More MOCO Upzoning - Starting in Silver Spring

[Anonymous]

The Planning Department in Montgomery County is a joke. At a certain point decades of failure and corruption need to result in accountability.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If they want to drop the missing middle rezoning proposal and just do this one maybe that is a reasonable compromise, but upzoning everything is a bad idea. Vision zero is idiotic and unrealistic though. The goal of reducing traffic fatalities attainable, but we need to balance operational concerns with safety improvements. The only way to achieve basically zero traffic deaths would be to reduce speed limit to 15 mph everywhere. Ridiculous policy goals like vision zero will harm society more than it helps.

How many deaths do you think it's worth for you to get somewhere 5 minutes faster in your car? How about 10 minutes faster in your car? Also, is it ok for people in your family to be killed or seriously injured in a car crash, or should car crash deaths and serious injuries be limited to people in other people's families?

You are ignoring the real-world trade offs that are involved in something like vision zero. Traffic deaths will never be zero unless we reduce the speed limits to 15 mph everywhere. There are very serious and negative consequences to reducing the speed limits substantially. For example, my doctors office that is now 30 around minutes away will take me around 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to if we lower the speed limit to 15mph. Multiply increases in transportation time across all of the county residents and the amount of time wasted will be astronomical. MOCO only has 39 traffic deaths per year on average. Applying the average demographics of MOCO residents indicates the the each of these people that die in a car accident are losing about 341,871 hours of their life. So any policy that waste more than this amount of other peoples time each year for every death prevented in car accidents is not a smart policy decision. Increasing the average daily driving time by 6 minutes a day for even 10,000 county residents wastes more hours than of peoples time than the hours of life gained by a single person who does not die in a car accident. I am supportive of policies that reduce traffic deaths given that a sufficient cost-benefit analysis is conducted. But it is foolish to pretend that any of these policies provide a free lunch. There are tradeoffs with pursuing policies and the vision zero proponents are largely ignoring this.

Are you listening to yourself?

I am not the PP, but the PP is a realist. Traffic deaths will NEVER be ZERO. Not really possible. Similarly, poverty will never be eliminated. You can work on the edges, which we should of course do. But ZERO is not humanly possible. Welcome to the real world, where bad sh-t happens unfortunately.

It is possible to have zero car crash deaths, though.

However, for the sake of argument: what do you consider an acceptable number of people killed in car crashes?

The acceptable level is determine by how much the government can reasonably afford to spend to reduce it and the impact on overall commute time. This is no different than society determining that there is a maximum amount that is reasonable to spend on medical care to prevent one death. The government cannot afford to spend (and should not) spend 1 million dollars on medical care for a cancer therapy that boost a persons life expectancy by one year. Spending exorbitant amount of money for small gains it wasteful and it allocates resources to activities that provide minimal benefits to society. There is a absolutely a value that must be assigned to human life because no government has unlimited resources. We need to prioritize spending where it has the largest impact and benefit for society.

Currently it's about 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County. Is that an acceptable number for you?

Lets get real. Some of those 40 deaths are really due to pedestrian stupidity. A few weeks ago, I witnessed several teenagers hot riding and waving their bikes through Bethesda. I see pedestrians regularly cross major streets without really looking out for traffic. I myself regularly j-walk in downtown DC. Simple fact is some pedestrian deaths are due to the stupidity of those pedestrians.

Ok, so 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County is an acceptable number for you. You're good with that.

I think that what they are saying is that some of the deaths are just casual suicides, and you can’t plan around those.

"Casual suicide"?

Some of the deaths are actual suicides, and yes, you actually can take actions to prevent them. Suicide barriers on bridges, for example.

Strokes, seizures, and heart attacks are not something that can be prevented.

Vision Zero was supposed to be an aspirational rhetorical goal. It is not possible to achieve.

You can design resilient infrastructure such that strokes, seizures and heart attacks don't cause as much damage.

The "resilient infrastructure", ie: concrete blocks, just makes it more likely that the person having the health emergency gets killed. It's trading one potential death for another and at best is death neutral.

You could say the same about guard rails. Do you want to get rid of guard rails?

