It's the morning rush hour in Downtown Bellingham and, clearly, the newly installed bike lane on Holly Street is leading to hell-in-a-handbasket traffic conditions for area motorists who are now denied one of three travel lanes!
One only has to bring in the costs of not taking the train: all the state subsidies to roads, to traffic police, to health care not just for accidents but also from the lack of exercise and the crankiness of not interacting with fellow human beings and being stressed in a car, plus the cost of lost leisure and labour from having committed the time to driving instead. And the environmental damage of driving and cars.
#BeppeSala vuole una "città meno convulsa", "con meno macchine e più verde", ma "senza fare la guerra alle macchine"
Il concetto di "guerra alle #auto" è sbagliato. Sono le auto che fanno la guerra a tutto il resto, occupano la gran parte dello spazio pubblico con un'efficienza scarsissima, e hanno trasformato le nostre città in luoghi dove chiunque è fuori da un'auto non si sente né a suo agio né sicuro.
"But with most American cities designed to promote cars over all other forms of transit, the health of scooter users is, like those of pedestrians and cyclists, at risk once wheels hit pavement. Perhaps it should be no surprise that of the 30 people killed in 2018 while riding an e-scooter, 80 percent were struck by a car."
Not surprised the City of Melbourne LGA has 60% of households with zero to one cars; I've always said you could easily live without a car in inner-city Melbourne. Would be interesting to see how many households here have precisely zero cars.
@maxkennerly This gift link isn't the same as for NYT or WaPo. Bloomberg requires registration of the reader, even if free. Having not read the B article, it is easy to see why auto insurance is and will be higher: body shops are already past their limits as are insurance adjusters. People buy vehicles with the name "Gladiator" (a Jeep model) not because they want simple economic transportation. If Romans took out insurance on real Gladiators, but it would not have been cheap. #waroncars
Just got hit by a car again. Luckily he was going super slowly. I had already crossed a lane of traffic and he had a stop sign he just completely ignored. Fucking drivers. "I was staring at the homeless dude on the sidewalk instead of looking where I was going" is not a fucking excuse unless he's planning on giving the guy his car. #waroncars#carswaronpeople
@scott Oh indeed. I'm a #waroncars guy even though I have one. And think the most powerful path forward is maybe through e-bikes. But many people want cars and until we get there BEV is an improvement.
Question for #carfree parents, or just parents that walk/bike their kid to school; what do you do for severe thunderstorms? Does the school make any allowances around it? This morning we had severe storms with flooding and a tornado warning and it wasn't until later that I noticed an email from the superintendent saying that people could wait and tardiness would be excused. #BikeTooter
Schools largely, at least here in the UK, are not responsive to this. While parents who drive a car carry with them an air conditioned living room, we who cycle have to endure the weather standing outside, as school grounds are closed to parents. Requests to provision a waiting room have been dismissed for our kids' school.
In other words: plan to do what suits you, bring an umbrella for waiting if sensible (no wind), and arrive at the time you find safe given weather conditions. The fault is yours and not your child's, and if and when the school complains, kindly and gently pass the blame onto them for not offering a waiting room while presently bending over backwards to provision a car line drop off and pick up for those who very unwisely drive (and selfishly pollute and endanger everybody else in their wake, in addition to announcing far and wide their condition as climate change deniers and about not caring one iota about the future of their own children).
Listening to a podcast this morning where the hosts try to push back against toxic masculinity, patriarchy, and gender norms. Randomly in the middle of an episode specifically about toxic masculinity and how harmful it is one of the hosts made a joke in response to something one of the other hosts said about how they "probably ride a bicycle with a bell on it like a child in the 30s". Car culture is so absolutely ingrained that this was entirely passed by without comment or concern.
For anyone in the #Denver area who is looking to reduce their carbon footprint, the city is starting a program to pay people to ride their #bike instead of take their car.
Transportation is the second biggest driver of greenhouse gas emissions and the largest contributer reducing air quality in three city. Every bit helps and the $150,000 in funds will hopefully help push people to make the healthier choice we all benefit from.
Serious politics going on to try to disrupt a plan to make Los Angeles safer for pedestrians and cyclists. Quite a bit of car-supporting backlash, highlighting the issues that seem to come up in any plan to attempt to battle fossil fuels usage.
Candidate for City Council:
“We don’t have room for bicycle lanes that one person might ride down once a day,” he said. “We need the mobility, and we need it for cars.”
Urbanists and cyclists 🚴♂️ in Naugatuck Valley #Connecticut are encouraged to complete an online survey examining habits, preferences, and challenges to walking/rolling and cycling in the community.