[ale] unusual global warming experiment

[JK]

On 2/11/2010 9:23 AM, Lightner, Jeff wrote:
> The problem with "reducing traffic" for those who can't telecommute is
> that it usually means "mass transit" which almost never gets you from
> start to finish.


But this is because our society does not have a commitment to mass transit
as a viable transportation medium.  I LOVE my fairly frequent trips to
NYC, because mass transit there is cheap and effective.  There's literally
nowhere I need to go that I can't get to with a 30-minute subway ride and
a couple blocks of walking.  I don't even bother to rent a car when I go
there.


>   When I lived in Houston and was dirt poor my job was
> 6 miles from home.  To get there via bus I'd have had to walk a mile,
> wait for a bus, go at the snail's pace the bus goes due to multiple
> stops, get off the bus and walk 1/2 mile to my job.   This says nothing
> about all the crazies you have to be exposed to at the stops and on the
> bus.
>
> I opted to just walk the 6 miles each way.   It saved me both time and
> money and was better for my health (physical and mental).


Right on!  "Bad mass transit saves lives".


> The "less traffic" solution is what Environmental nuts keep trying to
> force by opposing any road expansion.   They think that it will force
> people to give up the comfort of their cars to avoid the commute time.


This is another symptom of wrong-problem-ism.  Some kind of planned,
integrated approach is needed; pushing "less traffic CAPACITY" without
a positive "more capacity to GET PEOPLE WHERE THEY NEED TO BE" proposal
is doomed to failure.  We're stuck with a lot of actors shouting at each
other at cross purposes; hopefully some consensus will emerge before
Atlanta is underwater.

On the upside, physicists have apparently figured out recently how to
use Bell's Theorem to teleport energy, so matter can't be far behind :-)
(This was on /. a couple days ago.)

-- JK

-- 
We Americans are a freedom-loving people, and nothing says "freedom"
like Getting Away With It. -- Guy Forsyth, "Long Long Time"