PedestrianError :vbus: :nblvt:

@FlashMobOfOne @jjjalljs I take transit more than I drive because I care about the environment. I’ve had a few uncomfortable encounters with unwell or overentitled people on transit. I’ve had many more encounters where my life was actually endangered by reckless drivers while driving (and that’s not even counting all the drivers who’ve almost killed me while I was walking or biking).

@Pyr_Pressure Are you talking about a curb or a wall between the street & the sidewalk? Regardless, people don’t cross exclusively at crosswalks, people who park along the street need to get onto the sidewalk, etc. Turning sidewalks into fortresses would be highly inefficient and have a lot of unintended consequences. We need more limits on where and how fast cars can go and safety features like automatic braking to prevent crashes, not to rearrange the whole built environment for cars again.

@Pyr_Pressure @rocky1138 That would lead to a lot more broken ankles and other more serious injuries for people walking, not to mention making it a lot more challenging to make sidewalks ADA accessible.

@BakerBagel @LibertyLizard And you’ve gotta have a place to park it. I’ve lived in urban US neighborhoods that were burdened by fools who moved in from the suburbs with their monster trucks or bought one without any thought to how they’d park it, but a lot of European cities have narrower streets and a lot less parking than our “historic” neighborhoods from the 1800s.

@DrunkEngineer Fucking useless Democrats aiding and abetting Trumpism every damned chance they get.

@AceBonobo No, the taxes should be paid where they work instead of where they live (or claim to, which the very rich they often game which of their properties they live in to minimize their taxes).

@AceBonobo @roguetrick Yes, while forgoing the income tax revenue from residents of their communities who commute into cities to earn their living. A lot of these “rural” conservative legislators aren’t from farm or mountain country, they’re from bedroom communities.

@zululove @bignate31 Not at all. Kids in cities typically have a lot more freedom than kids in suburbs and crime rates are far lower now than they were in the 80s. The only differences are the car-dominance of the urban form and the climate of fear which is constantly stoked by politicians, tv, and social media.

@Trainguyrom @firewyre Better idea for people who observe a child walking where there’s no sidewalk and think it’s a problem: call the damned transportation department and demand proper infrastructure!

@Katana314 @moriquende Another factor is that when women enter into patriarchal marriages, a lot of them allow their husbands to choose their vehicles for them. Certainly there are single women and married ones who buy SUVs for a variety of reasons, but there are also a lot of women who let men choose their cars for them, leading to a car choice that is not necessarily optimal for the safety, comfort, or preferences of the person driving it.

@Katana314 @moriquende SUVs have undergone an interesting transformation in their marketing and in how conformist people perceive them. When they first exploded in popularity, they were seen as manly cars. Now in order to keep expanding the oversized car market, they’ve become the old minivans and a man, even if he lives in a city, is told SUVs are for women and he has to have a giant pickup truck to keep his “man card”.

@Bennyboybumberchums @A_norny_mousse Do you say this about motorists who are proceeding through an intersection with a green light when someone comes along speeding on the cross street, fails to stop, and t-bones them?

@half_fiction @fuckwit_mcbumcrumble Tailgating is a ridiculously stupid behavior that far too many US drivers routinely engage in. It’s like nobody had physics or driver’s ed in high school. On any given day, 1/4 of the drivers are following the vehicle in front of them at a speed and distance that would not allow them to stop if the car in front encountered an obstacle and had to stop or slow suddenly. It’s completely preventable and cars can and should be designed to prevent it.

@half_fiction @fuckwit_mcbumcrumble A greater raw number of crashes is sometimes observed when a new red light camera is introduced, but severe injuries and fatalities go down. The crashes prevented are of more severe types, like t-bone crashes or hitting people, while any extra crashes are the rear end variety which produces few major injuries. Plus, rear end crashes are 100% the fault of the trailing driver following too closely. After an introductory period, more people learn not to tailgate.

@DrunkEngineer A normal company fires its CEO and cleans house after something like that. Instead Tesla just offered him a big new compensation package to encourage him to stay and keep destroying their reputation and any shred of morality they may claim to have.

@A_norny_mousse @logicbomb Every state has some version of duty of care or expectation that a driver maintain control of their vehicle to avoid collisions. Passing stopped cars in two adjacent lanes before hitting the person crossing under a flashing yellow light is definitely an indication of negligence. There was clearly some traffic engineer negligence too, but if police/the DA wanted to at least put a mark on the driver’s record for killing the victim, they absolutely could.

@DwZ Bicycling safety instructors, who wear helmets and meticulously follow all the rules, are dropping like flies at the hands of motorists, but other cities (@BmoreCityDOT) put out press releases claiming they/their partners in disinformation and inaction are meaningfully addressing bike safety by handing out helmets and platitudes.

@blarghly @miss_demeanour Certainly there are many examples of middle class people who are living beyond their means and the planet’s at the same time, but their overconsumption is child’s play in the grand scheme of things. We can encourage people to consume less (I certainly share your disgust with car/monster truck culture, fast fashion and fast food) without insisting anyone struggling in this shit society is a dumbass.

@blarghly @miss_demeanour This kind of animosity within the working classes (including the relatively privileged middle class) is exactly what the oligarchs want. If you’re busy casting aspersions at couples earning $75k each in New York City who probably don’t own a car much less a pavement princess and are struggling to
keep up with the bills their parents were easily able to afford, you’re looking away from how a handful of billionaires are dismantling the country and trashing the planet.

@gurnu @WorldsDumbestMan Misogyny is part of why so many men buy oversized cars and drive them aggressively. Find a better insult that actually focuses shame on the person behaving badly.