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Comment by akira2501 | Hacker News Reader

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>>That being said, you're in a city, what did you expect?

Literally every single city I can think of it's better to walk than drive, so I guess it's a uniquely American perspective? Or like the other commenter said - a joke?

I wouldn't generalize this as an American perspective; at least many of my US friends envy the walkability of the European cities they visited (while recognizing the disadvantages / inconveniences about it, too)

As an American (New Englander), I would say that if it's better to drive than walk or take transit, you are not actually in a city, you're in the suburbs. So this definitely isn't a universal American perspective.

As a European, it's... hard to fathom.

I've lived in big cities most of my life and I take the car maybe 10 times per year, including cabs. And that's mostly to get away from the city, where I can't go by bus.

I lived in the suburbs of a very large European city. I still drove to work every day. Sure I could walk to the bus stop and wait or walk KMs to the train station and wait. But my car was the most direct and easy way to get to the office.

I never had a big city job. Mostly office buildings in office parks. So I guess me and my co-workers' lifestyles were very similar to Americans.

This is the thing about tourists who come back from Europe raving about "walkability" well of course, you were staying in the heart of a major city probably, of course there is a lot of stuff you can walk to, and there's good public transit. Get a few miles away and you'll find that many more people have cars and drive.

Living in The Netherlands, and unless you live very far out in the country, everything is easily walkable or bike-able. The closest supermarkets are generally a 5-10 minutes walk, a train or bus station is almost always close by, etc.

I myself do not own a car, and besides some very rare moments (like bringing large trash to the junkyard or something, in which case I can ask friends to quickly borrow their car), I do not have any hindrance from it.

I just moved away from the (close) suburbs of Paris and I biked a few miles to work. But yeah, if you live in distant suburbs, it's much harder.

> That being said, you're in a city, what did you expect?

:-) I giggled on this one 10y ago when I first saw this difference in mindsets, and also smile at it today. I sometimes wonder if I were growing up there, would I also feel weird when I see my alterego walking around on the _streets_ of Zürich, where I don't even have a vehicle to _drive_ to one of the national parks.

> you're in a city, what did you expect? If you want to spend time walking outside drive to one of the many National Parks

Is this a joke? I hope this is a joke and I’ve misunderstood it.

Cities are not synonymous with cars. There are lots of walkable cities in the world. Driving to a place where you can walk is a very strange inversion of the norm.

" Driving to a place where you can walk is a very strange inversion of the norm."

Can is a strong word here.

I am an avid walker with around 13 thousand steps daily on average (counted over last three years), but in my daily life, I generally take some form of transport if the expected walking time exceeds some 25 minutes. A tram or a bus, but I don't regularly walk 7 km to the centre of my city and back, even though I certainly can. It would simply take too long.

> Driving to a place where you can walk is a very strange inversion of the norm.

There's no way for that to be true; driving to a place where you can walk is a possibility. Walking to a place where you can drive would be useless, because you wouldn't have a car there.

> Walking to a place where you can drive would be useless

You could walk to a vehicle rental shop or (eg London with Zipcar) walk to where a vehicle you can rent is parked. But not a normal situation, definitely.

> or (eg London with Zipcar) walk to where a vehicle you can rent is parked.

I never got Zipcar. They made themselves completely pointless by charging you for time when you didn't need the car, inflating what appeared to be reasonable fees into ludicrous overcharges.

If I want to visit my family 90 minutes away over the weekend, I might pay for three hours of car rental. I'm obviously not going to pay for 48 hours of car rental. Who exactly is using Zipcar? Where did the model "like long-term car rental, but we'll lie about it" come from?

Former Zipcar employee. Nothing here is confidential afaik.

In London, they did have the one way concept for some time - I don't know if it's still there. They experimented with dedicated spaces as well as charging by the minute with approved parking areas. I don't think any of the competitors in that space are still using that model because it didn't work out financially. (Parking was a giant issue - our competitors and us could only negotiate for parking in some places. If the user parked outside of that, we got fined, and GPS was terrible in trying to make sure they were in the right area - the buildings were too close together. And users were frustrated if the area they were allowed to park was full.)

The fundamental problem is that the cars end up getting bunched up away from where people want to take them. Let's say you're driving to your parents for 90 minutes. Who is going to rent your car 90 minutes away? Are they going to go to your parents' house to use it when you don't have it? What if there's no car when you get back, because they put it somewhere else? How many places allow you to park a car for days without prior agreement?

Zipcar is meant and priced for shopping trips or other short errands on the order of a few hours. If you want multiple days for a longer trip, that's what traditional car rental exists for. If you're "obviously" not paying that, that's your choice and nothing to do with Zipcar.

You don't get to break down Zipcar's hourly pricing into just the hours you need to drive each way. In the interim inbetween then the Zipcar isn't at its spot and therefore unavailable for other use. Zipcar's hourly pricing includes the fact that it will be returned and immediately available for other customers.

TLDR: You may only use the Zipcar for a few hours, but it's out of its spot and unavailable for the entire trip, so that's what you're paying for.

> You don't get to break down Zipcar's hourly pricing into just the hours you need to drive each way.

This is how all other vehicle rental works. It's the only advantage of rental over ownership.