Guard rails crumple. You can't say the same thing about guard rails.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Planners are looking for opportunities for infill development and will recommend zoning changes to all properties within 500 feet of University Boulevard. There is a meeting tomorrow at Blair to discuss with two other upcoming meetings later.

https://montgomeryplanning.org/planning/corridor-planning/university-boulevard-corridor-plan/

This is going to be the same for each one of these transit plans. It’s coming to your area, too, if you live in Montgomery County. Piece by piece they slip this legislation through. Thanks to that new legislation that the council just passed they won’t even have to include parking. Once it starts it’s all over.

I think this is great. My memory only goes back to the 70s but, in my experience, EVERY transit project is actually a real estate development project. That's why I don't focus on whether things like the Purple Line with "break even." The upzoning of Chevy Chase Lake over the next decade might be enough to compensate for any Purple Line "losses".

Wait, does that mean our public transit dollars are actually going into the pockets of real estate developers? 100%, buddy. 100%.

Upzoning won’t break even. Most residential development does not create a fiscal surplus. The only residential development that consistently creates a fiscal surplus is senior housing and very high end residential. Everything else usually costs the county more than these residents contribute in taxes.

+1. They promised smart growth would help the budget 30 years and since then it’s only gotten worse. Now they even want us to subsidize smart growth through tax abatements.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Planners are looking for opportunities for infill development and will recommend zoning changes to all properties within 500 feet of University Boulevard. There is a meeting tomorrow at Blair to discuss with two other upcoming meetings later.

https://montgomeryplanning.org/planning/corridor-planning/university-boulevard-corridor-plan/

This is going to be the same for each one of these transit plans. It’s coming to your area, too, if you live in Montgomery County. Piece by piece they slip this legislation through. Thanks to that new legislation that the council just passed they won’t even have to include parking. Once it starts it’s all over.

I think this is great. My memory only goes back to the 70s but, in my experience, EVERY transit project is actually a real estate development project. That's why I don't focus on whether things like the Purple Line with "break even." The upzoning of Chevy Chase Lake over the next decade might be enough to compensate for any Purple Line "losses".

Wait, does that mean our public transit dollars are actually going into the pockets of real estate developers? 100%, buddy. 100%.

Upzoning won’t break even. Most residential development does not create a fiscal surplus. The only residential development that consistently creates a fiscal surplus is senior housing and very high end residential. Everything else usually costs the county more than these residents contribute in taxes.

+1. They promised smart growth would help the budget 30 years and since then it’s only gotten worse. Now they even want us to subsidize smart growth through tax abatements.

Tired of this county being captured by small groups of ideologues that are sending it rapidly down a rabbit hole. Every time their crap doesn’t work - and it never does - the solution is always public subsidies instead of just doing something else that does work. Have to do everything possible not to let the ideology down.

[Anonymous]

In 2017, 3,709 deaths were caused by accidental drowning. BAN POOLS. No one needs to swim - it's just a luxury. Banning pools would cost nothing, and save over 3,000 lives. Is 3,000 dead people acceptable to you just so you can get wet every once in awhile???

/s

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Planners are looking for opportunities for infill development and will recommend zoning changes to all properties within 500 feet of University Boulevard. There is a meeting tomorrow at Blair to discuss with two other upcoming meetings later.

https://montgomeryplanning.org/planning/corridor-planning/university-boulevard-corridor-plan/

This is going to be the same for each one of these transit plans. It’s coming to your area, too, if you live in Montgomery County. Piece by piece they slip this legislation through. Thanks to that new legislation that the council just passed they won’t even have to include parking. Once it starts it’s all over.

I think this is great. My memory only goes back to the 70s but, in my experience, EVERY transit project is actually a real estate development project. That's why I don't focus on whether things like the Purple Line with "break even." The upzoning of Chevy Chase Lake over the next decade might be enough to compensate for any Purple Line "losses".

Wait, does that mean our public transit dollars are actually going into the pockets of real estate developers? 100%, buddy. 100%.

Upzoning won’t break even. Most residential development does not create a fiscal surplus. The only residential development that consistently creates a fiscal surplus is senior housing and very high end residential. Everything else usually costs the county more than these residents contribute in taxes.

