Not Just Bikes / r/fuckcars / Urbanists / New Urbanism / Car-Free / Anti-Car - People and grifters who hate personal transport, freedom, cars, roads, suburbs, and are obsessed with city planning and urban design

[Daytona Fox]

If it’s truly so convenient to walk to restaurants in dense cities, why would anyone ever order delivery and pay its high fees?

Why walk when you can get a bicyclist to deliver you your food? I’ve seen this guy a couple times on my feeds on a couple platforms and I always thought it was unnecessarily retarded. The guy drives like an asshole and occasionally gets hit by cars or spills food.

https://www.instagram.com/bikingdc

 

[Xarpho's Return]

It’s curious how delivery services like DoorDash are most popular in “walkable” areas. In the suburbs, most people prefer to pick up their own food or dine in. If it’s truly so convenient to walk to restaurants in dense cities, why would anyone ever order delivery and pay its high fees?

Same thing with grocery delivery. I have a low opinion of people who use the "curbside" services or use delivery (the one time I used delivery I was home sick). Pizza is the only food that kind of makes sense as delivery because of the way it can go straight from an oven into a box (and then into an insulated pouch), but stuff like fast food doesn't hold up nearly as well.

Urbanists talk about "third places" so it sounds like food delivery would be counter-intuitive to that but there's the data about urban areas being full of childless people and/or shut-ins. The other thing to bring up is that restaurants in urban areas (and we're talking New York/Philadelphia/other dense areas here) are REALLY tightly packed and not at all suited to large groups. As @quaawaa has previously brought up, even when comparing the same chain, McDonald's is much smaller than its suburban counterparts (and I believe downtown locations was the first time when McDonald's had to redesign its restaurants for non-standard buildings and spaces).

On a bigger scale, that's one reason why a lot of the downtown buildings lost value and were demolished. Standard "downtown" buildings aren't a one-size-fits-all solution (and knocking out walls is usually not an option) and by the 1950s most of those buildings were vacant and torn down because they couldn't find enough tenants to fill them. It's the same thing with malls...filling a multi-story 200k square feet building is hard to do because there just isn't much of a market for them anymore.

Small towns can get away with this because downtown land value isn't very high to begin with. That's why you can find these sorts of buildings still existing, and while they've clearly had better days you can find the usual gamut of professional offices (lawyers, accountants, etc.), antique stores, and some average Tex-Mex restaurant that has been there for the last thirty years. (Anyone who has been through smaller towns knows EXACTLY what I'm talking about.)

The curious thing is that when it comes to these demolished buildings, while urbanists will use proof of their former existence for "cars bad" they don't actually want to see them back. They want to see them replaced with higher-density buildings (which the market would tend to demand). But higher-density buildings need actual demand and profit potential to be built which is why parking lots still cluster in downtown areas.

 

[BulkForceFive]

It's the same thing with malls...filling a multi-story 200k square feet building is hard to do because there just isn't much of a market for them anymore.

Malls are dying because the owners often ask retarded rents, delivery can be difficult and you're stuck with mall opening hours. Plus the usual suspects turning malls into indoor ghettos.

Everything is stripmalls now, you get your own storefront and only share a wall and utilities with the other tenants.

 

[Meriasek]

Adam Something shits on maglev trains (because trains have to have wheels reeee), but picked the wrong target, i.e. the new Japanese Chou Shinkansen line. Lots of angry comments about how he's wrong.
Never mess with the weebs, you stupid faggot.

 

[quaawaa]

Adam Something shits on maglev trains (because trains have to have wheels reeee), but picked the wrong target, i.e. the new Japanese Chou Shinkansen line. Lots of angry comments about how he's wrong.
Never mess with the weebs, you stupid faggot.

Rail shills have hated maglev for a while because it's superior to traditional rail in every way. The one argument against it, cost, is irrelevant now thanks to governments embezzling money while building traditional HSR.

 

[Meriasek]

Rail shills have hated maglev for a while because it's superior to traditional rail in every way. The one argument against it, cost, is irrelevant now thanks to governments embezzling money while building traditional HSR.

People like Adam hate maglev because it's modern and they really like low tech commie living.
And, of course, just autism for rolling trains.

 

[Yamamura]

People like Adam hate maglev because it's modern and they really like low tech commie living.
And, of course, just autism for rolling trains.

They are their own form of luddites in a way. It's partially why they praise low tech forms of transportation like bicycles.

 

[Markass the Worst]

Adam Something shits on maglev trains (because trains have to have wheels reeee), but picked the wrong target, i.e. the new Japanese Chou Shinkansen line. Lots of angry comments about how he's wrong.
Never mess with the weebs, you stupid faggot.

Why is the urbanist genre being a smug contrarian faggot and hating on cool things?

 

[Return of the Freaker]

Since maglev got brought up, I seem to recall West Berlin building a maglev line to restore a traditional rail service that was cut off by the wall. Of course, it entered service just as the wall came down and it got scrapped a couple years later.

 

[Xarpho's Return]

It's the dumb tourist mindset, as always. When they talk about european cities they think of clean intimate little streets nice for a stroll.
Nothing wrong about nice places to relax when you're on vacations but why do they think everywhere is like that too?

When I see urban Europe that's n1 part of the tourist spots, it looks old, run-down, and generally disgusting-looking. (It probably smells like piss). Moreso if there's third-worlders or graffiti. You'd basically have to go to the center of the blue counties to find something close to that.

Malls are dying because the owners often ask retarded rents, delivery can be difficult and you're stuck with mall opening hours. Plus the usual suspects turning malls into indoor ghettos.

Everything is stripmalls now, you get your own storefront and only share a wall and utilities with the other tenants.