> In the interim inbetween then the Zipcar isn't at its spot and therefore unavailable for other use.

That's just logistical incompetence on the part of Zipcar. Why would the Zipcar be unusable when not at "its spot"? My car doesn't become unusable when it leaves my driveway. The Zipcar is usable as soon as I return it to Zipcar. Their choice to refuse my return is just their commitment to an unworkable business model.

if you only need the car for an hour, you paid for the hour. that was their business model. not sure what's confusing about that

I think they would like to pick up the car, drive somewhere else, and then leave the car parked somewhere for a weekend without paying for it in that time. Which is difficult to make work as a business (is anyone else going to rent it in that time? Would they be happy if all the cars were to be driven away somewhere else?) Even more traditional rental companies will often charge you extra to drop off a car one of their locations which isn't the one you picked it up from.

Zipcar and co are generally aimed at daytrips, the kind of thing where you occasionally need a car or van for a day but no longer, not for longer distance trips where you are away for a few days.

Self-driving cars can flip that script for obvious reasons, but I’d say we’re still a good decade away from that right now.

> There's no way for that to be true

Humans have had cities for thousands of years before cars.

So, yes, driving to a place so that you can walk is an inversion.

Sorry but you are wrong.

I live in Zürich, in my experience the city with the best public transport system(Stockholm a close second, but Switzerland has much better public transportation overall). In case I need a car in Switzerland I would simply rent one for the day using one of the many rental options.

Public transport for 95% of my trips, 3% cab, 2% rental. It’s better for me, it’s better for the environment, the people around me. Reducing cars on the road also makes it so much more pleasant and nice just to be in the city. I travel frequently to London and it’s unbelievable how big difference it makes to be in a city designed for pedestrians and not cars(and London is absolutely designed for cars first).

I travel world wide for work and my default option is always public transport, with the occasional cab ride for convenience. In some places it sadly doesn’t work out so then I end up renting a car.

I mean, walking from my home to the beach is almost as fast 70% of the time (the summer month make finding nearby parking spot really difficult and time consuming), and it's definitely better to come back walking too, as I don't like sand in my car. Going to the farmers' market by foot is faster (unless I go at 6am and find a free parking spot), and less alienating (I say 'hello' to a dozen persons on the way, another dozen on the way back, meet friends, flirt a little). The only exception is going to see my parents, It's definitely faster to drive around the small marsh than the 40 minutes it takes to cross it, but I usually cross it, and when I don't, I use my bike rather than my car.

And when I used to drink, I definitely walked to my bar rather than drove to it despite the free, often empty parking nearby and the 10 fewer minutes it took.

I honestly don't see situations where a walk is worse than a drive in my living area. At worse I take a bike? When I was alone, I managed with rentals only tbf (now it's a bit more difficult, also the windsurfs are easier to handle with a car, and are the primary reason we own one)

Why would you need a case there

Yeah, but you have to find somewhere to park at both ends which is a hassle, you are limited in where you can go - couldn't stop and have a drink with friends either.

> you're in a city, what did you expect? If you want to spend time walking outside drive to one of the many National Parks

Many Europeans are used to "cities as Open Air Museums". (If you are not under the time constraints of appointments, and instead you have the time and want to enjoy the place and what is contained with some natural attention, you need to walk.)

That's a weird assumption, given that it's the exact opposite. In most European cities it's better to walk especially if you're under time constraints or have an appointment, it's going to be usually quicker and more predictable in terms of time needed than driving.

Which assumption?

Just to be sure there were no misunderstandings: I wrote that "If the agenda allows, you will need to enjoy the open-museum city by walking - faster methods will decrease the ability to pay attention": that is not inconsistent with "If the agenda does not allow enjoying the open-museum city, you may want to consider walking as a more reliable way to respect the scheduling".

The fact that you get downvoted is mind blowing. European cities have a clear policy to make it harder for cars and easier for other transportation.

The previous poster is basically saying "Most Europeans use the cities they live in as open air museums, and not to live in. They don't have time constraints, they don't have appointments, they don't work there". Living the life in Europe, as a full-time open air museum visitor, it's great!

A city not worth visiting is a city not worth living in.

> The previous poster is basically saying

No. For fuck's sake no.

The parent poster (parent to my original post) wrote that there is little to «expect» from a city, and recommended at least the in turn parent poster - who wrote about having been an exception as a city walker - to go to a park for walking.

So I informed the parent poster that to walk in many European cities is, opposite to that idea, an experience of architecture, monuments and art. I.e.: walking many European cities is far from unusual and with reason.

The idea of the poster above about time constraints and appointments is delirious and completely disconnected from what I wrote, literally, briefly, clearly, and exactly with the purpose of avoiding misunderstandings.

I hope the above post is at least only the consequence of rushed reading.

> Many Europeans are used to "cities as Open Air Museums".

LOLNO. ~330 million Europeans in the EU live in cities. Or I guess you count them as museum exhibits? :-)))

I counted the subset of them living in nice cities full of remarkable architecture, art and monuments as people who could call walking the city a privilege, as opposed to the post against which I commented, that went "what do you expect if not bewilderment if you are seen walking through a city".

> drive to one of the many National Parks that are in Texas

Texas has two National Parks, and they're nowhere near Austin. Literally on the complete other side of the state.

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