+1. They promised smart growth would help the budget 30 years and since then it’s only gotten worse. Now they even want us to subsidize smart growth through tax abatements.

Tired of this county being captured by small groups of ideologues that are sending it rapidly down a rabbit hole. Every time their crap doesn’t work - and it never does - the solution is always public subsidies instead of just doing something else that does work. Have to do everything possible not to let the ideology down.

Great summary of where we are on housing and why housing supply won’t increase much here anytime soon. At some point the advocates should own the outcomes but that never seems to happen here.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If they want to drop the missing middle rezoning proposal and just do this one maybe that is a reasonable compromise, but upzoning everything is a bad idea. Vision zero is idiotic and unrealistic though. The goal of reducing traffic fatalities attainable, but we need to balance operational concerns with safety improvements. The only way to achieve basically zero traffic deaths would be to reduce speed limit to 15 mph everywhere. Ridiculous policy goals like vision zero will harm society more than it helps.

How many deaths do you think it's worth for you to get somewhere 5 minutes faster in your car? How about 10 minutes faster in your car? Also, is it ok for people in your family to be killed or seriously injured in a car crash, or should car crash deaths and serious injuries be limited to people in other people's families?

You are ignoring the real-world trade offs that are involved in something like vision zero. Traffic deaths will never be zero unless we reduce the speed limits to 15 mph everywhere. There are very serious and negative consequences to reducing the speed limits substantially. For example, my doctors office that is now 30 around minutes away will take me around 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to if we lower the speed limit to 15mph. Multiply increases in transportation time across all of the county residents and the amount of time wasted will be astronomical. MOCO only has 39 traffic deaths per year on average. Applying the average demographics of MOCO residents indicates the the each of these people that die in a car accident are losing about 341,871 hours of their life. So any policy that waste more than this amount of other peoples time each year for every death prevented in car accidents is not a smart policy decision. Increasing the average daily driving time by 6 minutes a day for even 10,000 county residents wastes more hours than of peoples time than the hours of life gained by a single person who does not die in a car accident. I am supportive of policies that reduce traffic deaths given that a sufficient cost-benefit analysis is conducted. But it is foolish to pretend that any of these policies provide a free lunch. There are tradeoffs with pursuing policies and the vision zero proponents are largely ignoring this.

Are you listening to yourself?

I am not the PP, but the PP is a realist. Traffic deaths will NEVER be ZERO. Not really possible. Similarly, poverty will never be eliminated. You can work on the edges, which we should of course do. But ZERO is not humanly possible. Welcome to the real world, where bad sh-t happens unfortunately.

It is possible to have zero car crash deaths, though.

However, for the sake of argument: what do you consider an acceptable number of people killed in car crashes?

The acceptable level is determine by how much the government can reasonably afford to spend to reduce it and the impact on overall commute time. This is no different than society determining that there is a maximum amount that is reasonable to spend on medical care to prevent one death. The government cannot afford to spend (and should not) spend 1 million dollars on medical care for a cancer therapy that boost a persons life expectancy by one year. Spending exorbitant amount of money for small gains it wasteful and it allocates resources to activities that provide minimal benefits to society. There is a absolutely a value that must be assigned to human life because no government has unlimited resources. We need to prioritize spending where it has the largest impact and benefit for society.

Currently it's about 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County. Is that an acceptable number for you?

Lets get real. Some of those 40 deaths are really due to pedestrian stupidity. A few weeks ago, I witnessed several teenagers hot riding and waving their bikes through Bethesda. I see pedestrians regularly cross major streets without really looking out for traffic. I myself regularly j-walk in downtown DC. Simple fact is some pedestrian deaths are due to the stupidity of those pedestrians.

Ok, so 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County is an acceptable number for you. You're good with that.

I think that what they are saying is that some of the deaths are just casual suicides, and you can’t plan around those.

"Casual suicide"?

Some of the deaths are actual suicides, and yes, you actually can take actions to prevent them. Suicide barriers on bridges, for example.

Strokes, seizures, and heart attacks are not something that can be prevented.

Vision Zero was supposed to be an aspirational rhetorical goal. It is not possible to achieve.

You can design resilient infrastructure such that strokes, seizures and heart attacks don't cause as much damage.

