This and that for your Sunday reading. – Beatrice Adler-Bolton discusses how the U.S.’ debate over the most basic of COVID-19 protections reflects fundamental choices as to whether people should have even the slightest respect for each others’ health and well-being. Glen Pearson notes that a (however unjustifiable) willingness to
Continue readingTag: Transportation
Things Are Good: Reducing Traffic Pollution Greatly Increases Health
It’s well known that vehicular traffic is deadly no matter where it is and how much of it exists. Even with all the evidence cities in North America put cars first with the occasional protections like bike lanes and pedestrian crossings. What we also need to talk about is the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Jennifer Rigby and Julie Steenhuysen report on the latest COVID-19 wave and its direct connection to the elimination of public health protections. Eric Topol writes about the role additional boosters may play in somewhat mitigating the second Omicron wave, while Paulina Kaplonek et
Continue readingThings Are Good: SF’s Busiest Street Removed Cars and Traffic Improved
Market Street in San Fransico connects many communities within the city, yet using it to navigate from place to another was a slog. Until they got rid of cars last year. The removal of cars on the popular main street made getting around the city faster, easier, and healthier. Anyone
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Noushin Ziafati reports on the continuing challenges facing people suffering from long COVID – particularly as governments attempt to pretend the pandemic which infected them never happened. And Eric Topol writes about the continued denialism in the U.S. as another wave is cresting.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Ed Yong rightly questions how the U.S. (like Canada) has come to see a large number of preventable COVID-19 deaths as normal. Hannah Rosenblum et al. study the effects of coronavirus vaccines and find that even reported adverse events were largely mild.
Continue readingThings Are Good: This Library Wants You to Ride a Bicycle
An active group of academics want more people to be fit and have fun. The Urban Cycling Institute has set out to educate the average person on the multitude of benefits that riding a bicycle has for people and the communities they live in. One of the initiatives they launched
Continue readingThings Are Good: Milan’s Massive Mobility Mission
The Cambio project in Milan aims to get more people on two wheels while also improving the cityscape. Milan once had a reputation as an industrial city clogged with traffic, but now with cleaner air and easy streets the city’s attracting more people. To improve life within the city they
Continue readingThings Are Good: The Transformation of Paris from Traffic Jams to Quick Movement
Paris once had a reputation for horrible traffic, long queues of cars and taxing journeys via cars. When you have a problem stemming from one element sometimes it’s best to just get rid of it. That’s exactly what Paris is doing. By getting rid of the car traffic jams are
Continue readingThings Are Good: We can Save 200,000 Lives a Year Replacing Car Commutes with Bicycles
A simple modification to our cities can save a lot of lives: add more and better bicycling infrastructure. Researchers looked into quantifying how many lives we can save by replacing car journeys with bicycle use and the results aren’t surprising, but will hopefully influence people. The harms vehicular traffic does
Continue readingThings Are Good: Paris, the City of Bike Lights
When I visited Paris long ago it was a traffic clogged mess, with lovely architecture. Parisians have had enough of bad traffic and decided to solve their mobility challenges by adding more ways to get around the city. Thy’ve already returned urban space to pedestrians and started to build more
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Bruce Arthur warns that the worst of the COVID pandemic may be just around the corner as the far more transmissible Omicron variant spreads throughout Canada, while Karen-Marie Elah Perry and Shila Avissa discuss the perpetual gaslighting effort aimed at persuading us the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Miquel Oliu-Barton et al. study the effects of different government approaches to COVID-19 – and find that elimination strategies have produced far superior outcomes to attempts to live with uncontrolled community spread. And Andre Picard begs us to stop repeating our mistakes in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Niels-Jakob Hansen and Rui Mano study the effect of mask mandates in saving tens of thousands of lives in the U.S. alone – while noting that far more could have been saved if they had been more widely applied. Anthony Vasquez-Peddie reports on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Cory Neudorf argues that a pandemic is the last time when we can afford to prioritize abstract individual interests over the collective good, while Alexander Wong writes that vaccination is a textbook example of a way in which parents can protect children
Continue readingThings Are Good: Electric Public Transportation is the Future, Not Cars
Politicians and car makers will often tout that the future of sustainable transportation lies in electric vehicles. Let’s be clear: cars won’t save us. In fact, cars are responsible for a lot of death on our streets and for supply chains that cause great harm to the environment. Instead, electric
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to start your week. – Bruce Deachman discusses the new “normal” we’re approaching in which COVID continues to be a threat to people’s health on an ongoing basis. – Nancy MacDonald highlights the nonstop catastrophes facing British Columbia as record heat is followed in short order by unprecedented flooding.
Continue readingThings Are Good: Glenfiddich Whisks Whisky Waste into Fuel
The whisky distiller Glenfiddich has converted its fleet of trucks to be powered by waste products from making whisky. It’s a classic bio waste to bio gas setup. The trucks were converted from diesel to biodiesel engines and the waste from distilling was gathered and converted to biodiesel. With such
Continue readingThings Are Good: Make Believe Ideas and the City
The mayor of Toronto, like other 20th century mayors, believes in mystical solutions to urban problems. In the 21st century smart mayors are shedding the myths and make-believe thinking around urban design. In forward looking places we see neighbourhoods made livable and large swaths of land made into the human
Continue readingThings Are Good: Driving Kills the Planet, Here’s How to End the Obsession with Cars
Smoking is bad for your health, yet people still smoke. Driving is bad for your health, yet people still drive. Over the last half century we’ve worked hard to help people quit smoking and deter people from engaging in the behaviour in the first place. It’s time we help people
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