So Miss Laura Mulkey loses her life to someone texting while driving. Sorry.
It's going to happen more and more, regardless of how much we try to legislate it.
It's going to happen because we have a nation obsessed with cars, and we have a transportation secretary that thinks a two-day summit, followed by six months of review, followed by a report that everyone already knows the results, is going to solve the problem of distracted driving.
It won't. Sorry. Miss Laura is just one of the first of a million Americans that are going to lose their lives to other distracted drivers over the next two decades. Go ahead, pass a law mandating that we not drive with a cellularized telephone in our hands and we're going to do it anyway. Two hundred million of us drive 52 miles per hour down 25 limited residential streets...you're going to tell me that now, tomorrow, some new federal law banning texting while driving is really going to stop them? Please. It won't. The only way to stop it is to change American culture, to change their relationships with their public realms, their roadways. And we are not in any position to change our culture of feckless speed and wanton negligence towards others.
Deaths are expected. Laura's death was expected. She deserved it because this is the natural consequence of a culture of ignorance towards others and a culture of more, of now, of today. My death on Franklin Blvd. might be next, and if so, it wouldn't be surprising and would wholly be expected. This is simply the collateral damage of perpetual motoring.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
The Help
Very clearly, yesterday morning began the crush of Land Rovers, Acuras, Infinitis, Armadas and Audis on Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd., each one a carapace for a wealthy Christian and one or more children, shuttling them to the first day of Catholic high school for 2009.
I had mentioned before the odd spectacle of driving an expensive rig through a poor neighborhood, a vehicle whose value is equal to or in excess of the housal unit values it commutes by. A similar but opposite event occurs in the Laurel and Topanga Canyons in LA, where the help emerges at 5:00 PM to get themselves down to the bus stops to grind out transit commutes back to their own neighborhoods.
I am not making any claim that such wealth distributions are wrong or right. It just is. To me, it's fascinating to watch the march of wealthy whites through poor neighborhoods, and vice versa. Even I do it -- a white guy on his "expensive" Cannondale riding in a Huffy neighborhood. The difference in my case, however, is that for as much commuting as I do a quality bike is essential...a cheap bike cannot do; it would not survive the rigors of daily commuting. This is not an intentional public display of wealth, unlike these Christian Brothers parents.
My Franklin Monologues are all about our relationships with energy -- every post is a commentary on these relationships in a very real sense, although sometimes I stretch this idea some. However, there is stark correlation between these people and their public damning of the environment we all live in. They do not allow their children to bicycle to school. They do not give a damn about their vehicular efficiencies as is clearly evident. They think nothing of the damage their motoring through other communities causes, regardless of how much or how little charity exists. They think little of the air we all breathe, and fail to understand the lunacy of a world population allowed to consume the level of natural resources they themselves consume.
Obviously this applies to everyone, pious or otherwise, but these aren't the actions of a life of supposed humility, of respect for others, of respect for the world they share with others. This is a microcosm of the USA at large, a population of 305,000,000 who all think the same way, sharing a culture of excess and greed. If the supposed faithful of the most humble figurecan't won't follow the principles of compassion for the environment or for others, then what of the balance of America? Should we expect this of Muslims? Of Buddhists? Of Atheists? Doubtful.
Although I try to do what I can, I reserve no hope that we will ever willingly change our culture of excess and greed. That's why I'd like us to be forced to change unwillingly.
I had mentioned before the odd spectacle of driving an expensive rig through a poor neighborhood, a vehicle whose value is equal to or in excess of the housal unit values it commutes by. A similar but opposite event occurs in the Laurel and Topanga Canyons in LA, where the help emerges at 5:00 PM to get themselves down to the bus stops to grind out transit commutes back to their own neighborhoods.
I am not making any claim that such wealth distributions are wrong or right. It just is. To me, it's fascinating to watch the march of wealthy whites through poor neighborhoods, and vice versa. Even I do it -- a white guy on his "expensive" Cannondale riding in a Huffy neighborhood. The difference in my case, however, is that for as much commuting as I do a quality bike is essential...a cheap bike cannot do; it would not survive the rigors of daily commuting. This is not an intentional public display of wealth, unlike these Christian Brothers parents.
My Franklin Monologues are all about our relationships with energy -- every post is a commentary on these relationships in a very real sense, although sometimes I stretch this idea some. However, there is stark correlation between these people and their public damning of the environment we all live in. They do not allow their children to bicycle to school. They do not give a damn about their vehicular efficiencies as is clearly evident. They think nothing of the damage their motoring through other communities causes, regardless of how much or how little charity exists. They think little of the air we all breathe, and fail to understand the lunacy of a world population allowed to consume the level of natural resources they themselves consume.
Obviously this applies to everyone, pious or otherwise, but these aren't the actions of a life of supposed humility, of respect for others, of respect for the world they share with others. This is a microcosm of the USA at large, a population of 305,000,000 who all think the same way, sharing a culture of excess and greed. If the supposed faithful of the most humble figure
Although I try to do what I can, I reserve no hope that we will ever willingly change our culture of excess and greed. That's why I'd like us to be forced to change unwillingly.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Does Mayo Float?
I started work on a difficult puzzle the other night, Leonardo's Last Supper. I offer some interesting social commentary on how this puzzle came into my possession.
Last Saturday we took the boat to Old Sacramento with our neighbors, and while walking along Front street we dropped into a kite shop. They sell an eclectic mix of stuff, and among the kites and frisbees they carry a massive catalogue of puzzles. As I'm pondering a purchase, it was brought to my attention that "these are expensive...you should go to Target and see if you can get a better price."
Well, if that's the case, why not just raze Old Sacramento to the fucking ground and install a Target in its stead? How about a WalMart with an indoor McDonalds and a Pick-Up Stix and eliminate all the downtown restaurants? It certainly would be easier (read: cheaper) for the city to manage the permits and licensing of one business rather than sixty. How about a Costco! Wa-hey! Doesn't taking the boat out on a hot afternoon to enjoy the river and a Costco Hot Pocket for lunch sound appealing? I could bring home a five gallon bucket of mayonnaise while I'm at it. Doesn't mayonnaise float?
What are we willing to concede for the sake of saving a few bucks on a puzzle, huh? It's obvious that a mom and pop (literally, the owners are married) kite shop cannot compete with volume, with mass marketing, with the ability to purchase 32,400 puzzles at a crack from a manufacturer in Busan, Korea and receive a deep discount for being such an important customer. Are we really willing to destroy every last independent retailer for warehouse bargains? To save a nickel, but to spend that nickel on even more cheap merchandise?
It turns out my neighbors had the exact same Last Supper puzzle at home already. They were willing to let me start it. I will likely finish it, too. The kite shop didn't get my business that day, but seemingly they should never get my business, or yours, as price is the only arbiter of value in our society.
Last Saturday we took the boat to Old Sacramento with our neighbors, and while walking along Front street we dropped into a kite shop. They sell an eclectic mix of stuff, and among the kites and frisbees they carry a massive catalogue of puzzles. As I'm pondering a purchase, it was brought to my attention that "these are expensive...you should go to Target and see if you can get a better price."
Well, if that's the case, why not just raze Old Sacramento to the fucking ground and install a Target in its stead? How about a WalMart with an indoor McDonalds and a Pick-Up Stix and eliminate all the downtown restaurants? It certainly would be easier (read: cheaper) for the city to manage the permits and licensing of one business rather than sixty. How about a Costco! Wa-hey! Doesn't taking the boat out on a hot afternoon to enjoy the river and a Costco Hot Pocket for lunch sound appealing? I could bring home a five gallon bucket of mayonnaise while I'm at it. Doesn't mayonnaise float?
What are we willing to concede for the sake of saving a few bucks on a puzzle, huh? It's obvious that a mom and pop (literally, the owners are married) kite shop cannot compete with volume, with mass marketing, with the ability to purchase 32,400 puzzles at a crack from a manufacturer in Busan, Korea and receive a deep discount for being such an important customer. Are we really willing to destroy every last independent retailer for warehouse bargains? To save a nickel, but to spend that nickel on even more cheap merchandise?
It turns out my neighbors had the exact same Last Supper puzzle at home already. They were willing to let me start it. I will likely finish it, too. The kite shop didn't get my business that day, but seemingly they should never get my business, or yours, as price is the only arbiter of value in our society.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Recession's Over!
I'll be looking toward the September new car sales figures here in another two weeks or so. I'm wondering if the August Cash for Clunkers has convinced several hundred thousand more Americans to perpetuate their new car debts this month...and next month...and the month after that. Are we back above the 11,000,000 new car sales threshold that Detroit needs to stay alive?
We might be. There is no finer sensitivity to the number of cars on Franklin Blvd. than by risking your life and riding your bicycle down it, and I'm not just finding the typical increase due to our kids returning to school -- there is a noticeable increase above and beyond just shuttling kids who should be walking or riding their own bikes. No, this measurement is an indicator of the state of the Elk Grovian Way Of Life -- the more we motor, the better our economy must be.
So my Franklin Blvd. is the arbiter of our economic state -- the increase in traffic is signaling that our recession is over!
With an improving jobs market or whatever is driving more people to be driving, out come the alpha males at Franklin and Consumnes River Blvd., driving their SUVs down the bicycle lane and pretending to make a right turn on red, only to gun it at the green and beat the stack of cars behind them:
During our recession, this dangerous activity was absent. My guess is that these people are as much assholes at work as well as on our public roads, and so as jobs are shed they are the first to be culled.
I did not witness this illegal, dangerous maneuver during the last twelve months, but it's coming back. It's a sign that our recession must be over. In that respect, I hope these green shoots of recovery are only that -- my hope is that our recession hangs on for years to come, if only to keep these drivers off the road.
