- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- technews@radiation.party
- hackernews@derp.foo
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We should not be building our cities in ways that necessitate owning a car.
That ship has sailed a long time ago
Never too late to change. Just look at Amsterdam now vs a couple decades ago
I know Jersey City has made a big push to bikify the city, and limited parking in new high-density development, with the idea being if you build it, they will come. It’s part of an overall plan that they date out to 2060. Shit takes time. Doesn’t mean you don’t try though, that’s for sure. I’m hopeful.
I’d argue that Amsterdam isn’t a great example, as the infrastructure of that city was largely built before the advent of automobiles, then converted to support a more Americanized design that was vehicle-centric, before finally realizing, “Hey, we’re Dutch, not American, we need more space for our bicycles!”
If we’re discussing American infrastructure designed in the 20th century, it seems to be pretty difficult to convert because the physical structures of both the transportation infrastructure and the destinations people want to visit are not built densely enough to make going without a car a top tier option for most people.
I mean this broadly, not to say that there aren’t opportunities to start moving this in the other direction, but emphasizing that changing the focus to downplay the importance of vehicles will be neither quick, cheap, or easy.
I mean… I figure nearly half of us cities were designed before 1900, to some extent anyhow.
Like st Louis was incorporated in 1822. Plenty of cities were clearly designed before the automobile and then gave up the plot for Robert Moses bullshit.
city cores and select transit corridors are going to be where the nice stuff’s built, but there are going to be pockets of car hell for decades. these places will probably start losing value and the farthest out ones will start disappearing to abandonment
It’s gonna be crashing on the shore pretty soon at this rate.
You’re right, let’s not change with the times but just lay down and die, nothing is worth the effort.
What are we gonna do, nuke all the suburbs and cram everyone into little pods?
Lmao. This is so ignorant
For example the minimum parking rules could be changed to allow buildings to not have parking
Commercial buildings then could occupy their entire block, if they don’t need all that space, more stuff fits in the city
Zoning could change, allowing more commercial stuff in the suburbs, more homes in the city
bro, capitalism is going to cram you into a pod no matter what we do with urban planning, because rich people control more and more of all the wealth and thus land. if anything breaking car dependence would make pods less likely because you could build real apartments in more places
not really. it’s a choice that’s remade every year. we can fix it, and people are trying.
It’s about oil and profits. They want us to need a car to go anywhere. More cars, more oil, more profits, RIGHT?
Nerevar, what do you need a car for? You have all the siltstriders in the world at your disposal. Here, take the keys to Juan Angelito. He’s my favorite.
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People who buy new are wild to me. I can afford a new car, or I could just buy a car that’s only a few years old with low mileage and save a ton of money. Seems like a no brainer to me.
Well for an EV it might make sense. There just hasnt been a used market for them for a while.
What do you mean? The Nissan Leaf first came out in 2011, the original ones are probably 13 years old now. The Bolt was released in 2016.
I own a car older than that. What I don’t want is to buy an EV and when it needs repair I have to find the one shop in my state that knows what to do. I keep hearing horror stories of having to go back to the dealer.
The problem will be solved with time but right now I would be hesitant if I was looking at replacing my car.
They generally need the same maintenance as any other car, struts, suspension, wheels, and miscellaneous parts that break. They’re not magical, they just use a different fuel.
Ok good to know, and the battery replacement stuff is all settled as well? I am planning my next car to be a used EV I just don’t want to have problems.
Battery replacements are generally about as frequent as getting a new transmission or engine. They’re rare, expensive, but if you want to pick something up on the used or remanufactured market it’s much cheaper. Supposedly the average battery will outlast the life of the car. My EV is only a year old, so I’ll have to get back to you on that, but the number I’ve heard is 10% degradation in 10 years.
the originals had terrible range right out the gate and have only gotten worse. practical electric cars aren’t common on the used market since most of them are still with their first owners
Depends on when. There have been many times in the past 20 years that “low mileage” cars are only a couple thousand less than new, and some rare cases during the pandemic where used was more than new, cause new didn’t exist.
Even now depending on where you live, you have to get a fairly used car to get a significant discount.
There are very few electric cars available used, which severely limits my options if I want to be responsible with an automobile purchase.
