5 Difficult Questions for Urbanists to Answer

Five questions or topics for urbanists like us to think through.
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References:
Downsides of height limits: www.sciencedirect.com/science...
Upward mobility and commute times: www.urban.org/sites/default/f...
Original source on upward mobility and commute times: academic.oup.com/qje/article/...

[@CHAOS80120]

If you ask any suburbanite why they don't move to a more urban mixed use area in Canada. They will either say they wish they could but can't afford it, or the much more common "I don't want to deal with homeless and crackheads". Someone asking you for money on the street seemingly IS very much a big deal to many people.

[@jeanbolduc5818]

Vancouver and Toronto do not define The identity of Canada but USA... homeless, crimes, drugs and very expensive asians cities

[@reilandeubank]

Yup. I think a lot of people forget the fact that a lot of suburbanites don't hate urbanism because of some great love for the car (although that does happen), but because for some reason the US has a major problem with urban crime and drug use that does genuinely make urban living less enjoyable than other places. I suspect much of this has to do with the fact that instead of everyone of all classes living in urban areas and taking transit, in a lot of cities it is concentrated to only poorer, less mobile communities.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@reilandeubank no, it's because Benjamin Franklin's plan was never carried out so we're stuck with Chicago being a dumpster

[@sinthoras1917]

​@@reilandeubank suburbia is the reason that inner cities are poor. They are parasitic towards the latter.

[@MiguelitoD770]

#4 shouldn’t leave out sprawling cities. I live in Houston where we voted via referendums for the over 400 miles of bike lanes and paths we have, the 3 rail lines, as well as BRT and other projects that we enjoy today. If we can do it, a city any size can. Transit oriented development is great especially in cities like ours that will never be as dense as SF or NY

[@AbeChang2]

Never say never

[@scpatl4now]

You also voted for equal representation on the regional planning commission. When I read the Houston only had 2 or 3 seats I found that hard to believe. I am glad Houston voters are trying at least to take back some of the influence they should rightly have.

[@MiguelitoD770]

@@scpatl4now No, we didn’t. That wasn’t up for referendum. And our transit system is actually run through the county, not the city so these 2 things are unrelated. Our city is run by maniacs, like most lol! That’s why putting things like this to referendum are beneficial. Americans coast to coast want more options!

[@scpatl4now]

@@MiguelitoD770 I thought Prop B was a referendum. Maybe I didn't understand how it works there. I believe it changed the City of Houston's charter

[@enjoyslearningandtravel7957]

I was really surprised that Houston has bike lanes now. I don’t live in Houston but I used to live in Texas and upon driving on the way to New Orleans. I forgot how many car lanes I counted each way six or more !!

[@1955DodgersBrooklyn]

Not a fan of the blanket "urbanists like trams because they look nice" statement. Trams are great, the problem is that they're misused as cheaper alternatives to metros in North America (Seattle being a prime example) when they should be looked at as a higher capacity and faster alternative to a bus.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

We cited a particular project in our city where it really does seem like aesthetics were the major concern.

[@eechauch5522]

Yeah, I get what they’re trying to say, but the statement is a bit too general. Sure, there are cases where a LRT system which got built should have probably been a metro. Seattle, Ottawa, Toronto line 5 and yes, REM de l‘est are all decent examples of this. At the same time there are dozens of BRT routes being built, which for a bit higher construction costs could have been a tram/ LRT which have lower operating costs, higher capacity and better ride quality. Any yes, many people do like them aesthetically, which is an important point both for attracting support and later to attract ridership. Studies here in Germany have shown an almost instant 50% increase in ridership on lines being converted from bus to tram. I don’t think the people rejecting metros and proposing trams instead are doing it, because they love trams, it’s because they see them as the lesser evil. Now, in a case like REM de l’Est you can choose to shelve the project entirely, if support to build the initial proposal is realistically going to obtainable in the future or build a different option, even if it may not be perfect. It’s a fair choice to make. What you obviously shouldn’t do is what Seattle or Ottawa did and spend the same amount of money that could have built a metro on a light rail line, which is basically just a discount metro.

[@TheRealE.B.]

Pointing to Paris doesn't necessarily have to be a defense of height limits. It can also just be used as an example of how much density you can accomplish without tall buildings. I assume that most American metro areas aren't dense enough for height limits to actually matter yet.

[@majorfallacy5926]

That said, higher densities stop making sense eventually anyway. Each additional story is more expensive than the last and makes the lower levels darker and overall less appealing. Looks and light matter! If you're not going for a garden tower city (which has a questionable track record) 4-8 stories is pretty appropriate for a dense urban core.

[@Anahi1991]

Usually places with height restrictions only have them due to airports anyway. And this video is so contradictory. People from Paris who have commented with varying opinions have been responded to with attitude. I can’t take this channel seriously.

[@jeanbolduc5818]

@@Anahi1991people in Paris are never satisfied on anything in life... But Paris is one of the most sustainable city in the world fighting climate change ... building skyscrapers in concrete and glass is the worst idea for CO2 and climate crisis .. you need to cool skyscrapers in the summer and warming up at high cost of energy in any season .... Buildings of 6 storeys are ecofriendly and makes a better quality of life and sense of community .

[@Anahi1991]

@@jeanbolduc5818 Good points. I definitely agree about the glass buildings. It amazes me when cities like Phoenix and Houston build the same. So expensive to run the ac under them

[@XH13]

And Paris density is skewed because the 2 big parks/forest (Boulogne in the west, Vincennes in the east). They are huge (2.5 and 3 times as big as Central Park) and outside the Périphérique (the circular highway that separates Paris from its suburbs) but administratively, they are part of the city. The real practical density of Paris should be 25k people/km² instead of 20. That's comparable to the 29 of Manhattan (the other NYC Boroughs are a lot less dense).

[@louisjov]

The link light rail in Seattle has always frustrated me because of it's speed. It's comparable to driving in heavy traffic, still better, since you don't have to drive, but if they had been able to have every third train be some sort of express train that went faster, it would be so much more useful

[@m2coy]

first time ive seen a youtube vid that focuses on asking the right questions instead of pretending to know all the answers

[@mathdantastav2496]

#2 as someone that lives in a very dangerous city in a third world country, I'd say crime is the biggest barrier to urbanism here, I choose to use a car most of the times because if I chose smthing else, I would not feel confortable going outside at all at night, and even during the day, plenty of crime still happens here at broad daylight, and for better or for worse, hiding within a giant steel moving death machine (car) protects you. The safety of US cities is so much better than almost any large city here in brazil, just go on the street and see how many people dare to pick up their phones in public, no one does that here

[@carlinthomas9482]

My favourite thing about this channel is how they look at all sides of an issue and propose realistic solutions.

[@therealdutchidiot]

They look at all sides from a North American perspective, disregarding everything actual urbanists have known for decades, and still trying to pander to the lobbies. It's like them critisising Amsterdam while never leaving the canal ring, which every urbanist knows to do. But oh no, they won't do that because it doesn't fit their little playbook.

[@yaygya]

Speed is an important point. A significant part of the reason why SkyTrain in Vancouver is so well-liked is how much consistently faster it is than driving. It’s quicker to get from Downtown Vancouver to Surrey or Richmond by SkyTrain than it is in a car at many times of the day. Even after our family got a car, we’d still take SkyTrain downtown.

[@Amir-jn5mo]

ironically the skytrain is not fast by any means. Its just faster than the commutiny traffic

[@longiusaescius2537]

@Amir-jn5mo average speed matters more than top

[@solotrippin09]

The skytrain isn’t fast by all means lol

[@annaliavalentine5752]

I lived In Downtown San Diego this past year and for a year straight their have been more people becoming homeless then getting housed. As a woman I didn’t feel safe at night alone there but I personally would not feel safe in a downtown at night either way. No homeless person ever harassed me and regular men were the ones who always talked to me. The situation is no San Francisco or LA but it’s unpleasant to have to walk on the road around tents, and the thing that always annoyed me was constantly stepping on glass while walking my dog. I had to leave to a more suburban area cause I can’t afford downtown anymore and let me tell you I will take homeless glass tents trash all day if I can walk to the grocery store, or go to my local coffee shop, walk to my library and have many restaurants I can access. It depends on the person because for me personally I care more about walkability, I am in La Mesa now right off a highway with a 10 lane busy road that I have access to mcdonald’s and a costco 😐 My situation is still miles better then other people but still for me personally it mattered so much more that I could stop by the grocery store on a walk and even though the library had people camping outside I still could walk to my library 😭🤷🏼‍♀️

[@enjoyslearningandtravel7957]

I would like the area with walk ability to groceries, etc. but if there’s homeless people camping out on the sidewalks or in tents in parks and doing drugs, then I wouldn’t feel safe to live there or walk around there which is I’d rather walk then drive everywhere. Not a homeless people are dangerous or doing drugs, but you don’t know which ones

[@enjoyslearningandtravel7957]

Meant to write, not all homeless people are dangerous, but often you don’t know which ones or often they don’t throw the trash away and take up space such as parks, where normally children could play or adults, could relax with a coffee or have a picnic and they’ve often paid taxes per year that goes toward these parks in other places.