We might be. There is no finer sensitivity to the number of cars on Franklin Blvd. than by risking your life and riding your bicycle down it, and I'm not just finding the typical increase due to our kids returning to school -- there is a noticeable increase above and beyond just shuttling kids who should be walking or riding their own bikes. No, this measurement is an indicator of the state of the Elk Grovian Way Of Life -- the more we motor, the better our economy must be.
So my Franklin Blvd. is the arbiter of our economic state -- the increase in traffic is signaling that our recession is over!
With an improving jobs market or whatever is driving more people to be driving, out come the alpha males at Franklin and Consumnes River Blvd., driving their SUVs down the bicycle lane and pretending to make a right turn on red, only to gun it at the green and beat the stack of cars behind them:
During our recession, this dangerous activity was absent. My guess is that these people are as much assholes at work as well as on our public roads, and so as jobs are shed they are the first to be culled.
I did not witness this illegal, dangerous maneuver during the last twelve months, but it's coming back. It's a sign that our recession must be over. In that respect, I hope these green shoots of recovery are only that -- my hope is that our recession hangs on for years to come, if only to keep these drivers off the road.
Parking is King
My guess is that the Sacramento Kings, if we are to have a professional team going forward, will find themselves at Cal Expo instead of the downtown railyards.
I am amazed, really, that the existing arena, built in 1988, is now unsuitable. Another example of how we build things that are not expected to last beyond thirty years. Apparently this arena is now unsuitable to even host a collegiate tournament. I wonder why. The thing seems plenty good to me, an observation from someone who's attended events there at least four dozen times. And with this last rejection by the NCAA, there isn't one concrete reason why this place is unsuitable listed in our local media, other than "it's the oldest in the NBA."
So we either have some bad reporting across the board or the reasons for unsuitability are utter bullshit. I'd take the latter. Let me guess, let me take a crack at some of the supposed reasons:
Nope. It's not that beer is $8, or that a hot dog is $6, or that to park costs $12; no, these prices will only be raised at any new arena. It's not that it's the smallest venue in the NBA -- somebody has to be the smallest!
Regardless of the supposed faults with the arena, I think the Cal Expo site will be preferred by the owners over the railyards precisely because light rail has no plans to run anywhere near Cal Expo over the next two decades, while it might actually get built through the railyards. Think of all that lost private parking revenue for the owners if horrors! people chose to use public transit to get to a publically funded venue. Instead, place it a good mile and a half away from any rail options. I trust my own intuition that the maximization of private profit over the public benefits of a well-placed venue will reign true.
I am amazed, really, that the existing arena, built in 1988, is now unsuitable. Another example of how we build things that are not expected to last beyond thirty years. Apparently this arena is now unsuitable to even host a collegiate tournament. I wonder why. The thing seems plenty good to me, an observation from someone who's attended events there at least four dozen times. And with this last rejection by the NCAA, there isn't one concrete reason why this place is unsuitable listed in our local media, other than "it's the oldest in the NBA."
So we either have some bad reporting across the board or the reasons for unsuitability are utter bullshit. I'd take the latter. Let me guess, let me take a crack at some of the supposed reasons:
- The ramps leading up to the entrances aren't at the 4.8% grade now recommended by the ADA instead of the current 5.2%;
- The ratio between luxury suites and club seats is non-optimal;
- A luxury suite sitter has to pedestrianate through three sections of "the commoners" to reach the exits, a wholly non-luxurious condition;
- For that matter, a luxury suite attendee has to pedestrinate upwards of three hundred meters from the valet parking to his seat.
- The scoreboard isn't displayed in HD 1080p format.
Nope. It's not that beer is $8, or that a hot dog is $6, or that to park costs $12; no, these prices will only be raised at any new arena. It's not that it's the smallest venue in the NBA -- somebody has to be the smallest!
Regardless of the supposed faults with the arena, I think the Cal Expo site will be preferred by the owners over the railyards precisely because light rail has no plans to run anywhere near Cal Expo over the next two decades, while it might actually get built through the railyards. Think of all that lost private parking revenue for the owners if horrors! people chose to use public transit to get to a publically funded venue. Instead, place it a good mile and a half away from any rail options. I trust my own intuition that the maximization of private profit over the public benefits of a well-placed venue will reign true.
Our Old Towns
I put the boat into Miller Park today to spend time on the Sacramento river. Nice way to keep cool on this near record hot day. We took advantage of the subsidized parking at the Old Sacramento public dock and ate lunch at Hot & Spicy, blowing one bill and pumping cash back into the local economy at a local eatery.
This part of Sacramento is very nearly the only part in the whole county that is designed in a traditional urban layout. What is it about this that attracts me, vs. Old Town Elk Grove:
First and foremost, the lack of enclosure in Old Town Elk Grove. And by that I mean buildings that form an enclosure around me, the pedestrian. I wouldn't have much business to conduct with second or third story tenants but that isn't my point; my point is, I feel more comfortable in an enclosed outdoor setting. Elk Grove feels rather like walking across a soccer field to the next business, and without a population density that puts people on the street, that soccer field is empty.
There is no way these newly planted trees are going to compensate for that lack of enclosure because these trees were planted haphazardly -- there is no uniformity, no formality, no likelihood of them overarching the future street forming a canopy. Elk Grove is a hundred degrees five months out of the year! Old SACTOWN doesn't employ many trees, either, but their pedestrians are sheltered from the elements. Even on a scorching day you don't feel like you're trying to cross the Venusian equator. The buildings themselves provide that enclosure. There is a continuity to the buildings while each is unique. That's the problem with Elk Grove -- our building codes say everything about what you can't build but give no guidance on what ought to be built; hence, a hodgepodge of styles and sizes and parking lots in between sections and overall disharmony...even though Old Elk Grove is designated a Special Planning Area! The code offers guidelines for what to do, but yet? Doesn't that make you wonder about the planning area in which you live? It ain't special, that's for damn sure.
I also think that Elk Grove Blvd., with its 5,000 daily thru commuters, doesn't help things. But compare this to Livermore's 1st street -- even though that thing is brutalized by thru commuters taking the shortcut from Tracy to Freemont, there remains a degree of livelihood on its margins. Parallel parking provides pedestrians a physical buffer from traffic and there is a substantial volume of parking on the street (although as you're endlessly circling around looking for one on a Friday night you wouldn't think that). It not only offers a place to park but the sheer volume of parked cars slows down all those irritable thru commuters. A thousand slant parking spots means there are a thousand potential cars pulling out and drivers have no choice but to slow down. Old Sacramento is not on an expressway, not on a thoroughfare, and not on a commuter freeway. Speeding to get to the dry cleaners before closing time doesn't happen there but it happens all the time on Elk Grove Blvd., and with a city mandate to ensure that the comfort and ease of vehicular transport trumps everything else, well...I'm not thinking, living, and shopping Elk Grove...
This part of Sacramento is very nearly the only part in the whole county that is designed in a traditional urban layout. What is it about this that attracts me, vs. Old Town Elk Grove:
First and foremost, the lack of enclosure in Old Town Elk Grove. And by that I mean buildings that form an enclosure around me, the pedestrian. I wouldn't have much business to conduct with second or third story tenants but that isn't my point; my point is, I feel more comfortable in an enclosed outdoor setting. Elk Grove feels rather like walking across a soccer field to the next business, and without a population density that puts people on the street, that soccer field is empty.
There is no way these newly planted trees are going to compensate for that lack of enclosure because these trees were planted haphazardly -- there is no uniformity, no formality, no likelihood of them overarching the future street forming a canopy. Elk Grove is a hundred degrees five months out of the year! Old SACTOWN doesn't employ many trees, either, but their pedestrians are sheltered from the elements. Even on a scorching day you don't feel like you're trying to cross the Venusian equator. The buildings themselves provide that enclosure. There is a continuity to the buildings while each is unique. That's the problem with Elk Grove -- our building codes say everything about what you can't build but give no guidance on what ought to be built; hence, a hodgepodge of styles and sizes and parking lots in between sections and overall disharmony...even though Old Elk Grove is designated a Special Planning Area! The code offers guidelines for what to do, but yet? Doesn't that make you wonder about the planning area in which you live? It ain't special, that's for damn sure.
I also think that Elk Grove Blvd., with its 5,000 daily thru commuters, doesn't help things. But compare this to Livermore's 1st street -- even though that thing is brutalized by thru commuters taking the shortcut from Tracy to Freemont, there remains a degree of livelihood on its margins. Parallel parking provides pedestrians a physical buffer from traffic and there is a substantial volume of parking on the street (although as you're endlessly circling around looking for one on a Friday night you wouldn't think that). It not only offers a place to park but the sheer volume of parked cars slows down all those irritable thru commuters. A thousand slant parking spots means there are a thousand potential cars pulling out and drivers have no choice but to slow down. Old Sacramento is not on an expressway, not on a thoroughfare, and not on a commuter freeway. Speeding to get to the dry cleaners before closing time doesn't happen there but it happens all the time on Elk Grove Blvd., and with a city mandate to ensure that the comfort and ease of vehicular transport trumps everything else, well...I'm not thinking, living, and shopping Elk Grove...
Friday, September 25, 2009
Gone Solar
A few fascinating solar power gems shine through in a recent Sacramento Bee article on Solar Power, Inc., a Roseville solar power company, how they are about to gross $50 million from a new solar PV installation.
The first gem is that the installation will be done eight thousand miles eastward, in Germany. Not anywhere near Roseville, not anywhere near the U.S. Of course, that should be expected in a nation unable to develop a coherent alternative energy policy, or for that matter, a coherent traditional energy policy. Next year we'll have different rules and different subsidies and the year after that we'll have a different Congress that'll scrap the programs with absolutely no continuity to get alternative energy built here on any meaningful scale.
The second gem is that the manufacturing will be done eight thousand miles westward, in China. Not anywhere near Roseville, not anywhere near the U.S. Of course, that should be expected in a nation unable to compete in the manufacturing sector.
