Rant: In the EU, you are 35x more likely to die from a car crash, compared to a train crash. The union has created the so-called Vision Zero program, which is designed to reach zero driving deaths by some arbitrarily chosen date in the future. And of course it talks about autonomously driving cars. You know, crazy idea, but what if instead of we bet it all on some hypothetical magic Jesus technology that may or may not exist by the arbitrarily chosen date and instead focus on the real world solution that we already have? But well, the car industry investors would make less money, so I can answer that myself. :(
Edit: Also, Musk is a Nazi cunt who should die of cancer.
Well, there is no train station at my house. Or Aldi. Or my kids Kindergarten. And I live Germany, where public transport is excellent on a global level (memes about Deutsche Bahn aside).
Cars will be necessary for the foreseeable future. Let’s make them as safe as possible while investing in public transport, they are not mutually exclusive.
We have Vision Zero in the US, too. They lowered speed limits in a couple neighborhoods from 25mph to 20, and all the LED road signs show annual aggregated deaths from car crashes until the number is greater than zero, then someone wrings their hands and says “Welp, we did what we could, guess people just like dying” and then goes on vacation. (Source: me, I made up the spokesperson who gets scapegoated, but all the other stuff is observationally evident where I live)
Too bad I live in hell country. Where there are no sidewalks or public transportation just roads and we have facist dipshits bought out by big car companies. I would love to take a train or a bus but that stuff doesn’t exist here and never will until we re-educate and remake America from the ground up. America is just too far gone at this rate to even want these public transportation services at all or even bike-lanes. Cities would rather destroy themselves for big top stores anyway and highways thinking they are a good thing only to realize that will ensure they will cease to be alongside their local businesses. I’m sorry but I’m forced to walk on the road and nearly get run over legally speaking with zero repurcussions from the driver side because I shouldn’t of been walking on the road anyway.
I’ve never been in the USA. Is it really that bad? I’ve heard that the USA have basically eradicated their own culture, because they destroyed their city centres in favour of suburbs, which need to be subsidised constantly. And therefore, cities sprawl. Is that true?
Yes it is really this bad and in a lot of cities there is even anti homeless architecture being built. Entire cities in the United States basically got turned into suburbs and roads overnight. For many Americans they cannot even walk outside their neighborhood without having the police get called on them in their own suburban sprawl or getting a gun legally pulled on them and potentially legally killed with no recourse on the shooter. This country is hell on Earth minus our theme parks and local parks and some of the cities that still exist normally today.
It’s called hostile architecture and it’s things like arm rests in the middle of a bench so you can’t lie down on it, or sloped windowsills so you can’t sit there.
I once saw a bench with a statue of a person sleeping on it. Wtf?
“To prevent the unsightly possibility of someone sleeping on this bench, we should put a statue of someone sleeping on this bench! Leave the useless bench there but also fuck you!”
In my city, there are buses, but because there’s sprawl to the edges of the huge county, and all the people in the suburbs drive and don’t want buses, and the county (not the city) is in charge of transportation, it’s starved to the point of near impossible inconvenience.
There are plenty of people living inside the city now, we’ve got a nice downtown, with people living there, but at this point it’s all set up to favor automobiles. Like I intentionally live in a short walk distance to bus stops that could get me anywhere the buses go, but I use the electric bike and can get anywhere faster than the bus. Transfers are so bad because the buses are so infrequent.
I think I start to understand. But how is it possible to move this many people with cars? I mean, for example, a family of four would then need, four different trips and essentially two different cars because if the adults do not work at the same place, how are they going to get to work on time? Or am I imagining it wrong?
Well, in my family of now just 4 we do have 2 cars because my husband and I each had one when we married. Nowadays this is the commute.
Mornings:
I take the bike
College kid takes my car, drops off high school kid then drives to her school
Husband takes his car to work
There is actually a direct city bus from our neighborhood to both the University and the high school, but because both are farther than my work and they run so infrequent it makes them need to leave so early, so I let the kids use the car.
(When there was one car it was a bigger loop sometimes, or sometimes there is a school bus available, so the kids can take that. Or the school was sometimes only a mile or two (3k or so) then the kids walk.)
Evenings:
I take the bike
Husband drives
College kid drives
High school kids gets a ride from a friend or takes the city bus BUT that bus comes only once an hour so if he misses it, he will walk, about 4 miles.
I agree trains are generally safer but I’d like to know more about the data. Are those just base death chance statistics (e.g.: 100 people die from train accidents every year compared to 3500 from cars) or deaths/km travelled?
Tldr: Take the train and be safe.
Rant: In the EU, you are 35x more likely to die from a car crash, compared to a train crash. The union has created the so-called Vision Zero program, which is designed to reach zero driving deaths by some arbitrarily chosen date in the future. And of course it talks about autonomously driving cars. You know, crazy idea, but what if instead of we bet it all on some hypothetical magic Jesus technology that may or may not exist by the arbitrarily chosen date and instead focus on the real world solution that we already have? But well, the car industry investors would make less money, so I can answer that myself. :(
Edit: Also, Musk is a Nazi cunt who should die of cancer.
