[David9694]

A new catch-all Tea Shop thread for those miscellaneous new stories that don’t quite fit with parking, crashing into buildings or trapped/prisoners in their homes. 

Topic

[David9694]

5000 driver problems

5000 driver problems

One of the great contortions of Carbrain is to turn your privilege (as a car owner/user) into victimhood, nicely chronicled by Newsthump over on the Reform and their Problems channel. You’re paying out so much, you believe you were promised so much in return, but so often it just doesn’t work out. So please all think of the drivers whenever they’re stuck in a jam, get a fine/ points, get a scratch or can’t park. 

There’s the raft of problems🧐 that drivers experience, and then there’s the multiple problems that car dominance presents for everyone else.  Cycling only for us die-hards, buses infrequent and unreliable or non-existent, walking with the chicanery of underpasses, narrow / blocked pavements (or no pavement); sprawl, the unremitting noise and pollution; the constant threat of road violence hanging over all of us. I can’t think of another situation where the wealthy take such an obvious, massive and regular dump on the poor. 

I watch children’s faces light up at quite old-fashioned outdoor things – a stream to dabble in, a tree to clamber over, sand castles and the rare joy of self-propulsion by bike where it is safe to do it. Nearly all bookended, sadly, by a car journey – this impoverishes us all.  Don’t get me started on all the public health issues that are tumbling out now. 

At 5000 posts, I don’t hold out much hope of a lot changing in the UK.  Perhaps the roll-out in the years to come of the self-driving vehicle, that severs the direct connection between drivers/ owners and the power and mass that the car industry has persuaded them they need, but with which so many are out of their depth. 

[ktache]

David, well done for 5000!!!

David, well done for 5000!!!

[Jogle]

Police car wedged on hedge
[b]Police car wedged on hedge after leaving road[/b]

Self-driving police cars now….

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cly889znp10o.amp

[David9694]

I’m sorry to report, contrary

I’m sorry to report, contrary to popular belief, that my baby does NOT take the morning train. 

Loss of Worcestershire Parkway train causing ‘havoc’

A campaign has been launched to reinstate the 7.37am train from Worcestershire Parkway to Birmingham.

Train company Cross Country says the service was cut as part of a bid to create a more reliable timetable.

https://www.worcesternews.co.uk/news/25280539.loss-worcestershire-parkway-train-causing-havoc/

No drivers involved – (sorry again). 

[David9694]

Rendel Harris wrote:

The splendid Dr Hannah Fry explaining how using fluid dynamics can cool down a car in seconds instead of sitting in it sweltering for five minutes running the engine to get the aircon to cool it down (and responding with surprise and sometimes threats of violence to any passing cyclist who may request that the engine be turned off).

I almost (but not quite) miss the old YouTube comments. This lot seem pretty demure, even the ones that need to tell the world that they fancy Hannah. 
E.g. 
[1980s pop song video]
comment 1 love this song!
comment 2 we used to dance to this
by the time you got to comment 7, the trolling of the artist and the commenter insults were in full swing, usually a death threat within about 15 comments. 

Is AI actually doing something useful here? 

[David9694]

Woman’s car ‘written off’ at

Woman’s car ‘written off’ at dicey Devon junction

Locals are pleading for change

Sue said: “All we’re asking for is some signage warning drivers they need to stop and the lines repainted. If I had been a cyclist, horse rider or a pedestrian, the outcome would have been very different, indeed the area in my car which was hit, often has a grandchild sitting in their car seat at that very spot – not something I want to think about”.

https://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-news/womans-car-written-off-dicey-10310546

Dicey, I tells ya. 

 

[Jogle]

Fixed speed camera toppled
[b]Fixed speed camera toppled hours before switch-on[/b]

North Yorkshire’s first fixed-location speed camera has been deliberately knocked over hours before it was due to be switched on, according to police.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0j445g5qw7o.amp

[Rendel Harris]

Well it makes a change from

Well it makes a change from the “I’m keeping the aircon running” defence…in the street that leads to mine…

Me: Turn your engine off mate, I live here, we like breathing.

Parked van driver (with the air of one who has an irrefutable argument): Can’t, we ain’t got a parking permit so if we keep the engine running we’re not parked so can’t get a ticket. [Is this true? Ed]

Me: Well if you haven’t got a parking permit you shouldn’t be here at all, should you?

PVD: Oh fuck off you cunt.

But entitled cyclists…

[David9694]

Free parking in Newquay to

Free parking in Newquay to vanish as ‘common sense goes out of the window’

The work is mooted as part of the £57m transport project

KevinRidsdale says: “Common sense goes out the window in this country, shops are struggling enough as it is. Buying stuff online is annoying at the best of times and waiting for deliveries can be a nightmare. Trying to lug stuff on foot or using a bus and then lugging things from the bus stop or worse still teetering along on a wretched push bike trying to carry your shopping is not a good idea.”

https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/news-opinion/free-parking-newquay-vanish-common-10306979

Well Kevin, quite how your grandparents ever managed to raise your parents will forever be a mystery.  You forgot to say it’s constantly raining and cold. 

(this is a follow-up to an article originally in favourite funny.) 

[David9694]

Five ways to encourage your

Five ways to encourage your child to play outside these summer holidays – and why it’s so good for them

https://www.warwickshireworld.com/education/5-ways-encourage-your-child-play-outside-summer-holidays-why-good-for-them-5195278

<cough> cycling <ahem>

[David9694]

Woman ‘trapped’ between car

Woman ‘trapped’ between car and telegraph pole in Kingswinford after ‘inconsiderate parking’

A woman needing lifting out of her mobility scooter in Kingswinford after getting ‘stuck’ between a car and telegraph pole

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/black-country/woman-trapped-between-car-telegraph-31952322?int_source=nba

go around 

its not in anyone’s way / I’ll happily move it if asked

its only for a minute / where am I supposed to leave it – you tell me

[David9694]

Someone was asking about the

Someone was asking about the “Spirit of BMW” – here’s a candidate.  F-bomb warning, unsurprisingly. Not sure who’s the worse to share the roads with TBH. 

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/16vkpXSVTn/?mibextid=wwXIfr

[David9694]

New Exeter parking charges

New Exeter parking charges ‘will kill city centre shopping’ claim

People are outraged

https://www.devonlive.com/news/news-opinion/new-exeter-parking-charges-will-10295825

“I run a car and have spare cash to spend in the shops, but I’ll walk/ won’t drive into the city centre if I have to pay £5 to park.”

[David9694]

carbrain in action for you

carbrain in action for you here 

Campaigner James Wright criticises high cost of little-used A39 cycle path

https://www.wsfp.co.uk/news/campaigner-james-wright-criticises-high-cost-of-little-used-a39-cycle-path-806203

[chrisonabike]

As someone here pointed out a

As someone here pointed out a while back bypasses and outer ring roads are in fact what e.g. NL uses as part of their “keeping through-traffic out of towns” or encouraging other modes (e.g. in Groningen).

However … solely putting more capacity around the urban area / better connections between them without other measures can still create issues.  Maybe the usual “easier driving / faster trips = more driving” will then apply?  If that’s the only change this will likely simply displace the congestion to the boundary – and that can feed back into the urban area.  (Or we may get motor-centric development around that boundary ring…)

(Indeed – in NL some places are starting to apply traffic reduction measures on e.g. inner ring roads).

Unfortunately it seems lots of the additional necessary “bigger picture” stuff is still blocked in the UK.  Ultimately that’s by government policies – council funding and transport: lack of prioritising transport other than the private motor car and continuing to subsidise driving.

[Author]

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