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Winter Walking and Cycling
(01-31-2022, 01:38 PM)danbrotherston Wrote: I suspect it was intentional, and I suspect it was as directed by council...I raised it a number of times, both with council and with staff, and nobody asked "Oh, I'm not sure what you mean, oh that's a good point" no...instead of engaging as they did for other questions they always quickly shushed it down, and ignored the question.

So I figure they were told, we're not going to pass this, downplay it please so the story is better when we do the thing that the study says doesn't work.

What I find weird is that I don’t understand the motivation, even though you’re clearly right that they should have welcomed your correction, not to mention the follow-on that the percentage of trips prevented by impassable areas would have probably gone down even more.

I mean, there are similar questions, and I jump mostly to US politics when I think this, where it’s obvious that the answer is that the Senator’s donors don’t like the proposed policy and the Senator’s job is just to shut it down without being too excessively obvious about the conflict of interest.

But here, I just can’t believe that Big Snowshovel is giving campaign donations to our councillors to keep the crowdsourced sidewalk shovelling going.
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(01-31-2022, 06:50 PM)ijmorlan Wrote:
(01-31-2022, 01:38 PM)danbrotherston Wrote: I suspect it was intentional, and I suspect it was as directed by council...I raised it a number of times, both with council and with staff, and nobody asked "Oh, I'm not sure what you mean, oh that's a good point" no...instead of engaging as they did for other questions they always quickly shushed it down, and ignored the question.

So I figure they were told, we're not going to pass this, downplay it please so the story is better when we do the thing that the study says doesn't work.

What I find weird is that I don’t understand the motivation, even though you’re clearly right that they should have welcomed your correction, not to mention the follow-on that the percentage of trips prevented by impassable areas would have probably gone down even more.

I mean, there are similar questions, and I jump mostly to US politics when I think this, where it’s obvious that the answer is that the Senator’s donors don’t like the proposed policy and the Senator’s job is just to shut it down without being too excessively obvious about the conflict of interest.

But here, I just can’t believe that Big Snowshovel is giving campaign donations to our councillors to keep the crowdsourced sidewalk shovelling going.

I think it's pretty straight forward. Councils which raise taxes get replaced. This is the belief (rightly, or wrong, and I think mostly rightly) that councillors have. Therefore, only when there is no choice or when they believe it is worth the risk will they do it.

Now I take a more nuanced view, that councils which wish to raise taxes to fund something, must inspire and lead the public into supporting it. This I think is increasingly difficult in our increasingly conservative anti-tax anti-government society, but it is still possible.
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[/quote]

I think it's pretty straight forward. Councils which raise taxes get replaced. This is the belief (rightly, or wrong, and I think mostly rightly) that councillors have. Therefore, only when there is no choice or when they believe it is worth the risk will they do it.

Now I take a more nuanced view, that councils which wish to raise taxes to fund something, must inspire and lead the public into supporting it. This I think is increasingly difficult in our increasingly conservative anti-tax anti-government society, but it is still possible.
[/quote]

I think it can be generalized to anything, they think the status quo on any given issue is a winning formula because it is. In the last election, the narrowest margin of victory for a Kitchener city councillor was over 7%. The median was almost 40%, and the widest margin was over 60%.

Maybe they think that this is because there is amazingly high satisfaction with the job that they are doing. With turnout south of 30%, though, I would say that they probably have a pretty good understanding that this is because of apathy. The last thing they want to do is rock the boat in any way that might attract attention and get people voting.

So they're willing to lie and say that the difference between a rate of 13% and a rate of 6% is 7% instead of accurately stating it is a more than 50% reduction in the number of uncleared sidewalks. It's not about "climate emergencies" or "active transportation" and definitely not "equity." Just about minimizing the attention paid to council so as to keep that voter turnout low.
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(01-31-2022, 02:43 PM)Bytor Wrote: Using bikes in winter or taking your kids somewhere with them is impossible, don'tcha know.

https://twitter.com/bmdoucet/status/1488211901242916872

[Image: FKcwv0RXwAQndKg?format=jpg&name=large]

Doesn't that rig he's showing cost something a few thousand dollars? I'd be happy if I'm wrong about that, I just remember a friend checking them out once.
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I suspect it is simply motivated reasoning. The status quo works for decision-makers and most city staff, upending the status quo could be disruptive to the decision-makers' careers (forcing tax raises or cuts elsewhere), writing a report with conclusions your bosses really don't like means sticking your head out and potentially risk career advancement, and so we end up with justification and support for the status quo, because that is what best serves the needs of everyone involved in the process, save the outsiders.
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(02-02-2022, 11:16 AM)MidTowner Wrote:
(01-31-2022, 02:43 PM)Bytor Wrote: Using bikes in winter or taking your kids somewhere with them is impossible, don'tcha know.

https://twitter.com/bmdoucet/status/1488211901242916872

[Image: FKcwv0RXwAQndKg?format=jpg&name=large]

Doesn't that rig he's showing cost something a few thousand dollars? I'd be happy if I'm wrong about that, I just remember a friend checking them out once.

So, you mean like tens of thousands cheaper than a car to buy, and thousands less per year to maintain, making a it a financially very viable alternative to a second car? ;-) :-D
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(02-02-2022, 04:40 PM)Bytor Wrote:
(02-02-2022, 11:16 AM)MidTowner Wrote: Doesn't that rig he's showing cost something a few thousand dollars? I'd be happy if I'm wrong about that, I just remember a friend checking them out once.

So, you mean like tens of thousands cheaper than a car to buy, and thousands less per year to maintain, making a it a financially very viable alternative to a second car? ;-) :-D

Indeed! Without in any way suggesting that bicycles are for lower-income people, consider that somebody with a very limited budget for vehicle purchases could, for the same money, buy either a real pile of junk car, or a top-notch bicycle. It makes more sense to see a poor person with a fancy carbon fibre bicycle than a poor person driving a car.
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(02-02-2022, 11:53 PM)ijmorlan Wrote:
(02-02-2022, 04:40 PM)Bytor Wrote: So, you mean like tens of thousands cheaper than a car to buy, and thousands less per year to maintain, making a it a financially very viable alternative to a second car? ;-) :-D

Indeed! Without in any way suggesting that bicycles are for lower-income people, consider that somebody with a very limited budget for vehicle purchases could, for the same money, buy either a real pile of junk car, or a top-notch bicycle. It makes more sense to see a poor person with a fancy carbon fibre bicycle than a poor person driving a car.

The London Bicycle Cafe has an interesting blog unpacking cost comparison for a car or fairly high end cargo bike.

There is also a general assumption that bikes are cannot be financed, but more often now dealers are partnering with groups who will to reduce that upfront cash. Whether people buy within their means when financing for cars or bikes is another story, but I do think that its possible to make even a relatively expensive pedelec comparable to the annual cost of even a lower value, used car (with much less repair cost risk to boot).
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(02-03-2022, 09:26 AM)cherrypark Wrote:
(02-02-2022, 11:53 PM)ijmorlan Wrote: Indeed! Without in any way suggesting that bicycles are for lower-income people, consider that somebody with a very limited budget for vehicle purchases could, for the same money, buy either a real pile of junk car, or a top-notch bicycle. It makes more sense to see a poor person with a fancy carbon fibre bicycle than a poor person driving a car.

The London Bicycle Cafe has an interesting blog unpacking cost comparison for a car or fairly high end cargo bike.

There is also a general assumption that bikes are cannot be financed, but more often now dealers are partnering with groups who will to reduce that upfront cash. Whether people buy within their means when financing for cars or bikes is another story, but I do think that its possible to make even a relatively expensive pedelec comparable to the annual cost of even a lower value, used car (with much less repair cost risk to boot).

Before you even drive a car, you're into at least 1000 dollars in insurance. Add in another 500 in repairs and at minimum 500 in gas for only a small amount of driving, and you're hitting 2k per year before you've even paid for a car. If you buy a very cheap 5k used car and it lasts 5 years, you've got a good deal, so that's another 1k per year. So absolute minimum cost for a car is 3k/year (and we all know typical cost--not maximum, just average cost--is 10k per year) so yeah, I think you'd find it very difficult to buy a bike that's more expensive in annualized operating cost than even the least expensive car you can possibly own.

