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A simple solution

Head Rambles Posted on by

Those Who Know Best have a simple answer to all our traffic woes.

We all know that driving a car is a mortal sin these days. Every journey kills at least one Polar Bear and causes a tornado somewhere. Petrol is the Devil’s urine and must be avoided at all costs.

Then there is the traffic congestion. Sitting in a traffic jam with our engines running means we are pumping out vast clouds of noxious gasses that kill hundreds of innocent people every day.

However, in spite of all the dire messages about planetary conflagration, destruction and widespread death, us ignorant peasants insist on using our evil cars. We must be stopped.

So the simple solution is to remove parking spaces.

By removing parking spaces we will de facto have nowhere to park. And seeing as we can’t park we either have to drive permanently in circles or ditch the car. But there are plentiful alternatives – we can walk, cycle or use public transport. That could work?

This solution is based on a simple concept of urban society.

We all live and work on the same bus route. If more than one person in the household has a job then there must be a suitable bus route for each person.

If work requires materials then every plumber, electrician and carpenter must be able to carry all their materials and tools [including workbenches] on the bus. Or else they can walk.

It must be warm, dry, sunny and calm every day of the year. No one wants to stand at a bus stop in the freezing rain and wind, nor does anyone want to cycle up a steep hill against the wind?

Life must consist entirely of work and home. Visits to friends and relations are out unless there is a suitable bus route. A picnic in the countryside is also out unless it’s on a bus route. You can forget holidays altogether.

If cycling is the the preferred option then there must be no hills or gradients. This applies to a lesser extent to pedestrians.

No bicycle will ever be stolen.

Everyone must be fit and healthy. The elderly or infirm will just have to suck it up.

No one can ever have a medical emergency. If your doctor doesn’t live on a common route past your house then tough shit. Even then your fate is in the hands of bus timetables. Ambulances are still allowed but will have nowhere to park at your home. Too bad. You can go and Meet Your Maker happy in the sure knowledge that you are single-handedly stopping Warble Gloaming.

Yes.

That’ll work?

 

Comments

A simple solution — 13 Comments

  1. Eire sounds even worse than the UK , which as you know is full of people trying to tell us how to live. Arseholes all of them.

  3. The privately-owned, petrol-engined, passenger car has evolved progressively over the last 120+ years to a point where it now offers an ideal combination of efficiency, reliability, economy and functionality for domestic use. Indeed the structure of life itself has evolved in parallel to map onto the car’s facility.

    So far, no-one has come anywhere close to identifying an alternative which can encompass its full range of capability at similarly low cost. If and when they do, I may be interested but, to date, all their dick-brain proposals are fuelled by nothing but fantasies, so I’ll continue to run my modest fleet of carbon-fuelled mobility, waving a defiantly-raised finger to them all.

  4. The problem is too many people. Your countryman Jonathan Swift had a modest proposal which would easily transfer to modern times. If we start eating babies the problem would solve itself. Sounds like a plan. 🙂

    • You may consider starting by first eating those babies with a darker-than-local skin-tone. Not only more plentiful but that way you could solve two problems at once, efficient or what?

  5. Once all the cars become self-driving (assuming Musk’s crap is not used), it’ll be possible to go anywhere by ‘bus’, as it’ll be in what was your own car, now owned by the state, but called up to take you places driver-less. Sounds far-fetched? Ha ha ha – it’s the future!
    But, as Mudplugger says, let’s first eat the babies and then worry about tomorrow tomorrow.

    • What the self-drive car zealots never mention is the effect on road capacity.
      In most developed urban areas, roads are pretty close to capacity already – and that’s when ‘driving’ is limited to those with the physical ability, mental facility, tested capability and wealth to own/operate a car.
      Self-driving cars open up the usage to the very young, the very old, the seriously disabled, the mentally-challenged, the blind, the capital-poor, those incapable of passing a driving test etc., all of which could easily add 50% to the total of road users, all operating within a common software-managed envelope which itself is far less efficient than the current variable, albeit sometimes illegal, driving pattern by humans.
      If you thought the roads were busy now . . . . .

  6. Privately owned cars are very efficient. They never go anywhere without an occupant, passenger, who wants to go there.
    Unlike taxis, buses, trains, whatever, which spend a fair proportion of their time running about empty, especially at night, or just waiting with engine running.
    Why do railway companies have so many road going vehicles?
    And who is going to hose out this shared car after every user has left it?
    Because if you don’t own it, and the custodian is not on board, why would you not leave it in a mess.

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