[@marmac83]

@@enjoyslearningandtravel7957 Interesting that there are homeless people in European cities, and they're relatively harmless...

[@icanhazADHD]

I grew up in La Mesa! I remember hearing the 94/125 constantly if I was outside my home. Now, I live in Boston, and every time I go back home, I’m aghast at just how hard it is to get around without a car. Boston has spoiled me with its compactness, its (semi) functional rail transit, and the ability to get anywhere I need to be in 30 mins or less by bicycle. Downtown La Mesa has such promise, but it’s squandered by car parking and car priority!

[@enjoyslearningandtravel7957]

@@marmac83 And how do you know they’re harmless?

[@statelyelms]

0:00: The Tourist Perspective (rose-tinted glasses and Eurocentrism) 2:13: Urban Crime & Disorder (the apparent draw of open-air crime & disorder to dense communities) 4:19: Messy Transitions ("useless" improvements to presently nonexistant networks that inconveniences existing ones) 5:54: Urbanism By Choice? (Lack of incentive for small, low-density, low-congestion communities to change from a system that appears to work OK) 8:06: Need for Speed (criticism of advocating against speed in general, despite its benefits) Important questions that may sting a little but are critical to acknowledge. I can't even point out one most relevant to me, they really all are.

[@davidbarts6144]

The crime issue affects some Canadian cities, too (think DTES Vancouver). Even to the point I have heard Canadians talk about Vancouver as being dangerous and crime-ridden, even though it's not, and the DTES is not in the least representative of the city as a whole. (And even in the DTES itself, the danger is overrated.) Likewise, the Tenderloin and Civic Center neighbourhoods are not all of SF.

[@jonathanbowers8964]

Yeah. In my experience, crime tends to be concentrated in areas that have been economically and politically neglected. Usually if you are a tourist or are a person who has the means to choose to move to a new city, you probably won't spend a lot of time in such neighborhoods. Also most serious crime is not random, but is instead either against former friends/relatives or is related to organized crime. If you don't go looking for trouble, trouble will have a much harder time finding you. The exception to this is petty crime (pickpockets) and some of the negative effects of homelessness. As for petty crime, you can take common sense solutions to help protect yourself (avoid wearing outfits that signal wealth or social class in certain settings; take public transit near peak hours or with a friend). As for homelessness, you just have to do your best to avoid the crazies (taken from personal experience of being horribly harassed by homeless people on multiple occasions). I think the West Coast has failed in finding solutions to the homeless crisis while many East Coast cities use a "tough love" approach of making people get off the streets and into shelters and medical facilities where they can get the help they need. If your tourist magnet park is taken over by homeless encampments, it is a sign that your city needs a tougher approach on homelessness as it is a public health, safety, and economic catastrophe in the making. Giving a person a loaf of bread or extra blankets is the "nice" thing to do, but we need to solve the problem, not just treat the symptoms. Also, forcing the homeless to move elsewhere isn't solving the problem either. NYC's "housing first" approach is the model that seems to work as it gets people the help they need.

[@davidbarts6144]

@@jonathanbowers8964 Housing affordability (or lack thereof) is a HUGE part of it. I have lived in the Northwest for about 25 years, and have seen homelessness explode as housing costs have exploded. There has also been drug decriminalization (which I support) but without the sort of support services that have made decriminalization a success in Portugal and Switzerland.

[@Alina_Schmidt]

@@jonathanbowers8964 ​​⁠ „tough love“ actually sounds like a euphemism for classism and violence. Speaking of forcing people into shelters… yeah, that is clearly a crime against human rights.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@Alina_Schmidt let IS do whatever man, stopping them is against their "human rights" great so don't complain when people don't let them live around

[@AbstractEntityJ]

From what I've heard, crime has gotten a lot worse in San Francisco lately and has become more widespread across the city. But yes, the perception of cities as crime ridden exists in Canada too. I've heard people say it about Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto, and Edmonton, even a little bit about Montreal, Calgary and Ottawa. The statistics back it up somewhat. Certain types of crimes tend to be worse in big cities per capita (murder, robbery), while others are actually worse in smaller towns (burglary, drug use). The upper middle class suburbs tend to be low in all types of crime, but that's because these communities are fortresses for the wealthy that deliberately keep out everyone else, unlike central cities, lower middle class suburbs, and small towns, which have more of a mix of income levels.

[@etbadaboum]

La Défense is a business district that was specifically built outside of central Paris (Paris intramuros) to avoid having towers in the historic center... and few people live there

[@OhTheUrbanity]

"This city has skyscrapers that they located outside of the historic city centre" doesn't really work as an argument for why skyscrapers are generally bad or unnecessary though. At most it's an argument for locating skyscrapers outside of the historic city centre in other cities.

[@etbadaboum]

@@OhTheUrbanity I was not making an argument, I was telling a wrong thing you said. Also very few people live in skyscrapers, because it's terrible

[@OhTheUrbanity]

@@etbadaboum Your preferences are not universal. Lots of people are happy to live in tall buildings (many even prefer it). If there wasn't any demand then you wouldn't need to ban or restrict them. Also, the video said that high-rises in Paris are mainly in the suburbs, so I'm not sure what you think we got wrong.

[@etbadaboum]

@@OhTheUrbanity In the US, people work in skyscrapers and live in the suburbs basically. Demographic studies have shown living in tall buildings is linked to reduced fertility.

[@Anahi1991]

@@OhTheUrbanityThat’s literally what the commenter said??? And why do y’all reply so rudely to people who make common sense points? Smh 🤦🏿‍♀️

[@6ixof135]

This might be my favourite one of your videos yet! (And that’s a high bar to clear 😊)

[@ericmaynard493]

I've really been enjoying your videos. Great topics and perspectives! I think urban crime is the topic that these channels dismiss too quickly. I don't think urbanists are going to promote their city visions by sharing KZbin videos or telling family about their trips to Europe. I think you really need local success stories like NYC and San Francisco to spread urbanism locally. When I talk to suburbanites about their visits to these places, they don't complain about the lack of a bike network, or confusing transit systems. They complain about the disgruntled half naked homeless men and people nonchalantly wearing ski-masks in the middle of the summer (a shockingly common dress code in Manhattan). People that are scared of cities don't want urbanism at home. Also this might be just a New York thing, but there seems to be an abnormal disregard for rules, minor laws, and courtesies. 10 percent of bike traffic goes the wrong way. Nobody except cars respects red lights. Cars always block the box/ honk very aggressively and frequently park in the middle of bike lanes or even normal car lanes. Its not a very pleasant atmosphere.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I guess a lot of us just focus on the problems we know best. Here in Canada, especially the cities we know, the biggest barrier to urban living is housing affordability, not any idea of "urban crime". We can recognize and (to some extent) talk about problems in places like San Francisco but we'll never be able to make that a central focus of our channel like the other topics (transit, bike infrastructure, housing) that are more real for us close to home.

[@ericmaynard493]

Yeah that totally makes sense. Thanks for teaching us about those subjects!

[@georgedaole-wellman3950]

At least in New York much of the reason for bikes not following rules of the road is delivery couriers, who have to get from point to point as quickly as possible to have a hope of making a living. And then I would guess other bikers just commuting or getting around the city are following their example. Cars blocking the box have no excuse however.

[@mindstalk]

@@ericmaynard493 The biggest barrier to life in San Francisco is also housing supply / affordability, by far. And it probably drives the homelessness/public order problems. And both are rather recent, not something inherent to urbanism or even San Francisco. Just 20 years ago, housing prices were like 1/3 what they are now, and homelessness far less prevalent. But there's also an inverse side to "vacation tourism"; homeless tend to gather (or be pushed) into specific areas, often adjacent to where people would be visiting. Someone visiting a city and being downtown is likely to see more problems than the people actually living through the city.

[@TommyJonesProductions]

It's more about the perception of urban crime. The media pretends that crime is out of control in the cities but, in fact, it's WAY down since the 1990s. If people actually come visit the cities instead of letting the TV tell them what it's like here, they wouldn't have such a skewed perception of crime.

[@Hiro_Trevelyan]

As a Parisian, a lot of cities build higher and still have soaring prices. I mean just look at New York. And the reason why we don't build higher in Paris is to specifically preserve character. Views of the Eiffel tower (or any monument) are very sought after, if developers were able to build higher and higher to offer better views, it'd be a nightmare. Also Parisians hate the Montparnasse tower, it traumatized everyone so nobody wants skyscrapers in the historic center of Paris. Paris should've extended its territory instead of the typical urban sprawl bullshit.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

New York has a lot of tall buildings but today they actually make building new housing pretty difficult. 40% of existing buildings in Manhattan would not be legal to build today: www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/05/19/upshot/forty-percent-of-manhattans-buildings-could-not-be-built-today.html

[@nicknickbon22]

I get the monument view and the fact that you pay a lot of money for it, but a view is not your property and you shouldn’t be able to block taller buildings because of it.

