(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Cars: What Are They Good For? -- Strike for the Planet week 111 [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-10-21 You can make a difference to the hurt being caused by climate chaos and the great extinction event in your town or your city! How? Reuse, repurpose, and recycle this information. You can push your local politicians to act. It will make a difference! This is the letter for week 111 of a weekly climate strike that went on for 4 years in front of San Francisco City Hall, beginning early March 2019. For more context, see this story. For an annotated table of contents of the topics for all the strike letters, see this story. Meanwhile… STRIKE FOR THE PLANET Kinda says it all, doesn’t it? This is from the Panhandle.1 This week’s topic: Cars — What Are They Good For? Absolutely nothing (say it again!) Cars kill How dangerous is it to be anything but a raging motorist in San Francisco? Well, there are maps, Created from sfcta data set of pedestrian collisions, including fatalities, from 2006 — 2017. The orange lines are the High Injury Network.2 From Vision Zero, 2017-20193 there are graphs and pie charts like this, From the San Francisco Vision Zero Traffic Fatalities: 2020 End of Year Report4 and there’s the lived experience of every pedestrian and every cyclist and every person trying to cross a street every day in the city that all point to one conclusion: It is dangerous out there — very, very dangerous. And SF’s response to this reality is not good What is the city doing to deal with this literal carnage? Cars are causing a problem? Open more spaces to cars cause that’ll fix things for sure!5 Cars are harming neighborhoods? Don’t change things to reduce or eliminate those cars no matter what!6 Getting rid of cars upsets big donors and people with privilege and power? Make false comparisons and try to get cars back everywhere!7 San Francisco is not built for cars The roads, in fact, were built for bikes.8, 9 SF is geographically too small to need or accommodate cars10, and is the second most densely populated city in the U.S.11 With more people per area and less space that is not inhabited, cars traveling at high speeds and breaking traffic laws on a regular basis cause deaths and injuries.12 Traffic is both bad and insanely dangerous in San Francisco.13 The situation would be bad enough if that was the extent of our problem, but it’s not. Cars are yet another excuse to not build affordable housing The possibility of long commutes for the working poor from places with housing to SF means there’s no need to build affordable housing in SF.14 And the working poor in SF is a large group. Teachers, for instance, qualify for low income housing in SF15, 16 and more and more live in the Valley as a result of being pushed out of SF (and are leaving SFUSD as a result). The arts had fled even before the pandemic,17 and the people who can afford to live in SF are growing Whiter and richer every day.18 Cars also are an excuse not to pay a living wage Lyft and Uber are prime examples of this phenomena19 but it didn’t start with them.20 Cars are expensive and the poorest households spend the most money on them.21 But work is set up so that the poorest are most in need of cars to find employment.22 Cars are not neutral tools They enable and are used in crime, especially in SF. 23, 24 They are becoming the favorite weapons of terrorists. 25, 26 They are anti-community. 27, 28, 29 They are actively anti-environmental in multiple ways.30, 31, 32 Get rid of cars and you disrupt the status quo And the status quo is bad33; if you need a reminder of why, just look above, revisit the maps and graphs at the top of this letter, take a walk up Polk. Go on, I’ll wait. And then go walking or riding or just watching on some of the Slow Streets or transit-only streets or where there is actually adequate (not luxurious, but just barely enough) pedestrian and bike space safe from cars. There’s a huge difference for the better, and that difference is just the start, not the end goal. Because the status quo is killing the planet Really, there are 110 prior Strike letters to check if you doubt that statement. And don’t you know how expensive not acting is?34 The costs of acting are much less than the costs of doing nothing.35 Just ask the insurance industry.36 And the military.37 And the families of those killed by cars in SF. It’s easy math. We’ve already shrunk the atmosphere38 and shifted the poles39, we’re pissing away the water while letting CO 2 spewing death monsters run riot over the city. SF’s chances for survival are borderline at best, and require immediate action?40 You’ve taken oaths to act for the good of SF. You say you are bound by the Precautionary Principle. You supposedly want to have something positive to show for all your Vision Zero talk. So act already. Because it’s not about politics anymore, it never was. It’s about survival.41 FOOTNOTES 1. These stencils were on the pedestrian/bike path at Masonic and at Stanyan for years and were the only warning we had about the insanely dangerous conditions of those 2 intersections. Masonic, by the way, is much better now. 2. High Injury Corridors from the Vision Zero SF website at https://sfgov.