How long do you suppose China will tolerate a solar company in the U.S. brokering deals between themselves and Germany, the two nations that 1) produce the most PV and 2) consume the most PV? What could a Roseville firm possibly provide that the Chinese or the Germans won't also be able to do in a few years time? The engineering? The financing? The marketing? The brokering? The installation? The project management? All of these things will soon be outsourced.
See, this is our role in the globalized world -- to manage the financial affairs of others while raking in money off the top, to broker the sales of goods manufactured by others to others while extracting more money off the top, and to spend that money buying cheap shit produced by foreign workers. That's a pretty good racket, wouldn't you say?
I can't imagine a scenario in the future where the Chinese won't just leapfrog right over the U.S. alternative power sector. PV from Shenzhen. Wind turbines from Hangzhou. Instead of a $750 165W solar panel from a U.S. based manufacturing facility in China, the Chinese are going to mass produce low quality $340 167W panels from their future locally owned plants and U.S. consumers are going to swallow them up, like they swallow up all those other cheap Chinese made products. Price is all that matters to us consumers. Our fledgling solar industry won't ever get off the ground. It will have gone to China.
The first gem is that the installation will be done eight thousand miles eastward, in Germany. Not anywhere near Roseville, not anywhere near the U.S. Of course, that should be expected in a nation unable to develop a coherent alternative energy policy, or for that matter, a coherent traditional energy policy. Next year we'll have different rules and different subsidies and the year after that we'll have a different Congress that'll scrap the programs with absolutely no continuity to get alternative energy built here on any meaningful scale.
The second gem is that the manufacturing will be done eight thousand miles westward, in China. Not anywhere near Roseville, not anywhere near the U.S. Of course, that should be expected in a nation unable to compete in the manufacturing sector.
How long do you suppose China will tolerate a solar company in the U.S. brokering deals between themselves and Germany, the two nations that 1) produce the most PV and 2) consume the most PV? What could a Roseville firm possibly provide that the Chinese or the Germans won't also be able to do in a few years time? The engineering? The financing? The marketing? The brokering? The installation? The project management? All of these things will soon be outsourced.
See, this is our role in the globalized world -- to manage the financial affairs of others while raking in money off the top, to broker the sales of goods manufactured by others to others while extracting more money off the top, and to spend that money buying cheap shit produced by foreign workers. That's a pretty good racket, wouldn't you say?
I can't imagine a scenario in the future where the Chinese won't just leapfrog right over the U.S. alternative power sector. PV from Shenzhen. Wind turbines from Hangzhou. Instead of a $750 165W solar panel from a U.S. based manufacturing facility in China, the Chinese are going to mass produce low quality $340 167W panels from their future locally owned plants and U.S. consumers are going to swallow them up, like they swallow up all those other cheap Chinese made products. Price is all that matters to us consumers. Our fledgling solar industry won't ever get off the ground. It will have gone to China.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Landscrapers
Each Monday morning I mount the bike to commute to work. Regardless of my actions over the weekend, I get on the bike and slog out an hour's worth of exercise, setting the stage for the week.
Each Monday the Franklin Blvd. landscaping crews are already out, and they post their sign near where I board Franklin:
I believe they are missing an "R" in the word landscapers -- It should read "Landscrapers Ahead," because for the next five miles landscrapers are the only things on either side of the boulevard. Miles of suburban sprawl in both directions, sprawl that had scraped the land from any previous agriculture or open space value. No more migratory birds. No more burrowing owls. No more Elk, and no more Groves. Franklin Blvd. runs down the middle of former ag land that had no trees, no boulders, no hills and no major creeks or rivers -- it was a developer's paradise. Instead of building up (skyscrapers) we built out (landscrapers).
My few visits to Western Europe made it clear that they have preserved their countryside while at the same time expanded their populations. Even while America stayed busy bulldozing ever larger swaths of land for collector roads and low density suburban living, Europe found ways to build cities that built up and out, instead of just out...the consequence of which preserves their surrounding lands as rural.
Perhaps Americans never learned to do this because our cities were built at roughly the same time as industrialization, and our initial suburban build-outs were intended to get people away from the industries that plagued the cities. European cities were developed centuries before, and so were better established with compact living arrangements that remain to this day, arrangements that need much less external energy to sustain.
I don't really know the true causes of suburbanization; I wasn't around when this shit started. But I'm currently living in the suburban peak, and what I do know is that our landscrapers require an immense volume of energy to build, to maintain, and to live in. The energy used to perpetually motor the kids to school ('cause it's too far to walk and too dangerous in any event), to perpetually motor to work ('cause we separate land uses), and to perpetually motor for recreation ('cause our cities are so fucking boring that we holiday at theme parks) is stunning. Every Monday morning, the landscaping crew drives in from elsewheres and mows the Franklin grass using heroic volumes of energy. There are dozens of miles of collector road grass strips in this city that have to be serviced...these are our public realms...the realms that the public doesn't even use. They only see it as they drive by. What, you think some family's gonna picnic on the grassy berm next to all that commuter traffic?
The grass is mowed and no one uses it.
Each Monday the Franklin Blvd. landscaping crews are already out, and they post their sign near where I board Franklin:
I believe they are missing an "R" in the word landscapers -- It should read "Landscrapers Ahead," because for the next five miles landscrapers are the only things on either side of the boulevard. Miles of suburban sprawl in both directions, sprawl that had scraped the land from any previous agriculture or open space value. No more migratory birds. No more burrowing owls. No more Elk, and no more Groves. Franklin Blvd. runs down the middle of former ag land that had no trees, no boulders, no hills and no major creeks or rivers -- it was a developer's paradise. Instead of building up (skyscrapers) we built out (landscrapers).
My few visits to Western Europe made it clear that they have preserved their countryside while at the same time expanded their populations. Even while America stayed busy bulldozing ever larger swaths of land for collector roads and low density suburban living, Europe found ways to build cities that built up and out, instead of just out...the consequence of which preserves their surrounding lands as rural.
Perhaps Americans never learned to do this because our cities were built at roughly the same time as industrialization, and our initial suburban build-outs were intended to get people away from the industries that plagued the cities. European cities were developed centuries before, and so were better established with compact living arrangements that remain to this day, arrangements that need much less external energy to sustain.
I don't really know the true causes of suburbanization; I wasn't around when this shit started. But I'm currently living in the suburban peak, and what I do know is that our landscrapers require an immense volume of energy to build, to maintain, and to live in. The energy used to perpetually motor the kids to school ('cause it's too far to walk and too dangerous in any event), to perpetually motor to work ('cause we separate land uses), and to perpetually motor for recreation ('cause our cities are so fucking boring that we holiday at theme parks) is stunning. Every Monday morning, the landscaping crew drives in from elsewheres and mows the Franklin grass using heroic volumes of energy. There are dozens of miles of collector road grass strips in this city that have to be serviced...these are our public realms...the realms that the public doesn't even use. They only see it as they drive by. What, you think some family's gonna picnic on the grassy berm next to all that commuter traffic?
The grass is mowed and no one uses it.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Jaws Of Life
A KCRA news item this evening showed how a local city is training their fire department how to use the Jaws Of Life. Apparently, new steel construction and new crash technologies, while saving lives, are also making it harder to extract all those dumbass drivers from their wrecks:
I find it highly ironic that the same fire departments responsible for extracting these people from their crumpled vehicles are the ones enabling people to speed through residential neighborhoods because their fire trucks can't handle some "traffic calming" bumps in the road. Highly ironic.
The training includes how to extract people from hybrids...apparently jawing through the wiring in these vehicles poses a problem for rescuer safety. They'd better get used to it, because we are migrating to hybrid and all electric vehicles faster than you can say Jack Robinson.
All electric vehicles could have been put into service three decades ago, but our NASCAR loving constituency demands power...demands performance...demands acceleration. Yes...these demands will be met with hundreds of thousands of annual calls for the Jaws Of Life to rescue these dumbshits after plowing into trees around residential street corners, or after flipping over while changing lanes on the freeways...in hybrids, in Volts, or in 1984 Plymouth Horizons (my favorite car, by the way).
Boy, I had better sharpen my own driving skills so I don't end up becoming one of these dumbshits myself, eh?
You really think that 40% of our population is going to go out and buy electric cars over the next few years when the price is roughly the same as a new Mercedes? Please. It'll be gasoline power, baby, and that power will push us into 41,000 new deaths each year unthinkingly.
I find it highly ironic that the same fire departments responsible for extracting these people from their crumpled vehicles are the ones enabling people to speed through residential neighborhoods because their fire trucks can't handle some "traffic calming" bumps in the road. Highly ironic.
The training includes how to extract people from hybrids...apparently jawing through the wiring in these vehicles poses a problem for rescuer safety. They'd better get used to it, because we are migrating to hybrid and all electric vehicles faster than you can say Jack Robinson.
All electric vehicles could have been put into service three decades ago, but our NASCAR loving constituency demands power...demands performance...demands acceleration. Yes...these demands will be met with hundreds of thousands of annual calls for the Jaws Of Life to rescue these dumbshits after plowing into trees around residential street corners, or after flipping over while changing lanes on the freeways...in hybrids, in Volts, or in 1984 Plymouth Horizons (my favorite car, by the way).
Boy, I had better sharpen my own driving skills so I don't end up becoming one of these dumbshits myself, eh?
You really think that 40% of our population is going to go out and buy electric cars over the next few years when the price is roughly the same as a new Mercedes? Please. It'll be gasoline power, baby, and that power will push us into 41,000 new deaths each year unthinkingly.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
The Validator
I was a fare jumper today:
No, I didn't physically jump a turnstile, but I did board Sacramento RTs light rail this morning without paying for a ticket. I jumped the fare. It's not the first time I've done it and it won't be the last and I freely admit to doing it...but I'm wondering...should I feel guilty about it?
