Josephine Roper @jroper@transportation.social

@michcampbell Love it. I didn't even know you climbed

@mszll it will come to that, but the people immediately affected are so poor and far from power that assassinating fossil fuel executives or shooting down planes is out of their reach, is my prediction… most terrorism is very local and small scale even though the exceptions are memorable. Meanwhile people like us aren’t existentially affected and have too much to lose, no matter how much we say we care.

@mszll Some people describe XR that way but they don't go for violence (AFAIK). I don't think violent terrorism is very compatible with the typical humanist morality of people who want to slow climate change.

I think for outright terrorism you need a group of people who are very personally and immediately threatened *and* feel that there is some potential for their actions to change the situation. The latter is lacking with such a global problem, and the former for most...

Bonus! #Bouldering without a car, is it possible?

https://carlesscragging.wordpress.com/2023/11/18/bouldering-without-a-car-is-it-possible/

New post on my #climbing by train and bike blog that I tend to forget to promote very much: Mt Alexandra and Mt Gibraltar, Mittagong https://carlesscragging.wordpress.com/2023/11/18/crag-mt-alexandra-mt-gibraltar/

@jedsetter It's nutty. There is a facebook group where people share petitions and generally agitate about it if you're on that site. https://www.facebook.com/groups/675675876656601

The new fleets should be better though who knows when they'll appear.

I am never going to drive to do a rail trail or bike tour... like never... just defeats the purpose for me.

Writing a paper for the Greater Cities Commission = trying not to get sucked down the path of governmental garble. Today's highlight: "This page summarises the relevant NSW Government policies that frame the development of options to address issues and opportunities associated with achieving a project or plan’s vision and objectives."

aaaaahhh

@benjamingeer I think people are reading this like I'm some sort of AV booster. I'm not, I don't do any of my work in that direction because I don't think it's a useful direction for sustainable transport.

I'm writing these things while shaking my head at all the single occupant cars going by, and thinking that if AVs *are* going to appear, maybe at least I can gleefully cycle in front of them on any road I like.

@benjamingeer yeah, I'm differentiating speed in the moment versus total journey speed, because most people who drive in these areas still don't know that and base their choicesmore on their perceptions of momentary speed. But, then the argument occurs that if people are sitting in their AVs reading a book they will no longer be focused on momentary speed either. But maybe then they'll get more familiar with door to door speeds of all the modes available to them. Who knows.

@colby yes I'm assuming they're going to be programmed to a higher standard than human drivers. Of course it's a big assumption. But isn't that the whole selling point for those who want them - that they will be safer than human drivers?

@benjamingeer But trying to cheer myself up with the positives of some alternative futures too.

In a world where every AV ends up travelling at the speed of the slowest cyclist, they may also effectively eliminate themselves as everyone who doesn't need to be in a car finds that they can get around faster and/or cheaper on a bike...

@benjamingeer "Dans la majorité des cas, ces accidents étaient le résultat d’un dérapage ou d’une perte de maîtrise du vélo, et les cyclistes en étaient souvent les responsables." and for ebikes they say 3/4 were due to the cyclist. So most of them are still occuring without cars.

Of course, the feeling of safety is a subjective thing, and is just as important as objective safety in influencing people to cycle or not. And I have no problem with banning cars, all for it!

@njtierney "If you’ve found yourself copying the internals of a function over to another script and hard coding the arguments at the top of the script and running the code line by line, then this is especially for you."

I feel like I do this more in Python than in R, any tips for that?

And if the robots are all chill, below-the-speed-limit drivers, it will become much more difficult for other drivers to speed around them, and people will have to unlearn aggressive driving even if they still want to drive themselves.

I'm now kinda looking forward to a future where I take over Mitchell Road, side by side with my fellow cyclist, without fear or guilt. Got to be optimistic about something in this messed up world!

... I felt much safer than in Australia, and it took a remarkably little time to build that trust, based on the behaviour of a subset of drivers, and apply it to the drivers as a whole. Without being able to speak to or in some cases even see drivers, you can get a vibe of whether you are respected as just another person getting down the road, or an aberrant other getting in the way.

Why do I think it won't be too hard to gain that trust - note I'm not talking about the technical side of identifying cyclists. I have no idea about that and how close we are.

I mean from the human side, why will I feel safe knowing autonomous cars are driving around me? Well, it's not like I get to make eye contact with every human driver and assess whether they seem sane, competent and calm, particularly drivers behind me. Some trust is already involved. I've cycled in countries where [...]