4,222 karma · joined May 25, 2018
Indeed, and the article itself agrees with you - the headline is deceptive. Without any specifics, the actual quote from the transport minister is about improving intermodal transport, saying "We must make it more attractive to travel by public transport, cycle, and walk."
That doesn't answer the question... what makes it thoughtless? For that matter, what makes a small urban apartment worse (or better) than a home in an abandoned village? I was certainly happier and had a better time balancing my budget living in a small apartment in Japan than trying to find out how to budget to live in north america.
> > (up to a certain point)
> That's incorrect [...] the most efficient cities are around 50-200k in population
So we agree on the fundamental, you just define the turnover point as 50-200k. I think it is inseparably tied with density - a city of 2million might be the turning point in a land constrained country like Japan, but I wouldn't be surprised in the breakeven in a suburban sprawly north american city is in the 100-200k range you mention.
> If you use the number of municipal workers per capita as a proxy,
This is a poor proxy. Capital budgets might be better, or ratio between median taxation and median income.
> After that, you're starting to need transit, zoning, and all other stuff.
Without breaking down what categories the employees work in, that's a poor comparison. Boise and NYC both have transit, zoning, etc so that alone doesn't make any difference. But for example car ownership rates are dramatically lower in NYC. If it's $2000 extra in taxes to pay for the transit drivers in NYC, but a household has an average 1 car instead of 3, then the NYC residents come out way ahead in terms of budget.
Additionally, you mention zoning - most of the smallest municipalities in the US have much more restrictive zoning than cities in Japan.
> For example, NYC [...] Boise [...]
Can you provide some Japanese examples, since we're talking about Japan?
It was in the comment you replied to, you only explicitly addressed the first part, but implicitly agreed with the latter as well:
> how many 19-year-olds do you know who want to live in a dorm setting and show up on time?
My gas car has a 42 litre tank, if i wait until the light has come on and the gauge is on (and then drive another 20km past that), I can only get 38.5 litres in.
Where in the US is made of "5-10 storey blocks with internal courtyards" that the op referenced? I don't know anywhere that that's an option on the table. People live in suburbs because it's what is available, full stop. If there were dense 5-10 storey areas sitting empty while the surrounding suburbs were full, then you'd have a point
Instagram can be used in a desktop browser just fine.
I disagree, it read more like a stream of thought on why public transport and walking sucks, followed up with why car driving is great, a short aside on how bicycle riding isn't even an option because it's dangerous, finished up by telling the readers "please do not @ me on this or any other point in this article"
I strongly agree with his conclusion about funding transit as loss-leaders. But take serious issue with the line "We also should retrofit proper separated cycle lanes into existing streets wherever this can be accommodated alongside existing traffic" - If you're couching such a goal as "we can't affect current vehicle traffic", you're not very serious about getting a functional bike network. Bike routes will only ever be as safe as their most dangerous leg.
> I don't use a car, but don't think that all car owners are arseholes, maybe 5% are?
Agree with you here, 5% of all road users (whether they be drivers, cyclists, or pedestrians) will be jerks, and unfortunately they are the ones who tend to be the most memorable - but 95% of people are just trying to get from A to B safely and efficiently.
As a Canadian, I think every household I've been in you take your shoes off at the door. Experience limited to Ontario and every province east of it.
Granular gradation is still a major part of modern roadway construction, there are just certain standards that are very typical so they get used without too much thought required. For some applications a visual inspection is enough, but there's generally some standard proportion of sieve analysis required (eg. 1 test per 10000tonne produced), along with proctor tests (to determine maximum dry density) and frequent nuclear densitometry. I've even seen loads of aggregate get rejected due to the large aggregate being too oblongated.
When you get into concrete or asphalt mix design, the aggregate standards can be even more strict - chemical makeup of the stone can be important to avoid alkali-silica reaction; minimizing fines increases the strength of asphalt mix but creates a tougher riding surface; etc etc etc.
- Removing the ballast from a section at a time to do the cleaning means that the rails and sleepers are floating in the air (~1:30 to 2:35)
- They're doing all this work, including transferring waste to another train, underneath catenary wires. low clearance!! (3:40 to 5:20)
Also important to note, they aren't so much washing the stones (though that may be part of the process), they're sieving (grading) the stones to remove everything that's under a specific size (looks like they're removing everything that passes a ~25mm/1" sieve, but scale in a video can be deceiving). Rail ballast is very uniformly graded, i.e. every piece of aggregate is about the same size. Vibrations over time will cause edges of the stones to chip and wear down, with these chips contaminating the ballast. It also leads to rounding of the aggregate, so there's less interlock between the particles.
As to the generations - those are still just useful generalizations. As soon as you start digging into it, you start seeing all the edge cases.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_demographic_compositio...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Canada_2023_Population_Py...
Here[1] is the US population pyramid. You can clearly see the small increases and decreases at various ages - a demographic pulse, as you said. There is a significant decline in the echo currently at ~14 in that image. I would note that early adulthood tends to bring in more immigration (people moving for university and staying), so I wouldn't read too much into it at this point.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USA_Population_Pyramid.sv...
Every individual action "contributes practically nothing to global CO2", so with this argument, nothing should ever be done.
But this is a strawman argument regardless: globally, steelmaking contributes ~11% of direct CO2 emissions[1]. Other countries[2] are progressing towards decarbonization. Per this very article, Europe will subsidize initially (progressively replacing subsidization with import tariffs over the next decade). And the whole point of all of this is to "internalize the externalities" - recognize that carbon emissions aren't free: Steel is incredibly emissions intensive, and free emissions lead it to be used in areas where other materials would be better from an emissions perspective.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steelmaking#Carbon_dioxide_emi...
[2] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/algoma-steel-420milli...
You are reading it wrong. What it says is that if you use fitness one hour per day, you will have to manually charge it once a week
> a wired charger is also included. On a full charge, which takes around three hours, the watch will run for about a week when using the added fitness features for an hour a day.
https://www.sibelga.be/en/about-sibelga/projects-challenges/...