Fuck Cars
A place to discuss problems of car centric infrastructure or how it hurts us all. Let's explore the bad world of Cars!
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It's the lack of third places in the US (and increasingly everywhere else). The only place they can unconditionally exist at, outside of their house, is their car.
I think this is the real reason that carbrain has so thoroughly overtaken America. It's our last remaining free space outside our house. You will get trespassed or ticketed for loitering if we hang out anywhere in public
The land of the free
What sort of third places exist in other countries? I've always wondered. I'm in the US and we have a lot of parks, most of which have benches where plenty of folks go to eat lunch or gather, but that's only feasible when the weather is nice. It would be amazing to have a third place with heat or AC where you can hang out. The library works in some cases but obviously you can't eat there and you have to be quiet.
I can only speak for Stockholm but outside of the parks there are plazas, benches and hangout areas out in the street (especially in the summer when many city streets close for car traffic), or just hanging out by the water on some steps. There's also woods and fields in the northern part of the city with places for BBQ or picnics. Since the city is not built in a grid pattern there are plenty of awkwardly shaped places that wouldn't make sense for a building where there's just some trees and seating, maybe a statue or a fountain.
Finding a place to hang out has never really been a problem at any time in my life since everything is accessible by public transport or bike.
EDIT: Oh and there's nothing wrong with being outside in the winter. Just bring a coat and thermos of glögg or Irish coffee. I always keep a seating pad in my backpack for wet or cold surfaces.
Okay so you just listed off public parks I think? Which, believe it or not, we do have in the states. In plentiful amounts too.
Also, the coldest temp ever recorded in Stockholm was -28c, and this winter we had over 40 days colder than that haha
Did I? Either my understanding of what "park" means in american english is off, or you need to work on your reading comprehension. For me, some stone steps leading down to the water, a bench and some trees does not constitute a park.
Obviously you would need to adapt to your climate. May I ask, what icehole do you live in? Alaska? North Dakota? Minnesota? Stockholm is rather warm compared to cities with similar latitude on other continents thanks to the gulf stream (Mil gracias, Mexico!).
Yeah I guess I would consider a "park" to be "any public outdoor place". For some steps leading down to the water and a bench it would be a small park, or possibly a "public access site" but that's still a type of park.
And yes, I do live in one of those "ice holes" haha. But to be honest, when I went to look it up I thought the numbers would be closer because you're at a similar latitude but I forgot just how mild of a climate Europe really has.