Protesting the planting of trees because seeds or leaves may fall into someone else's yard is literally a NIMBY move. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that you aren't a NIMBY but a lot of the points are false dichotomies, strawmen, or arguments to moderation, many of which are actually used by NIMBYs. While the ultimate message appears correct, that we should organically develop a plan for each locality based on the material conditions of the area and population, the general tone is that of refusing to get treated for cancer at the hospital because you don't like the colour of the gowns. Action is needed and we're just going to have to make some mistakes along the way if we want to see any change within our lifetimes. Anyway, happy new year.
I am an urbanist, I live car free, but I spend most of my time in the suburbs. And it's true: you can live in a low density suburb, dream about a detached house, and still manage to live car free.
So true! Thank you for making this video about a more holistic viewpoint around urbanism and urban planning. I have been wanting to make a video or videos to say similar things because it does seem that some people think you can't be a YIMBY if you are against any highrise residential and encourage more of a missing middle or mid-rise building instead for legitimate reasons.
Sorry, but this video sounds like a handbook for nimbys. Especially those, who already cry, that urbanism is about "forcing people to life in skyscrapers and ban all cars" or "poor Europe needs urbanism for their old cities, but America was build for the freedom of cars!". Sorry, but no sane urbanist wants high rise housing to be the norm, because they are just _the other extreme of anti-human design_. That's why North American downtowns are full of them, while Europe has mostly stopped building them around the same time, they scraped the idea of "car oriented cities". And no sane urbanist wants to "ban all cars" (anyone already hearing the "but what about emergency vehicles?" comments?), they just want to discourage driving. There also is no "American-style urbanism", the urbanism in Canada and especially the US is just barely starting and despite all good examples hasn't even been able to change the general direction.
Private vehicles are not needed by anybody inside a city, transit is needed. Car free advocates are trying to push cities to build transit and walk-ability. There is no good reason why a city should be accommodating to private vehicle ownership over other forms of transportation and a LOT of good reasons why they should not be accommodating private vehicles. Why are so many people starting to show up within urbanist/transit channels that want to keep accommodating for private vehicles. We've been doing that for 80 years and its created a garbage lifestyle. It clearly does not work for sustainability, for poverty avoidance, for city planning and for affordability.
Because that's an extremist position devoid of the nuance of the real world and the actual advantages cars bring. Especially for people who dislike like living in dense urban environments and prefer living in low density, but still want more transit and less car dependency. You wouldn't expect the plumber to take all their equipment on a bus with them. They need a van. The tree-trimming service needs a truck. Mail can't be delivered by transit either. Car infrastructure is required. And cars are a useful thing for people to have. Should everyone need one? No. But should _no one_ need one? Also no.
I didn't see this as defending accommodating private vehicles, I saw it as a condemnation of people who will shame those who "choose" to drive in places where that is the only choice. Telling people that they are horrible people because they drive instead of biking and taking the bus when biking is incredibly dangerous and there is no bus isn't going to win those people over to our side. Telling them how much better it would be and selling them on the idea of how much better their life will be with an actual choice will win a lot of them over.
Sure, i have a revoIutionary spirit too. So let me know when the urbanist revoIution is going down, and then we can get ideal transit systems for entire cities planned & built overnight. But yeah, until that happens incrementalism is all thats even politically permissible as it stands. I’m not saying we shouldn’t push the limits, but until the guiIIotines come out we’ll have to work strategically within our means. This means being context sensitive. Plan excellent transit in places and ways that it will be a gleaming success, and that becomes the propaganda. The only way to convince suburban chuds, who cant even conceive of themselves becoming a dirty bus rider, is to make it obvious that their car dependent life might be worse than a dirty bus rider’s
This is pretty good video but I have to say...is there any evidence that high rises are less fire safe? It'd be the first I've heard of it. iirc the most important features of building fire safety are things like materials, of which concrete structures are far safer than things like lowrises which are more likely to be made out of a material like wood, and preventative things like sprinkler systems or alarms, which are more likely to be installed in newer buildings, especially if they are in things like highrises, which are far more tightly regulated. Something like 90% of all fires in the US happen in buildings without sprinklers-something which is exceedingly rare in newer highrises. I doubt building height is a major influence on the danger of a fire, at least in the US or Canada.
It really depends on the maintenance and inspections of the building owners as well. Generally high-rise buildings are safe, but if the maintenance of fire hydrants, alarms, emergency exit access, etc. isn't guaranteed, then it is very problematic. The education of residents and tenants about how to use a fire hydrants, locate access, etc. is also important too. So while it is safe, a much more catastrophic incident can happen if a fire occurs!
