The pricks
I’d usually say it’s unbelievable but it’s not is it?
We're governed by people so desperate for power and popularity that they've ignored the reason we have them elected in the first place.
I'm not shocked any more, I'm angry.
I've gotten to the point where in order to understand this government I need to look at where the money is. I guess in this situation their logic is something like
Cycling > Healthier and more incentive to be live a healthy lifestyle/make better decisions/spend less on UPF's and unhealthy brekkie > ideal for short commutes 5-30 minutes > can nip home at lunch > low long running cost > good for environment
Commuting by public transport because of bad traffic/slightly too far to comfortably cycle to the office means bus pass/railcard and money going into public transport > Less healthy someone more likely to get off a stop earlier to grab some breakfast putting more money into economy because morning+boredom+horrible commuting=who wouldn't want a greasy bacon sarnie and milky latte to provide a bit of comfort? > just too far to get home for lunch and back so may as well pop out for lunch and eat with some co-workers and more money goes into local economy.
I remember seeing something a good while back when there was RTO arguments in the boom of WFH and a news article about how our economy now relies on public transport, coffee shops and people eating out after all of our gold reserves were sold off moons back. Just my interpretation though.
why wouldnt you want loads of services and jobs within 15 minutes of home? they are nuts.
One of our cycling group believes this is a conspiracy to stop us travelling/driving - his political views are very right-wing and as per with many folk I've seen interviewed, he struggles to evidence any of his 'rational'.
And like other right-wing Govt we're seeing around the world they don't seen bothered about governing any more, every thought is about electioneering. Expect more over 2024.
why wouldnt you want loads of services and jobs within 15 minutes of home? they are nuts.
BeCaUsE Da GuVveRmEnT wAnT 2 CoNtRoL uS!!1one
We R fReE 2 gO wEaR wE wAnT!
Great news as far as I'm concerned. Those who wish to live in a carless 15 minute city crack on. Enjoy shredding the trails within 15 mins of your door.
15 min cities, after covid, ukraine this is the next in the firing line for conspiricist flat earthers.
they dont see the benefits and only see it as a way of getting the general public they like to refer as 'sheeple' to be controlled, to then ban all driving outside these 15 min designated zones.. :0)
Enjoy shredding the trails within 15 mins of your door
You can only ride your bike for 15 minutes?
Or is it 30 minutes? Presumably you have to ride 15 minutes away from your door and then 15 minutes back.
I've come to the conclusion, a significant part of the population are incredibly stupid. I mean absolutely, shit eating, pig ignorant, morons.
It’s also weird that these idiots who are now so worried about restrictions in freedom of movement, weren’t quite so concerned 8 years ago.
"I’ve come to the conclusion, a significant part of the population..." don't care about cycling and being healthy.
I think the Government are dead right about "a significant part of the population" hence this change will save them some money (in the short term) and it won't impact their election prospects (also a short term issue).
I'm not surprised or disappointed - this is a sort-of-democracy and the competition for popular opinion is all that they (politicians) need/want.
It's not the population as a whole, it's a small proportion who are very vocally opposed to it.
Most people are quietly in favour of these measures. It's just that they tend to keep quiet about it, because the ones who are opposed are absolutely frothing about it and who wants to get into an argument on social media about it?
Right wing politicians interpret data that challenges their ideology as media/academic bias, and react by enabling their own echo chambers.
Therefore they think this is a vote winner. It won't be.
It is possible to live in a 15 minute city, and still own a car to go other places.
Patrick9-32 | 19 hours ago20 likes
For the older folks who are easily led by propaganda there are a couple of definitions which you can use to help them understand what these terms mean:
15 minute city = Where you grew up.<br />You remember being able to walk to the corner shop and walk to school and walk to the bank etc when you were young before everything moved to out of town shopping centres you had to drive to and the world started feeling isolated and hostile? That's what people are trying to bring back.
Low Traffic Neighbourhood = Cul De Sac.<br />A road that only is used to access the houses on it. The only cars there being ones belonging to residents or their visitors. Kids playing in the street, quiet, low road noise. i.e. a good place to live as a child, an adult or an elderly person. <br /><br />
^ A comment on the road.cc story. It's spot on.
This govt is driven by thinktank types who know how to manipulate and ride the wave of social media conspiracy/knee-jerk thinking, has been since early Brexit days if not before. The biggest danger we have in politics now is that credible, reasoned debate is a thinking process needing more time, the fast thinking monkey mind will jump onto the soundbite headline or half truth and move on. Majority of us have that fast-thinking or confirmation bias reaction and aren't interested in moving past it and the govt/populists know it.
