Comments by "mindstalk" (@mindstalk) on "Life Where I'm From" channel.

  1.  @cordeliacentauri1737  Some Japanese furniture like a futon and low table could be brought up the stairs. Also, I know some European cities have cranes, to lift furniture up to a (wide) window. Not sure about Japan.
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  2.  @brycemcewen6146  " Honestly a lot of people rent small flats like that as extra storage space" Could also work as a commuter home, rented for being close to the office, then go to your home further out on the weekend. Or for some high schooler sent off to a private school far from home, bonus of being smaller so they fit better.
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  3. "almost everyone who can drive" Bike friendliness is still important for those who can't, like kids.
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  4.  @LifeWhereImFrom  "Microapartments are inhumane" say many people who went through college in dorm rooms that were even smaller... drives me nuts.
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  5. Plus these apartments are far more stackable than vans (6 stories in this case!) and have full utilities.
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  6. We want the same level of free stuff that drivers get.
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  7. US associates step-through with women too. Odd how the "men's bikes" are the ones with a painfully located bar if you slide forward...
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  8.  @Volkbrecht  If true, that's fine, for many people for part of their lives. Americans spend their college years in dorm rooms that may be no bigger, and shared with a roommate. Workers may want a cheap place during the week, and go to their suburban home on the weekend. But also, that's not necessarily true. "Living" means different things for different people. An introvert who spends a lot of time on their laptop can "live" pretty well in such a place. (Plus, we're in the Zoom era.) A diligent student can likewise spend much of their time there, even if they socialize outside. There is no reason to ban building such homes.
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  9. And it's probably better than that; the ranking seems dubious.
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  10. "There is nothing nice in this" $250/month rent is pretty nice. Do you feel that college dorms, often no bigger and shared with another person, are inhumane? Many people are happy to live in such places at least for a while. Who are you to get in their way?
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  11.  @omegoa  So, just like drivers, then.
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  12. Well, you're taller people.
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  13.  @illiiilli24601  Thanks! I see in my journal I did watch it a few years ago.
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  14. You also won't get to the store faster by car if there's nowhere adjacent to park your car. I didn't see car parking by your store, and of the four markets near me when I lived in Osaka, the closest car parking was a paid garage adjacent to Tennouji station... with the markets in the basement of the station. So you're walking a few minutes anyway. Vs. abundant and free or very cheap bike parking right by the entrance of the non-train station markets, and outside Tennouji. As for the video points: yeah! across the board. Living in Osaka and seeing its 25% bike mode share showed me that the Dutch bike paths aren't vital. What's vital is separation from fast cars, done by slow shared streets (both countries), or separation on fast roads via dedicated path (Dutch) or multi-use wide sidewalk (Japan, as you highlight.) People are happy to bike as long as they're not scared of being run down. I was tickled to see the MITT chart of fastest travel times. The blogger kchoze had made similar graphs, to understand by bus service is terrible in major Japanese cities (answer: it's squeezed out by walking, biking and trains; bus is almost never the fastest mode, unless maybe you can't walk far due to age or something.) Never knew there was an official version!
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  15.  @cbpostservice  I've also seen "rear wheel lock"
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  16. It is acceptable to live in such places. Why do you think you have the right to impose your preferences on others, @carbonwarrior ?
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  17. Electric trains are quite CO2-efficient, and most people simply are not going to bike the distances efficiently covered by trains. As for sedentary issue... you walk to the train, and if it's crowded, stand as well.
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  18. Might work better with traditional Japanese furniture. Folding futon (not the couch-bed Americans call futons, actual 3-section mattress), low table you kneel at, etc. Stuff that you could actual bring up those stairs.
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  19.  @Bionickpunk  It's not "more humane", you just like European aesthetics more. The first thing you need for "human planning" is affordable housing, and Japanese cities have excelled there. Japan is also quite good at transportation infrastructure.
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  20.  @Boomdizzle99  Much of NYC was famously built for poor immigrants. "Tenement apartments". Harlem. Chinatown. Cities have recently become places for the rich, because Americans want to live in walkable cities again and our zoning laws limit the supply. Demand goes up, supply is fixed, prices go up. If we were a free country we would be building a lot more such places, and prices wouldn't be so high.
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  21. Mamachari and omafiets are pretty similar, yes. I'm not sure if there was direct inspiration or just convergent evolution. I suspect the latter: similar problems, similar solutions.
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  22. I feel I still saw tons of biking when I suffered through August in Osaka. I wasn't paying that much attention to it, though. Note, though, that around 3/4 of bike trips are under 4 km, and many of them are under 2 km. Lots of people don't have cars, and driving short trips is inconvenient anyway. So these are trips where if you weren't biking, you'd be walking in that humid heat. Would you rather walk 10 minutes to the supermarket, or bike?
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  23.  @LifeWhereImFrom  I assume that's one reason bike mode share isn't higher compared to the Netherlands. Great for short trips, inconvenient for multi-modal trips. Another reason being how big the cities are: it's probably feasible to bike across smaller Dutch cities; not Tokyo or Osaka.
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  24. quoting one website: "Tadpole trikes typically have a lower center of gravity placing the rider “in” the trike more than “on.” Having two wheels in front also makes them corner slightly better at speed, with two wheels offering more stability to resist cornering forces. However, being lower, they may not be as easy to get in and out of, so this is certainly a point to consider if your mobility is limited. They also typically have a larger turning radius than delta trikes, so may not be the best choice if you need to maneuver in tighter places."
