Comments by "Blackadder75" (@Blackadder75) on "Not Just Bikes" channel.

  1.  @mushroomsteve  lucky for the 1% of Americans that live in Oregon I guess...
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  2. it's still the richest, you guys just have a strange way of dividing up and using those riches... That makes it one of the poorest developed countries at the same time.
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  3. We have a system for clearing the sidewalks. It's called De Buurman. But the system got in disarray a few decades ago.
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  4. In badly developed countries (and yes USA, falls in that category these days) public transport is often dirty, full of homeless people etc. When you have been harassed by a drunk guy in the bus a few times you might not want to use it anymore. Of course these problems are almost non existent in areas with good funding and less social problems . so the circle is: public transport not funded -> not reliable to use -> people with money don't use it. -> stigma of poor -> less funding -> repeat
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  5.  @PK-tt5kk  it's pretty understandable for poor countries to see more cars as a sign of success. We did the same, when we escaped poverty in the 1950s-1960s. I don't blame them. We can only hope they learn faster than we did, because they can see the mistakes that others made before them.
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  6. good observation.. Also I think the Swiss are actually richer per capita than the Americans.
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  7. video idea: Zwolle. Zwolle has both an old medieval city center and modern city planning like Stadshagen. I think Stadshagen could be a nice topic it seems to be designed with a lot of car restrictions in mind, yet still car friendly. And it's quite new with thousands of houses build in the last 10 years. it has 20,000 people and is a great example of the latest Dutch city design policies.
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  8. Yet americans are still richer on average, but they only want to be rich to be able to buy their own small kingdoms of luxury and comfort, in gated communities, the rest of the country can rot away for all they care. I never understood that mindset, those rich folks also have to get out in 'the wild' I would be ashamed if I saw how sloppy my country is
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  9. Basically, in the US, most of the old conservative GOP voters are a lost cause. We can only hope they will die out and their (grand)children will become more reasonable. And the political right needs to reinvent themselves and turn away from the Trumpism that drives them right into self-destruction
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  10.  @rangersmith4652  those with a car are still not free, they are prisoners of their 4 wheeled cell.. At least they have AC to make it a bit less uncomfortable.
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  11. I never realized how bad it was in the US because the kids in the Simpsons and South Park actually do bike around.... But those shows originated in the 90s
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  12. Actually Americans are thinking about the future with those high stack interchanges. New settlements can use those high ramps for safety after the nuclear apocalypse 😉
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  13. indeed. the USA was the world leader from the 1940s till the 1970s.. it;s gone downhill ever since. Unless you are among the top richest people, it;s a shitty place to live
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  14. Me, Dutch, really like the Spanish cities.. Despite the disadvantageous terrain (lots of rocks and hills usually) they really try to make their cities bike / e-bike friendly. and their public transport is pretty good as well. (note: I am only familiar with tourist destinations in Spain)
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  15.  @bodhid  it worked because everybody would clean their own bit because if they didn't the Neighbours would Gossip
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  16.  @minhuang8848  Switzerland has the best train system in the world (maybe shared for #1 with Japan) Both countries are mostly mountains....
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  17. I never see ads, I have adblock + sponsorblock , but I did see the cat, so the addon works perfect. I am very fanatical in avoiding ads of ANY kind, I really can't stands ads. No exceptions. If I want to support somebody I can become a patreon or sometimes donate something directly.
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  18. Some Cities in SPain are getting very good at this too. I am not sure if it's just the tourist places at the costa del sol, but when I was there a few months ago I saw a lot of room for bikes / electric scooters and pedestrians and a lot of techniques to repel cars. Also quite a lot of streets where cars were totally banned. They make it nice for the tourists who are often on foot on on rentals
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  19.  @notthatcreativewithnames  yes, but that is less of an issue in 1st world countries that got richer earlier. it was the same here in the 1950s-1960s Once you have a few generations where everybody (who wants one) owns a car, that effect goes away.
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  20. yes, in the winter my home work commute is 30 minutes by car, in the summer its 20 min. But in the summer I want to bike, in the wet winter, not so much... aaarch!
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  21.  @MajorMlgNoob  you car infrastructure is also poorly developed and has 30-40 years of maintenance neglect. it looks really shitty . sorry, truth hurts
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  22.  @MaximeKG  the problem of developing countries is that bicycles is associated with poverty , if you never had anything else for generations, and you make a little bit more money you really really REALLY want that car that you and your parents could only dream of before. This is a tragic thing of human psychology.. Note: people in the West think exactly the same, only they have been rich for a long time now, so they can use other material belongings to feel good about themselves.
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  23.  @mnm5165  to be fair most Dutch people also live in houses that have dozens if not hundreds exact copies in nearby streets, and yet our cities are portrayed as utopia. the strong points are the city centers, the infrastructure and all the services that are available for everybody with or without car, but not the common housing
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  24.  @rjdverbeek  touché
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  25. pick-up trucks
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  26. It's adventurous. Most adventures include some danger. But as a tourist it's ok , you only do it a very short period of time, if you live there, it's another thing.. the last time I was in the USA was in 2001, and even then I already noticed how shoddy and backwards the place was (California, so not exactly a poor area) I concluded that the US is only a livable place if you are at least a millionaire, so you can buy yourself out the crap
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  27. I gained 10 kgs in 2020 :( I could blame covid, but that's a lie. my job didn't change, I just ate more snacks. Working on walking it off now
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  28. NJB lives in the Netherlands, which has much better bike infrastructure, and not only in city centra but all across the country. So compared to that it's mwah. As for pubic transport, it;s the other way around.. The Netherlands has an ok public transport, better than many other places, (like Sydney) but the Swiss beats that, theirs is even better.