It can depend. I bought new in 2017, but it was for a 2017 chevy volt. It was discounted plus had a $7500 tax credit (which I wouldn’t get if I bought used). Final price after absolutely everything was about $20k, though the money I saved on gas helps bring that down. Still driving it to this day and loving it the whole time.
Just bought an 11 year old car for 12k. Because a new one would’ve wiped out my savings and then some after saving for 5 years to replace my 20 year old car. Nobody can afford shit.
People need to stop “pretending” they can afford all this shit, it’s not needed and noone cares, who are people showing off too?
New iphone? Don’t need it
Maybe if we stop buying shit these companies will actually try
They’ll just cut you off from your subscription if you don’t buy buy buy.
That’s all the 80 month car loans are at this point.
I’m curious. What car did you buy? I hate how everything is so inflated. I bought a mint civic si for 8 grand like 6 years ago. I kinda want insight/realize everything is fucked.
We picked up a 12 year old civic hatchback before Covid for 5k and it was in immaculate like-new condition, low miles. It got totaled right after our other car’s engine finally wore out. I then found a 10 year old Toyota for 16k. It was the lowest price in a 200-mile radius for cars/small trucks with under 150k miles on them that weren’t limping/totaled/savaged.
It was fucking flabbergasting.
You got yours 6 years ago. 8k was about average for a decent used car then. Now you’re paying almost full price for a 5 year old car or if you’re okay with a shit box that may or may not last then you can drop 5k. I got a 2012 GTI.
shrug and?
I know most people want “New cars” and fine, go chase that over priced luxury, but I’d rather a car that’s 1-2 years old that’s dropped more than half the price, and being passed over because new shiny thing came out.
People shouldn’t have to drive beaters, but buying a car for 10k isn’t a bad decision unless you’re extremely well off our only care about status symbols.
Like there’s a reason I was able to buy a house, and a good job helped, but also my wife and I lived with in our means, which is something I feel that isn’t talked about in the consumerism age. (You can buy something new, but for most things you don’t need a yearly iphone/car/or anything. A good 50 inch tv works well for a tenth of the price of the newest one. ) And yet I see people complain about not having a lot of money yet they’re always talking about the newest graphics cards, newest tvs, and newest tech… I wonder why.
I’d rather a car that’s 1-2 years old that’s dropped more than half the price […]
Except that doesn’t really happen anymore. Shoot, I’ve seen some cars appreciate in value after they roll off the lot in recent years. Hoping that reverses soon, but it sure isn’t like it used to be.
Take the Toyota 4runner for example - they’re incredibly reliable because they are simplistic in many ways with bullet proof components. You can even find 5 year old models that are within 5k of a new one.
Look at this guy with his $10k…
Get a better job. If you can’t afford a $10k car, you’re doing something wrong…
You understand that if someone in a low paid job gets a better paid job, the low paid job does not disappear in a puff of smoke? That the proportion of people in low paid work is a function of political decisions as to what the economy should look like?
I mean, the headline is fucking ridiculous (we don’t need anything like 10% of car sales to be new cars). But so is giving careers advice as a solution to the high prevalence of shit pay.
Why don’t I strap on my job helmet and squeeze down into a job cannon and fire off into job land, where jobs grow on jobbies?
The only thing that’s being done wrong here is you defending the system and not the individual.
Yeah it’s insane. I bought a 1 year old Hyundai and knocked tons of depreciation off an already cheaper brand.
At my work people be driving around in leased Range Rovers/AMG Mercs. Then they will take the piss out of my car.
Seriously? I now have more disposable income because i’m not wasting it renting a car and also I own my car… It should be me bragging
I got a 2021 car last year with 6000km on it . It was almost full price .
Probably because it only had 6000 km on it. Average is closer to 15000 km/year.
I have a 2020 rav4 and it is only valued at $3k less than what I paid for it brand new. This isn’t a reality anymore.
Arguable the case for purchasing a brand new vehicle starts to make more sense as BEV become the majority as the batteries are a consumable that degrades with use and time. So long as the increased price is offset by the longer utilization of that battery.