Broadly speaking, that's the thing--spaces that have, for whatever reason, fallen out of favor because the market for it has shrunk so much. Same with neighborhoods when large commercial businesses are no longer viable—think of how many Walmart stores have closed in the last decade, with the vast majority of them being in neighborhoods where not even locking things up saved them from people walking out with unpaid merchandise.

Rail shills have hated maglev for a while because it's superior to traditional rail in every way. The one argument against it, cost, is irrelevant now thanks to governments embezzling money while building traditional HSR.

I find it curious as to why he's using al lot of anti-rail talking points to throw maglev rail under the bus, up to an d including new portmanteaus like "gadgetbahn" (new mass transit projects are basically scams), unique infrastructure that you can't do anything with (6:25 in the video), complaining about a single line going from point A to point B, and extremely costly for what you get. None of these are technically wrong, but for this moron who will shill HSR and mass transit whenever possible.

His thing about "well what if you could redirect it in case something goes wrong—there's not anything on HSR (not California's at least, to my knowledge) that has cross-compatibility with the traditional freight rails, and if one line is electrified and the other isn't the utility for that is quite limited. Of course, light rails in cities are all-new infrastructure that don't interface with anything else. If anything, the freeway should be his favorite form of transportation if he's shitting on maglev that hard.

- Compatibility with other, existing transportation forms? Check.
- Not that expensive for what you get? Check.
- Can get you from Point A to Point B with optional points in between? Check.

 

[Meriasek]

Since maglev got brought up, I seem to recall West Berlin building a maglev line to restore a traditional rail service that was cut off by the wall. Of course, it entered service just as the wall came down and it got scrapped a couple years later.

Yeah, the M-Bahn. Similar to the Birmingham Maglev. There were small wheels for stabilisation, though, it wasn't a pure maglev.

 

[Kyria the Great]

Have they come to terms with China is going through likely a recession in part due to their insane infrastructure spending in HSR and the low returns on lines?

 

[IdiotPlusPlus]

Rail shills have hated maglev for a while because it's superior to traditional rail in every way. The one argument against it, cost, is irrelevant now thanks to governments embezzling money while building traditional HSR.

TBH most of the hate is because of techno-fetishism from bugman before urbanism because their cause du jour, the gadgetbahn name is just from the jilted rail urbanist types who wank over the German rail system.

Maglev unfortunately gets lumped in with the 'theme park' urbanism shit like monorails and 'people movers' and its big benefit is speed, otherwise complexity and lack of supply chain are its biggest downsides, so it works well on a isolated grade seperated new build, but is impractical in a lot of cases heavy rail is good for.

Maglev is more a competitor for planes and long distance passenger trains over traditional heavy rail freight and commuter service anyways.

Which is also why bugman hate it, god forbid you leave a city and go see the countryside and breath fresh air or something lol

 

[Kyria the Great]

They are their own form of luddites in a way. It's partially why they praise low tech forms of transportation like bicycles.

I love how all the evidence points to a strong correlation between motorization and a more developed economy and they ignore it.

 

[Baraka Obama]

Rail shills have hated maglev for a while because it's superior to traditional rail in every way. The one argument against it, cost, is irrelevant now thanks to governments embezzling money while building traditional HSR.

I'm not going to watch an Adam Something video but aside from cost the chuoshinkansen has taken forever to build, it runs so fast that the noise it makes is a huge issue and it has to be run mostly underground which ruins the scenery (one of the best parts of the existing tokaido shinkansen is the view of Mt Fuji), increases cost even more, increases lead time, and complicates maintenance.

Aside from a run directly from Tokyo to Osaka, two of the most densely populated safest places on the planet with existing high transit use, why would you ever want to build or use such a train when a handful of aircraft on a shorthaul route would be cheaper, faster, and many times easier to set up?

 

[Markass the Worst]

I'm not going to watch an Adam Something video but aside from cost the chuoshinkansen has taken forever to build, it runs so fast that the noise it makes is a huge issue and it has to be run mostly underground which ruins the scenery (one of the best parts of the existing tokaido shinkansen is the view of Mt Fuji), increases cost even more, increases lead time, and complicates maintenance.

Aside from a run directly from Tokyo to Osaka, two of the most densely populated safest places on the planet with existing high transit use, why would you ever want to build or use such a train when a handful of aircraft on a shorthaul route would be cheaper, faster, and many times easier to set up?

This is a good argument, but an urbanist would disagree because they have an irrational hatred of airplanes too.

 

[Eventide]

When I see urban Europe that's n1 part of the tourist spots, it looks old, run-down, and generally disgusting-looking. (It probably smells like piss). Moreso if there's third-worlders or graffiti. You'd basically have to go to the center of the blue counties to find something close to that.

This. Heck, even the tourist spots tend to be run down/full of gypsies trying to steal your wallet. European gypsies are something else. Eldest sister had one of them on the Paris metro try to toss a BABY at her, when their clipboard & flower scam didn't work (i.e. they hand you items and while you're distracted reach into your wallet/purse/pocket/etc. & rob you blind).

 

[Ravier Xavenblood]

Have they come to terms with China is going through likely a recession in part due to their insane infrastructure spending in HSR and the low returns on lines?

Nah. They'll cope until China fudges the numbers and denies there ever was a recession. Then, the official CCP narrative will be the official reddit canon.

 

[Jotch]

maglev is the coolest shit and I wish the US had one cross continental.

 

[Midwit]

British country roads are absolutely insane. Twisty, single lane (not single lane per direction, single lane total), blind corners, potholes, and a speed limit of 60 mph.

Not to mention all the Bimmers sticking out of the obligatory roadside dykes.