New Newsletter A picture of tragedy
Read more: https://walksydney.substack.com/p/a-picture-of-tragedy
No disrespect to people killed or disrupted by falling bridges, but it would be nice to get even a tenth of that attention on road safety, the lack of which kills more than a million people globally each year, including 40k Americans, and injures many times more - a number that is going up when it should go down.
New designated parking zones for share bikes | City of Sydney - News https://news.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/articles/new-designated-parking-zones-for-share-bikes
#ClimateDiary - Writing research plans for postdoc applications -> anxiety and guilt about whether I am working on climate change to the extent that I could be.
Only real reassuring thing is remembering I am just one part of a whole community of people who care about this, especially on here. Thankful for that.
Does anybody have examples of designs for #ADA parking stalls in combination with a two-way, parking-protected on-street cycle track? It seems like your city staff think the only way is to have the parking right up to the curb and the cycle-track swerving around it. I wonder if there are alternatives that work well for #accessibility and also make for good bike facilities. @sofio or @bikepedantic maybe?
Went for a ride this morning, and came back across Anzac Bridge.
The Rozelle interchange, now open, makes me want to weep. Nineteen lanes of traffic wide, it sprawls across a huge tract of what should be prime public land. So expensive, so much pollution, so much urban blight and for so little benefit.
PATH letter to COP28
Did you know that mode shift does more to fight climate change than EV? This diagram from Bloomberg illustrates just how many barrels of oil internationally have been saved through EV (four wheeler) vs eBike and moped uptake (two and three wheeler): Read more about it here: Walking can do even more. In Australia, the Climate Council's report "Changing Gear" highlights the need for this transition in Australia, quantifying the target we must reach to hit Net Zero at just…
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/
From WalkSydney: Why is City of Sydney removing zebra crossings?
> Despite community opposition, City of Sydney Council is proceeding with a proposal to rip up two pedestrian-priority zebra crossings on Mitchell Road in Alexandria and Erskineville. Instead of investing in safety upgrades, it wants to replace them with pedestrian-delaying traffic lights at a cost of roughly $1 million.
A petition against is at https://www.change.org/p/save-upgrade-alexandria-s-and-erskineville-s-zebra-crossings
https://walksydney.org/2023/11/16/why-is-city-of-sydney-removing-zebra-crossings/
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
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 [...]
Random thoughts. I'm actually pretty optimistic about AVs as far as comfort for other people on the roads, especially cycling.
*If* we get to a point where I feel at least as much trust that the robot will see me as the average driver - and building this trust is probably easier than people imagine - I can cycle without worrying about abuse, harassment and unsafe passing from drivers who are irrationally upset by the presence of cyclists. Robots will have no such feelings :)
The CRC RACE for 2030 Pathways to Net Zero Precincts (NZP) project has been awarded to Curtin University for a three year period and includes 3 PhD scholarships. The project’s overarching research question is: How do we integrate appropriate design, technologies and governance models to enable net zero to work effectively in different urban fabrics?
PhD student at UNSW City Futures Research Centre. Committee member of WalkSydney (https://walksydney.org/). Interested in access, walkability, sustainable transport in general, open source urban analytics. Transport cyclist, climber, plant based.