Here's how to do it: I stick my one-way ticket into the station validator at, say, 6:15AM. It's good for two hours on light rail, good until 8:15AM. However, my ride to work lasts a whole 14 minutes, so at 6:29AM I depart the train but I [accidentally] leave my ticket on the validator machine on my way out. Someone else comes along, ready to validate their own ticket, but finds mine and wa-hey! -- a free ride. The only way for me to take advantage of this is for others to do the same. And they do.
So...this morning I spied two two! still-valid tickets lying on the machine at the 8th and O Station and I snagged one. I walked to the Archives Plaza Station, boarded the train, and got to work at the same price as it used to cost me before September 1st. Unfortunately, I [accidentally] lost that ticket somewhere near the 59th street station. Somewhere near the validator, I think. Pity.
I will tell you -- there are more of these valid tickets left on the validator machines, now more than ever -- now that riders have been fucked over by the decision to eliminate the RT transfer on September 1st, a decision that doubled the cost of my transit. I believe it is against the spirit of the law to [find and use] an unexpired fare, but I nonetheless boarded the train with a legal and valid pass.
My first question I ask again -- should I feel guilty about it? You would think that someone who blogs about bad urban design and the underwhelming nature of Sacramento county transit would never even consider stealing a transit ride. You would think that the more I do this the more transit becomes a less viable mode of transportation.
You would think that.
Until, of course, you understand that the subsidization of transit is totally and completely dwarfed by the subsidization we endure to enable the private automobile. We spend trillions of federal, state, and local tax dollars to build and expand roadways to enable Easy Motoring For Everyone while the actual use taxes don't even come close to shouldering a fraction of the total burden. Seeing how my effective tax rate is 16%, I think I pay more than enough for the road capacity upgrades that I don't use by bicycling and using transit but I still pay for regardless. Transit funding has never been about a lack of resources; it never has -- it has only ever been about the failure to allocate resources to transit instead of private transportation.
So I will rationalize my stealing, and I won't feel guilty about it. Catch me if you can.
No, I didn't physically jump a turnstile, but I did board Sacramento RTs light rail this morning without paying for a ticket. I jumped the fare. It's not the first time I've done it and it won't be the last and I freely admit to doing it...but I'm wondering...should I feel guilty about it?
Here's how to do it: I stick my one-way ticket into the station validator at, say, 6:15AM. It's good for two hours on light rail, good until 8:15AM. However, my ride to work lasts a whole 14 minutes, so at 6:29AM I depart the train but I [accidentally] leave my ticket on the validator machine on my way out. Someone else comes along, ready to validate their own ticket, but finds mine and wa-hey! -- a free ride. The only way for me to take advantage of this is for others to do the same. And they do.
So...this morning I spied two two! still-valid tickets lying on the machine at the 8th and O Station and I snagged one. I walked to the Archives Plaza Station, boarded the train, and got to work at the same price as it used to cost me before September 1st. Unfortunately, I [accidentally] lost that ticket somewhere near the 59th street station. Somewhere near the validator, I think. Pity.
I will tell you -- there are more of these valid tickets left on the validator machines, now more than ever -- now that riders have been fucked over by the decision to eliminate the RT transfer on September 1st, a decision that doubled the cost of my transit. I believe it is against the spirit of the law to [find and use] an unexpired fare, but I nonetheless boarded the train with a legal and valid pass.
My first question I ask again -- should I feel guilty about it? You would think that someone who blogs about bad urban design and the underwhelming nature of Sacramento county transit would never even consider stealing a transit ride. You would think that the more I do this the more transit becomes a less viable mode of transportation.
You would think that.
Until, of course, you understand that the subsidization of transit is totally and completely dwarfed by the subsidization we endure to enable the private automobile. We spend trillions of federal, state, and local tax dollars to build and expand roadways to enable Easy Motoring For Everyone while the actual use taxes don't even come close to shouldering a fraction of the total burden. Seeing how my effective tax rate is 16%, I think I pay more than enough for the road capacity upgrades that I don't use by bicycling and using transit but I still pay for regardless. Transit funding has never been about a lack of resources; it never has -- it has only ever been about the failure to allocate resources to transit instead of private transportation.
So I will rationalize my stealing, and I won't feel guilty about it. Catch me if you can.
Alpha Male
On the very same 41st Avenue that "connects communities," I stopped today for all of 2 1/2 minutes to take pictures of a speed bump. One would think that a speed bump ought be designed to actually slow down dumbass South Sacramentans.
The speeders are predominately brown. I just calls it likes I sees it. Call it stereotyping, call it racist, call it whatever you want, but brown alpha males are speeding through these neighborhoods all the time:
Look at these two, going 40 miles an hour down the middle of the road, and then think of all those dumbass "traffic calming planners" who, for the sake of FIRE TRUCK INGRESS, allowed these spaces so that anyone could easily navigate the street at 60 mph with one finger on the steering wheel.
Here's something to consider -- for all the people who navigate over the bump, they almost all do so at speeds well in excess of 15 mph. So, what's the problem with a fire truck doing the same thing? What, the truck's gonna get hurt taking a bump at 25 mph? Firemen gonna get boo-boos banging around inside the cab? Christ! Cars do it all the fucking time!
Of course, I'm sure the fire department has conducted all sorts of analyses why speed bumps are bad. Maybe firemen are thrown off the back. Maybe the drivers lose control. Maybe response times are reduced by a few seconds. Maybe.
Maybe it's utter bullshit, too.
What is interesting, and I find it highly interesting, is that the local residents, so pissed off at the wanton ineffectiveness of these bumps and believing for themselves that it's utter bullshit, actually laid their own asphalt in the grooves in the summer of 2007 because their citycouldn't wouldn't design an effective calming device. The bad news is that their asphalt lasted no more than two months before being worn down by all those drivers, like the driver above, who drove directly over them. In my mind it was a noble effort by citizens to suppress the actions of assholes that our local governments are unwilling to suppress.
Look! There goes another one right now, traveling, of course, at the suggested speed of 15 mph.
If you can't stop 'em, join 'em.
The speeders are predominately brown. I just calls it likes I sees it. Call it stereotyping, call it racist, call it whatever you want, but brown alpha males are speeding through these neighborhoods all the time:
Look at these two, going 40 miles an hour down the middle of the road, and then think of all those dumbass "traffic calming planners" who, for the sake of FIRE TRUCK INGRESS, allowed these spaces so that anyone could easily navigate the street at 60 mph with one finger on the steering wheel.
Here's something to consider -- for all the people who navigate over the bump, they almost all do so at speeds well in excess of 15 mph. So, what's the problem with a fire truck doing the same thing? What, the truck's gonna get hurt taking a bump at 25 mph? Firemen gonna get boo-boos banging around inside the cab? Christ! Cars do it all the fucking time!
Of course, I'm sure the fire department has conducted all sorts of analyses why speed bumps are bad. Maybe firemen are thrown off the back. Maybe the drivers lose control. Maybe response times are reduced by a few seconds. Maybe.
Maybe it's utter bullshit, too.
What is interesting, and I find it highly interesting, is that the local residents, so pissed off at the wanton ineffectiveness of these bumps and believing for themselves that it's utter bullshit, actually laid their own asphalt in the grooves in the summer of 2007 because their city
Look! There goes another one right now, traveling, of course, at the suggested speed of 15 mph.
If you can't stop 'em, join 'em.
Freeway Revolts
Between Franklin Blvd. and MLK Jr Blvd. I ride my bike along 41st Avenue to cross over Highway 99. 41st is one of the few streets that connect the two sides of South Sacramento that was filleted in half like a salmon in the early 1960's in the name of progress. Call it poetic justice that Highway 99's expansion to allow early white Elk Grovians easy motoring through poor, brown South Sacramento has given way to discussions on the future Capitol Southeast Connector that will slice east Elk Grove in half with 22,000 cars per day. You know what? Fuck 'em -- they get what's due them for sixty years of commuting through other "communities" of Sacramento County. Sorry if their bucolic acres will abut the sound walls of a freeway or six-lane expressway -- they've done the same damn thing to others for sixty years because Elk Grove has no jobs of its own.
But wait! East Elk Grove is wealthy! And connected! And organized! Those non-wealthy disorganized politically disconnected brown Sacramentans, well, they can always move if they don't want to hear the din of the freeway but East Elk Grove is different! It's special! It's a beautiful "community" that provides boundless enjoyment for its residents! To route a freeway through this community would be tantamount to original sin!
The website for this project has an absolutely fantastic tag line -- Connecting Communities. Yes, it will! It will allow for the easy connection of housal unit 6 on the future Dunmore Homes tract 27 off Kammerer Rd. to commercial unit twelve in the future Quail Hollow Crossings strip retail plaza in Folsom, some twenty seven miles distant. Yep. This sounds exactly like connecting communities to me.
What? What's that I hear? There's a freeway revolt? Some people don't want this connector? What the fuck is wrong with them? Don't they know they are standing in the way of PROGRESS? Don't they know that adding new road capacity always adds value to the communities that it touches? What is wrong with these people!
But wait! East Elk Grove is wealthy! And connected! And organized! Those non-wealthy disorganized politically disconnected brown Sacramentans, well, they can always move if they don't want to hear the din of the freeway but East Elk Grove is different! It's special! It's a beautiful "community" that provides boundless enjoyment for its residents! To route a freeway through this community would be tantamount to original sin!
The website for this project has an absolutely fantastic tag line -- Connecting Communities. Yes, it will! It will allow for the easy connection of housal unit 6 on the future Dunmore Homes tract 27 off Kammerer Rd. to commercial unit twelve in the future Quail Hollow Crossings strip retail plaza in Folsom, some twenty seven miles distant. Yep. This sounds exactly like connecting communities to me.