[@jkgambz]

Introducing density in the suburbs, like La Défense, and then expanding from those is probably the most reasonable compromise. At the same time, La Défense is not a residential neighbourhood, so it is not necessarily a good example for this argument, or the arguments in this video.

[@hunnerdayEDT]

I miss my apt in Japan. I rode my bike to work and walked to parks. I could walk to bars, restaurants & shopping in 10-15 minutes. Public transportation was easy to use if I wanted to go to Yokohama or any neighborhood in Tokyo. The only time I rode in a car or taxi was when I needed to go grocery shopping and it was raining or colder than I was comfortable with.

[@Shadowfax-1980]

This is probably the best urbanist/public transit video I’ve seen in a while. Way too many other urbanists, including some of the most popular ones, make videos that are just preaching to the choir and often don’t get down into the details of the changes they advocate. Also, way too many flat out hate cars and assume that’s everyone else shares their view. I would suggest that these content providers look to this video as a guide to provide more convincing videos going forward. It’s easy to make videos that get thousands of likes and supportive comments from like-minded viewers. If we’re going to try to make constructive change, it has to be by convincing and addressing the concerns of people who may be skeptical.

[@Jaggerbush]

My last trip was south East Asia for 5 weeks - it was amazing!

[@Urbanhandyman]

I enjoyed the video but the section where you criticize Americans and Canadians going to Europe and bringing back "tourist" ideas about making their communities more "European" was confusing. Yes, Japan as you mentioned is an alternative model with regards to their take on public transportation and zoning laws. There are many great lessons from there that I would enjoy seeing here in California. Ironically, they don't have world-class bicycle infrastructure. It's better than the United States but it's far behind The Netherlands.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

We don't think it's bad that people travel to Europe and bring back good ideas. Vacations are in fact a very useful tool for learning or talking about urbanism. We just think people need to give some thought to how their experiences and priorities as a tourist might differ from what matters in a city to locals.

[@Urbanhandyman]

@@OhTheUrbanity An interesting idea would be to poll Europeans and Japanese tourists about their urban experiences in Toronto, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, etc. Ask them what they think would be good to see replicated in Osaka, Madrid, Hiroshima, and London. Is there anything outside of importing fast food chains (which they already have) that they would want to see?

[@ac1455]

Probably has to do with exposure and what side of NA you live on.

[@mindstalk]

@@Urbanhandyman Japanese bike infra is behind Dutch, but bike use is still pretty good. One source said bikes are 15% of mode share in Tokyo and 25% in Osaka. And these are cities that are probably much denser than Dutch ones (so walking works fine in more cases), that are much bigger (so you're less likely to just bike across town to work), and don't let you bring bikes on trains (though there's a lot of bike parking at train stations). I think the key thing for mass use of bikes is separation from fast cars. The Dutch do that via slow residential streets, and protected bike paths along busy roads. Japan does it via slow residential streets, and wide sidewalks along busy roads. May not be Dutch, but still works much better than anything in North America.

[@SKAOG21]

As @mindstalk mentioned, density is higher in Asian cities like Japan. I used to live in Singapore and now live in London, and in general compared to Europe they also have enough (sometimes more than Europe, usually when comparing the suburbs) density of heavy metro stations with excellent frequency that the combination of Metro + bus + walking is more than sufficient for most people. The Buses operate at high frequency as well, and bus stops are plentiful enough that people walk to the nearest bus stop and then either use solely buses for shorter trips, or use them in conjunction with the Metro for longer trips. This excellent existing combination of transport plus generally faster and wider streets means that biking is more risky than say in Amsterdam with its smaller slower residential streets. Bikes have hence been used and prioritised less.

[@woodmanvictory]

Thank God you exist as a channel in this community. Appreciate these videos that actually force a a deeper thinking on urbanism.

[@KarolaTea]

#4 Having grown up in a village with not-so-great public transport I needed my parents to basically drive me everywhere (except school) as a kid. This limited what kind of activities I could do and when, and obviously also cost my parents a *lot* of time. Even if all adults are happy to drive to work... at least parents should be able to grasp just how much time, and gas money, they could save if they didn't have to give their kids lifts everywhere. (Although maybe North American parents would first need to wrap their head around letting their kids go anywhere on their own...) Ugh yes, "as a European", trams that get stuck in traffic are annoying af. Or well, the traffic is. Put it underground/seperate it some other way and give it priority in the few cases where different modes do cross.

[@inglorion]

Re: The Need for Speed. Being able to get to your destination quickly is good. Aside from good things like ensuring that destinations aren't unnecessarily far, there is also a role for higher speeds. This is something that can be designed for. Trying to use the same surface for local destinations and longer distances and sharing it among cars, buses, cyclists, and pedestrians, you'll end up with something that's neither fast nor safe. On the other hand, I've been to cities with low-speed streets in front of houses, high-speed roads that connect to the highway outside the city, and medium-speed roads connecting parts of the city, with separate lanes reserved for buses and taxis, and physically separate roads for bicycles. Works great for many trips, and I haven't even mentioned anything that runs on tracks yet.

[@erni2619]

0:39 hmmmmmmm😂 "lovely"... righttt. I guess it is somewhat charming in some parts ahah

[@LCTesla]

the funny thing is most Europeans view the touristy spots of their country as the worst parts while Americans fawn over them. Amsterdam is just the funniest example of this because no American I ever meet ever acts like any other cities exist in the Netherlands while most of them are way more livable than Amsterdam.

[@user-iw4jl6bc8h]

ONly 40 % of americans have a passport and meanstream media do not teach anything about the world except drama, wars and politics

[@nicknickbon22]

I mean it depends if the area is packed with tourist or not: I would like to live in the historical city center of my hometown, but on the other hand I know that at the moment it is not Venice level packed in any season. But even in big historical cities tourist are concentrated into very few spots and a few blocks away you’ll never find one, even in cities like Venice (Some parts of Cannerggio in the northern part of town and Castello in the easternmost are good examples of it).

[@dimensionX4]

Please review the part about density und high rise, which ist incorrect. Paris has one of the highest urban densities in Europe. Why? If you have high rises, your zoning code in a certain area will require you to keep grater distances to other buildings and have wider streets.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

No one's denying that Paris is quite dense. But high-rises can absolutely provide more floor space than mid-rises. For example, Hong Kong is substantially denser than Paris. For more on density: kzbin.info/www/bejne/r2S7oIh4r8uLptU If they didn't provide more floor space and density, why would anyone build high-rises?

[@PipoZePoulp]

1/ Those suburbs where the skyscrappers are? That's not Paris. Different mayors (La Defense is situated on three different towns), different town, and different urban code (La Defense was exempted from height limitation.) 2/ In Paris' case, height limit is half the problem. The other half is surface limit. Paris can't expand. Outside of Paris, you're in a different departement (aka district more or less). Yes, there's the Greater Paris Authority, but, different mayors, conflicting interests and all that, it's only unified on paper. Turning Paris bicycle friendly for instance, in practice it means kicking cars out and leaving all surrounding towns to deal with the problem.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I understand that municipal borders are important to locals for cultural and political reasons, but for country-wide or international discussions we frequently understand cities more as metro areas. So, for example, "Toronto" as we talk about it often doesn't mean the City of Toronto, it means the Greater Toronto Area, including different municipalities like Mississauga, etc.

[@johnjoseph9494]

La Defense is a 20 minute train ride from Central Paris. How is it not a part of the Paris metro area?

[@PipoZePoulp]

@@johnjoseph9494 La Defense is split amongst 3 different towns (Nanterre, Puteaux, Courbevoie), meaning 3 different mayors, and is itself a special administrative zone (called La Defense Paris). For the longest time, it was the exception where landplot was rented or sold in volumes instead of in surface. And why it was a special administrative zone in the first place. There's another town (Neuilly) separating La Defense from Paris itself which has nothing to do with any of it. Those 4 towns mentioned are part of Hauts de Seine departement (92), while Paris is in a departement of its own (75). Both departement are part of the Ile de France region, with its own regional council. The train system is autonomous from that administrative lasagna (RATP; roughly translate as Paris Transport Autonomous Management). Finally there's the Greater Paris that supposed to cap and coordinate all that. Almost forgot; there's one mayor for Paris, but there's actually 20+ deputy mayors with it (deputy as in junior mayors) Now, to prevent a rant about admin bloat, the situation is not so bad. The one problem in the region is Anne Hidalgo, Paris mayor. She is a incompetent and corrupt politician (spent 3 weeks in French Polynesia paid with taxpayers' money. Supposedly it was a business trip, the opposition has asked her to produce any work note from her trip. They're still waiting.) Her specialty is chasing away problems into the neighboring towns to please her ecologist/socialist voter base, leaving them to deal with the problems, blaming her neighbors for any trouble she can't finesse herself from. In this situation, having the mayors of towns around Paris gang up on the bully is not so bad.