Yeah, of course… But they’re also replaceable. You can even check the individual cells, swap out the worst ones with cells from other used packs, and end up getting back up to decent capacity. There’s a whole statistics, mean time to failure aspect to batteries - it’s not going to take them back to new, but swapping out the worst cells can get you a lot better performance
Or you could just replace the batteries with newer, likely better, battery banks. The first option needs a certain scale, but would be cheap, the second would be a straight range upgrade over even the factory range.
There’s also the fact that electric cars are much more mechanically simple - this is unlikely to catch on under our current economic system, but it’s way easier to swap electric motors than an engine…
My points being, I think we need to make way less cars, and electric cars are actually easier to repair (at least from a physics and resource perspective, hostile design and economic pressures could easily eat up that difference)
we need right to repair laws for cars so this is possible
The problem with replacing individual cells is you’ll end up with cells with different wear levels which means different discharge rates and capacities (max voltage). The battery management system can mitigate some of the problems that arise but can only do that while chargering. While the battery is in use or sits for an extented period of time the cells will try to level out the voltage difference causing loss in capacity and a potential fire risk if the cells are too out of balanced.
Replacing the battery with new better batteries isn’t really an option either as any significant increase in power density would be from a change in battery chemistry and that would also require changing out the on board charging circuit and related systems. There’s also the issue that the majority of charge points providers state in their TOS that the use of any aftermarket parts or modifications to your battery or charger is forbidden so you are essential blacklisted from using any DC fast charger.
That’s why I mentioned pairing cells from multiple used battery packs… This isn’t magic, it’s numbers… You pair like with like, and by removing the underperforming cells, you get rid of the dead cells bringing down the whole bank because they can’t hold a charge. The fire risk is also greatly overstated… Batteries and management circuits have come a long way. You could swap in new cells and it would be fine… It would just be a waste, the new cells would degrade faster than their spec sheet implies.
And as far as matching like with like, you can build a lithium cell tester at home to profile each cell for a few dozen dollars… Literal hobbiest level stuff
And you most definitely can upgrade with newer, better batteries. There’s three numbers - energy density, voltage, and discharge rate. You can upgrade the density to the moon, so long as the other two match it’s a drop in replacement… And these three things are a tradeoff when you build the battery, so a better battery bank with the same output and voltage is just going to make you car run further, easy as that.
Yeah, TOS might stand in your way, but that’s economic pressures, not an engineering issue. We could entirely solve that problem through force of law. On the topic, let me take this opportunity to promote right to repair - companies are going to feed us a lot of bullshit reasons why we need to throw it all away and replace everything fresh… They have every incentive to make us believe that. It’s less work for them to say “that’s not an approved use”, they make far more money if they convince us they are the only ones that can fix it… it’s an economic alignment problem, the engineering solution is well understood
but also my wife and I lived with in our means, which is something I feel that isn’t talked about in the consumerism age.
the problem is the basic cost of living is going up beyond what can be afforded and people scream at you about not making extremely bad decisions you didn’t even make and don’t have to in order to end up struggling.
I can’t even afford an old car lol
Same here, why I went with a motorcycle instead lol
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I can’t afford a used car. My dad helped me buy my current car and if it does I’m fucked.
2 years ago I was in need of a new truck (work related). Practically all the used stuff that’s worth a dam was priced not far behind if not more than new. The kicker, the new ones I was interested in weren’t available…so I was forced to buy used.
Yet CEOs and billionaires are making more money than ever. Something has to give and soon…
Right, right after the article about tech workers living in “pods”. I mean, how much money are they making for other people? And then I know of this millionaire (who made his money in f’ing health insurance) with an 18,000 square foot house by Vail that his family visits twice a year for a few weeks.
The newest car I’ve ever owned (and currently own) is a 2007 model. Not gonna lie, with all the BS getting loaded into cars nowadays I think I’ll keep it that way. It’s easier just to have a couple of cheap shitboxes in the driveway that way you have something to drive when one of them inevitably needs work
I got a almost new 2021 last year and there’s no key hole for the door so when the key fob battery died in the middle of the winter I was stuck outside looking up on YouTube how to unlock my car . Turns out you have to pry off a piece of plastic that I ended up breaking to use my key to unlock the door . It also sets off an alarm when you open the car that way . Who thought that was a good idea ! To make things worse it was like -30 C and I had my 5 year old with me because we where sliding.