Plus a transportation system and land use such that people likely to have strokes, seizures, and heat attacks can get where they need to go without driving.

Nobody plans to have a stroke, seizure or heart attack. Those also aren't issues limited to any specific demographic.

There's an important difference between "people likely to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks" and "people planning to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks"!

We're talking Vision Zero. It makes absolutely no difference. Concrete does not prevent people from having strokes, seizures and heart attacks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they want to drop the missing middle rezoning proposal and just do this one maybe that is a reasonable compromise, but upzoning everything is a bad idea. Vision zero is idiotic and unrealistic though. The goal of reducing traffic fatalities attainable, but we need to balance operational concerns with safety improvements. The only way to achieve basically zero traffic deaths would be to reduce speed limit to 15 mph everywhere. Ridiculous policy goals like vision zero will harm society more than it helps.

How many deaths do you think it's worth for you to get somewhere 5 minutes faster in your car? How about 10 minutes faster in your car? Also, is it ok for people in your family to be killed or seriously injured in a car crash, or should car crash deaths and serious injuries be limited to people in other people's families?

You are ignoring the real-world trade offs that are involved in something like vision zero. Traffic deaths will never be zero unless we reduce the speed limits to 15 mph everywhere. There are very serious and negative consequences to reducing the speed limits substantially. For example, my doctors office that is now 30 around minutes away will take me around 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to if we lower the speed limit to 15mph. Multiply increases in transportation time across all of the county residents and the amount of time wasted will be astronomical. MOCO only has 39 traffic deaths per year on average. Applying the average demographics of MOCO residents indicates the the each of these people that die in a car accident are losing about 341,871 hours of their life. So any policy that waste more than this amount of other peoples time each year for every death prevented in car accidents is not a smart policy decision. Increasing the average daily driving time by 6 minutes a day for even 10,000 county residents wastes more hours than of peoples time than the hours of life gained by a single person who does not die in a car accident. I am supportive of policies that reduce traffic deaths given that a sufficient cost-benefit analysis is conducted. But it is foolish to pretend that any of these policies provide a free lunch. There are tradeoffs with pursuing policies and the vision zero proponents are largely ignoring this.

Are you listening to yourself?

I am not the PP, but the PP is a realist. Traffic deaths will NEVER be ZERO. Not really possible. Similarly, poverty will never be eliminated. You can work on the edges, which we should of course do. But ZERO is not humanly possible. Welcome to the real world, where bad sh-t happens unfortunately.

It is possible to have zero car crash deaths, though.

However, for the sake of argument: what do you consider an acceptable number of people killed in car crashes?

The acceptable level is determine by how much the government can reasonably afford to spend to reduce it and the impact on overall commute time. This is no different than society determining that there is a maximum amount that is reasonable to spend on medical care to prevent one death. The government cannot afford to spend (and should not) spend 1 million dollars on medical care for a cancer therapy that boost a persons life expectancy by one year. Spending exorbitant amount of money for small gains it wasteful and it allocates resources to activities that provide minimal benefits to society. There is a absolutely a value that must be assigned to human life because no government has unlimited resources. We need to prioritize spending where it has the largest impact and benefit for society.

Currently it's about 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County. Is that an acceptable number for you?

Lets get real. Some of those 40 deaths are really due to pedestrian stupidity. A few weeks ago, I witnessed several teenagers hot riding and waving their bikes through Bethesda. I see pedestrians regularly cross major streets without really looking out for traffic. I myself regularly j-walk in downtown DC. Simple fact is some pedestrian deaths are due to the stupidity of those pedestrians.

Ok, so 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County is an acceptable number for you. You're good with that.

I think that what they are saying is that some of the deaths are just casual suicides, and you can’t plan around those.

"Casual suicide"?

Some of the deaths are actual suicides, and yes, you actually can take actions to prevent them. Suicide barriers on bridges, for example.

Strokes, seizures, and heart attacks are not something that can be prevented.

Vision Zero was supposed to be an aspirational rhetorical goal. It is not possible to achieve.

You can design resilient infrastructure such that strokes, seizures and heart attacks don't cause as much damage.