Just look at how they reacted to a TV show about the post office, a situation 20-30 years in the making. One TV series that gets it in people's minds = populist govt reacts. They're the same as the Trump's Republicans. It's all about presentation and manipulation to help their aims (no need to explain those aims).
It is possible to live in a 15 minute city, and still own a car to go other places.
Indeed. It's as if folks like @daveylad wilfully misunderstand/tell lies about it simply to get a reaction...Who'd have thought it.
Or is it 30 minutes? Presumably you have to ride 15 minutes away from your door and then 15 minutes back.
What if you live at the top of a hill with the prevailing wind behind you?
You ride down that nice steep hill with the wind behind you so get some good distance in and then realise you need more than 15 minutes back.
Doubling down on conspiracy theories. Is this the reason for ebikes? Since with a normal bike it would be harder to monitor the time travelled whereas the ebike is more likely to be checkable?
Oxford is at the forefront of 15 minute city initiative...
https://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/residents/roads-and-transport/connecting-oxfordshire/traffic-filters#:~:text=Residents%20in%20Oxford%20and%20some,to%2025%20days%20each%20year.
<h4 style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 1.875rem; padding: 1.25rem 0px 0px; clear: both; font-family: 'Fira Sans', sans-serif; font-size: 1.25rem; font-weight: 500; color: #525252;">Residents in the Oxford permit area</h4>
100-day permits per calendar year per vehicle. Maximum one vehicle per person (must be the registered keeper or owner). Maximum three vehicles per household. Valid for all six traffic filters at any time during that day.
Residents in the Oxfordshire Permit Area
25-day permits per calendar year per vehicle. Maximum one vehicle per person (must be the registered keeper or owner). Maximum two vehicles per household. Valid for all six traffic filters at any time during that day.
That's why people are up in arms about it. But *Gammons/Brexit/Far Right/idiots* delete as appropriate. One vehicle per Kulak, only 100 journeys per year allowed.
Oxford is at the forefront of 15 minute city initiative…
Those car limitation regs are just confusing what a 15 min city idea really is.
Car limitations are something else, perhaps necessary in some places judging by the street parking chaos but it's inevitable where 2 kids are still living at home and working because houses are 10x average salary.
The answer to that is nothing to do with 15min cities and all about housing, job prospects and locations, public transport etc - big things to fix when politicians rarely think past 4 year's time.
That’s why people are up in arms about it.
Oxford has been fighting to get and keep cars out it's city centre for decades, and has nothing to do with the 15min city concept. If you ever had to use Woodstock or Banbury road at rush hour or wondered why it's ringed with park and rides or use the A34, or the A420 or the A40...you'd probably not give it a moments thought, but then you only have to look at the sizes of the houses along those two roads, and wonder at all the Range Rovers and Beamers to know who opposes the measures.
Quoting this sensible journo on Twitter:
"I went down the 15 minute city rabbit hole last year. No polite way of putting it.... these people are proper batshit crazy - beggars belief that they are informing Tory transport policy."
https://twitter.com/Otto_English/status/1745001679236235358?s=20
Proof, if ever it were needed, that we're now effectively being governed by the editorial writers at the Daly Mail
I’ve come to the conclusion, a significant part of the population are incredibly stupid. I mean absolutely, shit eating, pig ignorant, morons.
I mean, you only have to look 3 posts up from yours!....
Makes me smile when people take @daveylad seriously, he's already admitted he's a troll.
whereas the ebike is more likely to be
checkablecontrolled by the 5g towers and any checking will be done by the implant you got with your covid vaccine
FTFY 😉
Indeed. It’s as if folks like @daveyladwilfully misunderstand/tell lies about it simply to get a reaction…Who’d have thought it.
Ah, I've now got a mental image of a saddoe frantically masturbating because "someone paid attention to me".
Makes me smile when people take @daveylad seriously, he’s already admitted he’s a troll.
Well, if he's admitted it why hasn't STW brought out the ban hammer?
Absolutely nothing shocks me about this shortsighted, incompetent government. They seem very accomplished at lining their own pockets and cronyism. I suspect that they ensure to place key people into public bodies, to hamper the next government, such is their huge nepotism.
JeZ
Ah, I’ve now got a mental image of a saddoe frantically masturbating because “someone paid attention to me”.
"Not now mum, I'm busy!"
That’s why people are up in arms about it. But *Gammons/Brexit/Far Right/idiots* delete as appropriate. One vehicle per Kulak, only 100 journeys per year allowed.
