You had me till the BuY AnOthER OnE, Pay me imaginary strawman. I do love bikes though, so do the fuckers that keep taking mine.
You have enough money for a pair of bolt cutters.
Yeah Yeah I do have some of those, where you parked again you say?
If you’re big enough, you just need money for a balaclava.
Hmmmm baklavas
I think the point was to contrast this with cars. Having your car stolen is 10x worse than having your bike stolen
10x? What car can be so cheap?
Ironically, a stole one
Think of it that way - whoever stole your bike was probably more happy to get it than you are sad to lose it. The total happiness in the world increased. So, whatever.
There it is.
The stupidest thing I’ll read all day.
And the sun’s not even up yet.
It’s a reference to this comic https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/1314087-my-bike-got-stolen-recently
I never know if the artist is serious or not.
Thank you; I had no idea.
I take it that the idea is that it’s supposed to be stupid?
- kryptonite U-lock.
- locking skewers for the tires, gears, seat and handle bars.
- an ugly color
At this point, they’ll need an angle grinder to get anything valuable off the bike. It’s more expensive but so long its not the standard of ever biker, bike thieves’ll target easier bikes to steal off.
It’s true although it sucks. You could have several bikes stolen a year and it’s still cheaper than a car.
It’s, once again, comes with infrastructure. When I moved to Germany from the country with no bike infrastructure, I only thought of a bike as an expensive stuff, but here I bought a used commuter for 40 Euro and it’s fucking great. I love it, but if it gets stolen, I would be mildly frustrated and buy another one of those for 40 Euro the next day.
With trains, you don’t arrive sweaty, you can’t get run down by cars, and someone else parks it
I ride a bike to work every day. I’m never sweaty. The infrastructure to cycle exists so I won’t get run over by cars.
Where I live I wouldn’t want to bike. Too many freaking hills
Where I live (Oklahoma City), I wouldn’t want to bike for at least 5 months of the year. Between mid April and late October, we are stupid hot and humid. We had lots of days this past summer that either got uncomfortably close to or passed 40°C. Dew points in the mid 20s all summer long. You’ll break a sweat just standing outside for more than about a minute or two.
Can’t imagine what it’s like for those sorry saps in Houston or Florida.
The comfortable temp for biking is significantly higher than it is for walking, especially with the right gear. 40°C is definitely beyond reasonable tho. Planting trees and decreasing the amount of asphalt would go a long way to make it a better proposition more of the year. A societal expectation that you don’t go or do anything when weather gets that hot could bridge the difference. Unfortunately that kind of philosophy is antithetical to capitalism’s demands for productivity.
I live in a somewhat hilly city. That is why I have an electric bike. I’m never sweaty when I arrive at work
Even if the city is flat as fuck you’ll still arrive sweaty if the climate is hot. Take Phoenix for example, you will sweat even if you are in the shade and doing no physical exercise because it’s commonly 46 degrees.
Phoenix is not a great example of how we should design cities. Putting a city in a desert is a bad idea from the outset.
The desert is the only reason it is habitable, if it were less arid the humidity would make it even worse. The largest desert on earth is Antarctica, deserts don’t have to be hot, just low precipitation.
But what deserts do very well is solar potential due to lack of cloud cover and I don’t know why we can’t use solar to power electric rail for public transportation.
Teach me the non-sweaty ways. I love my bike, but theres no way I can arrive not sweaty. Before you say go slow, I’m not letting no bus take my god-damn glory.
E bike.
In Germany those are only allowed to assist you up to 25kph, which means they only help you going up hills, everywhere else will be the same amount of effort
30 in Canadaz that’s enough speed for commuting.
An Ebike is extremely helpful, especially if there are hills. Wear a breathable long sleeve SPF shirt. I like hemp and some of the stuff Colombia makes. If your route is safe enough don’t wear a helmet. Shorts and sandals are also helpful. I’ve had some success with lightweight merino clothes as well but they tend to get holey in a few years of frequent use
Only if you live at one train station and work at another.
You can also do this thing called walking. Although I am aware that in the United States that is considered suspicious behavior.
Im from europe, train stations here are a little more than walking distance apart.
The public transit isn’t that great where I live by European standards. I use a Brompton folding bike to make up the difference. It’s great for trains
I love trains but they give me so much anxiety. I have stories of facing harassment on public transport. But it’s not just me though, here’s some idea of why public transport can suck for women or other people in case my anecdotes are just that: https://www.metro-magazine.com/10111994/sexual-crime-and-harassment-on-public-transportation-a-study
California had to make a law for race-based harassment, so it’s not just a one place or just sex-based harassment issue: https://19thnews.org/2023/02/california-introduces-bill-harassment-safety-public-transit-systems/
If public transport can come without being subjected to people and whatever miserable state of mind they’re in, I’d like that. I can at least escape a dumbass in my car, but in a train they’re either right in front of me or nearby for a long time. How do we fix this?
