Police can't stop sideshows. Solution: Make the streets more annoying | Hacker News Reader

Police can't stop sideshows. Solution: Make the streets more annoying

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30 pointserehweb48 comments

Here in Florida we have the Bithlo drag race track. They have events where locals can race their own cars, and sometimes ones where you can compete against a souped up police car that the local department races. I think this goes a long way towards reducing illegal street races by providing a legal outlet. I wonder if something similar would help here? There’s a car culture of meeting at an empty paved area and gathering around and doing donuts, perhaps there could be a designated “public park” for this?

Sonoma Raceway is about an hour north of the city and has similar drag racing events.

Maybe it can potentially reduce illegal activities

These people aren't the most intelligent or participatory in civilization; they like doing it at 4-way intersection BECAUSE it disrupts.

At a morning/afternoon car show (generally the only kinds you should go to, evening ones are bad news) where I brought my v8 camaro, I was invited to my first sideshow and to drive in the convoy.

Went, saw the malarkey, left.

> they like doing it at 4-way intersection BECAUSE it disrupts.

I agree there are (at least) two large segments of the attending crowds, those looking for auto-sport type activities and those you describe who are basically looking for large-crowd street events in their urban area and view an event being unofficial, illegal and/or disruptive as making it even more appealing and 'authentic'.

I'm more in the first group and having the kind of street racing-centric and adjacent events GP describes available locally would appeal to me and be a real alternative. Conversely, I think the second segment of the crowd are pretty much going to "do spontaneous large-crowd things" in these areas even if authorities intentionally degrade urban intersections to be so annoying that "sideshows" (as currently practiced) cease. The second type of crowd will just morph what they do in that area into something else that's suitably unofficial, illegal and/or disruptive. Probably nothing short of much wider-scale urban reform than just impeding some intersections, is going to meaningfully change that.

To be clear, my point is only that something like GP's proposed alternative might actually meet an unmet need for one segment of the participants with a workable substitute, while for the other segment, what the authorities are currently doing has little chance of really solving anything other than pushing today's specific disruptive activity into a different disruptive activity tomorrow (while further degrading urban intersections all the time). I take no position on what (if any) viable solutions might exist to really address the problem with the second segment because it's a symptom of much larger systemic issues. However, I'm fairly confident what authorities are doing now does nothing to address the autosport need AND does nothing to fundamentally address the root causes of illegal underground urban street rally/protests.

>Probably nothing short of much wider-scale urban reform than just impeding some intersections, is going to meaningfully change that.

Interesting. What did you have in mind?

Well, I said elsewhere in my post

> "I take no position on what (if any) viable solutions might exist to really address the problem with the second segment because it's a symptom of much larger systemic issues."

So I don't know of anything in particular which might, A) address the underlying causes of urban youth being disaffected or engaging in disruptive behavior, and B) Fit within the ability and political will of urban cities to implement and afford.

As far as I can tell it's a largely intractable problem which has existed to some extent for as long as there have been large, dense, urban inner cities. Historically, different cities seem to have gone through periods where it was worse (Chicago in the 60s, NYC in the 70s, Detroit in the 80s) but it's never been completely "fixed" in any of these cities. While today's manifestations of urban youth disaffection, such as sideshows, are different on the surface, I suspect the underlying root causes are much broader and not much different than they've always been.

It's entirely possible that some of these root causes are baked into the structure of large, dense, urban inner cities and fully addressing the root causes isn't possible without essentially banning the existence of large urban centers beyond some arbitrary population density. Lee Kuan Yew seems to have found a different urban equilibrium in metro Singapore - but only by being a totalitarian and limiting individual rights in ways the U.S. constitution could (thankfully) never allow.

Apparently, the best that can be done in the context of modern U.S. urban inner cities being allowed to exist, is to somewhat reduce the fundamental issues through some balanced combination of social programs, schooling, community engagement, policing and local political participation. And the optimal "harm minimization" balance for a given city seems to change over time based on evolving macro conditions (economics, demographics, etc).

There are only two things I'm fairly confident in, and they are

A) Over the past decade the S.F. Bay Area has devolved into a shit show for a wide variety of complex reasons (which reasonable people can (and do) disagree about)

B) Trying to solve the "sideshow problem" by further degrading some urban intersections is the most temporary of surface fixes, which addresses a 1 hr/week symptom by making already-failing infrastructure even worse 24/7. And it'll only cause expressions of the root cause issues to morph into other forms - ultimately not solving the existing problem while creating new problems. The only sort-of positive is that it is "something", thus allowing local government to claim they "Did Something."

