gerv 

I enjoy short TED Talk videos on a variety of topics. Great speakers on normally great topics.

I just saw this video on "The Walkable city" by Jeff Speck. He covers much that we talk about here, but at about minute 8, he mentions a fact which crystalizes the rest of his discussion. Car crash statistics show that New York City is much safer than, for example, Orlando. In fact, NYC is one of the safest cities in the world in this category.



Anyone find any great TED videos related to bicycles and transportation?

tandempower

Great talk. Thanks for posting.

Walter S

The next zip-car

gerv 

Nice.... I followed up a bit on Robin Chase and her adventures after ZipCar. https://www.ted.com/speakers/robin_chase

Robin Chase display some interesting thinking...

Artkansas 

I think I've posted it before but here is an acquaintence of mine, Mark Martin.

harshbarj

I'm a fan of Mikael Colville-Andersen.

wvridgerider

He hit the nail on the head. I just wished I lived where I could be car free.

Dahon.Steve

Good post!

I don't know how people are spending 20% of their incomes on transportation. It's an insane amount of money and I would be broke spending that percentage on buses and trains. I spend only 3% of my income and that's alot!

Roody

Keep that thought in the back of your head--someday you will probably have an opportunity to move someplace whee you can be carfree. In the meantime, keep trying to use you car less.

wahoonc

Many people have no clue where their money goes or the percentages involved. The less they make the higher their transportation cost percentage will be. I would hate to have a minimum wage job and having to support a car, but unfortunately that is the way it goes in the US much of the time. A 40 hour week at minimum wage, a tank of gas could come close to hitting that 20% mark. For someone making a bit more, put in car payments, repairs, taxes, and fees and someone making $10-$12 an hour full time could very easily be at that 20% figure. Average wage for Retail workers is ~$12 an hour fast food workers ~$9 an hour. In much of the country the locations where these people work is not accessible by anything other than a car.

Aaron

wvridgerider

Being in a rural area, it would be tough. I commuted by bicycle to work for around 15 years but quit due to the traffic in this area. It was only 2.5 miles but a mile of it was on a two lane with speeds of 45+MPH, a blind curve at the entrance of work and a reserve base being built on our property. I really miss it and every time I try it just isnt worth the risk. Morning driversare horrible. I would rather ride in the middle of the night.
I retire in the next ten years and plan on moving, where I am not sure but it will be to an area where I can ride more.

wvridgerider

Oh yea, this area is a pretty good area to ride.

ThermionicScott 

I enjoyed that one a lot, gerv. Thanks for posting it. I noticed that he had a follow-up TED Talk:


and learned that he was the consultant on my city's efforts to revitalize the downtown and become more pedestrian-friendly! Cedar Rapids still has a ways to go, but is much better now.

Grillparzer

What a great way to rob a bank.

gerv 

He seems adamant about cycling facilities. (If you don't build it, they won't come.) But the same law dictates that adding an extra car lane encourages more motorists to show up.

Dahon.Steve

What an intelligent man. He's an incredible spearker and I didn't know he wrote the "Walkable City". I purchased that book 2 minutes ago and can't wait to start reading it next week. Too bad this country doesn't have more people like him.

ThermionicScott 

Don't we generally find that to be the case? The idee fixe has been that to cure congestion, all you need to do is make the roads straighter and add more lanes. Yet they seem to stay congested after the road work is done.

Roody

I hope city planners will be reading is book too. He seemed to be saying that the public and the media get the walkability message. Even retailers and business people get it. But planners are less aware of the importance of making city areas walkable in order to make them popular and prosperous.

About narrower streets being able to accommodate the traffic...
A four lane one-way street by my house was reconfigured to three lanes with a full-lane buffered bike lane. In this case, the planners were the ones who said that car capacity/speeds would not be reduced when the bike lane was put in. OTOH, many citizens (motorists) spoke out against the bike lane because they feared car traffic (mostly downtown-suburb commuters) would be slowed down.

The planners were right--car traffic did not slow down at all when lanes were reduced to accommodate a full buffered bike lane.

Now the "dream" is to make the street two-way with two lanes--perhaps slowing down car traffic "a little bit" in order to make the street more walkable.

RoadTire 

I just watched a TEDx about cycling - just ride - from Allen Lim. I won't spoil his talk, but if you can't sit through the whole thing, watch the first 5 minutes then skip to 12:46 for the rest.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LndpgmPLW-0

Machka 

I wonder if you've/we've come across anymore TED talks on car-free topics in the last couple years. What else is out there, on this subject, beyond the walls of this LCF forum?

Dahon.Steve

Interesting.

In the 1970's, a typical american spent 10 percent their income and now it's 20 percent. I totaled my public transit for the entire year and I'm spending 3 percent of my income! I though my transportation cost were expensive! Seriously, if I would be broke spending 20 percent of my income.

I can actually reduce this to under 2 percent if I wanted. I'm spending less for transportation than a family in 1970. WOW!