Screw that. I love paying for car insurance, gas, oil change, tires, and random bolts maintenance. There is also the thrill of driving in traffic, and dealing with road rage. There is plenty that makes the car the ideal transportation mode loved by the masses.
My personal favorite is how if someone bumps you and you get the smallest scratch or dent on your door, you now have to be late for whatever you were doing, pull over (impacting other traffic) exchange insurance info deal with possible hostility for that and ultimately have a crappy day because of it.
Stay out of the road with the heavy machinery. Cars won. Get out of the way or get run over.
ITT: Carbrains
As soon as bicycles are mentioned, everyone suddenly has to transport their washing machine 200 miles in sub zero temperatures.
I think it’s more that when someone is suggesting something as a perfect thing, people naturally try to challenge that by finding faults in it.
It’s blindingly obvious cycling is not a panacea for all transport and no one is suggesting it is. Yet here they are, all pointing out what everyone knows in response to a statement that was never made.
It’s like you don’t read your peers comments. Yes, people argue this ALL THE TIME.
If I had a dime every time someone said oh just rent a truck when you need it making blind assumptions about my life and what I need, I could buy a bike with it.
Scooter, pic unrelated
Every time I see this kind of post I just wish they would try to go to work in a +40 degree Celsius environment.
It must be nice to work in a place that won’t mind if you arrive drenched in sweat.
Edit: I love the hive mind
It would be one thing if all employers offered locker rooms and adequate time to get ready along with safe storage.
It must be nice to work in a place that won’t mind if you arrive drenched in sweat.
coughs nervously in works-from-home
But yeah, it’s more weather dependent for sure
Honestly, no matter the mode of transportation, I’d arrive drenched in sweat in a 40° environment.
I would probably not even step outside unless absolutely necessary. At that temperature I would already suffer indoors, and if I stepped out I’d faint if I stayed out there for longer than thirty minutes.
**
Being able to travel almost 100 miles in just an hour is a pretty significant advantage to motor vehicles. Not everything is within cycling distance. Not everybody lives in your overcrowded city.
Cars were, and to some extent, still are, a statement of wealth. Having a “horseless carriage” back when personal vehicles were called that, was an easy way to distinguish that you were a successful person. As time went on, this transformed into having the latest vehicle or vehicles of a specific brand or type, or that cost x amount of dollars… Many of these points are still true today, unfortunately.
Because of the status you would demonstrate having a vehicle, demand for infrastructure from the affluent persons that owned these vehicles, most cities were built with space in mind so their richest could enjoy their personal vehicles as optimally as they could. As time went on, and more people bought cars due to the ease of transport they provided, that infrastructure demand only increased.
Specifically in America, further pressure was given to state and local governments by automobile manufacturers to build better and better roads to more places so more people would have access to roads and therefore see value in owning a personal vehicle.
Then there’s the interstate. Again, specifically talking about the states here, mostly… The Interstate systems were desired by the auto makers and people, but we’re not strictly required. AFAIK the largest push for interstate freeways came from the military, so they could rapidly move equipment from one location to another. This is why interstates are so built up; if you compare the underlying structure of most roads with what’s done for interstate freeways, the difference, at least, historically, is quite significant. The interstate was designed to have a batallion of tanks roll from place to place, something that would utterly destroy most roadways. Of course they can also move other equipment on it, since the majority of the remainder of what they would need to move is less damaging to the road than tanks… Like planes. Many interstates are designed, on purpose, to act as impromptu runways to land or take off from. This enables the military to set up shop pretty much anywhere they need to, in order to defend the land.
The existence of the interstate only drove (no pun intended) more people to want and buy cars. Further compounding the problem.
Now, many years later, city streets are generally not built for you. They’re not built with regular human lives in mind. They’re built to act as conduits for emergencies so personnel or equipment can move from place to place with ease and relative speed. Public emergency services (police, ambulance, fire) are all geared around the existence of roads for transit. Because of this and a multitude of other, somewhat less notable reasons, roads continue to be a fixture in most cities and urban areas.
