322
Car free zones make every city and town better. There are really very few good reasons for a car to ever be in a city centre, that should be reserved for emergency services and accessibility for people with disabilities
I went to Texas to visit a friend and without a car I couldn't go anywhere. Usually I love to explore the neighborhood by foot, but roads were completely missing a place to walk
So you didn't have "freedom" in the most free state of the most free country?
Xkcd is so great at being relevant.
I saw this for the 4th time now. Any way to fix this?
Don't be subscribed to 4 different "fuck cars" communities?
I think the Lemmy devs are working on a way of reducing duplicate posts in feeds...
4th time on 'All'.
After a lot of research I’ve come to the conclusion the only viable solution is bike lanes with a curb separating them and roads. As a mode of transport, bikes are as different from cars as they are from pedestrians. All three need their own lanes. Bikes make city traversal much more viable without a car.
Of course there are some caveats here. Not every city is well planned for cycling. Cities in the Netherlands have much higher density than places like Austin. If it takes 10km to get from your home to the grocery store, bicycle lanes are just less useful. Geography also matters. Holland is flat as a pancake. Many other places are not, and like it or not, hills suck for cycling unless you have an e-bike. Most people do not. Finally, weather matters. People in cold climates can dress warmer. People in hot climates cannot dress any cooler than shorts and t-shirt. If the temperature is hot for much of the year, or months at a time, people cannot rely on it for their commutes or errands. This makes cycling unviable for some hot cities.
Car free zones are great, but only when the public transport infrastructure can support it. If most people who come to the city live far away because of low density, public transport becomes very expensive to implement and maintain. People don’t want to jack up their taxes 10-20% to pay for that. Longer term planning should permit and encourage higher density, but there is a cultural component here. Some people really like having a house with a backyard. Apartments don’t offer this.
I feel so many of these arguments have been addressed already by NJB, CityNerd and the like, and they don't hold up.
I’m sure they really believe their opinions but I don’t subscribe to the conspiracy theory that cycling is a panacea of awesome and everyone who opposes it is an oil shill. There are many real obstacles. Proponents often argue, “well just restructure society!”, as though that’s achievable or even desirable to many citizens.
That said, there are many ways to improve eco-friendly transport in cities. It just requires convincing locals that it’s better than driving. Selling this vision has been a catastrophic failure for activists. They need to stop arguing for a nebulous benefit which might benefit some future generation. They need to argue for why cycling is better today. If they can confidently prove it’s better, voters will support these measures.
The problem with Austin is that they keep building car-dependent suburban sprawl. If they focused on only building infill development, then they would be able to have more density. Also public transportation and bicycles can travel longer distances than you think. Just because Austin isn't as dense doesn't mean that you need to change the city radically to get rid of cars.
There are plenty of hilly cities with lots of bikes.
There are plenty of hot and cold cities with lots of bikes.
The ranking of transportation options, from cheapest to most expensive, and from most prioritized to least prioritized is
- walking
- bicycles
- public transportation
- cars
The most affordable transportation is walking and bicycling, but even public transportation is cheaper than cars if done right. Car-dependent society costs every single person tens of thousands of dollars a year, both from the expenses of owning a car, and the government expenses of building and maintaining expensive roads. A bus doesn't cost that much.
Dutch suburban houses have backyards and bikes.
r/kutautos would like a word about this idea of the Netherlands.
huge discussion about this comic found on a Youtube community post. Go there if you want to read more after lemmy has run out of comments to read.
Since when has youtube had text/image posts? How do you even get to them? Are they a mobile only feature?
I see them in the browser at Youtube.com alongside Shorts, surveys, and YouTuber community posts.
this post was submitted on 23 Sep 2023
322 points (96.5% liked)
Fuck Cars
9784 readers
4 users here now
This community exists as a sister community/copycat community to the r/fuckcars subreddit.
This community exists for the following reasons:
- to raise awareness around the dangers, inefficiencies and injustice that can come from car dependence.
- to allow a place to discuss and promote more healthy transport methods and ways of living.
You can find the Matrix chat room for this community here.
Rules
-
Be nice to each other. Being aggressive or inflammatory towards other users will get you banned. Name calling or obvious trolling falls under that. Hate cars, hate the system, but not people. While some drivers definitely deserve some hate, most of them didn't choose car-centric life out of free will.
-
No bigotry or hate. Racism, transphobia, misogyny, ableism, homophobia, chauvinism, fat-shaming, body-shaming, stigmatization of people experiencing homeless or substance users, etc. are not tolerated. Don't use slurs. You can laugh at someone's fragile masculinity without associating it with their body. The correlation between car-culture and body weight is not an excuse for fat-shaming.
-
Stay on-topic. Submissions should be on-topic to the externalities of car culture in urban development and communities globally. Posting about alternatives to cars and car culture is fine. Don't post literal car fucking.
-
No traffic violence. Do not post depictions of traffic violence. NSFW or NSFL posts are not allowed. Gawking at crashes is not allowed. Be respectful to people who are a victim of traffic violence or otherwise traumatized by it. News articles about crashes and statistics about traffic violence are allowed. Glorifying traffic violence will get you banned.
-
No reposts. Before sharing, check if your post isn't a repost. Reposts that add something new are fine. Reposts that are sharing content from somewhere else are fine too.
-
No misinformation. Masks and vaccines save lives during a pandemic, climate change is real and anthropogenic - and denial of these and other established facts will get you banned. False or highly speculative titles will get your post deleted.
-
No harassment. Posts that (may) cause harassment, dogpiling or brigading, intentionally or not, will be removed. Please do not post screenshots containing uncensored usernames. Actual harassment, dogpiling or brigading is a bannable offence.
Please report posts and comments that violate our rules.
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS