Josephine Roper @jroper@transportation.social

I've been a bit quiet here lately so general life update: recently moved to France where I'm aiming to finish my thesis, have a baby, and find a postdoc, hopefully in that order.

Here enjoying the European luxury: trains with power points! on the way to Brittany to visit some of my French in-laws.

Had a week off showing the in-laws (over from France for the first time) around Sydney and environs. Here's me having my morning coffee in 'bed' at Little Beach, Bouddi National Park :)

The sort of break that takes your mind off work effectively... but also makes you quite happy that it's over!

Another Erskineville spring evening, in this photo:
- jacarandas
- a lovely bike cut-through creating a safe route home for me and
- streets so quiet that people are walking in the roadway, and
- a share bike, parked well out of the way (I think)
- a delivery cyclist wearing hi-vis clothing as is the law nowadays in NSW, because that's easier to impose on the poor souls than making more streets like this

Thanks for all the new follows ☺️ Always finding new interesting people here.

Here's a little window into (or rather out of) my life in Erskineville ❤️ always special in spring!

😊 One of my main PhD papers is out: 'Incorporating diminishing returns to opportunities in access: Development of an open-source walkability index based on multi-activity accessibility'.

https://jtlu.org/index.php/jtlu/article/view/2308

What it's about 🧵

Lovely weekend #rockclimbing around Mittagong by train and bike. Sent one of my projects (last picture).

It's a funny contrast bike camping in the land of cars though, and looking out over the sprawl between Mittagong and Bowral from Mt Gibraltar.

Your correspondent taking 'walking' holidays at a young age.

(Mum is going through old photo albums).

Hadn't been to Burwood for ages, forgot how lively it is, there's about a year's worth of food I want to try on the main street.

But also forgot about these pedestrian fences, or are they new? Such an ugly solution to what should be a positive 'problem' (a popular town centre where lots of people are getting around on foot).

Slowly building the group of friends who are willing to go #climbing by train :)

We get up to Blackheath a little later and theoretically miss out on some of this beautiful winter sunshine... but much more relaxed and enjoying the whole package of the day. And I still climb enough to be exhausted!

Visiting mum - got to be one of the nicest located bus stops in Sydney.

Ofc the bus only comes every half an hour and one of the neighbours has campaigned to remove it because they don't like the noise and hardly anyone gets on here (except mum). The vicious cycle of low frequency. But for now, it exists.

From Pete Dyson’s ‘Transport for Humans: Are we nearly there yet?’, which I haven’t yet read, but looked like a good read from the parts I flicked through at #utsg2023

Saw a classic example of excessive turn radius / curb extensions needed today - corner of Queen Margaret Drive and Kelvin Drive, Glasgow.

Kelvin Drive is 20mph in both directions, so just a local road. But set up like people are trying to turn into it at 50. I was quite nervous to cross the first time, but eventually realised hardly anyone was turning in.

Found some plans to fix it as part of a bike lane project a few years ago, but not yet implemented.

Took the train to Salzburg on the weekend to see a friend from Slovenia.

The historic centre of Salzburg is a pedestrian area controlled by bollards, but with some car access as you can see.

From what I can find: disabled people with a Euro-key can park inside, taxis can enter anytime (saw quite a few) and the bollards are down for deliveries before 11am. I guess before 11am the risk of confused/lazy tourists driving in is considered lower.

It seemed like a good balance.

Staying in Gilching, a sort of commuter village 30 mins outside Munich. I always find it interesting as a place that seems very bikable, but not that walkable.

First picture is the triplex we are staying in, middle building. Right is a duplex (I think), not sure about left. Sneaky density that looks like traditional houses.

Others show parts of my route to the climbing gym. On a bike it would be great - straight, flat and fast. On foot... eh, it's a little bit dull and far.

I took a bus 🧵

Train of the day: Paris to Munich, ~8 hours including local connections

Train snack: cake salée with nettles and brie, from my belle-mère, coconut, from the station

French boyfriend complaints: the reduction in train speed after crossing the border. “Germans are *paying* to go this slow?”

Some pretty streets without street parking I've seen on this trip 😍

Though the Japanese ones are much more pleasant to walk or cycle than the French ones. Perhaps partly design - speed limits and the French street having a tiny footpath, implying that pedestrians should stay there, versus small Japanese streets often having either wide painted footpaths or no footpath - but a lot of it is just the driving culture.

At least the interminable Eurostar line has a pleasant view of Gare du Nord

Aside: you can play spot the dog here, and compare to the number of humans waiting. Whenever the topic of pets on public transport comes up in Sydney, people seem to imagine every carriage full of fur. But in places it’s allowed, I usually see proportions like this - perhaps 1-2% of people with a pet. And this is off peak - long distance lines at 11am on a Thursday. I imagine on commuter services it’s even lower.

One of the food ones (they are chosen at random from a list of half a dozen or so, it appears).

Translation: For your health, practice a physical activity regularly. www.[eatingmoving].fr

Something surprising for me: French TV showing sustainable transport messages below car ads! No idea if this actually does anything, but certainly a different government mindset, can’t imagine it in Australia.

Also they only appear for 3 seconds so they’re hard to photograph, sorry for the blur. Unlike the equivalent food ones (in reply) which appear for the duration of the ad.

Translation: For short journeys, privilege walking or cycling. #GetAroundPollutingLess

Visited a friend in an interesting deck-access/breezeway-type building near Rennes yesterday, 'Utopia', Bruz.

Some English description: https://www.stirworld.com/see-features-bruz-utopia-housing-by-champenois-architectes-explores-idyllic-community-living

The courtyard seems quite dominated by the footbridges at first, but there was plenty of light at the base when we visited. Probably lets more light to the internal windows on the ground floor than a conventional corridor design. Will be interesting to see how the plants are doing in a few years.

Only flaw my friends said...
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