The only solution to traffic and gridlock is providing viable alternatives to driving. If you’re gonna spend all the money on a tunnel, at least put a train in there. A double track would have a way higher throughput than even 10 lanes of underground traffic.

Advocates against ablism then calls the general public imbecilic disgusting wastes of oxygen…

Nearly everything i mentioned can be done at a municipal level which tends to have less extreme shifts than federal politics. A good city council could commit to improving their city’s situation. Often once this gets started, people like it. For example, people loved the pedestrianized streets some cities had during covid. I do understand your point though, the premier of my province made it illegal for municipalities to build bike lanes (which imo is way too much provincial over reach into muncipal planning).

Many trams and light rail are accessible for various disabilities.

Cars are also restrictive to people with certain disabilities. The fairest way is having a wide variety of options available, including specialized cars for those who need them. Currently, the car is pretty much the only option in many north american cities, which certainly isn’t the fairest.

It is a huge problem cause we had great functional cities with lots of housing and most had trams on every majory roadway. We made huge mistakes destroying multi story buildings to pave surface level parking lots. This problem was decades in the making and will take decades to build out of, but thats what we’ll have to do if we want to fix it. There is no magic undo button.

Things cities can do to start improving today inckude upzone residential neighbourhoods to make midrise multi units possible to build. Allows mixed use zoning where residential moxes more with light comercial and restaurants. Restrict new developments on the edges of the city to meet minimum density requirements and transit access standards. Update fire/building codes to make single staircase buildings safe and viable. Do a street assement when repaving roads to determine if dedicated transit, cycling, or pedestrian lanes should replace some car lanes.

Thats pretty much exactly what we did to accommodate cars with their highways and parking lots in the first place. But its really less about tearing down and more about building up instead of out. They already tore down the cities to pave more lanes and make more parking.

So you’re saying it somehow makes more sense for every single person to own a car and a garage and pay all the initial and maintaince upkeep, and insurance costs than just use a taxi or uber a handful of times a year?

If someone can get by for the vast majority of their needs without a car, they don’t need to own a car. We have taxis, rideshare, and car rentals that can fill in the gaps they can’t make with walking or transit. Those options are far cheaper than owning if they don’t use the car often.

I haven’t even touched on how car dependancy destroys affordability, city budgets, and the environment. I really don’t see how everyone owning a car is more of a winning narrative than everyone having access to effecient transit.

You’re right, it isn’t feasible to always use a bus, thats why walking, cycling, trams, and light rail should also be used. The biggest problem is density. Low density makes it very difficult to effeciently service, yet many north american zoning and building codes make it very difficult to build any housing that isn’t detached single family homes with minimum parking standards and set backs.

The problem with transit is more about how cities are designed, zoned, and built. If we built cities for people instead of cars the vast majority of people in a city would likely have faster commutes on transit than driving a private vehicle.

Other things can help with this as well such as transit signal priority.

Some cities allow trains to refrain from horns within city limits and instead the barrier makes a more localized dinging. I live near a major rail interchange and they rarely every honk their horns, oftenly only using a short warning horn if needed.

When I lived rurally trains with horns were far more common. On a human note I’d rather hear a train horn occasionally than hear constant traffic noise. I get how thats harder to manage with a dog but perhaps consistent training could lessen their response to horns.

This sounds more like a freight train. Many modern light commuter trains are quieter than an average SUV. The rail line could also have sound barriers installed if noise is still an issue.

Both times I’ve ever been pulled over for speeding the road was empty except me and i was going the average speed people drive on them. 3 people doing 20 over, a cop can shrug and say i don’t wanna pick one to ticket. A single car not only sticks out as speeding more easily, but there also isn’t much of an excuse for the cop not to pull them over.

Counter intuitively, its easier to get away with speeding when the roads are busy because you blend in. The biggest things you want to avoid when speeding and busy is agressive behaviors and frequent passing. Make it seem more casual and you will blend in with the flow of traffic.

But doing 55 in a 65 isn’t unreasonable, and 95 is pretty fast and at that speed handling can become difficult on cheap or poorly maintained cars.

There are also conditions where 30 is what you’ll do on a highway if its a blizzard and you’re stuck behind a plow truck.

Certainly cheaper than paying for a police cruiser and all their equipment and wages. Its also less likely for the camera to be racist, be bribed, or shoot someone.

Cars are so common and speeding ignored for long we’d probably need at least double the amount of cops to enfroce traffic if we got rid of red light and speeding cameras.

It honestly frustrates me so much with the speed limit thing. On a societal level, speed (and differences in speed) tend to be one of the biggest factors in car crashes, so ignoring speeding is just accepting more dangerous roads.

On a peronal level, i try to do the limit or maybe 5-10 over (20 over is the norm in my area, even in school zones). The really frustrating part is as soon as i act like everyone else a try to do 20 over i get a ticket and my insurance goes up. This is frustrating becauae it just feels as if I’m being punished for doing what most people consider to be “safe” and normal. If it was drastically obvious that 20 over is faster than the flow of the traffic, it would feel a lot less frustrating if i get a ticket.

It can actually feel dangerous doing the limit on roads notoriois for 20-30 over. People agressively pass, tailgate and cut you off. Its fucked up but you get more dirty looks for doing the limit than you do for doing 40 over the limit. I think part of this is the north american attitude of cars being an extension of yourself. Someone doing 40 over is both couragous enough to go that fast, and also wealthy enough to own something faster and wealthy enough to afford the ticket, or at least that seems like the trend.

Also promotes higher house prices. 3% is still very low if we look back farther than 10 years.

If you don’t read the news, you’re uninformed, if you do read the news, you’re misinformed.

Most of those are probably prerolled joint tubes

There are some valid uses for replaceable batteries. Fire alarms for example is not something i want to take off the ceiling to recharge every few weeks.

That said, banning single use/non refillable vapes is something i could support.

He needs to ramp up health issues before privatizing healthcare. Next we’ll see doctors recommending their favourite cigarettes again.