- cross-posted to:
- greentext@sh.itjust.works
- cross-posted to:
- greentext@sh.itjust.works
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/26368144
Anons argue in comments
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I don’t know about inexpensive. The bike I want is approaching a grand and my last car was $5500. I would be crushed losing that amount.
Merely owning a car has cost me an average of $2000 a year. Insurance, tires, oil and other maintenance costs brings that up to $3000. Just to own the car, that doesn’t include gas to actually use it
I mean, bikes are great for a lot of things and cities should definitely have the infrastructure to support their usage, but let’s not pretend that they can easily replace cars in every use case.
Cars are faster, cover long distances which are just infeasible for bikes, are more comfortable, can be used in bad weather, and are needed for people with disabilities. Granted, all of those use cases should be covered by a good public transport system, but that’s exactly why cars are considered to be the symbol of freedom - not depending on the bus/train schedules, weather, distance etc.Most jurisdictions don’t require a licence plate and therefore is harder to track.
Also, is Green Mario’s most faithful companion
To create a pedestrian first world I think we need to legitimately understand what advantages a car has. A car is a true source of empowerment.
Sure, I can ride a bike, but I could never ride a bike 300 miles for a weekend trip to any arbitrary destination. I can take a bus but not at any moment, and not the middle of the night. I can take public transit, but not to the place I need to go.
A car is a portable personal space. I can eat lunch in my car, I can take a nap.
A car is a space protected from the elements - I’m not getting rained on. Protection from wind, snow, sun.
Its locked doors are a barrier between me and potential (and sometimes imagined) threats.
I don’t need to list out for this community all the negative things associated with cars. I just list these pros to highlight it’s a challenging task to displace cars. It’s a list of benefits to replicate.
This comment made me sad, because it’s a reminder of just how bad a shithole most of the United States is: You need a car to go 300 miles at a whim because transit is bad or non-existent, and driving sucks. I know people who refuse to do that distance in one day. You need a car to go longer distances to bars, stores, restaurants, because
racismzoning makes everything far away and a pain and a half to access.You need a secluded, personal space to eat lunch or take a quick nap because the U.S. hates homeless people so much that there’s nowhere to do either of those things in public, and you’ll get abused by the police if you try. A car is a less-than-ideal spot to do either of those things comfortably; a picnic table or a park shelter would be better.
The best protection from threats is crowds, the “eyes on the street” principle. In fact, a lot of assaults happen in parking lots because there’s nobody around to intervene. But Americans are scared shitless of each other for no reason, and our society is collapsing because of it.
Oh, also, a car isn’t even a good place to eat or nap if you’re poor. The cops will hassle you to no end if you look like you don’t belong. (Hence, the prevalence of setting up a van for stealth camping.) It’s not a source of empowerment, if you’re poor. I would never have dreamed of jumping in my car and driving 300 miles on a whim when I worked retail. If the car broke down, or got damaged, I would’ve been supremely fucked, unable to pay to repair it, and without access to any alternative transportation.
But, frankly, I think that’s the point: Car dependency is supposed to hurt poor people, by physically excluding them, and providing a social marker of affluence so the not-quite-so-poor can feel good about themselves. (Why else bro dozers?)
You need a secluded, personal space to eat lunch or take a quick nap because the U.S. hates homeless people so much that there’s nowhere to do either of those things in public,
Ok that’s a leap. We do, in fact, have parks with benches.
Instead of going on an in-depth exploration of where those parks are located, I’ll say that if need a car to have a spot on the landscape where you’re allowed to do basic, human things like eat and nap, then that’s not an advantage of cars.
but I could never ride a bike 300 miles for a weekend trip to any arbitrary destination.
Work out. You can do it if you simply get thighs of steel.
You need to be introduced to cargo bikes and rain tents on bikes
You don’t know about my thighs!
Jokes aside, it’s one thing to say it’s possible to recreate some aspect of car ownership with a bike. But it’s making the individual responsible for something that requires a societal solution.
Suggesting impractical alternatives to what are easy benefits with cars isn’t a serious alternative. And we won’t fully replicate everything a car does. But understanding where the trade-offs are is essential to approaching the problem.
Por que no los dos?
You don’t need to fully replace cars to have a positive impact. I’m sure many people in the US could commute via bike if the infrastructure was there. Even if not every day, just sometimes. Also the public transit comment is definitely true in the US, and is not true many other places.
I see the benefits, and don’t disagree at all! Just saying that not all boxes need to be checked to offset some car use
You’re right, not every box has to be checked before it starts making sense for some people to switch to bike. I just commented because the original post was saying “why do we say cars are the ultimate symbol of freedom?” If someone can’t see why people like cars, they may have a hard time creating an environment where people move away from them.
Because our previous generation of 1% wealth leaders had a vision to make an entire economy built for, and dependant on, gasoline and oil. This new generation of wealth leaders don’t have as strong of a vision. They just see some weird techno-feudalism fantasies where they rule us all because of social media and AI or some shit.
I thought thier vision was to abandon earth and move to mars or something… But I guess they abandoned that and now just want to hoard and protect as much wealth as possible until they die.
In my area, bikes are considered motor vehicles and have to adhere to the same rules and regulations as bikes.
Which is stupid because there’s no infrastructure for bikes, and it’s illegal to ride them on the nearly completely unused sidewalks.
My FIL got me an e-bike that I can’t use for anything other than riding around the neighborhood because I have to get on the highway to get to town.
Uhhh…wow, bikes have to adhere to the same regulations as bikes?