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=fa37f1274b4446f1bdddd7bdf9e708ff . Oh look! JFK Drive is there! When there were cars roaring down it, it was a high injury corridor. What a surprise! 3. Vision Zero. 2019. https://www.visionzerosf.org/vision-zero-in-action/evaluating-monitoring-our-progress/ . 4. Vision Zero Traffic Fatalities: 2020 End of Year Report. Vision Zero SF. March 2021. https://www.visionzerosf.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/Vision-Zero-2020-End-of-Year-Traffic-Fatality-Report_1.0.pdf. 5. Carly Graf. “Temporary Great Highway closure could lose support from District Four supervisor”. San Francisco Examiner. 13 November 2020. https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/temporary-great-highway-closure-could-lose-support-from-district-four-supervisor/ . 6. Aaron Bialick. “Cars Will Remain on the Crooked Block of Lombard Street Until at Least 2016”. Streets Blog SF. 24 June 2015. https://sf.streetsblog.org/2015/06/24/cars-will-remain-on-the-crooked-block-of-lombard-street-until-at-least-2016/ . 7. Roger Rudick. “Supervisor’s Comparison of Car-Free JFK to Jim Crow is ‘Offensive’”. Streets Blog SF. 12 May 2021. https://sf.streetsblog.org/2021/05/12/supervisor-waltons-comparison-of-car-free-jfk-to-jim-crow-is-offensive/ . 8. Joseph Stromberg. “‘Roads were not built for cars’: how cyclists, not drivers, first fought to pave US roads”. Vox. 19 March 2015. https://www.vox.com/2015/3/19/8253035/roads-cyclists-cars-history . 9. Lia Garcia. “30 Things Nobody Tells You About San Francisco”. Practical Wanderlust. 26 May 2021. https://practicalwanderlust.com/things-nobody-tells-you-about-san-francisco/ . “Driving a mile in San Francisco can take an hour for no reason, plus another hour to try to find parking. This is also why you should never drive in the city: the traffic, the parking, and the LYFT/Uber/food delivery/Amazon package delivery drivers who treat congested streets like their personal parking lots make it absolute hell.” 10. Julieta Chavez Delua. “Top 10 cities where you can live without a car and help save the Earth”. Habitat for Humanity. Accessed 2 June 2021. https://www.habitat.org/stories/top-10-cities-where-you-can-live-without-car-and-help-save-earth . 11. New York City is the first. 12. Max DeNike. “S.F.’s “Vision Zero” Isn’t Stopping Bad Drivers, Or Hit-and-Runs”. SFWeekly. 24 June 2016. https://www.sfweekly.com/news/s-f-s-vision-zero-isnt-stopping-bad-drivers-or-hit-and-runs/ . 13. And it’s gotten so much worse since Lyft and Uber. I’ve been in 3 bad crashes while biking in SF, my husband has been in 2 bad crashes while biking in SF, my students have been in multiple bad crashes while biking or skateboarding or just crossing the street in the crosswalk with a green light at the school intersection in SF. It is always the car’s fault, the police usually try to blame the victim, and we’re told nothing can be changed unless a certain number of people die in the same situation and then we might get a stop sign. This obviously doesn’t work, and hurts the poorest, youngest, and oldest the most. 14. Mike Moffitt. “What science says Uber and Lyft are doing to San Francisco”. SFGate. 16 October 2019. https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/Uber-Lyft-San-Francisco-pros-cons-ride-hailing-13841277.php . 15. Eric Westervelt. “More Teachers Can’t Afford To Live Where They Teach”. NPR. 24 March 2016. https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/03/24/470710747/more-teachers-cant-afford-to-live-where-they-teach . 16. I’ve had loads of coworkers enter the lottery and a few even managed to get housing after years on the list. 17. Try to find a mid-level theatre company operating in SF, one without an Equity contract. Go on, I’ll wait. Ooh, try to find a small theatre company operating in SF that lasts for more than one season and has a home. Have fun! 18. Laura Mallonee. “Capturing the Bay Area’s Diversity—And Rapid Change”. Wired. 12 November 2015. https://www.wired.com/2015/11/status-update-san-francisco/ . 19. Angie Schmitt. “New Labor Rules for Uber and Lyft Should Help Cities”. StreetsBlog USA. 13 September 2019. https://usa.streetsblog.org/2019/09/13/new-labor-rules-for-uber-and-lyft-should-help-cities/ . 