They are struggling with the 100 journeys into the city centre concept? Do they relly want to go into town every weekend of the year on both days? Willful ignorance to the fore.
Clearly the Tories know what kind of moron they need to appeal to in order to stay in power this year.
It's not safe, even when active travel is implemented. We had traffic calming humps in my local town smoothed out (so cars can now do 30mph over them) because of (false) complaints they were damaging cars.
Everyone tells me cycling is 'dangerous'. I take that as a veiled threat.
Big problem here is that while this is the wrong policy, of the other main parties (in England at least) one is often disappointing on AT, particularly since the Uxbridge by-election (even though it's an equality issue when 1:4 households, often the poorest, don't have a car and public transport is inadequate) and the other is good at saying "we support AT but not *this* scheme"
I strongly feel there's a need for people to write to Councillors/candidates/etc. on this. Even some Tories can be OK.
I do struggle to understand the opposition to AT, it's completely irrational. I live in a rural market town, 2 miles wide. It is the perfect candidate for cycling around. I would estimate less than 1% of inhabitants ride and even less ride for a purpose (shopping/commuting etc).
I think it's actually opposed by SUV drivers who live out of town and are happy with the status quo.
We should get the BBC to make a documentary about it...
and the other is good at saying “we support AT but not *this* scheme”
Well that's just opposition by another name.
Oh but we DO support [thing]. Just not in this form. Not in this place. But we DO support it!
Translation: we don't support [thing] at all but it's not politically correct to say that.
It can be used on anything from cycle lanes to drug rehabilitation centres to social housing. Oh yes, we absolutely agree that there needs to be more social housing. But not near us.
I would actually have more respect for some of the anti- brigade if they simply said "we don't give a shit about you and your bike, we want to carry on driving our SUVs about the place" rather than trying to dress it up as "ooh what about the elderly? / what about the disabled?".
I think it’s actually opposed by SUV drivers who live out of town and are happy with the status quo.
There's an element of that, certainly. There are other bits underpinning it, such as the idea that hard working people commute by car (well, they do, but it costs £thousands to run a car every year and often there's no alternative) and that AT infra is 'for cyclists' (it isn't, it's for the ⅔ of people who currently don't but would if they felt safer). Add in a failure to grasp that routes need to be continuous and link nodal points...
Ultimately, we as a society need to decide if we want to continue with people having the untrammelled right to drive wherever they want at the cost of other people's right to walk, cycle or play out in the street, or whether we need a degree of traffic restriction (which as has been said ad infinitum before won't actually stop people driving between any two points, it just might make it take longer).
Don't forget that the Netherlands is only the way it is because the Dutch made an active decision to have safer roads in the 1970s.
@crazy-legs I completely agree. They should at least have the honesty to say so, and take the electoral consequences (from their own party members as much as anyone else).
There should be a rule that whenever someone says 'not this solution to problem X' they then should have to provide a worked-through alternative, or get back in their box. The big one of "“ooh what about the elderly? / what about the disabled?” is floating bus stops - the Ranty Highwayman on SoMe is good on this, essentially detail matters but no other country has come up with a better alternative, and opposing these is opposing AT.
A large part of the problem is that public transport, especially bus services, outside of the big cities were absolutely destroyed by the Tories in the 1980s by de-regulation.
Lots of people now have no idea of the fact that with decent public transport it's quite possible to have a good, if not better quality of life than they currently do dependent on cars.
I honestly prefer getting the train to places than driving. Yes I've had some shit train journeys, but I've also had some shit car journeys too.
I honestly prefer getting the train to places than driving. Yes I’ve had some shit train journeys, but I’ve also had some shit car journeys too.
Amen brother! Best commute I ever had was Huddersfield to Leeds on the train, even knowing it was going to involve TPE it was much less stressful than driving.
Hopefully bus re-regulation is inbound in lots of places but the problem is that it costs money, and rather than seeing PT as an enabling public service that generates growth, we look at it as an expensive luxury that has to cover its costs. [/soapbox]
Labour in Manchester beginning to re-regulate the buses is being watched by other regions with interest. I know Brabin was pushing for it here in West Yorkshire.
It's potentially great, especially if Burnham can find a way to do TfL-style Hopper fares. Aspiration is to have everyone within 400m of a half-hourly bus service (presumably not overnight)
Doubling down on conspiracy theories. Is this the reason for ebikes? Since with a normal bike it would be harder to monitor the time travelled whereas the ebike is more likely to be checkable?
and the government could shutdown your ebike remotely to stop you having fun, or if they think you need more exercise
makes you think.
