BIKE: Roads Gone Wild

[Thorne]

Ponder, if you will, some of those parking lots being developed in a manner
somewhat similar to the Mueller Airport redevelopment, mixing residential and
commercial properties and residents a wide range of economic positions, and
think whether such can include traffic solutions.  There you are.  It's the
new fashion after all.  It's far from the sort of idea to dismiss out of hand,
unless you'd prefer things be just as they are, which I'm sure MD doesn't.

Jeff

------ Original Message ------
Received: Tue, 07 Dec 2004 03:46:08 PM CST
From: Mike Dahmus <mdahmus>
To: Bob Farr <bobfarr>Cc: forum
Subject: Re: BIKE: Roads Gone Wild

Bob Farr wrote:

> Mike Dhamus wrote:
>
>> Patrick Goetz wrote:
>>
>>> Bob Farr wrote:
>>>
>>>>> From WIRED on-line:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.12/traffic_pr.html
>>>> Roads Gone Wild
>>>> No street signs. No crosswalks. No accidents. Surprise: Making 
>>>> driving seem more dangerous could make it safer.
>>>>
>>>>
> (SNIP)
>
>> (if your argument is that we should immediately somehow rebuild the 
>> suburbs so that intersections are frequently spaced and design speeds 
>> much lower, then please just say so and spare me the trouble of 
>> bothering with a response from the land of the World As It Actually 
>> Exists).
>>
>> - MD
>
>
> Actually, that's exactly where I was going with it.
>
> Another quote from the referenced article:
> "
> Instead of widening congested highways, New Jersey's DOT is urging 
> neighboring or contiguous towns to connect their secondary streets and 
> add smaller centers of development, creating a series of linked 
> minivillages with narrow roads, rather than wide, car-choked highways 
> strewn with malls. "The cities that continue on their conventional 
> path with traffic and land use will harm themselves, because people 
> with a choice will leave," says Lockwood. "They'll go to places where 
> the quality of life is better, where there's more human exchange, 
> where the city isn't just designed for cars. The economy is going to 
> follow the creative class, and they want to live in areas that have a 
> sense of place. That's why these new ideas have to catch on. The folly 
> of traditional traffic engineering is all around us."
> "
> -- 
> Bob Farr (living in the real world, but holding out for better)

I eagerly await your plans to connect Leander, Cedar Park, Round Rock, 
Pflugerville, etc. to central Austin via these wonderful new narrow 
roads. I'm assuming you're using some kind of unreleased wormhole 
technology, since of course, all possible routes operating in the 
existing (boring 3-dimensional) space are already covered with 
neighborhoods and parking lots and whatnot.

- MD

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