If you change streets to not feel like highways then a lot of this would be impossible to do in the first place. However that would require a bigger reckoning with car culture in the US that it seems we’re not ready to have yet.
I have little insight into LA because South Pasadena isn’t known for street races but here in San Diego, the intersection between my house and the I15 (in an immigrant/family oriented suburb at the outskirts of the city) regularly gets taken over by these assholes on Friday nights. They not only do donuts in a four lane intersection but use it as a launch point for late night freeway races which regularly break triple digit mph [1].
The cops are fucking useless [2]. There’s at least three squad cars every time and all they do is a half assed attempt at crowd control.
At this point I’m hoping my alibaba bulk order of caltrops doesn’t get held up by customs.
[1] a few years ago “in my youth” I pushed my Toyota Corolla to the max racing one of these fellows at midnight going west on the 52 right before the warped asphalt (which has sadly been fixed). If I managed to reach the limits of my speedometer you can bet the guys with turbos are even worse.
[2] a few months ago I was driving down the freeway a few cars behind a cop right as they received a call. For the next five minutes I watched several dozen cars completely ignore the flashing lights, forcing the cop car to weave in and out of traffic like a street racer.
Drivers became more brazen during the COVID-19 pandemic shutdowns, which cleared normally clogged streets and freeways of traffic. Suddenly, many streets were empty and drivers believed they had a newfound freedom to speed, either for takeovers or street racing.
Actually this is a nation wide phenomenon and not just in LA. Road deaths/accidents and road rage incidents are increasing since 2020. I believe The article mentions the takeovers in Arizona also.
I personally think that quote is exactly correct. The empty streets in 2020 caused people to start going faster and taking advantage of the roads and they haven't changed their mindset.
Although in fairness to the police, pulling over a person for a traffic ticket can lead to a gun fight so it's possible police have decided it has a high risk and low reward as far as their time goes.
Before the late 1800s, cityfolk did not have to go get entertained at night or do other business -and they lived and they prospered for thousands of years. Nor do people in small villages have to.
Lockdowns of any kind are not designed for humans.
From wikipedia:
> As of 2019, the Los Angeles Police Department had 10,008 officers sworn in. Of these, 81% (8,158) were male and 19% (1,850) female. The racial/ethnic breakdown:
48.8% or 4,882 was Hispanic/Latino (of any race)
30.9% or 3,090 was non-Hispanic White
9.62% or 962 was African American
7.66% or 766 was Asian
2.46% or 246 was Filipino American
remaining were Indian and Other Ethnicities.
true class is how someone conducts themselves, not their color, neighborhood, job, or income.
is it nice to stage street takeovers or is it dangerous and thugish? what did the "cops" do that was questionable, except perhaps show too much restraint?
And street races are unquestionably dangerous.
What America needs is a competent police force that's held accountable for what it's doing (or not doing).
Comment to skorpeon87 [who is shadowbanned] who said:
If that were true, then we would not see people protesting against misogyny or clamoring for more representation in the various media and producers would tell them to take a hike that it was disproven in the 90s.
Some politicians tried this back in the 90s and were widely derided for it. The matter hasn't really been addressed since; the public has seemingly decided that only fools could believe people are influenced by movies, music, and video games.
Blaming this on stroads is a dangerous politicized oversimplification.
Not everyone agrees with you that cars and roads are something we should discourage.
i think the anti-stroads people are right but naive: stroads are bad, but how did we get them? and in light of your answer to that, how can we expect them to be fixed? undoing stroads will be a huge expense that will only benefit the overwhelming mass of people. it'll never happen.
The term came from this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORzNZUeUHAM
No, it is used by folks who like proper design:
> Streets: The function of a street is to serve as a platform for building wealth. On a street, we're attempting to grow the complex ecosystem that produces community wealth. In these environments, people (outside of their automobiles) are the indicator species of success. Successful streets are environments where humans, and human interaction, flourish.
> Roads: In contrast, the function of a road is to connect productive places. You can think of a road as a refinement of the railroad — a road on rails — where people board in one place, depart in another and there is a high speed connection between the two.
> Stroads: Stroads are a mash-up of these two types of paths. We like to call them "the futon of transportation" because, just as a futon is neither a particularly good bed nor a particularly good couch, a stroad is neither a particularly good road or a particularly good street.
* https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2017/10/30/the-stroad
People who use the word "stroads" want society to stop building stroads and go (back to) building streets and roads. See the ten-minute mark of the video you posted on how The Netherlands does it: stroomweg (highway), gebiedsontsluitingsweg (road), erftoegangsweg (street).
See also his video "The Best Country in the World for Drivers":
> Police say they don’t have enough manpower to stop such street takeovers, which have been popularized by the “Fast & Furious” movie franchise. Residents are fed up.
you'd have to be a baby to take that seriously. cops are just lobbying for more money, "manpower." how old is "fast & furious?" 20 years? more?
This idea is so preposterous it could be made into the story line for a Seinfeld episode. The wide roads made them do it, Jerry!
For my part, I blame the shitheads not getting their asses thrown in jail with vigorous immediacy. Let the cops barricade the roads and load up the wagons.
The /r/fuckcars subreddit, for example, would absolutely turn this thread into an anti-car talking point.
I'm surprised police wouldn't use something like a Stringer/blast ball to disperse large crowds that are beyond control, a riot. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blast_ball