Labour in Manchester beginning to re-regulate the buses is being watched by other regions with interest. I know Brabin was pushing for it here in West Yorkshire.
I was involved in some work a few years ago about trying to set up a common back-office system for buses in Manchester - precisely so that Hopper-style fare could be introduced. The bus operators were absolutely dead against any form of collaboration, any idea of sharing or indeed any concept that this was best for the passengers - you know, those people that actually make a bus service viable and profitable.
Nottingham has an in-house bus service, it was one of very few regions that managed to avoid the deregulation drive and as a result the bus network there is routinely voted one of the best outside London on pretty much all metrics in nationwide passenger surveys.
@crazy-legs They do like running buses up Wilmslow Rd though?
I live in Nottingham, the bus service is one of the few things the council got right - in fact it's too good - they could probably reduce the number of stops on all routes, in many places there's a stop every couple of hundred metres.
bus service viable and profitable.
Bus services shouldn’t be profitable. They should be subsidised.
This shit show of a 'govt' is more interested in trying to get votes from the typical slob who never leaves home, has never been abroad, has never wanted to be educated and is totally shagged when it comes to health issues. They'll use the car to go to the corner shop where they'll buy fags, vapes and plenty of booze. They'll vote for this shite because all they want to do is fester... and of course, they'll never reach pension age. Win win for the tories.
Reading also has public owned busses.
Powered by gas not diesel so they're warm to cycle behind but not coughing and horrible!
Also free wifi, charging, and generally newer than most cars.
Only fly in the ointment is because they're so good, they also run most of the inter-town services for other councils. Which means the bus costs about double if I catch it on one side of the junction or the other depending if it's Reading busses for Reading people or Reading busses making a profit.
They're introducing some sort of tap on/off system but I don't understand it, the TfL system works because the busses are a flat rate (AFAIK?).
Bus services shouldn’t be profitable. They should be subsidised.
100% agree.
The situation we're in with buses now though is they got deregulated and flogged off to the private sector who DO need to make a profit hence very high fares.
TfL buses are cross subsidised from Tube fares to the tune of about £700m. Of course there did used to be a Government grant to TfL of about that amount but the fat blond sofa got rid of that when he was London Mayor.
@crazy-legs They do like running buses up Wilmslow Rd though?
Because Wilmslow Road is a busy and therefore profitable route. Lots of bus companies all desperate to get in on that which leads to the insane situation of 4 companies running near identical services along the road, all trying to oust the others; meanwhile 300m away on a parallel road there's bugger all service because it's not profitable.
Absolute madness.
grimep
Free MemberOxford is at the forefront of 15 minute city initiative…
TBH Oxford is in the 100th year of dealing with being a medieval city with a river with ony 2 bridges running right through the middle that's totally overwhelmed by cars, and the 75th year of trying to make the Plain roundabout work. Mureno wasn't even born when they started. Just about everyone seems to approve of the existing restrictions in the city centre but the attempts to un**** the east side is somehow different and scary, even though you can summarise it all as "getting people to use the A40 so that people who need to go into the city can do so without getting stuck in a vortex of doom" and "giving locals tons of exemptions"
bigrich
Full Memberwhy wouldnt you want loads of services and jobs within 15 minutes of home?
Something something communism eating bugs The Jews, generally.
Because Wilmslow Road is a busy and therefore profitable route. Lots of bus companies all desperate to get in on that which leads to the insane situation of 4 companies running near identical services along the road, all trying to oust the others; meanwhile 300m away on a parallel road there’s bugger all service because it’s not profitable.
Yep. And it's a total PITA (or at least was *mumble* 25 years ago *mumble* when I was a student at UoM) as tickets for one bus company aren't valid on the others.
Someone keen on this stuff was in a meeting with Brian Soutar of Stagecoach, who just couldn't understand why it would be desirable to cross-subsidise unprofitable routes from profitable ones. This is exactly why deregulation has led to places having no bus service.
Elsewhere in Europe, PT is considered a public utility, and there's a decent amount of evidence that the economy in the North is dragged down by the sheer difficulty of getting around.
On the plus side, we have a very successful Sustrans project, called E-Move. Locals can hire a Tern GSD (free) for a week to bomb around on. It's a great way to help transition people out of cars. Not sure how many users have gone on to buy a (electric) bike after using it, but 4 bikes have been booked solid for the last year or so.
And for the tinfoil hatters, yes, they are all tracked!