[@laurie7689]

@@OhTheUrbanity Not all smaller suburban bedroom cities in a metro area consider themselves to be a part of the metro area, at least in the USA they don't. Many don't want to be a part of a larger metro area or associated with the larger city. My small suburban bedroom city is officially considered part of a metro area, but if you were to ask anyone here if they are part of the metro, they would say "No". Many folks work in the larger city and some go to university there, but aside from those two things, we don't want anything to do with the larger city. It's too dense for our liking. Even if all the cars were removed from the equation, we still wouldn't want to stay there.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

@@laurie7689 Right, these cultural/lifestyle differences can be real and relevant at the local level. I'm just saying that when we understand cities across states/provinces/countries, it typically makes more sense to think of metro areas. It's not perfect but it's a consistent way to make comparisons.

[@adjsmith]

I would love to see takes from other urbanist channels on this topic. My own city is a low-density semi-urban area of ~150k, with a lot of car connections, and a lot of people in the area support conservative politics. (Sounds like a lot of places, doesn't it?) A lot of the questions you raised are common talking points around here, that are used against the idea of expanding mass transit or building a more functional bike network.

[@aarons3008]

Thanks!

[@OhTheUrbanity]

Thank you!

[@eahiv]

love the channel!

[@Alexander_X_]

Speed matters only on long distances but frequency of transit is important every time.

[@ajrothBU09]

Boston, typically considered a city with good transit availability, would take me 15 minutes to drive, 45 minutes to bike (and have to shower when I got there, no e-bike yet) or 1h30 to transit, mostly because I had to change trains or change buses halfway. Any interchange easily double the trip length. The point about speed to help people make the transition is so key. If transit was down to 30min I would have sold my car.

[@rolandxb3581]

Please, four ads in less than three minutes? This is infuriating.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I don’t think we directly control that, but if you watch a lot of KZbin like we do, KZbin Premium is a pretty good choice

[@scpatl4now]

Some interesting thought provoking questions. I am about as big a fan of transit as anyone, but I very often don't feel safe on the MARTA train in Atlanta. I recently took the train from the airport to the Lindbergh transit center where I usually get a Lyft for the last mile. There was a guy on the train acting erratically and proceeded to start taking his clothes off and was talking to people who were not there. Schizophrenic people can turn violent on a dime. It was enough forme to get off the train 2 stops early. As far as bike infrastructure goes where I live, they really are making an effort, so I want to give the City of Atlanta credit. The problem is they are (currently) a bunch of disjointed sections that don't go anywhere. I wish they would build them out in a way that you had origin and destination availability. It makes it a lot safer that way too instead of having a bike lane end all of a sudden and you are thrown into traffic. With any transit, I'd prefer frequency over speed if I had to chose. In a dense downtown area, a streetcar is the best "last mile" option as long as it has its own ROW, signal priority, and prepaid fare availability. They also need to also actually go somewhere people want to be. A lot of cities (mine included) have been building in "phases". The first phase of the Atlanta streetcar doesn't go anywhere, but if you look at the long range plans it is a cohesive network, but it gives the NIMBY group a reason to oppose it.

[@sammymarrco2]

I had this happen too, I just moved to the next train car.

[@enjoyslearningandtravel7957]

I agree with you that some schizophrenic people can turn violent easily and you can’t predict that. I knew someone who was schizophrenic and didn’t take her medicine and for no reason they started chasing after jogger with a knife come, at least she didn’t catch the jogger. I know some people are for letting people with psychiatric problems and schizophrenia have their independence but when their independence infringes on innocent people safety in public then that law should be changed they need to be involuntarily put in some hospital, or such to be hopefully helped. And I would definitely put more tax money toward things like that. My safety and innocent people’s safety is important. So if you want people to feel safe enough to ride public transportation and walk ability, they need to feel they can go around safely.

[@RudeMyDude]

@@enjoyslearningandtravel7957 Most people with schizophrenia are more likely to harm themselves than to harm others. Systematically institutionalizing people with disorders without any agency like it's the 1960s again is not the answer to feeling uncomfortable on a train. It's dehumanizing, and doesn't help people rehabilitate into normal lives. It's just cruel, and there's a reason we don't do it as much as we used to. Other forms of treatment are more effective.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@RudeMyDude Reagan cut healthcare, that's the only reason we stopped

[@EuskaltelEuskadi]

I want to understand why stories like this are apparently so common in the USA... I've lived in Madrid and Paris, along with a few smaller cities in the UK and France, taking public transport on a daily basis, and I've never once seen something like this. Are there really just more severely mentally ill people in the USA? Is it purely due to the cost of healthcare there? Or is there another reason?

[@97nelsn]

I feel like the American version of La Defense is Rosslyn, VA since the main city it borders on the Potomac has height restrictions with the tallest structures being symbolic to the city and nation as a whole, and it’s full of low rise skyscrapers with density and public transit access.

[@redsoxfan713]

I consider myself an urbanist, but I hate trams / streetcars / light rail, and always have (in no small part due to the MBTA's Green Line in Boston). Low capacity and low speeds ==> the opposite of what most places need.

[@mindstalk]

Light rail is a poor replacement for a subway but a nice replacement for a bus, and not everywhere needs a full subway. The Green Line's branches aren't great implementations: no signal priority, too many stops (at least on the old B line) and the further E line even runs in traffic. Plus the weird thing of having a driver/conductor in each car, wiping out the labor savings of having a train. OTOH the D line is pretty sweet. Fewer stops, and like a discount subway as it runs in a trench most of the way.

[@MarioFanGamer659]

@@mindstalk To be fair, the D line really makes sense to be upgraded to proper rapid transit standards. Not very likely with the current state of the MBTA but important to note when considering the Orange and Blue Lines' past.

[@Cptkoala4]

I actually think Japan does urbanism best

[@longiusaescius2537]

Yeah it cause Japan

[@itoen9080]

FYI, BART is much much better today then when you visited. If you saw something every third trip, it’s probably at a ratio of every 10th now. Safety has been a huge priority.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

Great to hear!

[@itoen9080]

Yep and it’s going to get even better! They are installing new high tech fare gates. The same company installed the gates for DC and Seoul! In addition there are a lot of exciting housing changes coming to the Bay and California at large this year. Honestly you guys could make a video entirely just on the massive upzoning and ministerial approval coming. Look up SB 423 and AB 2011 for starters. Once rates go down I expect a LOT of infill all through out the bay.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@itoen9080 the gates are useless, station entrance ambushes are still common and bus drivers have rocks thrown at them

[@NiceKobis]

Hey, kind of unrelated but I was wondering about the pronunciation of newfoundland. At 07:04 you say (what to me sounds like) newfound in a way that sounds like a dialect new "nyoo-fn", but the land is very clearly pronounced as "land". Is that the standard? I've always thought most non-US English speaking countries are more prone to smush names together so it would sound like "lund" or something. Like how Toronto isn't "Toronto" it's "torrono", or Canberra isn't "Canberra" it's "Canbra". I'm Swedish so maybe I'm just entirely wrong. But is the way you said it standard? Maybe people say it in multiple different ways in Canada? Thanks for your fun videos

[@OhTheUrbanity]

Good question! Yes, the way we normally pronounce "Newfoundland" in Canada has secondary stress on "land", which means that the vowel doesn't get reduced and it sounds similar to how you'd pronounce "land" as a word on its own. The other pronunciation with the reduced vowel (as if saying "new Finland") is something I mainly hear from tourists and visitors to Canada.

[@Sythemn]

I was pleasantly surprised by the high rise condos in Seoul. An extended family member bought an inexpensive condo in a 15 story building. From a distance they look a little dystopian, as do the hallways and elevator. But the actual condo was fine. At ground level however the entire area was nice. Lots of greenery, playgrounds for kids, exercise equipment for adults, bus stops everywhere if you didn't feel like walking, schools and even a university in walking distance. Within an hour you could walk to a national park. It was a really nice place to live.

[@bearcubdaycare]

#1 refer to the experiences of the millions of North Americans who've lived and worked overseas #2 stop the focus on hub and spoke. Centers are often the focus for those problems. Paris is a lovely decentralized city, with the ability to get from anywhere to anywhere with one stop on transit, typically. This is a more pleasant, human model than urban canyons and Borg cubes. #3 25 years ago, Colorado Springs started a special sales tax for Trails, Open Space and Parks, leading to an extensive, well used, well maintained multiuse pathway network (as well as loads of open space and parks). Dedicated, continual funding seems to have worked well. #4 I visited the teenage neighborhood of my Mom in a smaller city. It was pleasant, walkable with sidewalks, and a nicely kept park that she remembered well, single family but affordable with small side and front setbacks and spacious backyards, highly affordable but well enough kept and lived in. I think that the transition to a pedestrianized downtown, and good transit that stops every mile from which people can walk, isn't that big, not necessarily that hard to sell. #5 I think that people would be willing to drive slowly and carefully last mile, 95% anyway, if highways were highways, high speed with few access points (because the latter make a highway slower, more dangerous and not a highway). Clearer distinctions between highway and access road, and a firmer hand in pushing access off onto side roads, would help achieve this. Also only give money for projects if this is the case, and if the project includes fully connected, fully separated pathways (by 100m preferably) the entire length, for better experience of both drivers and others.

[@liamtahaney713]

Hey look Antwerp b roll! Always exciting to see my home city. Transitions are true for everything not just bikes...same issue with trams, transit etc.