That’s why you read the manual, especially for a complex peace of tech, when you buy the thing. Just because you didn’t bother to look up how stuff works doesn’t make it bad. This one’s on you.
Or how about you don’t fix something that ain’t broken. This push to start shit is a cancer
I fucking love my push to start.
It’s easier, more secure, and cool to boot.
If my key fob dies I just stick it in a hole on the steering column and it starts right up. The door key is easily accessible in the fob, and the batteries aren’t difficult to replace regardless.
It’s also your responsibility to know and understand these things before you spend tens of thousands of dollars on any purchase. It’s not like it suddenly got like that when you got into that situation.
Just because you read it, doesn’t mean you retain the information after.
At today’s car prices, it’s actually cheaper for some people to use a rideshare every day. Especially when you factor in the cost of gas, maintenance, insurance,and parking. My friend drove for Uber and had a regular daily commuter, a nurse who worked in Houston’s medical center where parking is around $30/day. We have no good mass transit options so Uber was the best choice.
Sadly it’s dependent on the area, my current area rideshare situation is so bad that it can take you almost an hour to get a driver who won’t cancel your trip because they deem that your trip is not profitable enough. The system’s fucked so you’re pushed to get a car so you can have mobility. This is doubly so when you’ve started having children.
Uber became super expensive as well, post pandemic.
Luckily not in my area
This is doubly so when you’ve started having children.
we need alternatives to driving otherwise people won’t be able to have kids
Yeah, that’s why public transit and multi purpose zoning are important
exactly. fuck cars
People living in Central/Eastern Europe: 80%? Amateurs.
I don’t know ANYONE who has a new car produced in last couple of years here in Poland. According to some statistic average age of car is 15.5 years here, in fact I drive 11 year old car myself. There’s just no way I am going to dump so much cash on a freaking car (and personally I’d rather buy some nice electric bicycle instead).
and personally I’d rather buy some nice electric bicycle instead
This is exactly the reason I bought a new and good bike for the price of a used car. And what’s more is that the exercise that comes with it is free and the insurance is exponentially lower.
We really need to make more bike friendly infrastructure around the world so more people have the same option as I have.
I’d love to live and work somewhere where I could bike. The distance to my current job would be doable for me but there is zero bike infrastructure to make it feasible.
I feel for you. Sometimes I forget I have the privilege of living in Denmark which is extremely bike-friendly, something I shouldn’t take for granted.
I’m in the same boat. I used to bike before I moved, but now there’s no route that I feel safe enough on.
hard fucking agree. we need to infiltrate the road design manual committees and get it written in that it’s mandatory to have protected bike lanes on any road with more than 4 lanes of traffic and not a freeway
Opel Astra, forever and ever
Truly reliable beasts, my family used to drive a mid 90’s Astra F for like 18 years and then it basically rusted away pretty quickly. Engine and everything else was totally fine. I think the only part we had to replace was the alternator…
481K new cars were sold in Poland in 2022, so it definitely happens. Sure, that’s 3 times fewer than in France (which has twice the population, though), but it’s far from “anyone”.
And yes, I know you said you “don’t know” anyone who bought one, not that they don’t exist, but I take your meaning to be that it doesn’t happen/is very rare.
Here’s another reason why taking transit doesn’t bother me. For five bucks a day I can listen to podcasts and music and read books for 30 minutes, and let someone else take care of everything, I do not love everything about the bus (really you have to make everyone disembark during rush hour so you can cram your obesity scooter on there so you can go to Tim Hortons so nobody else can sit down?), but honestly it’s pretty stress free. I realize not everyone has access to transit but I think people should make more effort to use it.
really you have to make everyone disembark during rush hour so you can cram your obesity scooter on there so you can go to Tim Hortons so nobody else can sit down?
Has it…occurred to you that some disabled people have mobility issues or pain disorders that limit mobility to begin with, and that weight gain is a byproduct of not being able to walk or move or stand for very long without trouble?
