DrTCombs

DrTCombs, 6 months ago to random

Y'all, she's 53 inches tall.
4 feet, 5 inches.
And still not tall enough to "be seen."

#RoadSafety #NHTSA #RoadTank #StupidTrucks

DrTCombs, 11 months ago to ebikes

I invite anyone who argues that #EBikes are overkill to come live my life for a week. And I'll go live your life, in your superfit body that never sweats, on your awesome infrastructure that accommodates you and your kids, hauling around your weightless groceries.

You can live in my wonky middle-aged body still inflamed from #COVID19, at the bottom of the hill my city is famous for, in heat and humidity, on roads that will get your kids killed if they're not strapped to you.

#BikeTooter

DrTCombs, 8 months ago to Help

TL;DR: frittata #help needed!

My niece is getting married next weekend and I have just learned I have been assigned the tast of making frittatas for pre-wedding #brunch. I'm a capable home cook, but my partner generally handles all breakfasty-things, so I'm not exactly in my comfort zone here.

Please send me your best frittata #recipes and tips, esp. re #cooking for a crowd! Assume I'm an idiot.

Thank you!!!

#Advice #Recipe #Eggs

DrTCombs, 9 months ago to Help

Fedi-brain-hive, I need you once again.

Is there an #English #word that means "to make permanent?" Essentially, I need the word "permanentize" to exist, but evidently it does not. Surely another word exists in its stead?

Please #help! This problem has been vexing me for over three years (since I began tracking the way cities changed their street space during the pandemic and whether or not those changes were permanentized).

I'm so tired of writing "were made permanent."

#Language

DrTCombs, 11 months ago to random

Hey there #RoadSafety & #TrafficSignals brain trust:

The NE leg of this intersection has a signalized #crosswalk w/ beg button. Town staff just converted it to rest-in-walk, which is lovely. But there's a permissive yellow that allows drivers from the arterial to turn left while the #walk sign is active.

We may have the option to* either*:

• keep the rest-in-walk
  or
• eliminate the permissive yellow but lose the rest-in-walk

WWYD?

https://www.google.com/maps/@35.906464,-79.0188263,77m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu

#ChapelHillNC #VisionZero

DrTCombs, 1 year ago to random

We--my partner, my kid, and I--have 2 days left to decide whether said kid stays enrolled at her neighborhood elementary school or enrolls in a specialized gifted education program that offers services she very much could use in a different school.

There are pros and cons. But the thing I can't get over is that the other school--the only place in the whole district where these services are offered--is in a no walk/no bike zone. As in kids are literally banned from #walking & #biking there.

DrTCombs, 4 months ago to Futurology

Heck yeah. My new #paper with Lindsay Oluyede & Carlos Pardo is out today in #TransportReviews:

"The why and how of COVID streets: a city level review of research into planning motivations and approaches during a crisis"

This labor of love examined the processes that led to and shaped #COVIDstreets programs in 28 cities around the world, as reported in peer-reviewed literature. 🧵

#COVID #transport #planning #ShiftingStreets

https://doi.org/10.1080/01441647.2023.2295368

DrTCombs, 9 months ago to random

#ITE (the Institute of Transportation Engineers) began recommending #RTOR (right turn on red) as a fuel saving measure in 1986. ITE rescinded that guidance in September 2019, writing:

"The existing [recommendation] fails to provide a sufficiently robust analysis of the impacts, especially with regards to the potential impacts on the safety of #pedestrians using #crosswalks."

ITE's full statement on rescinding the RTOR recommendation:

https://www.ite.org/pub/?id=B59F0054-B3AE-FD5C-81E5-62E18920B5DC

1/

DrTCombs, 8 months ago to MountainBiking

Hiya friends! Any recommendations for portable, real-time particulate matter meters?

As the kids say, I'm tryna see something

For real though: trying to develop guidance on #walking and #biking facility placement in #school #walkzones

#AirQuality #research #PediatricHealth #Kids

DrTCombs, 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago) to gardening

2 years ago, we bought a house that was being eaten (for real) by #bamboo. With several months of actual blood, sweat, and tears, we got rid of the bamboo and uncovered 1/8 acre of beleaguered, nutrient-depleted land just begging to someday be a #garden.

Today:

#veggies #gardening #soil #pollinators

DrTCombs, 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago) to random

when are we going to stop counting on inner city, lower income, Black & Brown neighborhoods to carry the water for our urbanist dreams?

DrTCombs, 10 months ago to random

My kid's attending a nature camp next week, and I have to sign a form for permission for her to ride in a van to go to a field site one mile away.

1 mile.

There is a nice, accessible public trail that to leads directly from the camp to the field site. But they are piling 24 kids into 3 vans, driving them 2 minutes, then unpiling, and then doing it all over again in reverse.