[@ManicEightBall]

I've tried buying moving boxes (flat) and carrying them home on the bus, and it was not easy. Also, Ikea may deliver to your home, but if you live in the suburbs of Oslo and have to drive out to a different suburb to get to Ikea, it can take an hour, even though it would be a 20 minute drive. And yes, walking around in Sentrum (downtown) while shopping is easy and pleasant, and makes a lot of things easier than they might be in North America for the most part. However, I think it's important to be realistic and not daydreamy about solving these problems. You do still have to get groceries in the rain or snow. You do have to get to work without taking too much time.

[@stevenkent6649]

With the proper gear, winter or rainy cycling isn't really bad at all. You warm up surprisingly fast, and with good layers the rain doesn't cause a problem. A lot of the gear is just normal stuff that you can use off the bike, too. A good pair of waterproof shoes, a wind/waterproof jacket, gloves, and a waterproof set of pants is all you need and you can take that same stuff if you want to go skiing, snowboarding, hiking, etc.

[@SquidWaffe]

The urban crime issue is prevalent due to factors like inequality, lack of medical care etc. Not really due to urban design.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@SquidWaffe that's cope

[@longiusaescius2537]

Unfortunately for you Sweden and Appalachia exist

[@SilkCrown]

In Japan, people have more agreement on norms for public behavior and crime than elsewhere. Maybe there is something to learn from places that already have relatively clean and safe public spaces where people are more courteous and polite than we are accustomed to.

[@longiusaescius2537]

Cause it's Japanese

[@yeyeTF2]

great conversation topics. i hope the other big urbanist channels takes a crack at answering some of these. they are fresh and important questions

[@niclasevaldsson1467]

We humans have evolved to react to perceived dangers from other humans. While we don't have evolved to access the dangers of traffic. That for example driving a car can seem much more safe even if the change of being in a car accident is much higher than being attacked in the subway. Crimes also make better news stories than traffic accidents. To address homeless and crimes you have to be willing to pay for example housing, health care and education. There this can also lead to a better society for all.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@niclasevaldsson1467 this is cope for wanting to never arrest felons

[@IanZainea1990]

1:21 I think all zoning restrictions should be incrementally variable. So if you have a 4 story height restriction, then someone could build a 5 story building. But no one could build 6 until the surrounding buildings are at 5 and so on. That way the city can still grow an evolve naturally, but not in hugely incongruent ways. Such as the new buildings along central park

[@longiusaescius2537]

@IanZainea1990 hard shell soft yolk is better (Low rise surrounded high rise)

[@shraka]

I disagree that Paris' main problem is height limits. Their public transport infrastructure is extremely extensive and stressed. Add more density and you'd overload the current (ed: already extensive) infrastructure.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

Maybe. But every type of place, including low-density suburbs, will have people saying that their infrastructure will be overwhelmed by new housing.

[@shraka]

@@OhTheUrbanity I posted this comment by mistake. My second comment goes into the problems with over densification. Suburbs are nowhere near maxing out their cost effective density, I think Paris is likely over that density threshold with about half of it's districts being over the population density of Manhattan. I think suburbs are where the density should be increased in places like Paris - it's often more cost effective, can be done pre-emptively rather than reactively, and can take pressure off the city centres.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

@@shraka What do you think about leaving it up to people's choices? Because it seems like this basically means a government-mandated density cap on Paris that pushes people into the suburbs. But what if more people would happily live in a denser Paris instead of the suburbs if given the choice? I'm not sure that would be a bad thing.

[@shraka]

@@OhTheUrbanity It is up to the people. They can vote out their council if they don't like the restriction. Leaving it without a cap just puts the decision in the hands of developers / the market (which is usually a race to the bottom). A better solution would be another mid rise city hub within 15 - 25 minute fast rail to Paris. It looks like Paris is trying to add density and infrastructure to the suburbs so more outer city density seems to roughly be their plan.

[@vincewhite5087]

In calgary transit, the train is much like SF. Open drug use. tO has same.

[@willroswell]

For #2, have you heard of Winnipeg? 😅

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I've mainly looked at homicide rates since that's the most reliable data we usually have. Winnipeg and other Prairie cities are higher than other parts of Canada for sure, but they're not that high compared to the more famous US cities.

[@blackpanda7298]

There was a shooting on TTC yesterday at Ossington station.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@blackpanda7298 and that restaurant stabbing?

[@JohnathanKumar-jy4rl]

Good video, but I must say, much of the new urbanism content on KZbin seems to be focused on the USA (the car-dependent hell) and Europe (the car-lite heaven). I've yet to see large amounts of urbanism content from the big creators (you guys, Not Just Bikes, Adam Something, etc.) focus on the rest of the world, such as Asia (not just Japan, maybe South/Southeast Asia and others. Correct me if I'm wrong here...). What about good examples of urbanism in other countries such as Singapore (e.g HDB flats with food courts and grocery stores and clinics right below, well-connected public transit)? For the whole world to benefit from walkable, car-lite cities, we must spread the movement worldwide!

[@OhTheUrbanity]

I see where you're coming from but I think what's often under-appreciated is that we urbanist KZbinrs are operating under constraints where we can only make videos about places or things where we have enough knowledge/data/experience/footage. To take Singapore as an example, it's a fascinating place but are we the right ones to make a video about it? We've never even been there and we don't have any footage. We don't want to make a video about a place just to have covered it, without having anything unique or interesting to say. I'm not saying never - if we had a partnership or local connection, or even more likely if we found some cool density data to present, like we did for Hong Kong. But in general we make videos about places we've lived or visited. We can recommend tehsiewdai, who focuses on cycling in Singapore. There's also Live Where I’m From, who's from Canada but has lived in Japan. He focuses on Japan but I believe he's planning to cover some other places like Taiwan too. And of course there's Reece Martin, who provides really impressive coverage of transit around the world.

[@JohnathanKumar-jy4rl]

@@OhTheUrbanity I see, and it's perfectly understandable. Thanks! I'm a big fan of Reece myself!

[@rlwelch]

I keep a list of all the most insightful videos I’ve found on Urbanism, that I would use to explain it to a friend, and Oh the Urbanity just keeps showing up there! (This video included)

[@bucketlistyo9596]

Thank you for mentioning public safety issue. No point in good urbanism if the public safety and way rampant crime is not handled.

[@shsd4130]

For what it's worth, as a Californian, more people I know vacation to Asia than Europe. It's closer and often cheaper.

[@NickBurman]

#1 - Hang out with the locals. Go out to the suburbs and see where and how they live. Use their services, do their commute. Check their environment. Only then you'll be able to do a real candid assessment.

[@highway2heaven91]

2:19 On #2: Glad to see an Urbanist finally discuss the crime issue. It seems to be the main issue brought up by NIMBY’s against building transit but it’s basically been ignored by most urbanist up to this point. Their answer is always “If there’s a lot of ridership, then crime will be stopped”, and then they’ll just leave it at that. It was nice to see the crime issue finally addressed on urbanist KZbin. Also, many Canadian cities have issues with crime as well. While the inner parts of Canadian cities are safer than their American counterparts, they can still be very dangerous. Crime is also increasingly an issue on Canadian public transit as well.

[@CortezEspartaco2]

I think the crime issue in U.S. cities comes from concentrating already-high crime into denser spaces. The crime rate in suburban areas in the U.S. is ridiculously high so it's no surprise that cities are even worse. Stuff that doesn't even make the news in small American towns, like shootings, would be national news for weeks in Spain. Whatever systemic problems are causing the crime need to be adressed.

[@alexseguin5245]

Meh. Crime is a non-issue. It is lower per capita in big cities than in rural areas in general. It's just fearful nimby fearmongering.

[@crowmob-yo6ry]

The real problem is the sensationalist American news media's fear-mongering about crime.

[@jamesphillips2285]

The problem is "tough on crime" governments cracking down on homeless people and addicts. Our provincial government shut down safe injection sites; so the LRT stations, with their extensive video surveillance, became the new safe injection sites. The same fascist government used the police act to force the city to hire 100 police officers to harass homeless people. That money (assuming rent is 1/3 of income) could have been used to house 300-600 people (the higher number assumes room-mates).

[@longiusaescius2537]

@jamesphillips2285 wow Canadians just come here and lie on the internet?

[@amjsatt1972]

You can not have low density transit (cars) with high density destinations (cities.) The math can not and will never add up.

[@justintaylor375]

Bang on y'all! Always thoughtful and nuanced!

[@midcenturymoldy]

4:59 “We can tell them it’s one step in *a bigger plan.*” Be careful who you say that to. Certain nut-jobs will take that as proof of their “15-minute prison city” conspiracy.

[@brushlessmotoring]

When I found out about that conspiracy, I could not stop laughing at how preposterous it was, and how gullible you would need to be to believe it. I don't know what we do about those kinds of folks? Someone put "15 minute ready" stickers all over Vancouver cycling infrastructure with a chain link fence as the background of the sticker, implying our cycle routes made us ready to be come a prison - it's so idiotic - whoever it was put maybe a thousand stickers around town, these nuts are certainly real as you say.