And yeah, I'm sure someone has some example of a 18 year old Toyota they got from some grandma who never drove it, which they then proceeded to never drive for another 10 years, and thus spent less than 3k per year on it...so like...sure, if you don't actually want to drive your car, you can spend less on it...why do you own a car again?
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Everyone beat me to it with respect to "cars way more expensive than bikes", but yes. +1.

(02-03-2022, 10:03 AM)danbrotherston Wrote: And yeah, I'm sure someone has some example of a 18 year old Toyota they got from some grandma who never drove it, which they then proceeded to never drive for another 10 years, and thus spent less than 3k per year on it...so like...sure, if you don't actually want to drive your car, you can spend less on it...why do you own a car again?

It turns out that people will pay huge amounts of money for options that they never exercise. SUVs are also that way too. And going to university lectures. I think it's an important part of human nature to take into account.
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No doubt even an extremely expensive bike is going to be way cheaper to operate than an expensive bike. To me, posting a picture of an expensive bike along with a sarcastic comment about it being "impossible" to get kids around in the winter is not too different than posting a picture of a cheap car with the same comment. Many people do not have a secure place to store a large expensive cargo bike, whereas almost every dwelling unit in the region comes with a "free" parking spot attached.

Mobility shouldn't come with a price tag of thousands of dollars. It's a bit nuts to me to say that it's easy or even practically possible to get kids around in the winter in this city. Of course it absolutely is- but you must pay for a vehicle that entitles you to use the roads, which are very well-maintained.
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(02-04-2022, 09:08 AM)MidTowner Wrote: No doubt even an extremely expensive bike is going to be way cheaper to operate than an expensive bike. To me, posting a picture of an expensive bike along with a sarcastic comment about it being "impossible" to get kids around in the winter is not too different than posting a picture of a cheap car with the same comment. Many people do not have a secure place to store a large expensive cargo bike, whereas almost every dwelling unit in the region comes with a "free" parking spot attached.

Mobility shouldn't come with a price tag of thousands of dollars. It's a bit nuts to me to say that it's easy or even practically possible to get kids around in the winter in this city.
Of course it absolutely is- but you must pay for a vehicle that entitles you to use the roads, which are very well-maintained.

I'm not sure if anyone is saying that.

I carried my daughter to/from daycare for months on my 10 year old Walmart bike with a bike seat I got for free from a neighbour. Sometimes I took her in the trailer I bought on kijiji for 200 dollars. And sometimes, I took her on the bus for 3.25.

As for whether it is easy or practical. It absolutely was easy and practical, but I specifically chose my housing and daycare to be accomodating of these choices, certainly our city is not designed to facilitate these trips for most people, but it's far FAR from impossible.

As for what Mobility should or shouldn't be, I wish our society took a more pragmatic look at subsidies and mobility, but we don't. But it's also the case that contrary to popular anti-bike lane rhetoric, cycling is a very very affordable method of transportation.
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(02-04-2022, 09:33 AM)danbrotherston Wrote: I'm not sure if anyone is saying that.

I carried my daughter to/from daycare for months on my 10 year old Walmart bike with a bike seat I got for free from a neighbour. Sometimes I took her in the trailer I bought on kijiji for 200 dollars. And sometimes, I took her on the bus for 3.25.

As for whether it is easy or practical. It absolutely was easy and practical, but I specifically chose my housing and daycare to be accomodating of these choices, certainly our city is not designed to facilitate these trips for most people, but it's far FAR from impossible.

As for what Mobility should or shouldn't be, I wish our society took a more pragmatic look at subsidies and mobility, but we don't. But it's also the case that contrary to popular anti-bike lane rhetoric, cycling is a very very affordable method of transportation.

You're right, no one was saying that. I think in practical terms this is how it works- either you buy a car, or you pay for a place in one of the relatively few (not that few, certainly getting better) neighbourhoods with good transit.

Otherwise, obviously be able-bodied, preferably younger (not obligatory, but close to it), preferably male (like most but not everyone who comments here is), have maximum one or two kids, be reasonably risk-tolerant/adventurous (you probably know the chart on biking I'm referring to)...and for sure getting pretty much anywhere by bike is not only not impossible, but easy.
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A video about winter biking from Oh, The Urbanity!:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdtR3T2Pg4s
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