Plus a transportation system and land use such that people likely to have strokes, seizures, and heat attacks can get where they need to go without driving.

Nobody plans to have a stroke, seizure or heart attack. Those also aren't issues limited to any specific demographic.

There's an important difference between "people likely to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks" and "people planning to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks"!

We're talking Vision Zero. It makes absolutely no difference. Concrete does not prevent people from having strokes, seizures and heart attacks.

It is relevant because you advocating for an economically wasteful policy that will harm the county.This frivolous use of money will crowd out other expenses that would be a better use of money. The county budget is not unlimited

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they want to drop the missing middle rezoning proposal and just do this one maybe that is a reasonable compromise, but upzoning everything is a bad idea. Vision zero is idiotic and unrealistic though. The goal of reducing traffic fatalities attainable, but we need to balance operational concerns with safety improvements. The only way to achieve basically zero traffic deaths would be to reduce speed limit to 15 mph everywhere. Ridiculous policy goals like vision zero will harm society more than it helps.

How many deaths do you think it's worth for you to get somewhere 5 minutes faster in your car? How about 10 minutes faster in your car? Also, is it ok for people in your family to be killed or seriously injured in a car crash, or should car crash deaths and serious injuries be limited to people in other people's families?

You are ignoring the real-world trade offs that are involved in something like vision zero. Traffic deaths will never be zero unless we reduce the speed limits to 15 mph everywhere. There are very serious and negative consequences to reducing the speed limits substantially. For example, my doctors office that is now 30 around minutes away will take me around 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to if we lower the speed limit to 15mph. Multiply increases in transportation time across all of the county residents and the amount of time wasted will be astronomical. MOCO only has 39 traffic deaths per year on average. Applying the average demographics of MOCO residents indicates the the each of these people that die in a car accident are losing about 341,871 hours of their life. So any policy that waste more than this amount of other peoples time each year for every death prevented in car accidents is not a smart policy decision. Increasing the average daily driving time by 6 minutes a day for even 10,000 county residents wastes more hours than of peoples time than the hours of life gained by a single person who does not die in a car accident. I am supportive of policies that reduce traffic deaths given that a sufficient cost-benefit analysis is conducted. But it is foolish to pretend that any of these policies provide a free lunch. There are tradeoffs with pursuing policies and the vision zero proponents are largely ignoring this.

Are you listening to yourself?

I am not the PP, but the PP is a realist. Traffic deaths will NEVER be ZERO. Not really possible. Similarly, poverty will never be eliminated. You can work on the edges, which we should of course do. But ZERO is not humanly possible. Welcome to the real world, where bad sh-t happens unfortunately.

It is possible to have zero car crash deaths, though.

However, for the sake of argument: what do you consider an acceptable number of people killed in car crashes?

The acceptable level is determine by how much the government can reasonably afford to spend to reduce it and the impact on overall commute time. This is no different than society determining that there is a maximum amount that is reasonable to spend on medical care to prevent one death. The government cannot afford to spend (and should not) spend 1 million dollars on medical care for a cancer therapy that boost a persons life expectancy by one year. Spending exorbitant amount of money for small gains it wasteful and it allocates resources to activities that provide minimal benefits to society. There is a absolutely a value that must be assigned to human life because no government has unlimited resources. We need to prioritize spending where it has the largest impact and benefit for society.

Currently it's about 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County. Is that an acceptable number for you?

Lets get real. Some of those 40 deaths are really due to pedestrian stupidity. A few weeks ago, I witnessed several teenagers hot riding and waving their bikes through Bethesda. I see pedestrians regularly cross major streets without really looking out for traffic. I myself regularly j-walk in downtown DC. Simple fact is some pedestrian deaths are due to the stupidity of those pedestrians.

Ok, so 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County is an acceptable number for you. You're good with that.

I think that what they are saying is that some of the deaths are just casual suicides, and you can’t plan around those.

"Casual suicide"?

Some of the deaths are actual suicides, and yes, you actually can take actions to prevent them. Suicide barriers on bridges, for example.

Strokes, seizures, and heart attacks are not something that can be prevented.

Vision Zero was supposed to be an aspirational rhetorical goal. It is not possible to achieve.