Cincinnati has been installing these truly egregious speed bumps everywhere. They're the kind with a raised edge and are unsafe to drive over at 15mph, slapped in a 35mph zone.

It's made things even less safe. Instead of everyone moving at a consistent (if high) speed, people still drive the same speed and just slam on the brakes to get over the speed bump, accelerate back to speed, slam on the brakes for the next bump.

I've started to reroute my commute around these dangerous obstacles in the road, as have many others. Now we have a net increase in travel time, CO2 emitted, and the roads are more dangerous than ever. Less-maintained backroads are taking more traffic than normal causing increased wear.

Truly the worst of all possible options.

Sounds bad for the planet too, all that wasted momentum.

Soon we will only have EVs with regenerative breaks so everything is fine. Apart from reality that at these deacceleration rates mechanical breaks get used... So it is all going to spend more energy and thus propagate climate change, which will kill people...

You say less safe, but do you actually have the stats regarding pedestrian deaths dynamic in those areas?

All these interventions look like they are in fairly sizeable 4 way intersections. It obviously isn't possible to replace all of them, but I think that it would make sense to lay streets out with roundabouts and avoiding 4 way junctions as the UK and various EU countries do, at least for new developments.

You can't do doughnuts in narrower streets without intersections.

I also think that many of these people are basically broadcasting their identity online whilst committing various reckless driving crimes. You don't necessarily need to show up and intervene at all of them in real time, but if the recent riots across the pond have shown anything, it's that it's fairly easy for the police to knock on your door in the morning and arrest you for misbehaviour the night before.

You're right, and roundabouts are being implemented in the US (at least in my region, the Seattle suburbs) as budgets and new construction allow. I rather like them.

If there aren't large intersections, they'll go to parking lots, which is what they do in my town. If the 3rd time you're caught at one of these, you're taking the bus for the next two years, that would solve the problem pretty quickly, leveraging the same viral social media that spread the problem so quickly. Since the events around George Floyd, the police in some jurisdictions have adopted a hands- off, do not interfere policy to "low level" offenses At some point in the future, cities may reconsider those decisions.

or, instead of installing basically speed bumps in all the intersections, they could show up and arrest the participants for misdemeanors and felonies that are clearly visible on video, actually book them into jail with serious bail. impound the cars as evidence and don't give them back unless they prevail at trial.

if the political system isn't interested in enforcing, of all things, these kind of laws, speed bumps aren't going to help.

Arrests require a willingness to use lethal force. That may not seem disproportionate to you. It does to me.

Given that cars driven unsafely can kill people?

But that's hypothetical. Are there cases of people getting killed by this activity? That would affect the trade-off.

> Are there cases of people getting killed by this activity?

Multiple cases in Toronto throughout the years. Just google and you will find multiple examples this year alone.

Well then, my heart does not bleed for the possible need for lethal force in the process of arresting these people.

In Toronto the police has a standing policy not to chase street racers. Instead, they track them remotely and arrest them once they get out of the vehicle.

These street racers are putting the general public at risk, and have indeed killed several people in the past few years.

Imagine not wanting to arrest people who endanger people on roads and cause havoc!

in your model of it, we deprecate all misdemeanors and only have violent felonies

that is untrue, and a disingenuous argument. there is no requirement for violence simply to arrest them.

but if street racing assholes decide to escalate to violence (and a car is a weapon), then both staying alive and protecting the public requires willingness to use lethal force in reaction to the criminals' violent and dangerous behavior.

and that isn't disproportionate at all, that's how it should be. and i'm grateful that there are people who make that sacrifice and have a willingness to protect me with lethal force if necessary.

Arrest means waiting for the crime to be committed. With a combo of curbs, roundabouts, speed bumps, road/street narrowing you redesign the street to disallow such behavior by default.

It's like putting a crosswalk far away from a bus station. It's a design that encourages ppl to illegally cross the street since crosswalk is far away. Instead you redesign the street/crosswalk in such a way that by design there's no more need to break the law. Or if you hate pedestrians you put a big fence that's impossible to cross unless you use crosswalk- again, a design that makes breaking the law hard/not relevant

I think changing behavior is superior to arrest. Infrastructure that can potentially damage your expensive customized street racer while presenting a minor inconvenience to legal drivers is probably effective.

It slows down emergency vehicles like ambulances, that matters quite a lot.

NY Times article on the lack of traffic enforcement since the pandemic: https://archive.is/2024.07.30-012727/https://www.nytimes.com...