I know it's a small thing but if a nature camp can't see what's wrong here, I fear we really are doomed.

sigh.

DrTCombs, 2 months ago to random

The kid's grown six inches in two years and still isn't tall enough to be seen over the hood of these ridiculous death machines prowling our neighborhood streets.

DrTCombs, 10 months ago to advice

#Advice needed!
I got a new #OfficeChair from a building being decommissioned. It's super cushy and has a huge up/down adjustment range.

But it has a fatal flaw: The seat is too long for my 5'1" body. If I sit up straight with my back against the seat's back, my legs stick out like a little kid.* After a day of desk work, it REALLY hurts my knees.

I'd love recommendations for grown-up office chairs built for small bodies! Thank you!

#ErgoTooter #VerticallyChallenged #ShortPeople

DrTCombs, 4 months ago (edited 4 months ago) to cycling

#NewBikeDay is approaching. Should I get a #Cleverhood to go with it?

#BikeTooter

DrTCombs, 9 months ago to Podcast

TL;DR: how do you #podcast?

My super nerdy kid has decided she wants to spend the rest of her hot summer break creating a podcast in which she teaches parents how to help their elementary aged #kids with #school.

She's all in. First episode recorded, eps 2-4 sketched out.

What comes next?? How do you go from recording to #podcasting? Not looking to make money! Just trying to support her efforts to find her true calling and save other kids from their clueless parents.

DrTCombs, 4 months ago to random

When this development was pitched to the #TownOfChapelHill, it was allegedly going to be "the most bike and pedestrian friendly neighborhood in North Carolina."

DrTCombs, 7 months ago to random

This is a great article on the "E-Bike Effect" from Treehugger (h/t @BrentToderian):

https://mastodon.online/@BrentToderian/111223648351940659
https://www.treehugger.com/e-bikers-ride-much-farther-and-more-frequently-than-regula-bikers-5076231

DrTCombs, 2 months ago (edited 2 months ago) to random

Happy #InternationalWomensDay.

My social media life has improved greatly since moving here from the other place. Still worth thinking about how social media, as a whole, treats women and femme-identifying people though.

I'm reposting here a thread I tweeted 2 years ago. It was illuminating to me then and now.

Link: https://twitter.com/DrTCombs/status/1501302408881836033

Copied/pasted tweets below ⤵️

DrTCombs, 1 month ago to cycling

Biking 1.5 miles to school today, my kid & I...

1. waited while a school bus ran a stop sign
2. swerved to avoid a car passing us on the left as we turned left
3. sat at a light for 4 min to get a walk signal
4. slammed on the brakes to not get t-boned by an SUV in a crosswalk

We don't pollute, make noise, cause pavement wear, or threaten anyone's safety. Yet our roads still force us to defer to cars or risk death.

And we're the entitled ones? Entitled to what??

#EntitledCyclists #BikeTooter

DrTCombs, 11 months ago to cycling

What? Not my dream #bike dropping on a random Wednesday

https://bikeshopgirl.com/tern-hsd-gen-2-electric-cargo-bike/

#BikeTooter #Tern #EBike #CargoBike #CarryShitOlympics #LeaveTheCarAtHome #BikeShopGirl

DrTCombs, 7 months ago to car

Just dropping in to say it's possible to own a #car and prefer getting around by other modes most of the time.

Habituation to #driving is not an insurmountable obstacle to reducing #automobile dependency and creating safer, greener, more resilient cities. Habits can be broken if the right supports are available at the right time.

#ClimateChange #Cars #TravelBehavior (1/2)

DrTCombs, 6 months ago to cycling

#WinterBike friends -- how do your kids keep their legs warm on the #BikeToSchool?
My 4th grader is riding her own bike now so a blanket is no longer an option.

Also taking recommendations for handlebar mitts for small people.

Thank you!!

#BikeTooter #KidsOnBikes

DrTCombs, 10 months ago to gardening

Now that most of the compost tea & sludge are contained, I've showered, and the laundry is running, I can reflect on what went wrong this morning.

In a nutshell, all of it. All of the things I thought might go wrong when trying to strain 20 gallons of compost tea by myself, in my PJs, after a near all-nighter finishing a report, did in fact go wrong.

Did I learn any lessons? Probably not.
Do my veggies appreciate my efforts? They damn well better!

#gardening #compost #fail

DrTCombs, 11 days ago to random

This story has something in it for everyone.

The town of #SummerfieldNC lies just north of Greensboro, North Carolina, and has seen a transition from rural farming village to bedroom community to reluctant suburb over the past two decades.

#Summerfield's current town council was voted in on a hardcore #NIMBYism platform. Putting that platform into action, however, has led to some substantial consequences for the town, including... (1/n)

#planning #LocalGov #government