[@mylesrussell]

As a person from St. John's, I fully agree. We are pretty much bottom of the barrel when it comes to active and public transit within canada's top 20 population metros. We have a level of service that makes most people jealous. Basically there is no traffic here. Traffic is at best, 15 minutes a day two times in select areas. That is because we have many highways all with the capacity to move 3800 vehicles per hour. All the money has been put into highways with only a drop for transit and barely a molecule for active transportation. Thankfully that is changing with over 20km of shared use paths getting added in the next 5 years, but that is honestly not nearly enough as no space for cars is being removed. I LOVEEE your folks videos. They are true balanced discussions

[@TheMl145]

A few years ago I had a long layover at the St. John's airport. I thought I'll just go downtown for something to do instead of being stuck in the airport. To my surprise there was no public transit from the Airport into town so ended up taking a cab there and back.

[@territoire]

Why are you always so damn accurate ! Every new video you make is more and more fascinating... while always staying nuanced. We need more of that "urbanist" content in our media sphere. As another urbanist channel, we say high five 👏

[@pchris]

Nothing convinces me of an idea more than its proponent being willing to admit its not perfect and discuss its flaws and look on the other side.

[@Kenionatus]

What? People like trams where trains could be used??? For me (as a Swiss person), trams are better, but much more expensive, busses (because they have a higher capacity, are more pleasant because they don't have a rumbling engine and dedicated tram tracks can have grass growing around them). I'd never really considered a route for a tram that wouldn't also make sense for a bus (barring capacity) to be a sensible one.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@Kenionatus so true Shinji "Meier" Ikari

[@thespanishinquisiton8306]

Unfortunately, it seems like REM de l'Est is being downgraded from automated light metro to not happening at all, rather than being tram-ified

[@glaframb]

After the fiasco that was the ARTM 36 B$ Projet Structurant de l'Est (PSE) basically an Underground Metro Line in Eastern Montréal and the sabotage of the CDPQ-INFRA REM de L'Est, some people try a third approach aka a Tramway but it still in the infency as a project.

[@iamsuperflush]

I think one of the inconvenient truths that North Americans need to face is that urbanism is good precisely because it forces people who would otherwise flee to the suburbs to confront the reality of poverty and crime. "Tough on crime" policy is popular in North America despite being demonstrably ineffective time and time again because the majority of the people actually voting for it don't have to face its dysfunction.

[@sSomeawesomeneSs]

lol not every city has that much poverty and crime, thats such a weird outlook. in east europe / asia many cities have minimal amounts of poverty and crime

[@iamsuperflush]

@@sSomeawesomeneSs 1) I specifically said North America 2) you prove my point: the necessity and proliferation of urbanism leads to an environment where people have an incentive to provide working solutions to poverty and crime instead of just running away from it. Cities in Europe and asia are a result of that.

[@sSomeawesomeneSs]

@@iamsuperflush id argue that its living in a cohesive society with a lack of extensive poverty. poverty and a loose moral system causes crime. you are acting like small towns in america dont have some of the worst crime out there...

[@iamsuperflush]

@@sSomeawesomeneSs I don't understand your umbrage with what I'm saying? From everything you are saying we broadly agree with each other.

[@longiusaescius2537]

If crime was all poverty Appalachia would be anywhere near St Louis (it's not though, one of the Lowest in crime actually)

[@ficus3929]

A much needed dose of pragmatism in the KZbin urbanist discourse! #5 is very true for us in LA. Hard to get people to take transit when it’s 2-4x slower than an already long car trip. Time is the most precious resource and transit should help not hurt that.

[@ronvandereerden4714]

The problem is not the mode of transportation. It is the distance to everything. While it's true that taking advantage of the best job opportunities *may* leave little choice but a longer commute, most other things should not require a long trip. Most trips are not commutes and the first step is living closer to daily needs. Single-use sprawl must come to an end. Nobody will ever solve big city transportation issues without getting that part right.

[@peppapickmeisha]

@@ronvandereerden4714Welcome to 2023. People can’t afford to live a mile or two from work. And for reference, the expo line in Los Angeles runs at an average of 19mph. 70 minutes to go 22 miles doesn’t incentivize Angelinos to take public transit.

[@HallsofAsgard96]

Wouldn't signal priority help?

[@mindstalk]

@@peppapickmeisha You don't seem to have read ron's comment at all. As ron said, most trips don't involve going to work. Huge reduction in car use can be done without people living a couple miles from work. 70 minutes for 22 miles only matter if you're going 22 miles, which you shouldn't need for most trips. Walk, bike, and short transit trips should suffice for many things.

[@peppapickmeisha]

@@mindstalk I read that nonsense. Most commuting or traveling of any kind is for one’s work. Which a 19mph light rail won’t help. Unlike you, the employed population has bigger trips to make than their local dispensary

[@metalblind95]

As a European myself, I do know that Europe is far from perfect, and I personally like to look at Asia, particularly Japan and Hong Kong

[@knarf_on_a_bike]

One of the things to consider regarding the "need for speed" is people need to consider real world time estimates. If you live in Kitchener, Ontario for instance, you might say, "why should I take the 1 1/2 hour Go Train when it takes an hour to drive?" But most week days you're stuck in traffic and a daily car commute can easily take over 2 hours each way. I live in Toronto's Bloor West Village and it's "only 15 minutes to drive downtown" by car. I can bike or subway in 20 to 30 minutes, but I don't get stuck in traffic jams or look for and pay for parking spots.

[@EricLight]

Problem is some places the difference is 15min car and 1 hour buss :/

[@josephfisher426]

@@EricLight Yes, within a fairly small distance or fairly egregious traffic conditions, people can be gotten out of cars. But the same people can in most places also choose a job or residence location that doesn't create that conflict. I would probably use transit if I worked downtown, or bike if my job was within a couple miles. Neither of those is true.

[@EricLight]

@@josephfisher426 we need more and better transit :/ I'd use transit more if it wasn't a huge increase in time and sometimes it even costs more per trip then a car :( I did find out that biking to my university would be faster then the BUS however biking is scary on the roads :(

[@josephfisher426]

@@EricLight They need to run transit at a loss and with oversupply until the people who don't need to make a transfer realize that it's a good option. A bus every 45-60 minutes isn't going to cut it.

[@Alina_Schmidt]

@@josephfisher426 Also why would one expect to make money from transit at all? A road doesn‘t make any money at all, it even costs a ton.

[@matthewconstantine5015]

Having just returned from Rome, I feel like that city is a nice bucket of cold water for folks like myself, who tend to fawn over European Urbanism. It's a city that makes North American cities seem positively forward looking when it comes to public transit and limiting personal vehicles. In spite of having the same sort of good, walkable, urban bones as many other old cities, it is extremely hostile to pedestrians. Forget about cyclists (and there are a lot of cyclists...the poor bastards). The public transit is packed, seemingly all the time, but very limited in where and how often it runs.

[@jeffparker1617]

Yup, I just did 2 weeks in Portugal, Porto and Lisbon are very much car sewers, then did a long weekend in Copenhagen before coming home. CPH was night and day different from Porto and Lisbon.

[@ficus3929]

Yeah I had the same experience. Tried to take their metro and buses and yeah, it’s not good. Outside of the city center it gets even more car oriented.

[@matthewconstantine5015]

@@ficus3929, the area I was staying in had (loud) traffic all day & night. And on weekdays the sidewalks, crosswalks, and every other flat or semi-flat surface, were covered in parked cars. Several times, there were whole blocks with folks double-parked. Even saw one car parked right in the middle of a big intersection, in a small triangle that was painted to direct traffic down two different roads. Just parked there. Nobody in it. Like that was where the driver was leaving their car for the day. It was insane. I've been to a lot of cities in North America, South America, Africa, and Europe, and I've never seen anything as nuts, when it comes to car-dominance, as what I saw in Rome. And there's clearly no legal enforcement of any rules.

[@Kodeb8]

Someone I know who went to Rome told me the buses in Texas are more on time than the ones on Rome.

[@matthewconstantine5015]

@@Kodeb8 I only used them a couple of times, so I can't say. I think 10 minutes was the longest I waited, which is better than I usually deal with in the Washington DC area, but it might be down to luck. I'll give them this, they're clean and fairly well run as far as I saw. It feels like whoever is in control of their Metro & bus system knows what they're doing. However, they're operating within a city where their equivalent of a DOT has ZERO interest in public transit. So transit exists on scraps tossed from the table of cars. I waited at one bus stop which had a design that I can only call hateful. You had to go underground, down an unmarked and unlit staircase. Then you stepped out onto the side of an underground highway. Foul air and extreme noise buffet you while you wait for a bus that is, of course, stuck in traffic. Once on the bus, it was lovely. But waiting for it...Yeesh.

[@davidfouts1939]

Thank you so much for this video! Like all social/intellectual movements, urbanism needs to ask itself hard questions and take its critics (at least some of them) seriously. I'm especially grateful that you talked about crime and disorder. Far too many dismiss these concerns or even label them as racist dog whistles, which is extremely unhelpful. Many others just blame wider social inequities or the lack of a social safety net. They're not necessarily wrong about this, but it often becomes an excuse for inaction in dealing with the symptoms (crime, drug use, homelessness, etc.) that drive people out of cities.

