choices people were exercising that were taken away.

Yep. And now they are being given back. In Portland, they've opened half a dozen new light rail routes in the past 20 years, including new bike-and-light-rail only bridges and cable cars. Here in San Diego there's a new trolley going in from downtown to the UTC area. Los Angeles got five new rapid-transit rail systems since 1990, and new lines are going in as we speak. San Francisco's BART has grown tremendously over the past 20 years.

New York - 2nd avenue subway recently completed. Atlanta - beltline streetcar. Austin - Austin Urban Rail. Denver - new line to airport completed. Minneapolis - Southwest LRT. Jersey - Passaic-Bergen passenger rail project. Sacramento - green and blue line extensions. Etc etc. That's progress.

During the intervening years, we've developed urban sprawl, parking lots on everything (minimum parking requirement zoning), living environments slashed through by freeways, traffic signals that only change for cars, dangerously high speed limits that no car driver obeys, traffic jams that stop public transit too, pervasive victim blaming, etc., etc. Cars and trucks make our cities insufferable, but their operators are not held responsible for the damage.

Car and truck DRIVERS make your life insufferable. People choose their behaviors - they choose where they want to live, they choose what kind of cars they drive, they choose what sort of music to play on their radios. You don't like drivers or home purchasers; that's fine. Many of them don't like bikers, and that's also fine. The important thing is to make good decisions on future forms of transit, and that's happening with the spending on light rail, EV incentives, bikeway improvements, urban development boundaries and zoning. It's happening with laws on gas mileage, ZEV and PZEV cars, congestion pricing and HOV lanes. All things that will tend to reduce the number of big gas guzzlers on the road, which is a good thing.

This isn't really a matter of cars being the most practical way. Other modes of transportation are shut out by design.

Obviously not true.

Cars are promoted by design, and subsidized.

So is light rail and biking.

 

[Chalo]

Cars and trucks make our cities insufferable, but their operators are not held responsible for the damage.

Car and truck DRIVERS make your life insufferable. People choose their behaviors -

No, it's the cars and trucks. If the assholes stayed and all the cars and trucks left town, it would be a lot better. Assholes are not nearly as noisy, polluting, obstructive, or dangerous as cars (even in Texas). And assholes who aren't in cars don't claim 100-200 meters of open space in front of them just because they're moving. They can maintain a lot of awful behaviors and still not be nearly as objectionable as cars that are driven by lovely and gracious people.

This isn't really a matter of cars being the most practical way. Other modes of transportation are shut out by design.

Obviously not true.

Really?

 

[billvon]

No, it's the cars and trucks. If the assholes stayed and all the cars and trucks left town, it would be a lot better.

So you are just as bothered by your neighbor's car parked in his garage as when it's being driven too close to you on the road?

It's the drivers, not the things they drive (or fly, or ride.)

Really?

Really. You wouldn't be able to ride an electric bike through that neighborhood? If so, the problem may lie with you, rather than with any layout of the roads in the area.

I live in an area that looks like that on a much smaller scale. I chose the home in part because it was three miles from where I work, and so I can bike. I don't even have to take a road; there's a path in the canyon out back that leads to my place of work without crossing any public roads. Indeed, medium-density housing like that is much better for mass transit than the large-lot homes some people prefer.