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  #41  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 2:41 AM
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Originally Posted by CaliNative View Post
Sometimes feces are on the often filthy sidewalks and alleys of LA, SF & SD and I don't think they're all canine. Homeless are less at fault than the muni authorities that don't provide adequate restrooms for people to relieve themselves and places to wash. In San Diego there was a hepatitis outbreak last year because of this. Twenty years ago who would of thought we would turn into Calcutta? Richest country in the world? Or just most callous? For a few billion $, we could probably solve this problem, about 0.01% of our military spending. But we don't.
I smiled--ironically--to myself the other day as I walked up one street and passed what appeared to be a tourist couple and right where we passed there was a sh*t pile at the base of a tree. It could have been from a large dog but I suspect otherwise . . . but, my guess was the tourists didn't even think about the alternative.

But I despair about how the city could really solve this problem. It has already tried public bathrooms: BART and Muni stations have them, they installed fancy French self-cleaning ones* around town and are replacing them now, they even built a pissoir in at least one park.

The public toilets have all been a disaster because they get used more for sex and drug using behavior than for the intended purpose, even when, like the French ones, the doors open automatically after 15 minutes or so. And the ones that don't clean themselves like the French ones are always filthy and smelly and very unpleasant--the city doesn't seem capable of keeping thjem clean.

As for homelessness itself, I've posted this repeatedly but we spend around $300 million annually on our homeless in a variety of ways. A number of shelters exist. The city built some new buildings for the "formerly homeless" (formerly because they are now housed), complete with medical facilities on the ground floors but, at several hundred thousand $ per bed and a limited amount of land, there's only so much of that we can do. Most people agree that most of the chronic homeless have mental health issues and SF has a network of public clinics where they can be medicated and receive some treatment.

Anyway, we have, as of yesterday, a new Mayor who, like all her predecessors, promises to fix the homeless problem. We'll see.

*"old style" French toilets--the kind we've now had for about 2 decades

https://www.sfbetterstreets.org/find...ublic-toilets/

new design (replacement for the ones above)

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/...k-12985870.php
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  #42  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 2:43 AM
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no toilets is one.
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  #43  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 2:47 AM
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Originally Posted by xzmattzx View Post
The road leading from I-89 in Quebec is a two-lane road two miles north of the end of I-89!
That's getting fixed. Our A-35 used to stop at St-Jean-sur-Richelieu but it's been extended south in phases over the past couple years. It will eventually connect with I-89 for a full freeway Montreal-Boston connection.
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  #44  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 4:21 AM
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One of my biggest pet peeves with my neighborhood (and so many other chicago neighborhoods) is the presence of stupid fucking suburban-style drive-thru/surface parking lot fast food chain restaurants.

There are three egregiously horrible examples within a half mile of me (McShittles, Burger Fuck, and Bendy's)

I wish they would all find a way to just go and fuck off.
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Last edited by Steely Dan; Jul 14, 2018 at 5:20 AM.
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  #45  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 4:27 AM
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Originally Posted by Steely Dan View Post
One of my biggest pet peeves with my neighborhood (and so many other chicago neighborhoods) is the presence of stupid fucking suburban-style drive-thru/surface parking lot fast food chain restaurants.

There are three egregiously horrible examples within a half mile of me.

I wish theyou would all find a way to just go and fuck off.
The only one I know of near me is about to get "redeveloped" but worse is a new trend toward drive-through grocery pickups--IN THE MIDDLE OF A CITY!! I have recently gotten 2 $20 coupons from Safeway usable for trying out this new thing. I just wish they wouldn't do it. I don't even want somebody else picking out my perishables which is why I don't have more groceries delivered. But if I'm driving to the store, I'm definitely going inside and making sure I get fresh veggies and meat.
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  #46  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 7:30 AM
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Originally Posted by Illithid Dude View Post
I HATE when new apartment buildings are not constructed to the lot line and instead have narrow throughways between buildings that are never used, or even worse, one or two foot gaps between buildings that aren't even wide enough to fit an adult man. It makes the urban environment look like a mouth missing teeth, or a guitar with three strings, rather than a cohesive streetwall.
Don't even get me started on zoning. In my city, every residential zoning district outside the downtown area and a few commercial overlay districts requires a 20-foot front yard set-back. In fact, the taller the building goes, the greater the setback. For the largest apartment buildings - once you get over 75 feet - then the setback has to be at least 50 feet. Also, every one of these buildings outside the key areas are also required to have various side yards.

There are few if any buildings that actually follow these since there are so many loopholes in the code including things like developing under a "planned residential development" overlay in which you develop more than one building on a parcels and variences. And much of the city was developed prior to the adoption of the current zoning code so any lot-of-record platted/divided prior to the code is buildable regardless of the requirements. But it's crazy how the code discourages height and size and just urban development by-right. Funny enough, the zones with the least stringest requirements are the two industrial zoning districts.
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  #47  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 2:49 PM
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Originally Posted by Illithid Dude View Post
I HATE when new apartment buildings are not constructed to the lot line and instead have narrow throughways between buildings that are never used
In that case, I would strongly advise you to stay away from chicago.

You just described like 95% of the entire city (legacy of the great fire).