[@ronvandereerden4714]

The need for speed is contextual. Linking dense residential nodes to big employment centres by fast, frequent, grade separated transit is essential in larger cities. But at the neighbourhood level, getting to shops, services and amenities on foot, bike or trams is more desirable because, in aiming for everybody to live near enough to everything, speed isn't the primary concern. Slower is better for neighbourliness in every way. Those slow tram systems can link to the fast commuter systems with great efficiency if most people don't need to travel too far for the connection. Meanwhile, we need to find ways to get more employment opportunities in those dense residential zones so strain is taken off of the fast metro systems as well. The slow tram is not a concern for commuting time if you don't even need to connect to a commuter system to a far away urban core. In all cases, single-use sprawl is just something to avoid. Having those who prefer that lifestyle pay the actual cost to taxpayers would be a good start.

[@jeanbolduc5818]

Vancouver is like San Francisco ., drugs , homeless and crimes .

[@JesusChrist-qs8sx]

Re question 1: I think a great response is pointing out the walkable, historic areas we have in America and posing the question of: why don't we still build these areas? Why do suburbs not have their own Main Street, or small town style downtown? This is an urban form that's similar to what you see abroad in Europe, but intimately familiar to Americans in our everyday lives.

[@coverversionoftheday9941]

One of your best posts. Thought provoking.

[@emdxemdx]

Don’t worry for the REM de l’est, it will be back to an elevated automatic transit sometimes, they’ll just wait a bit, then ignore the NIMBYes (who were pretty idiotic anyways). The streetcar you’re talking about will not be chosen, because unlike the REM, streetcars need operators, and lots of employees means a union, and a union means that some of their union dues will be funnelled to political parties that threaten the territorial integrity of Canada… And just on cue, right now, the streetcar in Québec has been put on hold by the government and the CDPQ has been tasked to review it.

[@bernadmanny]

This is a good episode of self reflection. 👍

[@harvey66616]

Of the 5, I feel like #2 is the odd man out in some important ways. Mainly, crime is a consequence of a host of other public policy decisions and conditions that are largely out of the hands of people who are focusing on transportation and urban planning policy. I think that policy choices for transportation and urban planning can affect crime rates, but I also think those kinds of choices will always be more of a nudge in one direction or the other. There are lots of other much bigger issues that affect crime rates, both real and perceived. That said, I also think it likely that there's a lot of overlap between people who are in favor of better education, health care, housing access, and support for the needy, and those who would like to see cities prioritizing people over cars (and of course, the housing part helps glue a lot of these otherwise disparate concerns together). In any case, good job identifying some major points that need to be addressed as part of the lofty goal of improving cities for all people.

[@JakobHill]

I think the best answer for #4 is to point to Winnipeg. Downtown was supposed to be carved up for freeways much like Calgary or Edmonton. While the Northern Freeway was stopped by community opposition, by the 70s the city could no longer afford anything but the inner beltway (and even that is mostly built as a boulevard). Instead, they expanded the bus fleet significantly and improved service in suburban areas. No urban freeways means the walkable pre-war neighborhoods and streetcar suburbs were largely untouched. This is why we have the highest rate of transit ridership in the prairies, and there are more transit riders in suburban Winnipeg than downtown Minneapolis or St. Paul. Tying in to #3, this also made the general public more accepting of protected bike lanes and the Southwest Transitway. Of course, we're still far from critical mass, Portage & Main is still closed to pedestrians, and Scott Gillingham's pushing a billion-dollar plan to finish the inner beltway and widen part of it despite the province already committing to making the Perimeter Highway a freeway.

[@noseboop4354]

Japan isn't expensive anymore, yen currency has lost 30-45% of its value in the past 2 years.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

We're thinking more of the flights. It'll depend on where you're leaving from and the dates, but I can do Montreal -> Paris round trip next month for CAD$600 in 7 hours. The cheapest Japan flight takes 20 hours and costs CAD$1,300.

[@superjubs]

the crux of hard drug use in public is that in the past a person may have a crippling addiction and also be housed due to and social safety nets. these problems are only made worse by police budgets constantly increasing at the cost of everything else.

[@longiusaescius2537]

They won't ever accept putting people who need help to get it though

[@cjthompson420]

3:37 no need to mention the 80’s, homicides have doubled in east New York, Brownsville, and other neighborhoods in NYC since 2020.

[@Kodeb8]

They took a sharp decline in the late 90s thanks to Rudy Giuliani, but after the lockdowns, they're rising back to pre-90s levels.

[@willcwhite]

In fairness to the "European tourist" school of Urbanism, allowing eight-story buildings throughout NA cities would be a quantum leap in density in places that are primarily zoned for single family detached houses.

[@laurie7689]

Those of us in the suburbs don't want tall buildings in our midst.

[@mindstalk]

@@laurie7689 Yeah, y'all reject property rights and favor government social engineering.

[@morat242]

Well, besides 8 stories not being enough, the other problem is that legalizing 8 story buildings just starts a 50+ year process to replace the SFHs one house at a time. Like, San Francisco's density is not nearly enough, and its density in 10 years with another few (or few dozen) small apartment buildings will nearly the same (but with even more demand).

[@laurie7689]

@@mindstalk Classism is big in the USA. We prefer to self-segregate. We vote for zoning that allows us to designate areas for the separate classes.

[@mindstalk]

@@morat242 San Francisco could be denser, but I bet it would help a lot of the rest of the Bay Area got denser -- many of the jobs are far to the south in Silicon Valley, after all. San Jose and SV towns could all triple in population and still not be as dense as SF. But anyway, if you legalize higher density, and _by right_ rather than getting caught up in approvals, then construction can progress rather rapidly. Americans haven't even seen a real housing boom for some decades now, we don't know what it's like.

[@j.s.7335]

Thank you SO MUCH for *legitimately* addressing point #2 about safety and comfort, where so many urbanist channels are just dismissive of people's discomforts. They essentially say, "get over it", and then put their hands over their ears when someone tries to say that uncomfortable or threatening interactions with other people dissuade people from riding transit. Of course the real question to take on is how to deal with those issues, but truly acknowledging the problem as a problem is always the necessary first step. Thank you.

[@StreetfilmsCommunity]

It is a tough one. When traveling I feel like any tinkling fear I may have is overblown. Since I live in NYC I tend not to get overly worried on transit in other places. People/friends come to NYC and talk about the high-alert they have every step in the subway. When I have almost none (but then again how much of it is auto-pilot precautions I am almost unaware of?). Hard to really know for certain. I felt so safe in Paris metro and took about 30 trips on my time there two weeks ago. But then again on my way to the airport I had a lady motion for me to come over by her with my luggage and she then told me she suspected I was about to be a target of a pick-pocket which is common there. I was thankful for that and freaked out until I got to the airport.

[@linuxman7777]

I do take transit in the US, but because it is less good in terms of behavior in Pittsburgh where I live, compared to any Japanese city I use it alot less. But at least it is much cheaper here than in Japan. In Japan you do get what you pay for, and even though the bus rides are like 2x the price for the same distance, they care alot more about quality.

[@evanw5572]

People are dismissive of it because we'd actually prefer to fix the problem rather than be accommodating to your class anxiety.

[@illhaveawtrplz]

@@evanw5572 It’s not that simple though. I’m a white cisgender man and it took me a long time to understand my partner’s concerns about taking public transit to and from work. She (very) frequently has unsolicited interactions with strangers that are unwelcome, while I am literally never approached by anyone in the same circumstances. That said, this is quite the chicken and egg scenario. We need more ridership to justify building more public transit, but we can’t get more ridership until persistent problems like the ones in this video are addressed. At the end of the day, our goal is to build fast, frequent, and safe alternatives to driving. Leaving out any one of those elements will continue to uphold the status quo.

[@barryrobbins7694]

Urbanist think those things are important too, they just have a higher tolerance and value other issues more. Urbanists need to be more aware that even using public transit is a big leap for someone used to driving all the time, driving from one safe environment to another safe environment. While I have seen many people killed in car accidents and no one killed on public transit, just a minor scuffle seen on a metro train can scare some people off for years.

[@Brindlebrother]

It would be easy to get people to see: Make a wall or a sign with car incidents on one side and cycling/PT incidents on the other. Every time there is a death, injury, or property damage, print out the news article headline and paste it to the wall/sign. After three months, watch how many incidents the car side will have. You could do this on a bus stop wall, a restaurant wall, a sign in someone's yard, anything where people will see it. People will quickly see that bicycle crash-pileups do not happen; that only happens with cars. Bicycles do not kill parents and children in one errant maneuver; that only happens with cars. Bicycles do not crash into storefronts and kill innocent shoppers inside; that only happens with cars. Bikes do not ram pedestrians in crosswalks; that only happens with cars. All the deadliest crap happens because of cars.