I had a boss who had dwarfism and used a wheelchair 80% of the time. 20% of the time he slowly, painfully did hobble about–but it was clear as day WHY he was higher weight than he should’ve been. My own blood pressure would spike hearing the tiny sounds of pain he made when got out of his wheelchair and moved.
I have a friend with POTS–and if you’re unfamiliar with that, basically she stands up and her blood pressure and heart rate is malfunctioning so her heart acts like she’s running a marathon, the beats per minute go insane…but blood is pooling in her feet and they’re turning purple where you can’t see it because things are out of whack and despite her heart going haywaire, there’s not enough pressure to get the blood out of her feet and elsewhere. This condition happened prior to any weight gain.
I can hear her breath start to go wobbly just doing simple things because her body doesn’t regulate her blood pressure and heart rate normally. She’s gained weight because she’s at risk of passing the fuck out if she is on her feet for very long–she has to literally plan out doing simple things like going to the grocery store because if she pushes herself she might end up downed on the sidewalk relying on the helpfulness of strangers to get back up. It’s taken her many years to accept she really shouldn’t be pushing herself into a collapse because she’s worried that people will judge her for being “lazy and fat”. Comments like yours about “obesity scooters” only act to tear down all the people who ARE trying their hardest and still having their body fail them.
I have a different friend who has thyroid problems, she inherited them from her mom (and her bro has them too), and weight is a bitch for her to manage because her thyroid is fried.
I just broke my foot in July, and watched my weight inch up because it’s really fucking hard to get up stairs when you can’t put weight on one foot. I was semi bedbound for like 2 months. I’m LUCKY in that my foot will heal, but I don’t even snack and I gained 15lbs because of that one little temporary mobility issue. I’m LUCKY in that once it heals, I will be able to move normally and lose what I gained.
You could’ve made your point about transit without taking pot-shots at disabled people, who often are stuck in a terrible situation of their body failing them medically, and society often forcing them into poverty to be able to access the care they need.
Seriously, why isn’t it possible to champion mass public transit for all without shitting on the people who use it by necessity currently?
We’re you refered to physical therapy after breaking your foot? Or are you able to see if insurance will pay because your mobility has been reduced?
I had several injuries in the military that left me unable to stand, walk, drive a car, or balance for very long. With the help of physical therapy I was eventually able to walk properly, then after some time I was able to take a ride to work a job where I was sometimes sitting but often standing. Eventually I was able to work and exercise enough that I got all my balance and mobility back.
Having public transit helped me when I still didn’t have enough fine motor control to operate a pedal and brake.
Not everyone is on the same journey, but please see if you can access physical therapy. Please advocate for not just healing but making yourself whole.
You don’t have to go to Tim Hortons at rush hour when everyone is using it to go to work and school, and inconvenience everyone on the bus making them late while you back your scooter on because you just have to go get your 12 pack of donuts right now. Just wait a little while until the buses are quieter for pity’s sake.
Disabled people couldn’t possibly have a reason to be outside at the same time as good, hardworking folk. Why don’t they just lurk in the shadows where they belong?
weight gain is a byproduct of not being able to walk or move or stand for very long without trouble
Weight gain is a byproduct of consuming more calories than your body expends. Not everyone can walk or be active, but everyone can put the fork down. It’s quite simple actually
It’s quite simple actually.
Or is it?
Do you take into account that:
- Most processed food are created around the bliss point in order to make it as addictive as possible.
- Fresh food being more expensive and/or more time consuming to prepare than processed alternatives.’
- the existence of food deserts.
- advertising pushing unhealthy and addictive eatings habits down our collective throats with little to no regulations (why not do what we did with alcohol/tobacco in a lot of countries?)
- bad habits formed during childhood such as empty calories used as rewards, etc.
Imho everyone can put the fork down as in everyone can stop smoking or doing any drugs really. It’s possible but demands an extra effort that not anyone is able to put in at any given moment (without even taking relapses into account).
To me it really has some “it’s your fault you got conned” vibes ^^’
When I was in college I lost weight when I had no access to a kitchen. I ate a lot of fast food but just counted my calories. Sometimes you have to do weird things like skipping the buns on a burger but it’s really not that hard
I’m glad it wasn’t that hard for you ^^
But I think you’re confusing hard and difficult.