Very unusual.
I thought that at first but sarcasm aside they meant that cycles have to adhere to motor bikes rules and regulations
Absolutely would be nice. I used to ride everywhere before I got priced out of where I was living and had to move. Now, my job is an hour away even by car… It wouldn’t need to be if things weren’t entirely designed around car travel here
I’m generally in support of this. The car allows for more freedom in certain conditions, though:
- Better for people with physical handicaps
- Can be more easily/comfortably used in extreme weather
- Doesn’t leave you as hot and sweaty, especially when going to work
Someone addressed your first point. But the second two are only true when your city is so spread out to make room for huge roads and parking lots between everything. Not to mention zoning laws that make it illegal to build denser housing, or to build a grocery store near where people live.
Id rather be in a tram on rails in snowy conditions than in a private vehicle thats subject to slippery conditions and other vehicles hitting it. The tram if hit often has more mass and survives the hit better than a sedan would.
The rail transport is always the safest option, barring staying at home in the first place.
rather be in a tram on rails in snowy conditions than in a private vehicle thats subject to slippery conditions and other vehicles hitting it.
Me too. The post is about bicycles though
This comment thread is about how cars shield you from the weather. I’d also rather tram part way and bike the rest if the conditions are nasty out.
I used to live steps from an LRT station. It was amazing. Didn’t even need to bike because the LRT took me everywhere I needed to go in the city! (Well, I also had the option of walking where the LRT didn’t go, lol)
the second two are only true when your city is so spread out to make room for huge roads and parking lots between everything. Not to mention zoning laws that make it illegal to build denser housing, or to build a grocery store near where people live.
That’s all definitely true! Sometimes people just live in areas that weren’t designed well, or they live in a different place than where they work by preference or availability.
If someone normally cycles to work in 20 minutes, it might be worthwhile to have a car available as a backup for days that are extra hot or extra blizzardy.
Even if someones neighborhood wasn’t designed well, changing zoning laws to allow for more density may make it more viable to put transit there. Then this hypothetical person’s normally 20 minute cycle could become a 5 minute walk + 10 minute tram ride on extra hot or extra blizzardy days.
Yeah, definitely. The post was about bicycle vs. car though, so that’s what my comment was based on. When we add public transit into the equation, it becomes a bigger and more wholesome picture.
I lasted 4 years of full time bike life and around 150k miles on the bike for 7 cars hitting me in 6 crashes where two were bad and the anomalous numbers are the last one that left me physically disabled after a broken neck and back. You will find a class of parallel parked cars making u-turns that is impossible to predict and avoid regardless of your skill, caution, and self awareness. Automobile safety is the anti Darwinian logic of disproportionately allowing stupidity to terrorize everyone.
Yeah. Street design, separation where possible and equalizing speeds where not, is super important. I have had numerous instances of almost being doored, patiently waiting for selfish assholes who I can tell from a distance are trying to speed through a stop sign, cars mistakenly entering the separated bike lane, so on and so forth. No crashes yet (I have fallen over on dirt paths) in 2 years and 2000km of bicycle commuting, but I try to take every precaution I can.
It’s probably why the reputation in cities with very little bike infrastructure, is that only people crazy enough to take a bicycle on the road do so, because the roads are designed so hazardously for them.
Greatly used in Montreal too for instance, but problem is winter, riding in a foot of snow while it’s -20, not easy…
So the thing for me isn’t the temperature nor the depth of the snow. It’s sharing space with cars and contending with the very real possibility of falling and getting my head crushed like a grape.
I quite liked using my fat bike in the park through the snow. But on a road with cars on ice? There’s a reason I sold it.
Also, I would literally sweat going downhill on that thing.
Cars perform even worse in snow.
Same when its over 110 F out…
Electric bikes work quite nicely in this scenario. Beautiful cooling breeze with minimal, if any, effort.
The automobile isn’t a symbol of freedom, never has been.
It’s a status symbol.
As someone who grew up in the rural US, it absolutely was, and I assume still is, as there are no alternatives in those areas. I could get to my school activities and work part time which, otherwise, was difficult to impossible relying on others. I don’t think it should be that way but it very much was (and probably still is) in those rural areas. For me, it also helped keep me away from abuse, but that’s (at least hopefully) an exception rather than the rule.
I live in a rural area. Like 15 minute drive to anywhere. Any less driving puts you in the middle of farmland. Not super remote, but enough.
Where I am, if it’s not in-town, you generally need to get there by motor vehicle. I only recently moved here, but I don’t think that’s super relevant.
I will always acknowledge exceptions to every rule. When you’re as rural, or more rural than I am, driving is an extremely useful tool to simply get anywhere. The utility of it, in my mind, is not really in question.
For the majority of people, who either live in, or near metropolitan areas, driving has an entirely different dynamic. It’s entirely unnecessary for anything that’s “in city”, which is going to be about 90% of what you’ll want to do. Apart from driving long distances to go on vacation or see family, a vehicle is entirely unnecessary. It can save time (at a cost) and it can be helpful when transporting items from one place to another, eg, when moving house; but again, they’re exceptions, not the rule.
Please forgive my terse initial comment. I usually find terse comments have more legs. There’s always more to any story, and exceptions are expected.
To bring this all back together, the number of people who will be in a rural situation, requiring a vehicle to travel anywhere in a reasonable timeframe, is, by the definition of rural, going to be fewer people than those who are included in my original statement, who live in a city or metro area where the population density is higher and there are more services in walking/biking distance. You and I, my friend, are the exception. Not the rule.