Protesting the planting of trees because seeds or leaves may fall into someone else's yard is literally a NIMBY move. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that you aren't a NIMBY but a lot of the points are false dichotomies, strawmen, or arguments to moderation, many of which are actually used by NIMBYs. While the ultimate message appears correct, that we should organically develop a plan for each locality based on the material conditions of the area and population, the general tone is that of refusing to get treated for cancer at the hospital because you don't like the colour of the gowns. Action is needed and we're just going to have to make some mistakes along the way if we want to see any change within our lifetimes. Anyway, happy new year.
I am an urbanist, I live car free, but I spend most of my time in the suburbs. And it's true: you can live in a low density suburb, dream about a detached house, and still manage to live car free.
Yes it doesn't have to be at an extreme point!
So true! Thank you for making this video about a more holistic viewpoint around urbanism and urban planning. I have been wanting to make a video or videos to say similar things because it does seem that some people think you can't be a YIMBY if you are against any highrise residential and encourage more of a missing middle or mid-rise building instead for legitimate reasons.
Yep! And especially when there are still a lot of barriers in development, we should go slow, one step at a time!
Well, I Thought this would have something to do with gender discourse :(
Sorry, but this video sounds like a handbook for nimbys. Especially those, who already cry, that urbanism is about "forcing people to life in skyscrapers and ban all cars" or "poor Europe needs urbanism for their old cities, but America was build for the freedom of cars!".
Sorry, but no sane urbanist wants high rise housing to be the norm, because they are just _the other extreme of anti-human design_. That's why North American downtowns are full of them, while Europe has mostly stopped building them around the same time, they scraped the idea of "car oriented cities". And no sane urbanist wants to "ban all cars" (anyone already hearing the "but what about emergency vehicles?" comments?), they just want to discourage driving.
There also is no "American-style urbanism", the urbanism in Canada and especially the US is just barely starting and despite all good examples hasn't even been able to change the general direction.
Private vehicles are not needed by anybody inside a city, transit is needed. Car free advocates are trying to push cities to build transit and walk-ability. There is no good reason why a city should be accommodating to private vehicle ownership over other forms of transportation and a LOT of good reasons why they should not be accommodating private vehicles.
Why are so many people starting to show up within urbanist/transit channels that want to keep accommodating for private vehicles. We've been doing that for 80 years and its created a garbage lifestyle. It clearly does not work for sustainability, for poverty avoidance, for city planning and for affordability.
Because that's an extremist position devoid of the nuance of the real world and the actual advantages cars bring.
Especially for people who dislike like living in dense urban environments and prefer living in low density, but still want more transit and less car dependency.
You wouldn't expect the plumber to take all their equipment on a bus with them. They need a van. The tree-trimming service needs a truck. Mail can't be delivered by transit either.
Car infrastructure is required. And cars are a useful thing for people to have. Should everyone need one? No. But should _no one_ need one? Also no.
I didn't see this as defending accommodating private vehicles, I saw it as a condemnation of people who will shame those who "choose" to drive in places where that is the only choice. Telling people that they are horrible people because they drive instead of biking and taking the bus when biking is incredibly dangerous and there is no bus isn't going to win those people over to our side. Telling them how much better it would be and selling them on the idea of how much better their life will be with an actual choice will win a lot of them over.
Sure, i have a revoIutionary spirit too. So let me know when the urbanist revoIution is going down, and then we can get ideal transit systems for entire cities planned & built overnight.
But yeah, until that happens incrementalism is all thats even politically permissible as it stands. I’m not saying we shouldn’t push the limits, but until the guiIIotines come out we’ll have to work strategically within our means. This means being context sensitive. Plan excellent transit in places and ways that it will be a gleaming success, and that becomes the propaganda.
The only way to convince suburban chuds, who cant even conceive of themselves becoming a dirty bus rider, is to make it obvious that their car dependent life might be worse than a dirty bus rider’s
This is pretty good video but I have to say...is there any evidence that high rises are less fire safe? It'd be the first I've heard of it. iirc the most important features of building fire safety are things like materials, of which concrete structures are far safer than things like lowrises which are more likely to be made out of a material like wood, and preventative things like sprinkler systems or alarms, which are more likely to be installed in newer buildings, especially if they are in things like highrises, which are far more tightly regulated. Something like 90% of all fires in the US happen in buildings without sprinklers-something which is exceedingly rare in newer highrises. I doubt building height is a major influence on the danger of a fire, at least in the US or Canada.
It really depends on the maintenance and inspections of the building owners as well. Generally high-rise buildings are safe, but if the maintenance of fire hydrants, alarms, emergency exit access, etc. isn't guaranteed, then it is very problematic. The education of residents and tenants about how to use a fire hydrants, locate access, etc. is also important too. So while it is safe, a much more catastrophic incident can happen if a fire occurs!