The problem I run into is time. And sometimes location. My previous job, for instance, was far enough out that there was no bus service; I had to drive. My only other option was a 2-hour transit ride and then a half-hour bike ride, partly on gravel roads.
And my friend has a job that’s 15 minutes by car, or 45 minutes away by bus. Even worse, with recent construction messing with the trains, his commute has gone to 2 hours plus.
And this is in a city with a decently robust transit system.
No definitely transit should be made more robust, I know it doesn’t work for everyone. Get light rail transit everywhere and make 15 minute commutes, I say. Make transit more convenient than driving.
Adding more light rail wherever it makes sense is definitely a good plan (and should happen), but improving bus networks gives a lot more bang for the buck than focusing only on light rail. Features like off-board fare collection (paying at the bus stop, not on the vehicle), bus signal priority (extending greens and shortening reds as buses approach traffic lights), and dedicated bus lanes all improve the overall speed of buses and therefore the overall rider experience. Expanding the prevalence of these features should be a priority everywhere, particularly on higher-ridership routes.
Those are also all excellent ideas. More tranist all around I say.
we should build rail out as far as possible, then at the termini put a park and ride and a BRT that stretches as far out as possible
The biggest problem I run I to with transit in most cities is the time sink, security flaws, and expense.
I drive to a park and ride where I have to pay 12 dollars to have my car broken into. Then wait 20 minutes to pamy another $15 to take the light rail that drops me off 8 blocks from my destination, then wait 20 minutes to pay 5 bucks for the bus that drops me 2 blocks away, then walk to my destination.
Or I could drive straight to my destination, pay 8 bucks for the parking garage with a security gate, and save an hour.
Right, the “take mass transit” works great … in places with functional mass transit.
Bike or electric scooter. Not sure what the distance is but anything under 25 kms is feasible.
I’m not cycling the 40 miles between affordable housing and my office in 105° for 5 months or of the year.
Not everybody can live in New York where the system can support robust public transit.
I live near Austin, and the cheapest place to rent in the small city I work is over $4,000 a month. The place I live is 1/5th of that, but it’s a 90-minute commute by car.
I’d kill for better housing or transit options, but it’s a very complex problem to solve in established areas that largely developed post-automobile. I work in municipal planning, so I appreciate both the advantages and the challenges more than most.
25 km (15 mi) is a bit of a stretch, although I’d have to test my ebike at those distances to know for sure. I got 10 miles one way throttle-only the other day before I ran out of battery
Can you not just manually pedal?
Well there’s that and the fact that if you’re a tradesman --or woman, or whatever-- having a truck or van can be pretty crucial to your ability to make a decent income.
I currently have a company vehicle, but for years, prior to my current position and when I was a contractor, I was obliged to own my own truck or van for very basic practical reasons.
about $800 last year for auto insurance
this year the number is about $1400
same vehicle same city
income stayed the same if not lower due to less work
new vehicles are more than likely unaffordable seeing how expensive a ten year old vehicle is
how the f#%k are we not in the streets
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Can’t have shit in Detroit.
(also funny that the motor city is not a viable place to have a motorized vehicle)
But the houses are $500
With I would assume 500k of owed taxes or some other trap, like living in Detroit.
But you shouldn’t have to have a car in Detroit. All of our cities need robust public transportation systems.
Yeah, having a here in the Inland Empire in California is one thing since we’re pretty spread out even if you increased density and public transit. But the major cities at minimum cars should be a luxury or something that sits in the garage half the time, and if its doing that it should also be quite small like those early 90s polish cars.
Same boat. Insurance costs have been going up for the last few years. I tried to talk to them about it… they said ‘well everyone else is getting in accidents, you don’t even know!!! It’s crazy out there’. Same vehicle. My only ‘options’ were to let them install a bunch of tracking devices and software (fuck that) or reduce my coverage considerably.
Gosh I love the for profit insurance I’m forced to have that gets to dictate everything.
New cars?
Shit, we can’t even afford groceries
A nonreligious Amen to that.
I have no idea why the Dacia Sandero is not brought to the US. $15,000 for a new car. They would be competing with the mirage and Rio all of which cost much more and are lower quality.
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