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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Kaorte
This issue is very important to me as I can't accept that MORE OIL is the answer.
The fact is that the United States is an entire country built for the car. The pedestrian is almost completely ignored except in very dense areas of population. In this day and age, if you don't have a car you don't have a job. Without a car we can't do simple tasks such as getting food for dinner, picking up our children from school, or even LOOKING FOR A JOB. If you are unemployed and live in a typical sprawl-suburb, chances are you can't afford the gas needed to go out and look for a job in person.
This kind of neglect to pedestrian needs is sickening to me. I can't remember the last time I saw more than 2 or 3 people biking down a typical 4 lane road in a suburb. Nor do I remember seeing anyone walking on the sidewalk. The ability to walk/bike to and from work, shopping, and home is essential if we ever wish to lower our dependence on fossil fuels.
I know some of you love your cars, and thats all fine. Our culture has taught us that the car is king. It is going to take a lot of learning and change in order to break our bad habits and create good ones. I sincerely believe that many problems facing us today can be solved by alternative transportation and energy sources.
I could go on forever.. I've read so many books that relate to this subject as it happens to be one of my favorites.
I'd really like to see you try and walk/bike anywhere in 110+ degree weather and not have a heat stroke.

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The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Raptor For This Useful Post:
Ridinandreptiles (02-25-2013),sorraia (02-25-2013)
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Raptor
I'd really like to see you try and walk/bike anywhere in 110+ degree weather and not have a heat stroke.
This person wasnt saying everyone that drives sucks or anything but the country as a whole needs to find alternative ways to travel. Why the negativity?
You live 35 miles away from school? Dang that's really far..
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The Following User Says Thank You to barbie.dragon For This Useful Post:
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When I was at UCCS I used to ride my bike to school and it was 10 miles and 970' difference in elevation. I took a little over an hour to get there and 45 to get home That changed when I had my daughter though, can't really toss her into the cart to get to day care and then ride to school anymore.
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by barbie.dragon
This person wasnt saying everyone that drives sucks or anything but the country as a whole needs to find alternative ways to travel. Why the negativity?
You live 35 miles away from school? Dang that's really far..
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No, I'm saying that in certain parts of the country, biking/walking everywhere isn't the safest thing to do. During the summer, temperatures during the day were no less than 110F and didn't drop down into the 90s until close to ten at night. If one happens to live in a the city and needs to get to the other side, that could be fairly dangerous.
And yes, I live 35 miles away from school. It takes me about 30 minutes to get there taking the toll road (min speed 50 mph, max 75 mph), and I'm getting ready to leave for class now. Going to be driving home in winter storm Rocky. Woo.

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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
My little Scion xB gets awesome gas mileage so it's not too too bad. Gas is around $3.60 per gallon in Phx right now, it usually costs around $40 to fill up my tank and I do that maybe once a week, give or take depending on if I randomly drive to far places much or not. I drive a fair amount so it doesn't seem too bad.
I'm kind of glad I wasn't driving yet when gas was only a dollar or so a gallon, I never had (comparatively) super cheap gas to miss really, to me it's always been expensive lol. Though I'd sure love if it it went back to those prices.
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Raptor
No, I'm saying that in certain parts of the country, biking/walking everywhere isn't the safest thing to do. During the summer, temperatures during the day were no less than 110F and didn't drop down into the 90s until close to ten at night. If one happens to live in a the city and needs to get to the other side, that could be fairly dangerous.
And yes, I live 35 miles away from school. It takes me about 30 minutes to get there taking the toll road (min speed 50 mph, max 75 mph), and I'm getting ready to leave for class now. Going to be driving home in winter storm Rocky. Woo.
So then what about conditioned public walkways? Underground tunnels? Above ground tunnels? There are still ways to make pedestrian transport safe in any climate. You can't just say "oh its hot, everyone needs a car". There needs to be other options.
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Kaorte
So then what about conditioned public walkways? Underground tunnels? Above ground tunnels? There are still ways to make pedestrian transport safe in any climate. You can't just say "oh its hot, everyone needs a car". There needs to be other options.
Can we please have those in Phx?! Please?
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*1.0 Anery motley corn *G. rosea tarantula *G. pulchripes *P. metallica *0.0.2 A. versicolor *C. cyaneopubescens *A. geniculata *B. smithi *B. boehmei *Nhandu chromatus *H. maculata *C. marshalli *1.0 Australian shepherd mix
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The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Coleslaw007 For This Useful Post:
Kaorte (02-25-2013),sorraia (02-25-2013)
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Kaorte
So then what about conditioned public walkways? Underground tunnels? Above ground tunnels? There are still ways to make pedestrian transport safe in any climate. You can't just say "oh its hot, everyone needs a car". There needs to be other options.
air conditioned public walkways. Who pays for it? For a small city, it might be feasible. A city the size of say Tampa? That's going to be very, very expensive. Not to mention, it's going to cost a great deal of money to keep the walkways air conditioned.
Underground tunnels. Going to be fun installing those around old pipes. ISPs have enough trouble installing fios lines, and you're wanting to install something that's going to be probably 8 foot high, and 6 foot across?
Above ground tunnels. Where are you going to put them?