Well, there is no train station at my house. Or Aldi. Or my kids Kindergarten. And I live Germany, where public transport is excellent on a global level (memes about Deutsche Bahn aside).
Cars will be necessary for the foreseeable future. Let’s make them as safe as possible while investing in public transport, they are not mutually exclusive.
PS: fuck Elon.
Speaking as a German: There are fewer train-related deaths because the trains don’t drive.
Well, we can thank Mr. Schröder for that. “Der Genosse der Bosse”
We have Vision Zero in the US, too. They lowered speed limits in a couple neighborhoods from 25mph to 20, and all the LED road signs show annual aggregated deaths from car crashes until the number is greater than zero, then someone wrings their hands and says “Welp, we did what we could, guess people just like dying” and then goes on vacation. (Source: me, I made up the spokesperson who gets scapegoated, but all the other stuff is observationally evident where I live)
Does every single post related to cars have to turn into “don’t use cars lol”???
It’s kind of the natural result, because cars are good for:
And they’re really bad for:
Do an honest evaluation, and “don’t use cars” is the inevitable conclusion.
Too bad I live in hell country. Where there are no sidewalks or public transportation just roads and we have facist dipshits bought out by big car companies. I would love to take a train or a bus but that stuff doesn’t exist here and never will until we re-educate and remake America from the ground up. America is just too far gone at this rate to even want these public transportation services at all or even bike-lanes. Cities would rather destroy themselves for big top stores anyway and highways thinking they are a good thing only to realize that will ensure they will cease to be alongside their local businesses. I’m sorry but I’m forced to walk on the road and nearly get run over legally speaking with zero repurcussions from the driver side because I shouldn’t of been walking on the road anyway.
I’ve never been in the USA. Is it really that bad? I’ve heard that the USA have basically eradicated their own culture, because they destroyed their city centres in favour of suburbs, which need to be subsidised constantly. And therefore, cities sprawl. Is that true?
98% true.
(The other 2% is historic districts and college towns.)
Yes it is really this bad and in a lot of cities there is even anti homeless architecture being built. Entire cities in the United States basically got turned into suburbs and roads overnight. For many Americans they cannot even walk outside their neighborhood without having the police get called on them in their own suburban sprawl or getting a gun legally pulled on them and potentially legally killed with no recourse on the shooter. This country is hell on Earth minus our theme parks and local parks and some of the cities that still exist normally today.
What is “anti-homeless architecture”? Genuine question.
Edit: Also, thanks for the detailed answer.
It’s called hostile architecture and it’s things like arm rests in the middle of a bench so you can’t lie down on it, or sloped windowsills so you can’t sit there.
I once saw a bench with a statue of a person sleeping on it. Wtf?
“To prevent the unsightly possibility of someone sleeping on this bench, we should put a statue of someone sleeping on this bench! Leave the useless bench there but also fuck you!”
Fuck. That.
In my city, there are buses, but because there’s sprawl to the edges of the huge county, and all the people in the suburbs drive and don’t want buses, and the county (not the city) is in charge of transportation, it’s starved to the point of near impossible inconvenience.
There are plenty of people living inside the city now, we’ve got a nice downtown, with people living there, but at this point it’s all set up to favor automobiles. Like I intentionally live in a short walk distance to bus stops that could get me anywhere the buses go, but I use the electric bike and can get anywhere faster than the bus. Transfers are so bad because the buses are so infrequent.
I think I start to understand. But how is it possible to move this many people with cars? I mean, for example, a family of four would then need, four different trips and essentially two different cars because if the adults do not work at the same place, how are they going to get to work on time? Or am I imagining it wrong?
Well, in my family of now just 4 we do have 2 cars because my husband and I each had one when we married. Nowadays this is the commute.
Mornings:
I take the bike
College kid takes my car, drops off high school kid then drives to her school
Husband takes his car to work
There is actually a direct city bus from our neighborhood to both the University and the high school, but because both are farther than my work and they run so infrequent it makes them need to leave so early, so I let the kids use the car.
(When there was one car it was a bigger loop sometimes, or sometimes there is a school bus available, so the kids can take that. Or the school was sometimes only a mile or two (3k or so) then the kids walk.)
Evenings:
I take the bike
Husband drives
College kid drives
High school kids gets a ride from a friend or takes the city bus BUT that bus comes only once an hour so if he misses it, he will walk, about 4 miles.
I think musk cunt should die of starvation.
Have you seen his human-growth-hormone belly? It would take years, man.
Retrofitting, in some parts of the world suburbs have already been built.
I agree trains are generally safer but I’d like to know more about the data. Are those just base death chance statistics (e.g.: 100 people die from train accidents every year compared to 3500 from cars) or deaths/km travelled?
The numbers are calculated from the average of the EU27 killed travelers per billion person kilometers.
So in this case 2.5 perished by car, 0.07 perished by trains, (2.5/0.07~35.71).
Source: https://www.allianz-pro-schiene.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/verkehrssicherheit/
Critique of source: biased towards trains given their organisation’s purpose.
Edit: typo.
Very thorough answer, thanks!