What? What's that I hear? There's a freeway revolt? Some people don't want this connector? What the fuck is wrong with them? Don't they know they are standing in the way of PROGRESS? Don't they know that adding new road capacity always adds value to the communities that it touches? What is wrong with these people!
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Circle Jerks
I rode the bicycle yesterday from work to my in-laws, who live on a South Sacramento corner that was recently converted from a four-way stop to a traffic circle:
This thing does absolutely nothing to slow down traffic. The four stop signs as you approach it are often ignored. Particularly, alpha male jackoffs in light trucks are the worst offenders, but really, almost everyone navigates this thing dangerously.
Standing on my in-law's lawn for ten minutes was all it took. That corner is brutalized by speeders. There were very nearly two accidents, both of which were caused by two single brown guys in their Chevy trucks, both failing to stop before entering the circle. My question is, why is my country filled with these dumbshits?
It's probably because we heavily subsidize our roadways...more than any other thing we subsidize. It's a "free good," and people will always take advantage of these. If gasoline were correctly priced at $8 a gallon to reflect the true cost of our roadways instead of funding it from general taxation, people wouldn't find it acceptable to dangerously accelerate around a traffic circle, even Hispanic male South Sacramentans. It would be too expensive to buy power, and too expensive to waste gas accelerating. If their daughters had to ride their bikes to school because it's too costly to shuttle them everywhere, perhaps these assholes would become civilized people; perhaps they'd be unwilling to tolerate others from doing the same thing they are currently doing.
In all four directions away from this traffic circle, each of these streets carry their own "traffic calming" speed bumps.
But these are totally useless. We allow spaces to accommodate the wheelbase of fire trucks and buses and cars simply weave through them, and in most cases around Elk Grove and Sacramento, the spaces are sufficiently narrow enough to allow a car to miss the bumps completely, allowing every 60 mph speed racer to drive right down the middle of the street. This is another case of why, in my opinion, "fire safety" is a load of horseshit relative to the degradation of "life safety" because we refuse to build traffic calming devices that are truly effective in slowing down traffic. Let's continue the stupid policy of letting firemen respond quickly to traffic accidents, accidents enabled by the fire departments themselves. Talk about job security!
Yet truthfully, no amount of calming will work so long as my nation remains filled with circle jerks. We have to fix them first. We deserve our 41,000 traffic deaths and 2,490,000 injuries per year; we deserve them because of our public policies of purposely enabling people to turn into dumbshit drivers, willing to navigate residential traffic circles like their NASCAR heroes.
I say we deserve these, and I'm absolutely resolute in that statement. Until we address our culture of speed and stupidity, and there's no indication we will ever willingly do that, we get what we deserve.
This thing does absolutely nothing to slow down traffic. The four stop signs as you approach it are often ignored. Particularly, alpha male jackoffs in light trucks are the worst offenders, but really, almost everyone navigates this thing dangerously.
Standing on my in-law's lawn for ten minutes was all it took. That corner is brutalized by speeders. There were very nearly two accidents, both of which were caused by two single brown guys in their Chevy trucks, both failing to stop before entering the circle. My question is, why is my country filled with these dumbshits?
It's probably because we heavily subsidize our roadways...more than any other thing we subsidize. It's a "free good," and people will always take advantage of these. If gasoline were correctly priced at $8 a gallon to reflect the true cost of our roadways instead of funding it from general taxation, people wouldn't find it acceptable to dangerously accelerate around a traffic circle, even Hispanic male South Sacramentans. It would be too expensive to buy power, and too expensive to waste gas accelerating. If their daughters had to ride their bikes to school because it's too costly to shuttle them everywhere, perhaps these assholes would become civilized people; perhaps they'd be unwilling to tolerate others from doing the same thing they are currently doing.
In all four directions away from this traffic circle, each of these streets carry their own "traffic calming" speed bumps.
But these are totally useless. We allow spaces to accommodate the wheelbase of fire trucks and buses and cars simply weave through them, and in most cases around Elk Grove and Sacramento, the spaces are sufficiently narrow enough to allow a car to miss the bumps completely, allowing every 60 mph speed racer to drive right down the middle of the street. This is another case of why, in my opinion, "fire safety" is a load of horseshit relative to the degradation of "life safety" because we refuse to build traffic calming devices that are truly effective in slowing down traffic. Let's continue the stupid policy of letting firemen respond quickly to traffic accidents, accidents enabled by the fire departments themselves. Talk about job security!
Yet truthfully, no amount of calming will work so long as my nation remains filled with circle jerks. We have to fix them first. We deserve our 41,000 traffic deaths and 2,490,000 injuries per year; we deserve them because of our public policies of purposely enabling people to turn into dumbshit drivers, willing to navigate residential traffic circles like their NASCAR heroes.
I say we deserve these, and I'm absolutely resolute in that statement. Until we address our culture of speed and stupidity, and there's no indication we will ever willingly do that, we get what we deserve.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Shi Thead
Yesterday's bike commute into work was pleasant. I passed cars stacked three light cycles deep on Franklin and Consumnes River Blvd. It was equally pleasant to stand on the 59th street overcrossing to witness an absolute logjam of cars on westbound Highway 50. I got caught by a nice old lady on that bridge.
Note: Image is typical congestion and does not necessarily represent my exact overcrossing.
"You're gloating, aren't you?" she asked and smiled as she walked by. I was caught red handed. What can I say?
Let me ask, it is morally reprehensible to hope that fatal car wrecks occur on days when I commute by bike instead of when I commute by car?
I don't believe so. As beholden to cars as we are, and as any gas price or any amount of bad traffic won't change that, 45,000 deaths are going to happen each year. Period. As we assume airbags and anti-roll technologies are going to save us we drive like total shitheads. As we commute longer, as we rack up more VMT per year and as we incorporate other living into our commutes like texting, cell phone conversations, eating, and DVD viewing to make up for all that lost time we are only becoming more distracted drivers.
This is happening regardless. Why not hope that accidents happen on days I'm not going to get stuck behind them? It's no different than hoping that an accident doesn't happen to me, except that I have some degree of influence to limit my own exposure to dying on the road while driving. And you have some influence as well. You can drive correctly. You can wait to text your mistress (a.k.a., Eyepatch) until you're in a parking lot. You can wait two seconds at an intersection before entering it to minimize getting t-boned -- no matter how late you are and no matter how pissed off the shitheads behind you get. You've got no control over them; to assume you do, or to try to by trying to cut them off is sheer madness. You don't, and never will have, any control.
Yes, I was gloating on the overcrossing this morning. I gloat every chance I get. I stand on the bike and look down at these drivers, some chatting on their phones, some resting their heads in their hands,
and some are snacking. But all completely ignore my presence on the bridge. It's like being in Seoul, South Korea -- everyone knows I'm a white guy but everyone completely dismisses my presence. A highly entertaining human sociological response...just like gloating at traffic. Call me Shi Thead...that's OK with me...
Note: Image is typical congestion and does not necessarily represent my exact overcrossing.
"You're gloating, aren't you?" she asked and smiled as she walked by. I was caught red handed. What can I say?
Let me ask, it is morally reprehensible to hope that fatal car wrecks occur on days when I commute by bike instead of when I commute by car?
I don't believe so. As beholden to cars as we are, and as any gas price or any amount of bad traffic won't change that, 45,000 deaths are going to happen each year. Period. As we assume airbags and anti-roll technologies are going to save us we drive like total shitheads. As we commute longer, as we rack up more VMT per year and as we incorporate other living into our commutes like texting, cell phone conversations, eating, and DVD viewing to make up for all that lost time we are only becoming more distracted drivers.
This is happening regardless. Why not hope that accidents happen on days I'm not going to get stuck behind them? It's no different than hoping that an accident doesn't happen to me, except that I have some degree of influence to limit my own exposure to dying on the road while driving. And you have some influence as well. You can drive correctly. You can wait to text your mistress (a.k.a., Eyepatch) until you're in a parking lot. You can wait two seconds at an intersection before entering it to minimize getting t-boned -- no matter how late you are and no matter how pissed off the shitheads behind you get. You've got no control over them; to assume you do, or to try to by trying to cut them off is sheer madness. You don't, and never will have, any control.
Yes, I was gloating on the overcrossing this morning. I gloat every chance I get. I stand on the bike and look down at these drivers, some chatting on their phones, some resting their heads in their hands,
and some are snacking. But all completely ignore my presence on the bridge. It's like being in Seoul, South Korea -- everyone knows I'm a white guy but everyone completely dismisses my presence. A highly entertaining human sociological response...just like gloating at traffic. Call me Shi Thead...that's OK with me...
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
The Public Is The Problem
Only men stood on the E-tran bus ride into Sacramento this morning. My 52 was packed, yes, but there were no pregnant women standing this morning while abled men snoozed in the seats. The public comments offered by my co-riders to prevent the city council from axing bus service mostly approached it from a "safety" perspective. A dozen people made the claim that standing on a bus on the freeway was unsafe.
This is bullshit in my opinion. We throw out this "safety" card because we've got nothing else to sway the city council into not axing our bus service. We assume that by waving the safety card our council should automatically forgo cuts to this public service.
There is nothing inherently unsafe about standing on a bus relative to sitting on a bus. It simply sucks. Period.
Standing on an e-Tran bus sucks. So what? So does standing on a bus in Dusseldorf Germany. So does standing on BART, or on RT Light Rail, or on the El in Chicago or the NY subway. If it's a such a bother to have to stand next to your fellow Americans then drive your fucking car, slick. It bugs me that grown adults can't accept standing on transit, that somehow Elk Grovians should be exempt, that instead we throw up the safety card.
My city is full of indulgent, above-the-median selfish people who presume that transit ought to provide the exact same amenities as private transportation, that they shouldn't have to interact with the public on public transportation -- that the problem with public transportation is the public.