[@longiusaescius2537]

@Brindlebrother ram attacks are recent

[@thelongwaysbetter]

This is a fantastic and real video. That first point in particular made me reflect on my visits to Melbourne in Australia as a tourist vs working there. The tram network is great if all you're doing is going between the CBD, Fitzroy and St Kilda as a visitor, but if you're actually using it to commute the slow speeds and getting stuck in congestion can take the shine off considerably. And that's if you're lucky enough to live in an area with trams - there are many areas that don't, and many journeys across town that would be frustratingly time consuming to do on public transport.

[@partiellementecreme]

Tolerance for people openly doing hard drugs in public in daylight is going to kill urbanism in Canada. It’s becoming synonymous with city living.

[@sm3675]

Yes!! During their stay in San Francisco, they called called their situation "unpleasant," which is an inadequate word to describe SF's drug, crime, and homelessness problem. It is traumatic, and as a result, many have left. Let this be a warning: Canadians must not develop any sort of tolerance to drug use or crime in their cities.

[@enjoyslearningandtravel7957]

Also, men asking for money can also be more than unpleasant for traumatic !!! I’m not against giving money to charity, but if I happen to be walking almost alone on the street at dusk, and then a man comes up to me. I guess he’s gonna ask me for money, but I’m not sure and he’s a lot larger than I am then of course I’m going across to the other side of the street just to be safe.

[@Kodeb8]

This is why I feel like we need more conservative figures in urbanism, they tend to worry more about crime than progressives do.

[@LucasDimoveo]

My family hates using public transportation because of the drug/mental illness crisis. And we live in a pretty walkable place too. It’s a shame

[@illiiilli24601]

As someone who aligns one self with progressives and is generally in favour of decriminalisation and treating them as mental illnesses, hard drugs in public is just something that shouldn't be tolerated.

[@theultimatereductionist7592]

WHY aren't you coalescing ALL your questions into asking HOW DO WE OVERCOME SUNK COST of all the low-density spread-out suburbs we ALREADY built? HOW do we provide train transportation to all of them??

[@ronvandereerden4714]

You don't. Allow and encourage a series of medium to high densities mixed-use clusters at reasonabe spacing and serve them well with excellent transit. Build high speed systems between clusters and toward the urban core but more modest systems to feed the clusters from surrounding areas. For the really sprawled areas, accept that the people who gravitate to those will just drive no matter where they live. Don't allow more to be built. Charge the true cost of driving to drivers. Just add water, stir well and wait. It will take time, but giving people options they don't currently have and fairly pricing transportation costs are the keys. The Vancouver region envisioned this in the 70s and it's finally taking shape. Still lots of issues but much better than sprawl-only development. The toughest political choice is the fees to cover the true cost of driving.

[@shraka]

I disagree that hight limits in Paris is a problem. Their city public transport infrastructure is already extensive and also overloaded. The average population density of Manhattan is 28k / km. About half of Paris is over that density anyway and 11 ARR is 40k. At a certain height (depending on various factors) the cost per internal square meter starts going up. That can be as low as 6 stories. Then there’s cost of maintenance. That cost is measuring labour and materials, which include more CO2. If you can achieve high enough density to enable walkability and justify an extensive frequent PT network (which Paris has) why continue to densify? Does it yield anything other than greater capital return for developers?

[@loogabarooga2812]

I've been getting a lot of pushback from transit people in SF about brt vs building out the subway. While we should build out extensions to connect Caltrain to the city centre and probably bart to north beach, these projects have ballooned in cost to the point where even I'd consider it untenable. Meanwhile, the Van Ness brt has been an absolute revelation and was completed (relatively) without issue Is it really so much better an investment to go for rail over electrified brt? Now I wonder how much overlap there is between car people who don't want to cede the road to brt and the cult of rolling friction. Great video as always! PS: I'm in Mexico city RN for vacation, and I have to say I'm loving the urbanism and transit here.

[@pex3]

BRT's cost lies in the operations. Drivers are expensive, automated trains are cheap.

[@chefssaltybawlz]

I’m going to disagree. We have to stop accepting “light rail” which is very slow and make proper investments. We’re the wealthiest nation, we pay enough taxes. Speaking of Mexico, Monterrey opened their new subway line and have more planned as it overtook Guadalajara for the 2nd biggest city after Mexico City. Corruption is running these projects more expensive than needed

[@BalaenicepsRex3]

​@@chefssaltybawlz Yup, I hate that. That's been a problem pretty much since forever in the Americas, especially Latinamerica. I often wonder how we could get to put effective anti-corruption policies in place, and get the culture change necessary moving. Anyways, have you guys seen "Plan Colibrí"? Looks like a huge, exciting jump in regional rail, too bad it sounds more like individual lines rather than a net.

[@chefssaltybawlz]

@@BalaenicepsRex3 actually I was tippin my hat to Mexico lol. I was just down in Monterrey in March it was awesome to see. I live in Houston and it took us forever to finally open the green line which still doesn’t go to hobby airport grrrr. And no I haven’t I’ll have to look that up.

[@loogabarooga2812]

​@@pex3 the amortized cost of building trains in SF seems to exceed that of upkeep with brt. That plus the time value of money and opportunity cost of lacking transit today waiting on a subway. There's an equation that sometimes answers brt and sometimes trains.

[@Mcguy215]

on "How do we learn from Europe without turning into the age-old stereotype of the annoying North American always raving about how much more sophisticated Europe is?" this perfectly describes why i dont watch Not Just Bikes anymore

[@joelwright4317]

Omg exactly

[@katherandefy]

This hits home. Great questions and talking points to consider. Wouldn’t it be cool for you to host a panel on these very questions?

[@frafraplanner9277]

Thank you SO MUCH for bringing up points #2 and #5 When I talk to people IRL, both male and female, the most common reasons for not wanting to use public transit are hard drug use, mentally ill people running amok, and the fact that it takes forever to go a few miles. I know Canada doesnt have the same issues with public drug use and public mental illness, but its a huge problem here in Portland, and also in other west coast cities like LA and Seattle. Meanwhile taking the bus or light rail in any west coast city will take longer than *cycling* to your destination. This is a problem especially in Los Angeles where most daily errands or leisure tips range from 10-100 miles. This also means Vancouver, Canada is GOATed because despite being on the west coast, it has a grafe separated rail system with high frequency and doesnt have public disorder. San Diego is working on a high speed metro line called the Purple Line, which will be like BART except running at 110mph and minus the open drug use (San Diego doesn't have as big of a problem as the rest of the West Coast)

[@oceanwonders]

Nice.

[@hugojulia7145]

always well-researched, thought-provoking and relevant videos, keep up the good work guys!

[@Mr_Yarn]

I noticed you once again featured Halifax in your video, and I appreciate it a lot. When considering the context of your video in relation to Halifax, the big issues I see around here are that, unlike a lot of cities in Canada, the governances around trying to develop positive urbanism seem a bit more complicated and nuanced. For one, we're amalgamated; formerly a bunch of smaller communities now collected into a larger municipality. This leaves us with a few districts that are entirely urban, and several districts that are entirely suburban, or entirely rural, which creates a slew of challenges toward trying to get positive change approved when there is such a varied level of geographic layouts and priorities; approving policies effecting the entire municipality would mean different things for people living in the North End of the peninsula, then they would to someone living in Lawrencetown. The geologic difference creates challenges, too. Being a part of the Appalachian region of North America, there is a lot of variation in land type, and the ground is full of hard clay and granite, among other hard rock, so new development often has to rely on in-filling of existing lots, or expensive blasting. All the while, it still suffers from a lot of issues that we see across North America, namely issues with zoning, car-centric design, and hurtles to fixing those things like proper public education and engagement, and better collaboration between municipal, provincial, and federal governments on the right policy changes to allow for an easier means to make the positive changes necessary, and within a reasonable time frame. If you listen to The Grand Parade podcast (a local podcast done by two reporters from one of our local independent news sources: The Coast), they talk extensively on these sorts of issues from a reporting on city hall perspective.

[@OhTheUrbanity]

For context, one of us used to live in Halifax: kzbin.info/www/bejne/o6mxoIObat2Gh68

[@NFvidoJagg2]

So basically HRM is a microcosm for urbanism in Canada?

[@Mr_Yarn]

​@@OhTheUrbanityI am familiar with that video. Things have certainly changed since you moved away, and there has certainly been some positive change, but there are still some fundamental elements that have yet to be addressed.

[@Mr_Yarn]

​@NFvidoJagg2 Pretty much, but it's also a bit unique as well. Most municipalities are either all urban, or all rural, or some mix of urban and suburban, or suburban and rural. I can't think of too many municipalities where the entirety of their jurisdiction is within urban, suburban, and rural areas. With over 500K people, spread within 5475.57 sq km, and of which about a 5th of said population is concentrated in the roughly 62 sq km of the urban core, most of the positive urbanism development has been largely confined to there, but more is being planned throughout the municipality, especially since they're expecting the population to quadruple by as early as 2050.

[@nathancurnow6425]

#3 is the story of my life here in Melbourne, Australia. Really insightful video.

[@joelwright4317]

Who can afford to take vacations?