20. Take Walmart, for example. Candice Elliott. “Corporate Welfare: How Exactly Does It Affect Us As Americans”. Listen Money Matters. Accessed 9 June 2021. https://www.listenmoneymatters.com/corporate-welfare/ . 21. Joanna Moorhead. “If you live in a city, you don’t need a car”. The Guardian. 6 March 2013. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/mar/06/live-city-dont-need-car . 22. So much so that there’s even a wikiHow on “How to Get a Job Without a Car” that has to say, right at the top “Know that being car-less is not a dealbreaker” because it, in truth, so often is. 6 May 2021. https://www.wikihow.com/Get-a-Job-Without-a-Car . 23. Dion Lim. “‘You are loved’” Woman responds with sympathy for attackers after violent robbery”. ABC 7. 23 March 2021. https://abc7news.com/woman-attacked-nob-hill-san-francisco-robbery-caught-on-video-stop-asian-hate/10442340/ . 24. Phil Matier. “In S.F., stealing a car is only the beginning of the crime”. San Francisco Chronicle. 13 December 2020. https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/philmatier/article/In-S-F-stealing-a-car-is-only-the-beginning-of-15796395.php . 25. CNN Editorial Research. “Terrorist Attacks by Vehicle Fast Facts”. CNN. 6 September 2020. https://www.cnn.com/2017/05/03/world/terrorist-attacks-by-vehicle-fast-facts/index.html . 26. Hannah Allam. “Vehicle Attacks Rise As Extremists Target Protesters”. NPR. 21 June 2020. https://www.npr.org/2020/06/21/880963592/vehicle-attacks-rise-as-extremists-target-protesters . 27. Kaid Benfield. “For walkability and community, put the building on the street and the parking in back”. Smart Cities Dive. July 2012. https://www.smartcitiesdive.com/ex/sustainablecitiescollective/walkability-and-community-put-building-street-and-parking-back/7556/ . 28. West Sider. “A ‘Park to Park’ Open Street Moves Closer to Adoption, Prioritizing Pedestrians Over Cars”. West Side Rag. 6 April 2021. https://www.westsiderag.com/2021/04/06/a-park-to-park-open-street-moves-closer-to-adoption-prioritizing-pedestrians-over-cars . 29. Strong Towns. “Want to Understand How Freeways Destroyed U.S. Cities? Watch This Guy Play Cities:Skylines”. Strong Towns. 11 September 2019. https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/9/11/want-to-understand-how-freeways-destroyed-us-cities-watch-this-guy-play-citiesskylines . 30. National Geographic Staff. “The environmental impact of cars, explained”. National Geographic. 4 September 2019. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/environmental-impact . 31. Jenny Green. “Effects of Car Pollutants on the Environment”. Sciencing. 13 March 2018. https://sciencing.com/effects-car-pollutants-environment-23581.html . 32. Solon Kelleher. “More Animals Are Killed By Cars Each Day Than We Ever Could Have Imagined”. The Dodo. 7 October 2015. https://www.thedodo.com/road-kill-every-day-1392772624.html . 33. Janette Sadik-Kahn and Seth Solomonow. “Surrendering Our Cities to Cars Would Be a Historic Blunder”. The Atlantic. 16 April 2021. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/cars-will-take-streets-back-unless-cities-act-quickly/618615/ . 34. Eric Roston. “The Massive Cost of Not Adapting to Climate Change”. Bloomberg. 9 September 2019. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-09/the-massive-cost-of-not-adapting-to-climate-change . 35. Starre Vartan. “The Cost of Tackling Climate Change Is Less Than the Cost of Doing Nothing”. Treehugger. 21 April 2020. https://www.treehugger.com/tackling-climate-change-will-help-economy-when-we-need-it-most-4865281 . 36. Andrew Hoffman. “Rising Insurance Costs May Convince People That Climate Change Risks Are Real”. Huffpost. 1 November 2018. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/insurance-costs-climate-change_b_5bd0a8d0e4b04d1f9a5582d9 . 37. Sébastien Roblin. “The U.S. military is terrified of climate change. It’s done more damage than Iranian missiles.” NBC News. 20 September 2020. https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/u-s-military-terrified-climate-change-it-s-done-more-ncna1240484 . 38. Damian Carrington. “Climate emissions shrinking the stratosphere, scientists reveal”. The Guardian. 12 May 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/12/emissions-shrinking-the-stratosphere-scientists-find . 39. Damian Carrington. “Climate crisis has shifted the Earth’s axis, study shows”. The Guardian. 23 April 2021. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/23/climate-crisis-has-shifted-the-earths-axis-study-shows . 40. Richard Procter. “San Francisco Knows How to Stop Global Warming — Will It?” SF Weekly. 11 September 2019. https://www.sfweekly.com/news/san-francisco-climate-change-emissions/ . 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