Hell hath no smugness like an urbanist with a social media account:
Americans love experiencing this on vacation, then come back home and forget what they experienced.
pic.twitter.com/F2OFhyGGs6— Andy Boenau (@Boenau) November 17, 2024
Are Americans really too dumb to understand that they can transform their own hometowns into the urbanist wet dreams they experience on their European vacations? Or are they perfectly content with their own lifestyle, but also enjoy sampling another another from time to time because, you know, THEY’RE ON VACATION??? That’s the whole point of a vacation–you visit someplace different for awhile and do different stuff. If I go to the Caribbean and lie on a beach drinking alcoholic beverages out of coconuts for six days, am I an idiot because I don’t keep doing that when I return home? Also, just as real life in the Caribbean is not lying on the beach all day, not everybody in Europe gets to spend all day riding bicycles around the city in the sun. They work and unclog their toilets and struggle with ingrown hairs and do all the other mundane and miserable shit we do. Also, there are shitty parts of Europe, too–it’s just that you don’t visit them WHEN YOU’RE ON VACATION.
Most of all, what urbanists fail to understand is that not everybody wants the same thing. People from the country come to visit New York City, have a great time, then return home and marvel at how people could possibly live there as they pull into their driveways in a Hyundai Santa Fe full of shit from Costco. Similarly, people from New Your City spent time in the country, savor the peace and quiet, then go back to their tiny apartments and thank the god they don’t believe in that a guy on a motor scooter will risk his life to bring them any type of food they can possibly dream up at all hours of the day or night:
Hey, I never want my vacations to end, either, but you’ve got to get back to work eventually.
Speaking of urbanism, the New York City congestion charge is back, though at a reduced rate of nine bucks:
Today — because you called and rallied and never stopped pushing — @GovKathyHochul is advancing congestion pricing.
We are one step closer to cleaner air, safer streets, faster buses, accessible subways & a more resilient future.
Today wouldn’t have been possible without you. pic.twitter.com/fs4HI17xtP
— Transportation Alternatives (@TransAlt) November 14, 2024
Not to piss on anyone’s participation trophy, but congestion pricing isn’t back because of the rallying, it’s back because the election is over. Also, there’s a notion that New York City is finally catching up to London by instituting congestion pricing, but it’s important to keep in mind that the congestion pricing is basically London’s only toll, whereas there have always been shitloads of them here in New York:
But I’m sure one more will fix everything somehow.
In another bold move, New York City is also finally joining the rest of the civilized world by requiring buildings to dispose of their waste in containers:
Sadly, unlike much of the civilized world, in New York City people will run off with anything that’s not nailed down, so buildings are just chaining the containers to the bike racks:
One step forward, two steps back:
I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords:
But yes, there are advantages to living in the city, and there are drawbacks, and that’s why I live at the very edge of the city, which allows me to enjoy those advantages whilst also being able to do almost all of my cycling outside of it. Naturally this requires a bicycle that is equally at home in town:
And country:
After praising the Y-Foil’s compliance and the road bikes of the late ’90s and early aughts, I should note that the Homer is at least as compliant as the former:
And at least as fast as the latter, all whilst boasting fenders, a voluminous saddle bag, a dynamo hub, and the widest gear range of any of my bikes.
I like it so much I even got it a friend:
If you’re not careful they do tend to multiply.