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The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Raptor For This Useful Post:
olstyn (02-25-2013),sorraia (02-25-2013)
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Kaorte
This issue is very important to me as I can't accept that MORE OIL is the answer.
Less consumption is obviously the answer. Making it happen, however, is problematic, and seems to be a trickle down situation at best.
The fact is that the United States is an entire country built for the car. The pedestrian is almost completely ignored except in very dense areas of population. In this day and age, if you don't have a car you don't have a job. Without a car we can't do simple tasks such as getting food for dinner, picking up our children from school, or even LOOKING FOR A JOB. If you are unemployed and live in a typical sprawl-suburb, chances are you can't afford the gas needed to go out and look for a job in person.
This kind of neglect to pedestrian needs is sickening to me. I can't remember the last time I saw more than 2 or 3 people biking down a typical 4 lane road in a suburb. Nor do I remember seeing anyone walking on the sidewalk. The ability to walk/bike to and from work, shopping, and home is essential if we ever wish to lower our dependence on fossil fuels.
Speaking as someone who biked to work (13 miles each way) whenever the weather wasn't miserable for 5+ years, yeah, biking is great. That said, it's far from being practical for all people all the time (some people can't arrive at work sweaty, etc), and walking is far less so, based on speed alone. In the metro area where I live, you can basically get anywhere on a bus...if you've got all day to get there and you don't mind paying about the same for your bus fare as you would have for gas in a car for the same distance. Public transit sucks.
As far as biking on 4 lane roads goes, you don't see it because bikers prefer to avoid those roads whenever possible; the higher the traffic level, the lower your safety. Sometimes it seems like cars are TRYING to hit you, and the more traffic you encounter, the higher your likelihood of encountering an :cens0r: who doesn't understand that you have the right to be there too.
The price of gas has definitely driven more people to ride bikes than in the past. I know this both because over the 5+ years I was a bike commuter, I saw more and more other people doing the same, and because I saw the price of a road bike with any kind of decent components on it roughly double (I paid $800 or so for a bike with a Tiagra front derailleur and a 105 rear toward the beginning of my time as a bike commuter, and a few years ago, it was more like $1500+ for something similar). Supply wasn't dwindling, so that had to be based on demand rising.
I know some of you love your cars, and thats all fine. Our culture has taught us that the car is king. It is going to take a lot of learning and change in order to break our bad habits and create good ones. I sincerely believe that many problems facing us today can be solved by alternative transportation and energy sources.
I could go on forever.. I've read so many books that relate to this subject as it happens to be one of my favorites.
Alternative energy sources are a great plan, but the infrastructure (electric car charging stations, etc) isn't there, and as a country, we can't afford to pay for it; we're already too far into a debt spiral. Yes, I know you're going to say we can't afford not to, but seriously, where's the money going to come from? More taxes? More debt? Both are unpalatable.
Once you've got the infrastructure, how do you get a significant enough portion of the public to buy new electric cars? The only one I find the least bit appealing is the Tesla roadster, and I can't afford that. Sure, I pay for gas now, but I also have no car payment and my insurance is pretty cheap. It would cost money I simply don't have. Get me something as good as or better than my current car ('02 Audi A4 1.8T quattro) in terms of speed, comfort, driving enjoyment, winter capabilities, etc, that's a pure electric or a hybrid getting 75+ MPG, and let me buy it for say $11000 like I paid for my Audi used, and we're in business. Yeah, not happening, I know.
Mountain bikes are for slow people, and reptiles are far better pets than cats & dogs!
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The Following User Says Thank You to olstyn For This Useful Post:
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Re: Price of Gas Affecting You, Too?
 Originally Posted by Raptor
air conditioned public walkways. Who pays for it? For a small city, it might be feasible. A city the size of say Tampa? That's going to be very, very expensive. Not to mention, it's going to cost a great deal of money to keep the walkways air conditioned.
Underground tunnels. Going to be fun installing those around old pipes. ISPs have enough trouble installing fios lines, and you're wanting to install something that's going to be probably 8 foot high, and 6 foot across?
Above ground tunnels. Where are you going to put them?
But but but... Can Phx still have them, pleeeeease?! Can't the other places all pitch in to pay for them in Phx?! We'll REEEEEEALLY appreciate it and and uh... We'll be good all year n stuff!
Balls:
*0.1 Mojave *0.1 Pinstripe *0.1 Bumblebee *1.0 Super pastel butter *1.0 Mojave orange ghost *0.3 100% het orange ghosts *0.1 Pastel 50% het orange ghost *1.1 PE Lemonback fires *1.0 Fire *0.1 Pastel *1.0 Albino *0.1 Spider 100% het albino
Other critters:
*1.0 Anery motley corn *G. rosea tarantula *G. pulchripes *P. metallica *0.0.2 A. versicolor *C. cyaneopubescens *A. geniculata *B. smithi *B. boehmei *Nhandu chromatus *H. maculata *C. marshalli *1.0 Australian shepherd mix
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The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Coleslaw007 For This Useful Post:
Badger711 (03-03-2013),Kaorte (02-25-2013)
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