this post was submitted on 27 Feb 2024
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No, we absolutely don't need to inundate every city with eight benches per block. (Two per side.)
There's a point at which you have to meet halfway, and if you can't walk for five minutes straight you should probably be in a walker or wheelchair.
In general I agree that cities need to be more walkable, and that includes seating. But the "some people can't walk three minutes" idea needs to go.
I'm a part time wheelchair user with some walking ability and there are a lot of spaces in my city that are too inaccessible for me to use. I don't mean internal space, I mean the built environment of the city itself. There's one route which, if I'm walking, is 0.2 miles. If I'm in my wheelchair, it's just under 0.6 because I have to take a weird route that doubles back on myself, because city designers put little ledges everywhere without considering how mobility aid users can be impacted
Of course you're right to highlight that a properly supportive and inclusive world requires more components than just modifications to the built environment, but I think that making accessible spaces needs to be in people's minds from the get go, and that "some people can't walk three minutes" is a useful idea for this.
Thanks for adding context Yeah, wheelchair accessibility is still a very relevant thing for us to work on. (Not to mention general walkability.) I think a bench quota is a bit tangent to that.
There's a good YouTube video on "Stroads" and how they've ruined our cities.
Yeah, totally unreasonable for people to have seating options. I mean the downsides are just so numerous...
Mandates often have unforeseen consequences and always create some burden. It's important to consider them carefully, even if they sound good on the surface, and make sure they're worth the cost.
A quick social media comment that "there should be benches every three minutes" isn't well considered policy. What even is a three minute walk to someone not capable of walking for five?
The sentiment is in the right place. The words are not.