I disagree. There is nothing wrong with approaching the council and saying that standing sucks, that the curtailing of routes can only lead to elimination of choice ridership, that choice riders represent the future of Elk Grove transit ridership and without them, e-Tran will forever stay marginalized as a viable option to solo-occupant driving. If the council elects to cut services in the face of that argument, well, they were going to cut it regardless.
This is bullshit in my opinion. We throw out this "safety" card because we've got nothing else to sway the city council into not axing our bus service. We assume that by waving the safety card our council should automatically forgo cuts to this public service.
There is nothing inherently unsafe about standing on a bus relative to sitting on a bus. It simply sucks. Period.
Standing on an e-Tran bus sucks. So what? So does standing on a bus in Dusseldorf Germany. So does standing on BART, or on RT Light Rail, or on the El in Chicago or the NY subway. If it's a such a bother to have to stand next to your fellow Americans then drive your fucking car, slick. It bugs me that grown adults can't accept standing on transit, that somehow Elk Grovians should be exempt, that instead we throw up the safety card.
My city is full of indulgent, above-the-median selfish people who presume that transit ought to provide the exact same amenities as private transportation, that they shouldn't have to interact with the public on public transportation -- that the problem with public transportation is the public.
I disagree. There is nothing wrong with approaching the council and saying that standing sucks, that the curtailing of routes can only lead to elimination of choice ridership, that choice riders represent the future of Elk Grove transit ridership and without them, e-Tran will forever stay marginalized as a viable option to solo-occupant driving. If the council elects to cut services in the face of that argument, well, they were going to cut it regardless.
Monday, September 7, 2009
Ninety Degrees
To get to my bus stop I have to pedestrinate across my street corner:
This is an action very, very few people ever endeavor to take, and for good reason -- it's a death march. No one crosses in this direction, and as a consequence the neighborhood is gutted in two. Truthfully, there is not one neighborhood. The people living over there might as well live fifteen miles away; they aren't my neighbors. It's two neighborhoods separated by a wall of speeding cars.
I live on this suburban corner that's brutalized by traffic; not from the volume, necessarily, but from the speed. Take note of my corner's radius -- instead of it being at a pedestrian friendly right angle, the wide radius encourages cars to take the turn at high speed. Tell me -- why is it at all necessary for Elk Grove to build street corners like this? What purpose could it possibly serve other than to place all its inhabitants at risk? And I do mean all -- the driver who now feels comfortable taking the turn at 31 mph who might lose control in the turn; the bicyclist who now has to take the lane to stop the driver from attempting to cut her off while taking the turn at 31 mph; the child who's crossing to walk to school, crossing a corner now twice as long facing cars moving twice as fast; the mother walking her dog; everyone is put into harm's way...but we build these fucking things nonetheless.
Suppose for a minute that the corner concrete met at ninety degrees. Everyone would immediately become safer. The only drawback would be that cars would have to slow down to negotiate the turn. Apparently, this is too big a drawback to allow. To impede speed is treasonous in our auto dependent city.
Perhaps the Elk Grove traffic manual outlaws 90 degree curbs, outlawed because a fire truck's response time would be lengthened as the fire truck would also have to slow down to negotiate the turn. This might impose an unacceptable fire safety risk. To address that risk I offer only one incredibly obvious observation -- how many fire truck and ambulance calls are made to traffic accidents relative to fires, huh? 17:1? 60:1? More? Less? The actual number doesn't matter; what matters is that life safety is reduced as a consequence of us building residential neighborhoods resembling NASCAR ovals. Firemen spend a fair chunk of their careers responding to traffic accidents, and it would be beyond irony if the same fire department enables these accidents in the name of response times or truck maneuvering. At least their response times to traffic accidents are "satisfactory."
Every day I ride the bus home I get to stand on that adjacent corner by the fence waiting to cross the street, and the curvilinear street makes it impossible, impossible, to cross the street with any sense of safety. I risk death by anyone driving 30 mph over the posted speed, which happens all the fucking time. The only way to ensure I live to see the other side is to listen for a speeding car on Frye Creek.
And two decades from now, when I'm 60 years old, deaf from thrash metal, crossing my street for the last time on my retirement day, and all our cars, trucks, motorcycles, ice cream trucks, scooters and tractor trailers are battery powered and silent, some dumbass "neighbor" of mine driving his Oldsmobile Ohm thirty miles over the limit will run me over.
This is an action very, very few people ever endeavor to take, and for good reason -- it's a death march. No one crosses in this direction, and as a consequence the neighborhood is gutted in two. Truthfully, there is not one neighborhood. The people living over there might as well live fifteen miles away; they aren't my neighbors. It's two neighborhoods separated by a wall of speeding cars.
I live on this suburban corner that's brutalized by traffic; not from the volume, necessarily, but from the speed. Take note of my corner's radius -- instead of it being at a pedestrian friendly right angle, the wide radius encourages cars to take the turn at high speed. Tell me -- why is it at all necessary for Elk Grove to build street corners like this? What purpose could it possibly serve other than to place all its inhabitants at risk? And I do mean all -- the driver who now feels comfortable taking the turn at 31 mph who might lose control in the turn; the bicyclist who now has to take the lane to stop the driver from attempting to cut her off while taking the turn at 31 mph; the child who's crossing to walk to school, crossing a corner now twice as long facing cars moving twice as fast; the mother walking her dog; everyone is put into harm's way...but we build these fucking things nonetheless.
Suppose for a minute that the corner concrete met at ninety degrees. Everyone would immediately become safer. The only drawback would be that cars would have to slow down to negotiate the turn. Apparently, this is too big a drawback to allow. To impede speed is treasonous in our auto dependent city.
Perhaps the Elk Grove traffic manual outlaws 90 degree curbs, outlawed because a fire truck's response time would be lengthened as the fire truck would also have to slow down to negotiate the turn. This might impose an unacceptable fire safety risk. To address that risk I offer only one incredibly obvious observation -- how many fire truck and ambulance calls are made to traffic accidents relative to fires, huh? 17:1? 60:1? More? Less? The actual number doesn't matter; what matters is that life safety is reduced as a consequence of us building residential neighborhoods resembling NASCAR ovals. Firemen spend a fair chunk of their careers responding to traffic accidents, and it would be beyond irony if the same fire department enables these accidents in the name of response times or truck maneuvering. At least their response times to traffic accidents are "satisfactory."
Every day I ride the bus home I get to stand on that adjacent corner by the fence waiting to cross the street, and the curvilinear street makes it impossible, impossible, to cross the street with any sense of safety. I risk death by anyone driving 30 mph over the posted speed, which happens all the fucking time. The only way to ensure I live to see the other side is to listen for a speeding car on Frye Creek.
And two decades from now, when I'm 60 years old, deaf from thrash metal, crossing my street for the last time on my retirement day, and all our cars, trucks, motorcycles, ice cream trucks, scooters and tractor trailers are battery powered and silent, some dumbass "neighbor" of mine driving his Oldsmobile Ohm thirty miles over the limit will run me over.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Moving Down
Every home "owner" I know, every one, wants housal unit values to stay put or rise 20% per year. Except me. I'd like them to crash down further, at least another 15-20%.
It would be a good thing for anyone "moving up." Sure, your own house at $250k is now only worth $185k, but the "move up" house you want has dropped from $425k to $345k -- what's not to like about that $15k spread? And think of the next twenty seven years of property taxes, how much less you're gonna pay?
When the couple (Mark & Melanie) across the street moved in in 2004, into an identical house to mine, I was well aware that their property taxes were putting my kids through school. Sure, I pay mine, but mine are over 50% less because I've parked my ass here for the last thirteen years and never moved-up. Every move costs immediate commissions and long term taxes, and over the dozen or so years I've been here I've seen dozens of neighbors come and go, each one losing a little bit more to the tax man.
Mark was schooled as a mechanic but over time developed a bad reaction to motor oil, so much so that he couldn't wrench anymore. He elected to process mortgages in 2001 and by 2004 they moved-up from Valley Hi. Hard to imagine my neighborhood as a move-up but bear with me. They moved-up because Valley Hi turned into liquid shit as almost all the suburban rings around Sacramento are destined to do. You can guess where this is going. He lost his job in early 2006 as the good times were ending and by late 2006 they spent eleven months trying to sell their house to no avail. They moved out of state and still "own" that rental elephant. The same factors that pumped up his income also raised his housal unit price.
Decades of low interest rates, decades of inflated housal unit prices, decades of suburban sprawl where the first hint of your neighborhood going downhill leads you to move to a new neighborhood ad infinitum, and decades of flipping houses for instant profit or moving-up have led to an environment where no one stays put and everyone pays more. We allowed a half million loan originators to rake cash off the top from every transaction, to sell any risk of default off to global investors who all have an implicit government guarantee for that risk (we the taxpayers) through the GSEs.
If we stupidly try to artificially hold housal unit prices up (and we are doing just that) then we should just accept that we're going to continue to get gang raped by investment banks, sales commissions, property taxes and three decades of higher interest payments. Sure, interest rates are artificially low, but please, tell me you'd rather pay 4.5% and fees on a $315k mortgage or 7% and fees on a $155k note.
But holding them up is exactly what we're doing. I will simply sit back and watch the implosion.
It would be a good thing for anyone "moving up." Sure, your own house at $250k is now only worth $185k, but the "move up" house you want has dropped from $425k to $345k -- what's not to like about that $15k spread? And think of the next twenty seven years of property taxes, how much less you're gonna pay?
When the couple (Mark & Melanie) across the street moved in in 2004, into an identical house to mine, I was well aware that their property taxes were putting my kids through school. Sure, I pay mine, but mine are over 50% less because I've parked my ass here for the last thirteen years and never moved-up. Every move costs immediate commissions and long term taxes, and over the dozen or so years I've been here I've seen dozens of neighbors come and go, each one losing a little bit more to the tax man.
