Comment by slimsag | Hacker News Reader

Comment by slimsag | Hacker News Reader

The title and website headline are misleading, this isn't going to be car-free, it's going to be _no privately owned cars_.

> We’re bringing together services like ridesharing, bikes and scooters, and same-day grocery delivery, so zero private cars means zero hassle.

Here's why this matters from someone who lives here: 4 months out of the year Tempe's average temperature is above 99F. This means one of the following:

1. Residents will heavily use ride sharing and delivery during the summer, just "in place of" owning a car.

2. Culdesac will install a ridiculous amount of outdoor cooling for its residents, one might imagine this will require a fair amount of water.

Don't get me wrong, this is a cool idea, but is Tempe the right place to do it?

There are many options like semi-underground homes that could have been trialed here which would have fit the local climate; but they aren't doing that. Seems like they are trying to create a one-size-fits-all solution which IMO will not work outside of California.

Not quite 99F (which is like 37C) but Singapore is VERY humid compared year round (as opposed to 4 months) of ~90 F (32 C). On many days I've seen "feels like 39 C" on google weather. Despite all that, car ownership is 12 per 100 people. People rely heavily on public transit, which is air conditioned (AC seems to be their sin, but it's definitely more efficient than AC in every car on top of burning gas to get it to move around).

I think as you allow as a possibility in the end of your reply, it's not like it can't work, but non-ebikes and scooters might become a bit much for some people unless there's copious cover.

Riding an ebike in 39c is uncomfortable but not unthinkable. I do it semi regularly. If your trip is >10km it's not that bad at all. You will probably have to shower when you get home but it's still better than owning a car.

Being on a modern E-Bike in 39C is definitely way more comfortable than walking. You can adjust the power settings so you barely have to touch the pedals to move, it's less effort than walking, and you'll be traveling at up to 25 km/h so you'll get some air cooling you wouldn't get if you were just walking.

I've ridden mine in up to 35C and it's like stepping into an oasis compared to standing still in that temperature, more so if you wear clothing like loose fitting cotton clothing that benefits from the increased airflow.

In my experience this would be air heating and not air cooling because the air temperature is higher than the skin temperature, unless you're already sweating and being evaporatively cooled from that.

>so you'll get some air cooling you wouldn't get if you were just walking.

39C is well above skin temperature so you're only going to get evaporative cooling and the effectiveness of that depends on humidity. It's possible the heating effect of the hot air blowing over your skin overwhelms the evaporative cooling and you are actually getting net warming.

Even if the humidity is low if you're not already drenched in sweet, it's going to feel awful.

>Riding an ebike in 39c is uncomfortable but not unthinkable.

Exactly. Before 1950s 90% of the people walked, rode bikes, horses, etc in all of these places, everyday, everywhere.

Billions still do all over the world in similar climates.

It's not like we need cushions, air conditioning, and so on, to go from one place to another in the summer heat.

> Billions still do all over the world in similar climates.

Yes. And it sucks. There is a reason the founder of Singapore said it “made development possible in the tropics.” We don’t “need” indoor toilets either. But they’re pretty great. So are cars. Big SUVs with the AC turned down to 65.

Exactly. There are a lot of things we can do without - refrigerators in every home, laundry in every home, AC, etc. But they make life way better and very few people are willing to go without.

>We don’t “need” indoor toilets either. But they’re pretty great. So are cars. Big SUVs with the AC turned down to 65.

Even more so a livable planet, and we're running out of that just so some cushioned entitled people can have "big SUVs with the AC turned down to 65", 24/7 burgers, and other BS...

It doesn't suck. It's just a temporary discomfort. I feel like the discomfort is actually somewhat beneficial. When I get home after cycling on a really hot day I immediately take a shower and then feel great about how comfortable my home is. Better than if I had taken an air-conditioned car/bus back. I think maybe we have too much confort all of the time and it makes it harder to appreciate than if we get to experience discomfort some times.

The first world privilege is stunning.

You mean the first world privilege of "Big SUVs with the AC turned down to 65"?

Yes, it is stunning.

Especially when its being confused to something like a basic human right -- that everybody should just adopt, instead of the spoiled result of a consumerist society, enabled by first world wages and cheap energy (subsidised by exercising global power).

As is the idea that the lifestyle of your country (or your adopted country) is the best in the world, and everyone should follow suit, with big SUVs and AC to 65" -- and if they don't do it, it's only because they can't afford it (never mind that places that can very well afford SUVs and full-on AC blast, like in most of Western Europe, happen to shun both as tacky).

Can't edit my comment now, but that's what I meant. Normal bikes in 39C is something I might do with a tank top or something, e-bikes seem neccessary there. I also implied scooters = bad but I take that back, scooters and e-bikes seem good, it is manually driven transit in 39C seems like it would be sufficiently uncomfortable.

Just wanted to say thank you for using Celsius in addition to Fahrenheit. I don't understand why people only use Fahrenheit without adding the equivalent Celsius value.

People that use Fahrenheit as a measurement by default tend to be people belonging to countries where they typically don't consider the rest of the world outside of their own borders. Celsius on the other hand, is used by most of the world.

Or maybe they assume that an American tech web site, populated by mostly American residents of one shape or another will be comfortable with F.

> populated by mostly American residents

I'm very interested to see if this is true. Seems like the US (take it you mean US, not all of Americas?) is about 4% of the world population, so my guess would be that there is more non-US residents on HN than US residents. (but I don't actually have any insights into it)

By US residents I mean people who live in the US culture. I would guess, but like you I have no insights into it, given the topics we discuss here and the ancestry of the site, that most of the people here are either Americans or spend most of their time in America. In other words, people on this site are likely pretty comfortable with the Imperial system.

> By US residents I mean people who live in the US culture

Usually resident refers to people having their domicile somewhere, not just being influenced by something like culture. I think many countries around the world follow US culture, but that does not mean they automatically know imperial system.

I think you underestimate the popularity of the Imperial system today in the rest of the world.

It's about 50% north american users if I recall correctly. Dang posted the stats once in a comment but I cannot find it using algolia.

Nice, getting closer. I think US is the only country in North America that uses Fahrenheit so one could say then that less than 50% of people on HN are from the US.

You don't want to be building anything underground in Tempe. There's a nasty layer of natural concrete called Caliche about a meter below the surface in much of the area. Archaeologists hate the stuff because it's so expensive and time consuming to dig through.

The local indigenous people have been building sustainable apartment blocks called pueblos for a long time though. They're surprisingly nice during the summer (approx. 80F inside), even without AC.

Caliche is very real even up in Idaho. There’s a local superstition about breaking through a 30cm layer to be able to have a tree grow successfully.

Probably not - I suspect it's only there because Arizona has a storied history of planned communities

And no mention of how they plan to ward off Uber's killbots, known to roam Tempe. Given the opacity of the financial system, how do we even know this is being developed by humans? The whole thing could just be a setup to lure more fleshy targets out into the open.

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