You can design resilient infrastructure such that strokes, seizures and heart attacks don't cause as much damage.

Plus a transportation system and land use such that people likely to have strokes, seizures, and heat attacks can get where they need to go without driving.

Nobody plans to have a stroke, seizure or heart attack. Those also aren't issues limited to any specific demographic.

There's an important difference between "people likely to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks" and "people planning to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks"!

We're talking Vision Zero. It makes absolutely no difference. Concrete does not prevent people from having strokes, seizures and heart attacks.

No, but concrete does prevent people who are having medical issues from driving into storefronts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Pls explain the new housing multi unit — where is this going? Up the entire blvd?

Yes it would be allowed by right for any property within a certain distance of the blvd.

Within 500 feet of University Boulevard.

You know, almost 1/10 mile into existing neighborhoods.

Existing neighborhoods within 500 ft of University Boulevard already have multi-unit housing.

They are zoned for it, but you already knew this.

What's your point? Existing multi-unit housing is fine, but the potential for additional, new multi-unit housing is not?

It should definitely be throughly and robustly debated, with current residents of the areas given ample opportunity to weigh in on the matter, along with everyone else. Those current units were likely approved individually, this is a global change to zoning. Again, you knew all of this.

Why do the YIMBYs have to come across as so disingenuous and sleazy? It gives people the ick.

The Planning Department is having FOUR ADDITIONAL COMMUNITY MEETINGS this month.

Do you know what "the current units" within 500 feet of University Blvd. even are?

Are the units being forced (eminent domain of existing SFHs) or it’s up to each individual homeowner? I do not want a multi unit apartment building bumping up to my backyard or to be forced to sell my home)

The PPs are fearmongering about potential rezoning, which would give property owners more choices for what can go on their property. For example, suppose that currently the zoning for your property only allows you to have a one-unit residence on your property. The zoning might be changed to allow you to have a two-unit residence on your property.

If anybody tells you that the University Boulevard Corridor plan envisions eminent domain of your property, they are lying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they want to drop the missing middle rezoning proposal and just do this one maybe that is a reasonable compromise, but upzoning everything is a bad idea. Vision zero is idiotic and unrealistic though. The goal of reducing traffic fatalities attainable, but we need to balance operational concerns with safety improvements. The only way to achieve basically zero traffic deaths would be to reduce speed limit to 15 mph everywhere. Ridiculous policy goals like vision zero will harm society more than it helps.

How many deaths do you think it's worth for you to get somewhere 5 minutes faster in your car? How about 10 minutes faster in your car? Also, is it ok for people in your family to be killed or seriously injured in a car crash, or should car crash deaths and serious injuries be limited to people in other people's families?

You are ignoring the real-world trade offs that are involved in something like vision zero. Traffic deaths will never be zero unless we reduce the speed limits to 15 mph everywhere. There are very serious and negative consequences to reducing the speed limits substantially. For example, my doctors office that is now 30 around minutes away will take me around 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to if we lower the speed limit to 15mph. Multiply increases in transportation time across all of the county residents and the amount of time wasted will be astronomical. MOCO only has 39 traffic deaths per year on average. Applying the average demographics of MOCO residents indicates the the each of these people that die in a car accident are losing about 341,871 hours of their life. So any policy that waste more than this amount of other peoples time each year for every death prevented in car accidents is not a smart policy decision. Increasing the average daily driving time by 6 minutes a day for even 10,000 county residents wastes more hours than of peoples time than the hours of life gained by a single person who does not die in a car accident. I am supportive of policies that reduce traffic deaths given that a sufficient cost-benefit analysis is conducted. But it is foolish to pretend that any of these policies provide a free lunch. There are tradeoffs with pursuing policies and the vision zero proponents are largely ignoring this.

Are you listening to yourself?

I am not the PP, but the PP is a realist. Traffic deaths will NEVER be ZERO. Not really possible. Similarly, poverty will never be eliminated. You can work on the edges, which we should of course do. But ZERO is not humanly possible. Welcome to the real world, where bad sh-t happens unfortunately.

It is possible to have zero car crash deaths, though.

However, for the sake of argument: what do you consider an acceptable number of people killed in car crashes?