Mark was schooled as a mechanic but over time developed a bad reaction to motor oil, so much so that he couldn't wrench anymore. He elected to process mortgages in 2001 and by 2004 they moved-up from Valley Hi. Hard to imagine my neighborhood as a move-up but bear with me. They moved-up because Valley Hi turned into liquid shit as almost all the suburban rings around Sacramento are destined to do. You can guess where this is going. He lost his job in early 2006 as the good times were ending and by late 2006 they spent eleven months trying to sell their house to no avail. They moved out of state and still "own" that rental elephant. The same factors that pumped up his income also raised his housal unit price.
Decades of low interest rates, decades of inflated housal unit prices, decades of suburban sprawl where the first hint of your neighborhood going downhill leads you to move to a new neighborhood ad infinitum, and decades of flipping houses for instant profit or moving-up have led to an environment where no one stays put and everyone pays more. We allowed a half million loan originators to rake cash off the top from every transaction, to sell any risk of default off to global investors who all have an implicit government guarantee for that risk (we the taxpayers) through the GSEs.
If we stupidly try to artificially hold housal unit prices up (and we are doing just that) then we should just accept that we're going to continue to get gang raped by investment banks, sales commissions, property taxes and three decades of higher interest payments. Sure, interest rates are artificially low, but please, tell me you'd rather pay 4.5% and fees on a $315k mortgage or 7% and fees on a $155k note.
But holding them up is exactly what we're doing. I will simply sit back and watch the implosion.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Trevi Of Sacramento
This is the new standard for architecture in America:
Our next generation of architects are out in force, designing the cupolas atop strip retail centers. I wonder...do you think the guy who designed this corner tower spent days trying to decide if three windows look better than four and four lights look better than three? Racked his brain trying to get the cornice design just right?
When I took this photo the superWalMart next to this cell phone store hadn't yet opened, and there weren't yet consumers consuming consumables. I'd almost be afraid to go near it today, on a Saturday with every south Sacramentan and his brother shopping at the new superWalMart to Save Money...to Live Better. I certainly would not be able to stand in the street to take pictures of the shitty state of American architecture, that's for sure. I would be honked at, told to "get out of the way, cars are tryin' to drive around here for Christ's sake!"
The round fountain is also a fantastic addition. Several decades from now our grandchildren's children will photograph themselves around it as they stand in reverence towards those great forward thinking builders at the turn of the century. The Trevi of Sacramento, it's been dubbed.
Our next generation of architects are out in force, designing the cupolas atop strip retail centers. I wonder...do you think the guy who designed this corner tower spent days trying to decide if three windows look better than four and four lights look better than three? Racked his brain trying to get the cornice design just right?
When I took this photo the superWalMart next to this cell phone store hadn't yet opened, and there weren't yet consumers consuming consumables. I'd almost be afraid to go near it today, on a Saturday with every south Sacramentan and his brother shopping at the new superWalMart to Save Money...to Live Better. I certainly would not be able to stand in the street to take pictures of the shitty state of American architecture, that's for sure. I would be honked at, told to "get out of the way, cars are tryin' to drive around here for Christ's sake!"
The round fountain is also a fantastic addition. Several decades from now our grandchildren's children will photograph themselves around it as they stand in reverence towards those great forward thinking builders at the turn of the century. The Trevi of Sacramento, it's been dubbed.
All Hat And No Cattle
I'm exposed to quite a few California state workers these days, through particpation in my social experiment called riding the bus. I was surprised, really, to discover that every state worker furloughed doesn't want it.
I would jump on that shit in a minute if I was offered a furlough. I would absolutely accept time off without pay under the same conditions that our state offers these furloughs. Absolutely...because I live within my means and I value my time away from work, even while I profess to have the best job anyone could ever have.
My Friday bus ride into work, well, I had the whole back to myself. I could have brought a pillow and blanket and laid out on the bench seats. Why e-tran doesn't curtail bus routes on these days while we are [literally] shoehorned into fewer buses on Tuesday through Thursday is beyond me. Every other Sacramento area business affected by furloughed state workers backs off during these days; why Elk Grove doesn't is maddening to say the least.
Regardless, Hai, my neighbor who paid off his mortgage in June, hates his furloughed days. My nephew's girlfriend would much rather be working. A co-worker at SMUD whose wife is furloughed says they don't like it one bit. Two other neighbors both have cut discretionary spending while a third queried me about working for SMUD instead of the state. It's not just people living paycheck to paycheck; they all hate it, particularly when it's assumed their productivity is not expected to decline.
Instead of furloughs, SMUD just raises rates! Wa-hey! 5.5% on September 1st while electricity sales are down. Rates are increasing 5.5% more come March 1st. And then 2% more in January 2011. Isn't is great working for a monopoly? Isn't it great knowing that you have no choice but to pay more to keep my annual raises coming in? Gloating aside, I would have gladly taken a furlough if it came to be but apparently I'd be in the deep minority.
I'd bet that anyone reading this probably thinks I'm all hat and no cattle, that if I really were laid off three days a month I'd reverse my position, that if I didn't make as much money as I do I'd not be able to live with a pay reduction.
Nah. No way. I would look at it as an opportunity, as everyone needs to be doing. If losing 15% is such a burden then find ways to eliminate the burden. Four billion other people in the world get by just fine on a fifth of what you make. Garden on your days off and save money on produce. Build some projects in the garage to sell or to offset you having to buy shit. Connect with your neighbors. Exercise, walk the doggie, brush your cat, read your stack of old magazines, pick up that guitar in the closet, sweep your porch -- all of which cost nothing to do. If you don't choose to seek out these opportunities, well, suit yourself, because furloughs won't be going away anytime soon.
I would jump on that shit in a minute if I was offered a furlough. I would absolutely accept time off without pay under the same conditions that our state offers these furloughs. Absolutely...because I live within my means and I value my time away from work, even while I profess to have the best job anyone could ever have.
My Friday bus ride into work, well, I had the whole back to myself. I could have brought a pillow and blanket and laid out on the bench seats. Why e-tran doesn't curtail bus routes on these days while we are [literally] shoehorned into fewer buses on Tuesday through Thursday is beyond me. Every other Sacramento area business affected by furloughed state workers backs off during these days; why Elk Grove doesn't is maddening to say the least.
Regardless, Hai, my neighbor who paid off his mortgage in June, hates his furloughed days. My nephew's girlfriend would much rather be working. A co-worker at SMUD whose wife is furloughed says they don't like it one bit. Two other neighbors both have cut discretionary spending while a third queried me about working for SMUD instead of the state. It's not just people living paycheck to paycheck; they all hate it, particularly when it's assumed their productivity is not expected to decline.
Instead of furloughs, SMUD just raises rates! Wa-hey! 5.5% on September 1st while electricity sales are down. Rates are increasing 5.5% more come March 1st. And then 2% more in January 2011. Isn't is great working for a monopoly? Isn't it great knowing that you have no choice but to pay more to keep my annual raises coming in? Gloating aside, I would have gladly taken a furlough if it came to be but apparently I'd be in the deep minority.
I'd bet that anyone reading this probably thinks I'm all hat and no cattle, that if I really were laid off three days a month I'd reverse my position, that if I didn't make as much money as I do I'd not be able to live with a pay reduction.
Nah. No way. I would look at it as an opportunity, as everyone needs to be doing. If losing 15% is such a burden then find ways to eliminate the burden. Four billion other people in the world get by just fine on a fifth of what you make. Garden on your days off and save money on produce. Build some projects in the garage to sell or to offset you having to buy shit. Connect with your neighbors. Exercise, walk the doggie, brush your cat, read your stack of old magazines, pick up that guitar in the closet, sweep your porch -- all of which cost nothing to do. If you don't choose to seek out these opportunities, well, suit yourself, because furloughs won't be going away anytime soon.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Delusions Of Adequacy
I attended an Elk Grovian special city council meeting Monday, to hear public comment on the proposal to cut my bus routes. Attendance and comments, I believe, led the council to cut only two runs instead of the four that were proposed.
Yep, the recession has finally hit me, 22 months into it. I was immune until Monday, but now I lost 1/4 of one of my options to get to work and back without having to drive my own car. My 2009 prediction of a loss of bus service has come true. What's really bad about this is that the buses are normally packed to the rafters, and now we're going to have to squeeze in all us riders into fewer buses. It's a good thing I ride my bike 1/3 of the time so I'm not competing with others to get on the bus.
Not only am I now paying more to ride (my cost doubled on Tuesday), I have fewer buses to ride. There is no need to wonder why people don't even try it. The #1 reason (across the whole USA) why people don't ride the bus is that service isn't on a time interval that can compete with the private vehicle. If you have to stand for a 1/2 hour to wait for the bus, well, fugettaboutit.
For me, the only cost I'm directly offsetting by transit is gasoline. As my car sits in the driveway I'm still paying to insure it and register it, the same as if I drove it 23,000 miles a year. Its rubber and plastic parts are still deteriorating the same as if I drove it 23,000 miles a year. The sun still beats down on the paint the same as if I drove it 23,000 miles a year. Perhaps I'm not replacing tires or changing oil as frequently, but really, there is no cost savings...not when I now pay more for a bus ticket than the cost of a gallon of gasoline to get me to and from work.
I could even argue that it costs me more to take the bus, considering it takes longer to take transit than it does to drive myself. So why do I even bother? I'm a "choice" rider. I have two legs; I can bike. I have three cars; I can drive. Both my next door neighbors work at SMUD with me; I can carpool. The Elk Grove city council, when looking to slash city costs, looks at me as a "choice" rider and wonders "why are we subsidizing this schmuck?"
I argue that this would be a false "choice," for reasons obvious to anyone who's read my monologues.