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  25. Annoying comment.
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  26. Separation from fast cars is essential for mass biking. If your fast roads don't have Dutch separated bike paths, then you need biking on sidewalks/multi-use paths, period.
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  27.  @illiiilli24601  Ooh! Youtube suppresses links, but can you point to the video title or something?
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  28.  @GNMi79  "Might be a little trickier if I had a rear rack and bag on it, I guess." So, like most of the bikes in Japan, then. Don't forget a possible child seat. Most bike trips are short utility trips, not mountain biking.
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  29. The Panasonic bike surprised me...
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  30.  @alquinn8576  Most of which are bad reasons.
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  31. ADA doesn't apply to housing of only 3 units; if 4+ units but no elevator, does apply to ground units. If 4+ and elevator, applies to all. This is a 6 unit building, so ADA should apply to the ground unit, which probably doesn't qualify. But in a sane system, there would probably be a waiver; I expect the lot is too small and narrow to meet the ADA at all. Not being flexible simply results in the land not being built on at all, which is a waste.
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  32. Possibly some of the locking is invisible: I think omafiets come with rear-wheel locks, so you can just stand up your bike (over-wheel kickstand) and lock the wheel and go into the store. It's not locked to anything but you can't just ride off with the bike.
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  33. As accessories. But also the basic bike was different: "youth city vs. youth mountain" bike as he said. The girls are getting a basket, fenders, and whatever you call that enclosed chain/hub.
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  34.  @carbonwarrior  That makes no sense. Supply and demand. What makes housing expensive is the lack of housing. People who are willing to live in little units like these aren't competing for bigger units. These bring prices _down_, not up.
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  35. "Japan is unique in having a high rate of female cyclists " I don't think it's unique in that; Dutch have it too, AIUI. The very similar classic bikes in the two countries are "granny bike" (omafiet) and "mommy bike" (mamachari), both names attesting to use by women.
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  36.  @Jintsoo  Ah, fair. I think it mostly comes down to safety and the convenience of short trips. Biking doesn't feel dangerous in Japan (there's no bike-only infra, but slow streets and wide sidewalks functionally are bike infra), and short trips are useful, so most people bike at some point. Also it's expected that kids will get themselves to school, by whatever mode works for them, so that's a big chore that Japanese (and many European) women don't have to do, unlike American women of the past few decades.
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  37. Why wouldn't the chef wash his hands after leaving the bathroom?
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  38. My previous bike was a Trek 800 hybrid or mountain bike, that I got on sale for $200 but was like $250 list price. Heavy steel frame, was 40 pounds after adding rack and baskets and lock, but it suited me, and lasted forever. (Disappeared one day after I'd left it out for a long while.) My current bike is a Zizzo Via folding bike, that I got for under $400. There are a couple of even cheaper Zizzo models in the $200s. My closest bike store doesn't have anything under $650, but I think part of that is local rent and expected income levels. And they're mostly into selling $3000 e-bikes now, anyway.
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  39. "As for the bike paths painted on the roads, anyone who doesn’t fall in the categories that allow them to ride on the sidewalks, should use these" No, they really shouldn't. People should not risk their lives to satisfy dumb rules.
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  40. "I don’t see much protected bicycling infrastructure." Yeah, no bike-only infrastructure. The wide sidewalks are the protected bicycling infrastructure.
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  41.  @LifeWhereImFrom  Don't mamachari have a rear wheel lock or O-lock built in? Do people use those? One thing I noticed in Osaka was that lots of small business "bike parking" was just a taped off space on the ground. You don't lock your bike to something, you just lower the (over-wheel) kickstand and maybe set the lock and walk in.
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  42. "not quite as high as it once was." So the question is: did Tokyo get objectively worse? (no) did it get overtaken by other cities (maybe) did they change their ranking criteria (maybe) is the criteria BS (maybe)
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  43. Which is part of why biking is so low in Australia. Dutch don't wear helmets too. People doing casual biking on slow bikes don't want to bother with helmets.
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  44.  @Arkiasis  Plus there is a burner. (No fridge shown but Japan expects tenants to provide their own.) You wouldn't be cooking complex meals easily but you could cook.
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  45.  @bigboyman5743  As an American I believe in letting others have the freedom to build what they want or think they can rent out. No one's trying to force you into small apartments, but current zoning laws forbid such places even though many people -- not everyone! but many -- would happily live in them for a while.
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  46. "100% of Americans would live in these homes" That's too extreme. But certainly many Americans would, for at least part of their lives. In fact, many Americans have lived in even 'worse' housing, called "college dorm rooms". My dorm rooms were often the same size as that apartment (though more rectangular), shared with another person, and lacking our own bathroom or kitchenette. And of course a small apartment doesn't have to be 11 m2, it can be 15 or 20 or 35, and still be an efficient use of land. It's American parking mandates that really kill this sort of thing.
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  47. Tokyo doesn't have bike-only infrastructure. Slow streets and wide sidewalks are bike-friendly infrastructure.
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  48. In the US, "women's bikes" have generally been the step-through ones.
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  49. Biking in the US is generally so dangerous-feeling that most biking is (a) people with no choice, (b) people who bike recreationally away from traffic, or (c) the kind of people who choose to bike in traffic, mostly athletic men on expensive road bikes.
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  50. Honestly might be a waste. Ethan did a video (youtube ID E6w_W6GyHEs ) on Wagyu and burgers.
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