The acceptable level is determine by how much the government can reasonably afford to spend to reduce it and the impact on overall commute time. This is no different than society determining that there is a maximum amount that is reasonable to spend on medical care to prevent one death. The government cannot afford to spend (and should not) spend 1 million dollars on medical care for a cancer therapy that boost a persons life expectancy by one year. Spending exorbitant amount of money for small gains it wasteful and it allocates resources to activities that provide minimal benefits to society. There is a absolutely a value that must be assigned to human life because no government has unlimited resources. We need to prioritize spending where it has the largest impact and benefit for society.

Currently it's about 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County. Is that an acceptable number for you?

Lets get real. Some of those 40 deaths are really due to pedestrian stupidity. A few weeks ago, I witnessed several teenagers hot riding and waving their bikes through Bethesda. I see pedestrians regularly cross major streets without really looking out for traffic. I myself regularly j-walk in downtown DC. Simple fact is some pedestrian deaths are due to the stupidity of those pedestrians.

Ok, so 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County is an acceptable number for you. You're good with that.

I think that what they are saying is that some of the deaths are just casual suicides, and you can’t plan around those.

"Casual suicide"?

Some of the deaths are actual suicides, and yes, you actually can take actions to prevent them. Suicide barriers on bridges, for example.

Strokes, seizures, and heart attacks are not something that can be prevented.

Vision Zero was supposed to be an aspirational rhetorical goal. It is not possible to achieve.

You can design resilient infrastructure such that strokes, seizures and heart attacks don't cause as much damage.

Plus a transportation system and land use such that people likely to have strokes, seizures, and heat attacks can get where they need to go without driving.

Nobody plans to have a stroke, seizure or heart attack. Those also aren't issues limited to any specific demographic.

There's an important difference between "people likely to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks" and "people planning to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks"!

We're talking Vision Zero. It makes absolutely no difference. Concrete does not prevent people from having strokes, seizures and heart attacks.

No, but concrete does prevent people who are having medical issues from driving into storefronts.

+1. This is a really great point. We definitely need to prioritize putting concrete around all storefronts. There have been a shocking number of incidents in which people have driven into storefronts in Moco, and I am not willing to accept a single one of them.

Relatedly, all houses need to hall concrete barriers also, to prevent incidents like this: https://www.wusa9.com/article/traffic/ride-on-bus-crashes-into-home-montgomery-county/65-1cb8bb7f-b3f3-4e52-a1d7-82ba7c8c9436

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If they want to drop the missing middle rezoning proposal and just do this one maybe that is a reasonable compromise, but upzoning everything is a bad idea. Vision zero is idiotic and unrealistic though. The goal of reducing traffic fatalities attainable, but we need to balance operational concerns with safety improvements. The only way to achieve basically zero traffic deaths would be to reduce speed limit to 15 mph everywhere. Ridiculous policy goals like vision zero will harm society more than it helps.

How many deaths do you think it's worth for you to get somewhere 5 minutes faster in your car? How about 10 minutes faster in your car? Also, is it ok for people in your family to be killed or seriously injured in a car crash, or should car crash deaths and serious injuries be limited to people in other people's families?

You are ignoring the real-world trade offs that are involved in something like vision zero. Traffic deaths will never be zero unless we reduce the speed limits to 15 mph everywhere. There are very serious and negative consequences to reducing the speed limits substantially. For example, my doctors office that is now 30 around minutes away will take me around 1 hour and 30 minutes to get to if we lower the speed limit to 15mph. Multiply increases in transportation time across all of the county residents and the amount of time wasted will be astronomical. MOCO only has 39 traffic deaths per year on average. Applying the average demographics of MOCO residents indicates the the each of these people that die in a car accident are losing about 341,871 hours of their life. So any policy that waste more than this amount of other peoples time each year for every death prevented in car accidents is not a smart policy decision. Increasing the average daily driving time by 6 minutes a day for even 10,000 county residents wastes more hours than of peoples time than the hours of life gained by a single person who does not die in a car accident. I am supportive of policies that reduce traffic deaths given that a sufficient cost-benefit analysis is conducted. But it is foolish to pretend that any of these policies provide a free lunch. There are tradeoffs with pursuing policies and the vision zero proponents are largely ignoring this.