Elk Grove transit suffers from delusions of adequacy. We can never hope to make it work in our low density suburban slum. It cannot possibly do an adequate job under the framework of sprawl. The city realizes that everyone drives themselves everywhere to do everything at all times, and when you build a city like that there is no hope for alternatives to the private car. Take the bus? Spend a hour longer to get where you're going. Ride a bike? Risk permanent paralysis or death by our speeding agitated drivers. Walk? Spend three hours longer to get where you're going. Take light rail? Wait two more decades to even start your commute.
Yep, the recession has finally hit me, 22 months into it. I was immune until Monday, but now I lost 1/4 of one of my options to get to work and back without having to drive my own car. My 2009 prediction of a loss of bus service has come true. What's really bad about this is that the buses are normally packed to the rafters, and now we're going to have to squeeze in all us riders into fewer buses. It's a good thing I ride my bike 1/3 of the time so I'm not competing with others to get on the bus.
Not only am I now paying more to ride (my cost doubled on Tuesday), I have fewer buses to ride. There is no need to wonder why people don't even try it. The #1 reason (across the whole USA) why people don't ride the bus is that service isn't on a time interval that can compete with the private vehicle. If you have to stand for a 1/2 hour to wait for the bus, well, fugettaboutit.
For me, the only cost I'm directly offsetting by transit is gasoline. As my car sits in the driveway I'm still paying to insure it and register it, the same as if I drove it 23,000 miles a year. Its rubber and plastic parts are still deteriorating the same as if I drove it 23,000 miles a year. The sun still beats down on the paint the same as if I drove it 23,000 miles a year. Perhaps I'm not replacing tires or changing oil as frequently, but really, there is no cost savings...not when I now pay more for a bus ticket than the cost of a gallon of gasoline to get me to and from work.
I could even argue that it costs me more to take the bus, considering it takes longer to take transit than it does to drive myself. So why do I even bother? I'm a "choice" rider. I have two legs; I can bike. I have three cars; I can drive. Both my next door neighbors work at SMUD with me; I can carpool. The Elk Grove city council, when looking to slash city costs, looks at me as a "choice" rider and wonders "why are we subsidizing this schmuck?"
I argue that this would be a false "choice," for reasons obvious to anyone who's read my monologues.
Elk Grove transit suffers from delusions of adequacy. We can never hope to make it work in our low density suburban slum. It cannot possibly do an adequate job under the framework of sprawl. The city realizes that everyone drives themselves everywhere to do everything at all times, and when you build a city like that there is no hope for alternatives to the private car. Take the bus? Spend a hour longer to get where you're going. Ride a bike? Risk permanent paralysis or death by our speeding agitated drivers. Walk? Spend three hours longer to get where you're going. Take light rail? Wait two more decades to even start your commute.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Two Thousand Per Inch
Last night our Mayor, Pat Hume, offered a compelling reason why Elk Grove doesn't yet have light rail service, after some twenty one years years of unmitigated southern sprawl. SACOG, the Sacramento Area Council of Governments and the body that renders regional transit decisions, is represented by Yolo, Sutter, Yuba, Placer, and El Dorado counties alongside Sacramento county.
Why will Folsom get light rail two decades before Elk Grove? Because El Doradoan SACOG membership influenced the decision to funnel transit monies in that direction. Why will Natomas and the airport get light rail a decade before Elk Grove? Because Sutter and Yuba county membership influenced the decision to funnel transit monies in their direction. South of Elk Grove, SACOG has no representation. According to Hume, had San Joaquin county been a member of SACOG and had a vested interest in our transit patterns, perhaps Elk Grove would now have light rail service. But that's not the case.
Apparently, the only way we're going to get light rail from Elk Grove to Sacramento is through the relentless march of low density stripmall/exurban sprawl all the way through Galt, through Collierville, through Lodi -- one gigantic suburban slum from Sacramento to Stockton. Once The Southland has sufficient representation in SACOG to influence policy we'll get our precious light rail and not a second before.
Mayor Hume was cognizant of the $1000 per inch cost just to get light rail to Consumnes college. His recognition of this implies to me that light rail will never come to Elk Grove. Three dollar gas, four dollar gas, five dollar gas, six dollar gas...no price point will ever be sufficient to overcome that cost -- the cost reflective of shoehorning in train tracks over existing low density suburban sprawl; the cost of building sound walls to pacify the dozens of suburban residents living four feet from the tracks because we gave developers run of the place; the cost of building a half dozen grade separations because we're so goddamn dependent on private automobiling that we can't accept quarter hour traffic stacking at the crossings. It's a thousand per inch to get it closer to Elk Grove, and my guess is that it'll cost two thousand per inch to get it to the city proper.
I am not holding my breath.
Why will Folsom get light rail two decades before Elk Grove? Because El Doradoan SACOG membership influenced the decision to funnel transit monies in that direction. Why will Natomas and the airport get light rail a decade before Elk Grove? Because Sutter and Yuba county membership influenced the decision to funnel transit monies in their direction. South of Elk Grove, SACOG has no representation. According to Hume, had San Joaquin county been a member of SACOG and had a vested interest in our transit patterns, perhaps Elk Grove would now have light rail service. But that's not the case.
Apparently, the only way we're going to get light rail from Elk Grove to Sacramento is through the relentless march of low density stripmall/exurban sprawl all the way through Galt, through Collierville, through Lodi -- one gigantic suburban slum from Sacramento to Stockton. Once The Southland has sufficient representation in SACOG to influence policy we'll get our precious light rail and not a second before.
Mayor Hume was cognizant of the $1000 per inch cost just to get light rail to Consumnes college. His recognition of this implies to me that light rail will never come to Elk Grove. Three dollar gas, four dollar gas, five dollar gas, six dollar gas...no price point will ever be sufficient to overcome that cost -- the cost reflective of shoehorning in train tracks over existing low density suburban sprawl; the cost of building sound walls to pacify the dozens of suburban residents living four feet from the tracks because we gave developers run of the place; the cost of building a half dozen grade separations because we're so goddamn dependent on private automobiling that we can't accept quarter hour traffic stacking at the crossings. It's a thousand per inch to get it closer to Elk Grove, and my guess is that it'll cost two thousand per inch to get it to the city proper.
I am not holding my breath.
Rosie The Riveter
I began work on the drawers to my tool cabinet yesterday; you can see the parts awaiting assembly, they've been waiting for almost three years:
I've been a real slacker these past three years, not devoting as much time to woodworking as I say I should. Other things like bike commuting, yoga, and this blog keep me tied up.
Years ago I told myself that I could retire early from my engineering career if I built high quality custom furniture, augmenting my retirement income. To that end, I endeavored to build up a collection of hand tools that would allow me to do just that. I figured I'd spend my engineering years using them to build my own furniture, to build up the necessary skills to be able to sell my work. Things didn't progress quite like I envisioned; I don't spend enough time doing it to feel proud about the quality of my work. It requires tremendous skill, patience and time.
I mention all this in the context of our currentrecession slowdown. I always believed woodworking to be a secondary skill I could use in the event I got fired or laid off in my engineering field. As a doomer I wanted a backup plan. I take note of my unemployed cousin, the cabinet shop worker and I wonder (if he weren't alcoholic), could he better survive this recession if he had built up a set of tools over his life and worked out of his garage until he could find another cabinet shop job? Where was his backup plan? I ask this same question of us all, and I have to say that I am not impressed with the growing number of Americans and their collective unwillingness to prepare when things are booming and an unwillingness to work even harder when things are busting.
I figured that as our nation moves towards wider wealth distributions I'd market my work to those at the top, to those appreciative of fine woodworking and those willing to pay for it. This is also because the remaining 98.3% of America has decided that cheap shit from Asia is all they could ever want. Drive the SUV to Big Lots, buy that cheap melamine veneered bookcase with hardwoods harvested in Thailand, frames assembled in Taiwan, and driven home in a box to be final assembled by the owner with cross dowels and connector bolts. The buyer has now become a cog in the production cycle -- not only is Rosie a mortgage service auditor by day, she's a highly skilled furniture parts assembler by night. She's as highly skilled with the enclosed 5mm allen wrench as her grandmother was with a pneumatic riveter.
Cheaply produced shit using low-quality materials. This is what we wanted and this is what we got -- a deteriorating manufacturing base while living in a world full of bad stuff built with unsuitable materials predestined for the nearest landfill. This is the same regarding our houses and cities as it is of our furniture.
I've been a real slacker these past three years, not devoting as much time to woodworking as I say I should. Other things like bike commuting, yoga, and this blog keep me tied up.
Years ago I told myself that I could retire early from my engineering career if I built high quality custom furniture, augmenting my retirement income. To that end, I endeavored to build up a collection of hand tools that would allow me to do just that. I figured I'd spend my engineering years using them to build my own furniture, to build up the necessary skills to be able to sell my work. Things didn't progress quite like I envisioned; I don't spend enough time doing it to feel proud about the quality of my work. It requires tremendous skill, patience and time.
I mention all this in the context of our current
I figured that as our nation moves towards wider wealth distributions I'd market my work to those at the top, to those appreciative of fine woodworking and those willing to pay for it. This is also because the remaining 98.3% of America has decided that cheap shit from Asia is all they could ever want. Drive the SUV to Big Lots, buy that cheap melamine veneered bookcase with hardwoods harvested in Thailand, frames assembled in Taiwan, and driven home in a box to be final assembled by the owner with cross dowels and connector bolts. The buyer has now become a cog in the production cycle -- not only is Rosie a mortgage service auditor by day, she's a highly skilled furniture parts assembler by night. She's as highly skilled with the enclosed 5mm allen wrench as her grandmother was with a pneumatic riveter.
Cheaply produced shit using low-quality materials. This is what we wanted and this is what we got -- a deteriorating manufacturing base while living in a world full of bad stuff built with unsuitable materials predestined for the nearest landfill. This is the same regarding our houses and cities as it is of our furniture.
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