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Comment by amilios | Hacker News Reader

Suffice to say I think this would only work in places like Europe where everything is relatively densely connected by rail. For me personally I live in North American and I visit my family in Europe once a year. Cutting me off from them would suck and effectively force me back to Europe :) this seems like it's coming from a place of "privilege" per se of everything being nearby.

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Isn't that how all of these style regulations go? People think up some stuff that doesn't really impact their life and propose it.

Who needs to maintain diplomatic relationships with North America anyway?

Ironically, the survey respondents overwhelmingly said North America was the destination they would most likely use their flights for.

4 trips to the US might be soft power going from us to them, but it's zero diplomacy going the other direction.

Don’t you feel it’s a privilege to be able to live all across the world? Most people in Europe can’t easily move out of Europe if they want to maintain a standard of living.

this is hacker news we dont do introspection here

I thought Europeans believed freedom of movement was a human right?

Actually scratch that, it's a human right but not if a virus exists, you have the wrong politics, or movement requires the emission of CO2.

Hey,

This doesn't ban ships.

Just saying.

Not saying I agree or disagree, but you're acting like limiting air travel would stop travel.

Fossil fuel powered ships are worse, because the carbon emissions of running a hotel at sea are high and ships use very low grade fuel with all sorts of nasty byproducts. And electric or renewable long distance ships run into the exact same problems as electric or renewable planes, namely the poor energy density.

Transatlantic cruises don’t have to be luxurious. If you’re comparing air freight to shipping by sea, it’s very clear ships are far more efficient. We just need to become better at containerising people :)

You vill live in ze pod!

I mean at minimum you need to run an actual kitchen to feed people for days or weeks at sea.

You mean? Yes. Yes, you'll need to have a crew and you'll need to need to ship the necessities, which eats into the efficiency of this mode of transport. However, a plane will create 40 times more CO2 for the same amount of cargo transported than a ship. I'd say we can figure out how to fit a larger crew and more supplies in that margin.

I’m not against people moving or travelling, just pointing out that the vast majority of people won’t move out of their country, whereas HN audience is more likely to have lived in different countries. I have, will probably move again in my lifetime. But I still don’t believe it’s a human right to move countries at will, nor do I think we should be flying as much as we are, draconian lifetime budgets notwithstanding.

But leave it to HN to read deep enough into a comment to make a straw man.

I am in a similar situation and have asked myself this. On the other hand, I think from an international peace and cultural exchange perspective, being able to live and integrate into other countries and cultures is very important. So many world-changing discoveries have been enabled by migrants and people who were able to spend time with people in the same field from other places. Imagine what we would lose if this was no longer possible!

I don't know, the rail connections here in Iceland are quite poor.

> Suffice to say I think this would only work in places like Europe where everything is relatively densely connected by rail.

It's not even true. I don't think I can hop on a train for a quick trip to Paris from Romania, Bulgaria or Croatia.

> For me personally I live in North American and I visit my family in Europe once a year.

Talking about privilege.

if you can contemplate how many flights you consider sufficient in a life, you have likely already solved (or had solved for you) far more significant problems.

the privilege is more than proximity.

You can take a ship. An inconvenience but not impossible.

Ships have worse carbon emissions per passenger mile. https://amp.theguardian.com/travel/2006/dec/

Partially this is because a ship needs to be outfitted as a hotel due to how long the journey is compared to planes.

Didn’t say it was better, just posed it as the alternative.

I mean the context is that this is a proposal to cap carbon emissions, and it's pretty much cutting off the nose to spite the face.

No, this is a proposal to make people feel good. Most transportation emissions are from cars, not planes. It is fairly pointless to limit air travel if you actually want to achieve something. It doesn’t matter if you do something worse, like travel by boat. As long as people see less planes in the sky, they’re happy. And their happiness is all that matters for those who want to maintain the status quo.

This is to me like when people argue about banning airbnb.

"The other day I had arrived in a city and there were no hostels, all the hotels were $300/night or full. If there were no airbnb, what would I have done?"

And the answer is you would have changed your behaviour. Booking something further in advance, changing your travel plans, finding a different city to stay in.

The whole point of this idea is reducing the number of flights. That probably also means it's harder for people like you (and me) to live anywhere we want. But that is a privilege we have, not a given. If the cost is too great, we change our behaviour.

If airbnb has destroyed the rental market in a city, it's better for them to ban it and lose some travellers.

Similar argument to the "any-benefit" approach to technology, which Cal Newport writes about with relation to digital minimalism. We think we're justified in using a tool if we can identify any possible benefit to its use.

You have just entered the 15 minute city. Please remain where you are.

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