Unironically, I support completely ceasing all road construction (even “just” repaving, let alone widening) until every street has been brought up to “complete streets” standard with proper sidewalks and bike lanes. Car drivers do not deserve more spending until cyclists and pedestrians are made first-class citizens!
Given that it takes a long time to bring a street up to standard (budgeting, design, contracting, and constructing), that would probably be 10-20 years at an optimistic estimate to get every street up. In that time, under your proposal, the roads would become undrivable, and therefore:
Emergency vehicles would be unable to operate. Thousands die.
Traffic increases exponentially as the usable roads become increasingly infrequent and commuters flock to the few good ones. The above problem is made worse; gas usage increases dramatically as more and more cars sit idle for hours a day.
Highway safety plummets. Thousands die in avoidable crashes.
Roads become impassible to trucks. Deliveries of food and goods grind to a halt. Starvation, food riots, economic collapse follow.
I’m all for increasing walkability and bikability; I’m fortunate enough to live in a city that is both, and it’s great. Proposals like this, however, do nothing but make it look like the movement is a bunch of “fuck cars” knee-jerkers who know nothing about infrastructure and can thus be safely disregarded.
Proposals like this, however, do nothing but make it look like the movement is a bunch of “fuck cars” knee-jerkers who know nothing about infrastructure and can thus be safely disregarded.
Also FYI, this “fuck cars knee-jerker” happens to also be a former traffic engineer. I know more about infrastructure than you think. Pretty much all of your pearl-clutching is ass-backwards and wrong, BTW.
OK so… demonstrate it? Explain how, with absolutely 0 maintenance for 20 years (or whatever you consider a reasonable time to bring every single road up to bicycle and pedestrian usability standards), the roads would be able to support the flow of commuters, emergency vehicles, and deliveries. You can appeal to your own authority all you want, but it’s worth just about jack if you don’t back it up.
The answer is, you simply upgrade the bike and pedestrian infrastructure at the same time as you do any other road work, and make it against the rules to do otherwise. So the roads that need repaving most urgently still get it, but they just get bike lanes and sidewalks urgently, too.
As for your previous pearl-clutching, which I have now found the patience to respond to:
Emergency vehicles have to be able to deal with shitty roads (including unpaved roads) already, so your first bullet point isn’t a thing.
Traffic would not “increase exponentially” by having fewer usable roads. In fact, it’s the opposite: that’s what happens when you expand roads. What actually would happen is that people would be driven to alternatives, such as reducing trips, biking, walking, etc.
This is almost too nonsensical to address. Making roads worse is essentially traffic calming, and would increase safety.
This is too nonsensical to address. Pure hysterical bullshit.
That’s most definitely not “ceasing all road construction,” and actually sounds like a feasible (ignoring realities of modern politics) plan that I would get behind.
Unironically, I support completely ceasing all road construction (even “just” repaving, let alone widening) until every street has been brought up to “complete streets” standard with proper sidewalks and bike lanes. Car drivers do not deserve more spending until cyclists and pedestrians are made first-class citizens!
Given that it takes a long time to bring a street up to standard (budgeting, design, contracting, and constructing), that would probably be 10-20 years at an optimistic estimate to get every street up. In that time, under your proposal, the roads would become undrivable, and therefore:
I’m all for increasing walkability and bikability; I’m fortunate enough to live in a city that is both, and it’s great. Proposals like this, however, do nothing but make it look like the movement is a bunch of “fuck cars” knee-jerkers who know nothing about infrastructure and can thus be safely disregarded.
Sometimes you need an extremist position in order to make the reasonable position look reasonable. When more than half of motorists view cyclists as subhuman cockroaches, trying to start off reasonable is a whopping loser of a strategy.
Also FYI, this “fuck cars knee-jerker” happens to also be a former traffic engineer. I know more about infrastructure than you think. Pretty much all of your pearl-clutching is ass-backwards and wrong, BTW.
OK so… demonstrate it? Explain how, with absolutely 0 maintenance for 20 years (or whatever you consider a reasonable time to bring every single road up to bicycle and pedestrian usability standards), the roads would be able to support the flow of commuters, emergency vehicles, and deliveries. You can appeal to your own authority all you want, but it’s worth just about jack if you don’t back it up.
The answer is, you simply upgrade the bike and pedestrian infrastructure at the same time as you do any other road work, and make it against the rules to do otherwise. So the roads that need repaving most urgently still get it, but they just get bike lanes and sidewalks urgently, too.
As for your previous pearl-clutching, which I have now found the patience to respond to:
That’s most definitely not “ceasing all road construction,” and actually sounds like a feasible (ignoring realities of modern politics) plan that I would get behind.
Just pruning the population. And all those suvs and trucks would finally, themselves, touch grass instead of just mall parking lots.
Let’s gooooooooooo