Are you listening to yourself?

I am not the PP, but the PP is a realist. Traffic deaths will NEVER be ZERO. Not really possible. Similarly, poverty will never be eliminated. You can work on the edges, which we should of course do. But ZERO is not humanly possible. Welcome to the real world, where bad sh-t happens unfortunately.

It is possible to have zero car crash deaths, though.

However, for the sake of argument: what do you consider an acceptable number of people killed in car crashes?

The acceptable level is determine by how much the government can reasonably afford to spend to reduce it and the impact on overall commute time. This is no different than society determining that there is a maximum amount that is reasonable to spend on medical care to prevent one death. The government cannot afford to spend (and should not) spend 1 million dollars on medical care for a cancer therapy that boost a persons life expectancy by one year. Spending exorbitant amount of money for small gains it wasteful and it allocates resources to activities that provide minimal benefits to society. There is a absolutely a value that must be assigned to human life because no government has unlimited resources. We need to prioritize spending where it has the largest impact and benefit for society.

Currently it's about 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County. Is that an acceptable number for you?

Lets get real. Some of those 40 deaths are really due to pedestrian stupidity. A few weeks ago, I witnessed several teenagers hot riding and waving their bikes through Bethesda. I see pedestrians regularly cross major streets without really looking out for traffic. I myself regularly j-walk in downtown DC. Simple fact is some pedestrian deaths are due to the stupidity of those pedestrians.

Ok, so 40 people killed in car crashes every year in Montgomery County is an acceptable number for you. You're good with that.

I think that what they are saying is that some of the deaths are just casual suicides, and you can’t plan around those.

"Casual suicide"?

Some of the deaths are actual suicides, and yes, you actually can take actions to prevent them. Suicide barriers on bridges, for example.

Strokes, seizures, and heart attacks are not something that can be prevented.

Vision Zero was supposed to be an aspirational rhetorical goal. It is not possible to achieve.

You can design resilient infrastructure such that strokes, seizures and heart attacks don't cause as much damage.

Plus a transportation system and land use such that people likely to have strokes, seizures, and heat attacks can get where they need to go without driving.

Nobody plans to have a stroke, seizure or heart attack. Those also aren't issues limited to any specific demographic.

There's an important difference between "people likely to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks" and "people planning to have strokes, seizures and heart attacks"!

We're talking Vision Zero. It makes absolutely no difference. Concrete does not prevent people from having strokes, seizures and heart attacks.

No, but concrete does prevent people who are having medical issues from driving into storefronts.

Which brings us full circle. That would be anti-vision zero. Trading one potential death for another potential death.

[Anonymous]

Is part of Vision Zero that we should eliminate all pedestrian crossings on roads in favor of bridge crossings? Vegas does the bridges, but of course only on the strip. We need them on every inch of every roadway, plus walls on the roads to make sure people use the bridges.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is part of Vision Zero that we should eliminate all pedestrian crossings on roads in favor of bridge crossings? Vegas does the bridges, but of course only on the strip. We need them on every inch of every roadway, plus walls on the roads to make sure people use the bridges.

No. Pedestrian bridges cost a lot of money, they occupy a lot of space, and then pedestrians don't use them anyway, because people don't want to have to walk 2-3 times as far just to cross the street. Pedestrian bridges are infrastructure for drivers who don't want to have to slow down or stop for pedestrians. What we need is streets that are safe for people to cross at street level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is part of Vision Zero that we should eliminate all pedestrian crossings on roads in favor of bridge crossings? Vegas does the bridges, but of course only on the strip. We need them on every inch of every roadway, plus walls on the roads to make sure people use the bridges.

No. Pedestrian bridges cost a lot of money, they occupy a lot of space, and then pedestrians don't use them anyway, because people don't want to have to walk 2-3 times as far just to cross the street. Pedestrian bridges are infrastructure for drivers who don't want to have to slow down or stop for pedestrians. What we need is streets that are safe for people to cross at street level.

Nothing that you said is true. Also to add that painted cross walks cost very little and pedestrians refuse to use those either. So what?