Hacker News Reader

Comment by 49531 | Hacker News Reader

I don't live in a sun belt city, but rather a smallish town (60,000 pop) in the US. I live less than half a mile from the nearest grocer store, but it's too dangerous to walk. No sidewalks, no shoulders. I have to drive.

I live 0.1 mile away from my kids' school, but cannot walk over there to pick them up, I have to get in a queue of cars that leads almost to my house. It's ridiculous.

View on HN

Just as an anecdote, but as a Dutchman visiting the US on a few occasions I was pleasantly surprised to find that San Antonio's center was actually quite pleasant to walk around in. Get anywhere away from the center and just crossing the street became impossible again, though.

San Antonio is a bit unusual as it is both tourist oriented and had a very intentional reworking downtown when they diverted the river, iirc.

San Antonio's River Walk is cheating

Since when is urban planning cheating? :)

I don't mean just the river walk though, the leafy streets a bit farther around it are quite lovely.

In many places, it's not that difficult to get into local politics and start making a difference. And it really is easier to get things done than at a national level.

This group has a lot of good ideas for how to start improving your town: https://www.strongtowns.org/

I understand what you're saying, but using eminent domain to seize part of people's property to expand the size of roads and add sidewalks is no small (or popular, or cheap) task.

That's why a lot of places prefer the hands off approach: Legal mandate sidewalks for all new builds/major changes, but grandfather in all existing property and let the "problem solve itself" over tens of years.

It kinda works if an area is naturally undergoing development. As farmland gets more urbanized and developers build housing they're forced to upgrade the roads to add sidewalks.

Road right of ways in most places are way more than sufficient to provide adequate space for sidewalks, so eminent domain isn't really a big part of the equation.

It's really a question of political will to stop making everything all about cars all the time.

Nothing more American than taking a politically expedient position and then kicking the can down the road for future generations to deal with.

I wish, but the fact is the average citizen probably doesnt care about walkability or walkable infrastructure and would likely be hostile to any such project because "tax dollars".

Right now people are fighting like hell to get a municipal internet in place (with much of the infrastructure already existing) to break the Specturm monopoly, but most people are apathetic or apprehensive to any sort of public spending

A small group of determined people can make a surprising difference.

Also: sitting around doing nothing is a great way to ensure that nothing at all happens.

There's a certain demographic in the US that is largely apathetic toward most issues until there's a price tag associated with it, at which point they leap to their bedroom office chairs to post incessantly on facebook about it.

Even in a larger city like Atlanta, I never had trouble getting access to my city council member. Their staffers were even more accessible. While I wasn't always able to get them to do what I want, they were always open to having a discussion as to why or why not something was possible. Once you start going up the government ladder, things quickly get much more difficult.

> In many places, it's not that difficult to get into local politics and start making a difference.

I've recently discovered this. You are are absolutely correct. I'm helping make my "small" City more walk and bike able.

Just moved to a smaller city in FL to take a new job. Sadly while there's some walkability around where I live it slowly degrades into unwalkable where the office is. So I'll just continue to shell out several hundred a month to Uber commute

Have you worked out how long you'd have to be in that situation for leasing or buying a car to be cheaper than Uber? At several hundred a month for Uber, I'd not be surprised if you could do better with your own car if you are going to be there a couple of years.

Yeah long term I've considered it, but I dont have a license and funding behind the wheel driver training that works with the schedule of a working adult is the first hurdle.

Curious if you'd be willing to share which city ... I'm in Orlando, FL, and outside of a few areas, this applies here too.

I'm in Lakeland a bit west of you

> I live 0.1 mile away from my kids' school, but cannot walk over there to pick them up, I have to get in a queue of cars that leads almost to my house

Can you elaborate? This is beyond ridiculous.

It's a really convoluted system which requires the kids to essentially be penned up and allowed to walk to their parents cars in a controlled way. They have a policy against walking since there are no sidewalks for most of the area around the school.

It's probably safer given the fact there are no sidewalks, but it still sucks.

Pretty common , here is a reference to one school district in TX:

https://www.click2houston.com/news/parents-upset-about-new-m...

That sounds like a different issue. Parents who still drive but don't want to wait in line so they park in the surrounding neighborhood. Trying to find a loophole.

I'd like to hear why someone who lives a few blocks away can't walk from their house to school and pick up their child.

I walked to school everyday in middle school and so did everyone in the neighborhood. There wasn’t even a bus that would come and get us. My parents still live next door to the same school and everyday lots of kids walk. Some have a bus option but refuse it.

Every morning I go by an elementary school and parents walk their kids. They even put a special cross walk with a button to make it easier.

Sounds like an issue with your school or school system.

I'm confused by this comment. How does your experience in a walkable neighborhood suggest that the school system in the parent commenter's unwalkable neighborhood is in any way at fault?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com