Another stupid (mostly American) reason is how far away everything is. The reason everything is so distant is a simple explanation: zoning. Commercial and residential zoning created problems where getting a plot of land re-zoned to build a strip mall or plaza is challenging at best. So since you live in a residential zone, all the commercial zoned services that you use, must be on different land in different areas. The nice thing about this is that residential zones tend to be much quieter than commercial most of the time, so homes can sit in quiet area while all the hustle and bustle of the city stays separate. This has somewhat changed on recent times but it still exists as a significant issue. Since zones of residential and commercial are generally not very small, unless you live at the edge of a residential zone that borders a commercial zone, essential services like grocery stores and shops are generally a significant distance away. Owning a vehicle and road infrastructure makes this a minor inconvenience at most, unfortunately it also makes this a major inconvenience for anyone who does not (thus driving sales of personal vehicles, again, compounding the problem). Again, in recent years, maybe the last 20-30, this has been changing, and we’re starting to see, at least in large Metro areas, the rise of condos. Usually intermixed with commercial areas, it’s a home you can buy that is surrounded by commercial services within walking distance (copy/paste for apartments).
Unfortunately, due to the military and historical reasons, as well as continued demand for roads from people living in residential zones that are further away, roads are and continue to be built, and maintained, in cities.
If you look “across the pond” to Europe, there are many examples of cities that existed long before zoning was even considered and where automobiles didn’t exist that are very convenient to bike or walk through. Homes are intermixed with shops, and generally living in the city, while a bit more noisy than a residential zone, is otherwise very convenient for walking and cycling where you need to go. Mainly because cars were not a consideration at the time that those cities were constructed. Walking was common and cycling was not unusual, so the infrastructure reflects that.
We’re seeing a resurgence of this kind of anti-vehicle infrastructure thinking among people, and with the rising costs of everyday living and the expense that vehicles can incur, both in operating them, storing them and maintaining them, it’s easy to see why, especially when housing, in the form of apartments and condos, is getting closer to the commercial services that people want and use. However there seems to be a growing animosity among those that want more walkable and cycling friendly cities, with their car-driving counterparts.
I’m impartial. I own a car and live in a rural area, so I need one to get pretty much anywhere. My situation is not that of a city dweller and I see the merit in the walkable city. At the same time, I see the merit in drivable cities too. I wouldn’t mind driving to a parking structure and taking a bus/subway/bike/whatever to get into any major city, since I do so very rarely. But I can’t deny the convenience of driving into a city and parking less than a block away from my destination. Both arguments have merit and ultimately, I don’t really have any “skin in the game” (so to speak), so what happens shouldn’t be up to me, and cities should sort that out among their populous. I just know way too much about the issue, so I decided to comment. Sorry for the wall of text.
The Japanese used bikes to defeat the British in Singapore. The Vietnamese used bikes to defeat the Americans in Vietnam. The Chinese used bikes to destroy manufacturing in the west.
I’ll be in the cold cold ground before I use some stupid commie machine powered by rice.
All other arguments for not using a bike are stupid.
Can’t tell if satire
"Cars are freedom! *
Except for the monthly finance payment, the legal obligation to insurance companies, the dependance on oil companies, etc"
Don’t forget the fact that you can be randomly stopped and forced to provide documentation that you’re legally required to carry in order to operate the machine… Unlike a bike, which you can just ride wherever.
Oh… And yeah, and most bikes don’t have computers in them that can tell on you to the cops if asked.
But yeah… Freedom.
Here is another reason. I can’t afford a reasonable sized apartment that can house my family near my work. So I have to travel further. Bikes are great for cities if you can afford to live in the city.
Also, what happens when it snows and you gotta get to work? Snow chains?
Cause you can’t actually GO anywhere on a bike. If you want to go somewhere 200 miles away for a week, it’d take a day and a half each way, minimum, and you can’t bring anything with you bigger than a backpack. It’s also physically strenuous to go literally anywhere, even the places you are allowed to go.
cities should look like this: bicycle/walking paths, trains, trams and buses. and a tiny road for the rare occasion you actually NEED a car. boom, problems solved. also mixed use zoning, rezone every city so it’s more compatible with a non car centric lifestyle
Also, bad weather is a major pain in the ass on a bicycle, but only a minor inconvenience in a car
I would love it if my city had bike only days. Or at least specific bike route that do not allow cars.
I don’t live in the us and there is a major road in my city that has a bike lane, but they just split one of the car lanes so there is a bike lane, half a lane for a car, and a full lane.
So cars have no choice but to drive in the bike lane. It’s also between the cars and a place with tons of right turns.
In addition to this, the city has some of the worst traffic in the world short distances can take hours. But it’s too dangerous to ride a bike.
I never learned how to ride a bicycle, I should really get to it someday. I just walk everywhere I need to go, or use carpooling/bus/subway…