Though I will say that we frequently use the gangway of our building.

We keep our stroller under our back porch. the gangway means we don't have to lug it through our home to get it out to the front sidewalk.
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Last edited by Steely Dan; Jul 14, 2018 at 3:03 PM.
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  #48  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 2:56 PM
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As for the shorts thing, I was running some errands around the neighborhood this morning, so of course I was wearing my summer saturday errand running uniform of shorts and flip flops.

When I was at the barber shop, I noticed 2 other guys wearing the same, and even two of the barbers were wearing shorts as well (though they had sneakers in lieu of flips). These were guys ranging in age from 30s to 60s.

Chicago, I adore your super-casual soul.
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  #49  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 3:20 PM
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when you live in a city that regularly has heat indexes of 110 F shorts aren't a question.
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  #50  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 4:35 PM
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I was looking for a place to post this observation without bringing back the previous shorts discussions... but I did notice recently in Mexico City that very, very few people wore shorts. After a bit my gf and I were actually trying to spot those who were (very cool, I know). Results were that the majority were clearly tourists and the others tended to be hipster types. So that observation certainly does stand in that case. Of course it was a dry 25 degrees C so I could just wear jeans - didn't even have to bring out the linen pants I brought.

It's over 30 degrees C today in Toronto (not counting humidity) and shorts are prevalent. I'm not changing out of my shorts/light button-up/slip on vans combo to go to the barbers and run a few other errands shortly, that's for sure.
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  #51  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 5:36 PM
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I seem to recall reading somewhere that DC's street plan had been laid out with the idea in mind to confuse invading armies, but I definitely recall reading about how Haussman's plan for Paris was designed specifically to prevent uprisings and blockades. You can block the streets in a medieval warren when they're so narrow you can lie down and touch one side with your fingertips and the other with your toes, but nothing is going to block the Champs-Elysses short of a several-hundred-car pileup.
Yes, I'm pretty sure this was an explanation given in a children's book that my parents bought me as a kid on one of our trips to D.C.
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  #52  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 5:39 PM
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The smell. New York smells like rotting garbage and urine during the summer. San Francisco smells awful too.
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  #53  
Old Posted Jul 14, 2018, 9:58 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by niwell View Post
I was looking for a place to post this observation without bringing back the previous shorts discussions... but I did notice recently in Mexico City that very, very few people wore shorts. After a bit my gf and I were actually trying to spot those who were (very cool, I know). Results were that the majority were clearly tourists and the others tended to be hipster types. So that observation certainly does stand in that case. Of course it was a dry 25 degrees C so I could just wear jeans - didn't even have to bring out the linen pants I brought.

It's over 30 degrees C today in Toronto (not counting humidity) and shorts are prevalent. I'm not changing out of my shorts/light button-up/slip on vans combo to go to the barbers and run a few other errands shortly, that's for sure.
mexico city is a quite mild city compared to the swamp that is the southeast quadrant of north america. i also feel like shorts were born as a very middle and upper middle class thing - a product of hard won leisure time, even if they spread to the other classes some time ago. places like chicago that had (and has) an enormous and proud middle class is going to have shorts, it just is. i think of mexico city as being a place more defined by an upper class and working class but i may have gone too far in my thesis.
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  #54  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 12:07 AM
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any city that wasnt made by someone with ocd
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  #55  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 1:06 AM
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power lines everywhere
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Oh my god, telephone polls and associated utility wires. I can't stand this stuff above the publci right-of-ways. My city is lousing with this crap, and there appears to be no set policy would when they bury them.
As a resident of Toronto, I feel your pain.
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  #56  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 1:09 AM
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ive never had those problems, just problems that i wish i lived in a space city heh
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  #57  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 6:29 AM
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For LA:

-- MacArthur Park being bisected by Wilshire Blvd.
-- DTLA's off-axis grid.
-- San Vicente Blvd.
-- 101 separating the Civic Center from El Pueblo and Chinatown.
-- Pasadena and it's environ's roadways: freeways that abruptly end (110 and 710) and redundant street names (multiple Del Mars, Marengos, Missions, etc.).
-- Crosswalks that barely give healthy adults enough time to cross some of our widest boulevards. The elderly have zero chance of making it across Olympic, Figueroa, Wilshire, Pico, etc before the lights change.
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  #58  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 6:00 PM
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Crosswalk pushbuttons. Particularly in areas with a lot of pedestrians. Seattle is infested with these. I don't pay attention to these lights of course.

Also slow light cycles.
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  #59  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 7:56 PM
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Originally Posted by mhays View Post
Crosswalk pushbuttons. Particularly in areas with a lot of pedestrians. Seattle is infested with these. I don't pay attention to these lights of course.

Also slow light cycles.
I've always wondered: Do they actually do anything or are they a sham to make you feel like if you wait long enough the light will change? I'm serious. I'm not actually sure they are hooked up to anything but I push them anyway like a fool.
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  #60  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2018, 7:58 PM
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Originally Posted by iheartthed View Post
The smell. New York smells like rotting garbage and urine during the summer. San Francisco smells awful too.
Lately, besides the smell of urine, a lot of SF smells like marijuana smoke most of the time. Really . . . not kidding.
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