I think we shouldn’t take cops’ word for it that they can’t enforce the law. In my opinion they’re too lazy and have no incentive to do anything besides collect easy revenue from everyday drivers who are more docile.

I think on top of this there need to be more types of vehicles and vehicle modifications that are just straight up illegal to own or sell at all.

At this point the rotten apples in the car and motorcycle community have spoiled the bunch. It shouldn’t be legal to sell vehicles that allow you to burn rubber at all. In no sane world should a Dodge Challenger with almost a thousand horsepower from the dealership be street legal. It shouldn’t be legal to purchase an extra loud performance muffler unless it can be locked out from being loud outside of a closed track.

In the era of computer traction control and accident avoidance, driving a car should be like driving an AirBus where the vehicle prevents the operator from performing dangerous maneuvers.

I do think that the built environment should be more conducive to save driving, but when you start installing hostile architecture similar to homeless or skateboarder deterrents you’re fighting the symptom instead of the cause.

Somehow we always end up punishing the masses for the sins of the few.

It’s called “The tragedy of the commons”.

I don’t think that applies in this case. You have trivially provable crimes, easily resolved by making a few examples getting harsh punishment.

We have cameras, drones, police departments equipped with military gear, and software to monitor and record electronic communications.

The only thing missing is political will to make it a priority.

Yes it's unfortunate no one wants to live in a police state.

You don't even need to make the punishment especially harsh.

What helps is to increase the likelihood you will actually get caught and face any consequence. It would be much better to reliably confiscate the cars of the people doing this than to randomly send a very small proportion of them to prison.

This is why I left the US. It’s actually way better out here.

Where? I think we’re all looking for an exit at this point

Not GP; but Scandinavia. I sadly had to give up my Norway residence attempt (by far the most appealing) for my current process in getting an Iceland residence permit, and ALL the times I've gone for tourism and culture - even for weeks at a time - it's not even close how much better it is. It has a culture you WANT to assimilate into, very high-trust and homogenous, almost all nation's pasts in Scandinavia are smooth enough to not disrupt modern society, very well-developed, tons of job opportunities in tech (and that's if you don't want to work remote), their structuration theory in politics is as reasonable as it is fair, lower populations, the list goes on.

It depends how you look at it. Lots of car drivers do break the law, redesigning the street to discourage driving with high speed is a good thing when you care about the safety of the ppl. Not just to stop those with high speed, but also to reduce the avg speed to give drivers more time to react. In this sense, if you put people safety as top concern, you help the masses(all the ppl are pedestrians at some point) by enforcing safe driving for the few that do drive with proper street design

But if we make it harder for motor vehicles to go over the speed limit, then we would also reduce the number of pedestrian and cyclist deaths as well. And it would mildly inconvenience those motorists who will gladly risk people outside their vehicle in order to save a few seconds. Is that the sort of tradeoff we want?

Roundabouts

I lived backing onto a roundabout for 10 years. Hoons would do massive donuts at speed, at all hours, often spearing off the road. One neighbour had cars through his fence twice, across from him had a retaining wall that took a few cars out. Opposite him there was a drop to some gated units, a car came through the roof of one of them.

Roundabouts are brilliant, but they don't stop maniac drivers showing off.

They don't stop completely but definitely reduce the amount of shitheads to almost zero. In Ireland idiots making donuts prefer supermarket parkings. And we are a country of roundabout dominance.

There are some non round roundabouts.

Like mini peanut shaped roundabouts[1].

[1]: http://www.swcivil.com.au/images/peanut-roundabout-warrnambo...

> but they don't stop maniac drivers showing off.

but they probably don't increase maniac drivers showing off either.

In my neighborhood, some a**.... did donuts in a regular four-way stop intersection. In a previous neighborhood, another a**.... burned rubber on a regular straigh road.

This website has done an amazing job of visually explaining what the solution is. The image comparisons are useful and the drone videos are super crisp. It's really impressive.

What?? Get plates, impound cars. This seems to be solvable without ruining roads for everybody else

Stolen cars, stolen plates, no plates. You're coming at this from the perspective of a law-follower.

I sure am! Didn't realize how much the crimes stacked up

Instead of enforcing the law against criminals, they propose to use criminality as a way to expand the war on cars. As a society, we need to stop the practice of punishing the masses for the sins of a few.

Ah. West Coast passive aggressiveness, ... can't arrest the people doing crimes, that would be too overt. Instead we need to make the road less safe so that they'll kill themselves and bystanders if they continue their activity, with a bonus of making the roads more irritating for everyone.

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