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  29.  @thomaspaine9420  by using more than just bikes.. the name of this channel explains it , and all these videos showcase it a lot better than I could do here in a random comment in a few minutes before I head off to work . and to be fair our Randstad 'metropole' isn't like London or Los Angeles , as said it's dozens of smaller cities grown together so that means it also has dozens of traditional city centers. People from Rotterdam won;t go shopping in The Hague usually because they have everything they need in their own part of 'the Randstad'
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  30. yeah, let's go on our bike to the grocery store in Iowa, after all it;s only 20 miles.... This would only work in a few areas in the US
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  31.  @XEinstein  that's why we live here, save up some money and then take a nice long holiday trip in the USA. That way even using the car (road trip!) can be an adventure instead of a nuisance. 20 years ago I saw my first stroad in San Diego and I wasn't depressed, I took pictures of it because it was so crazy!
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  32. In the land of the blind (NA) , One-Eye (Montreal) is king.
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  33.  @tony_5156  You will stay inside your chosen prison the rest of your life? I am not criticizing making a nice place for yourself, I am criticizing that they don;t care that the world is a craphole as soon as they drive out of their gate. I want to see nice things when I am outside my house too. Not just in my own living room or garden.
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  34. I live in Enschede, a 100K something town. In a neighbourhood without high flats, we have 5 of these trash bin points within 200m. 2 of them are within 75m .
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  35. we are only slightly better. Watersnoodramp -> Delta werken. Corona is another example, experts have warned for this for decades, yet we were very unprepared.
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  36.  @themartinandersson  I never worked there but my eyes were opened when I traveled their in my twenties for MTG tournaments (a strategic cardgame with a 'pro' competition) I remember being in San Diego and seeing all these old pensioners working as parking guards and lift boys... These people were 70+ sometimes close to 80. And not some illegal immigrants, just white americans that needed any little pay they could get to survive.... I also remember we laughed at this long boulevard with 30 fast food restaurants in a row... on each side!. If you were at a Mc Donalds sign you could actually spot the next yellow M on a bright day. And from the wealthy city center, within a few blocks you walked into a shady dirty area. However, the city center was quite walkable and had good public transport , I stayed there a week and with busses and the city tram I could go everywhere easily. And going to the beach in january was amazing. I think this was in 2001 or 2003
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  37. Meanwhile a bazillion Germans come shopping in Enschede every Saturday... (well before corona anyway) And it's not just for clothes and stuff, you hear a lot of German in our supermarkets too. Prices are not that far apart, except on alcohol.
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  38.  @thomaspaine9420  you are right, we have small cities , but we have an area called Randstad that is basically a 5-8 million city , it;s just a dozen of the smaller ones grown together with a little bit of greenery left in the middle . It's about the same size as the 9 counties of SF bay area
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  39. @ you didn't watch the video did you? If you did, try again and this time pay attention to the central theme of the video which is : YOUR car dependant life style IS THE ONE THAT DOES NOT pay for itself, but instead is subsidized by the city dwellers that pay more tax and don;t need all the rural car infrastructure that is needed for big box stores and 5 mile long fastfood stroads
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  40. As for land use, this is the Netherlands, you can 't just say 'hey we have a new station, let's re-develop the surrounding area. All the land is owned, and especially around Driebergen Zeist, owned by a lot of old money on old land with huge estates and institutions (the park you mentioned is part of that) there is no way that they would sell it it put some apartments or more office blocks on it 'because the transport infrastructure now is so nice' Some of the land might also be part of a nature reserve. In Kampen the situation is different. the land would obviously still be owned, but it's farm land / polder. with relative few parties involved. it's much easier there to make a destination plan, and put a whole area as future 'woonwijk' , buy out the few farmers and start planning and building.
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  41.  @KoenPrins  not in Amsterdam, unless you have a highly skilled job with appropriate high salary .
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  42. you can't not have a car in those suburbs, that is the whole american sub theme of this channel
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  43. In europe every country, even the poorer ones, moved to electronic payment with chip cards a decade ago. Almost nobody ever pays cash except tourists who haven't gotten the proper bus card yet. which can indeed sometimes be a hassle to get
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  44.  @-wessel7877  but we must be honest, that is only around the Randstad and a few other large cities. Most of the rest of the country has typical 30 minute schedules for bus and trains, turning to once an hour in rural places
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  45. In Enschede, it's a complete failure in low social class neighbourhoods. Turns out, the 'lower classes' can't be bothered to separate garbage or to use the containers properly, they just dump everything next to the nearest container, full or not. Of course not everybody is that 'aso' but enough are to make it a constant mess.
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  46. I see the same in many Spanish cities, like Malaga.
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  47. Sadly we are already overpopulated and you can only get here easily if you are rich / highly skilled tech worker
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  48. edit: above 1 million it's 2%, above 7M it's 1%+€70,000 and above 10M it's 0,5% +€120,000
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  49. I wouldn't call it meh... it has more water and tall buildings, it's quite nice, but from a totally different angle
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  50.  @tony_5156  and you plan to stay there the rest of your life? As a hermit?
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