FriendOfDeSoto

You don't show him the stupidity of his ways by sleeping with that lady. You either find a way to confront him about that. Or you unattach yourself from this toxic person by finding other, better friends. Frankly, I would give him a piece of my mind and then find other friends anyway.

Nein. In den Vornamen der Politikerin bitte kurz an sich bietender Stelle mental ein Leerzeichen einfügen und nochmal von vorne. Oder von hinten. Da steck ich nicht drin.

SPRICH

Ihr Gatte ist auch Christ.

I see your point. I was thinking about fining just the assholes who obstruct sidewalks beyond the tolerated minimum. I think there is a middle way to make that work and maybe even turn a profit. But that's not a great additional argument from me. It might need a federal regulation change. They could introduce a hefty fine for parking in such a manner that a wheelchair user could not safely use the sidewalk as a result. One can dream.

I don't follow your relaxed law logic. The law was not enforced before and would be more tightly enforced under this plan.

I would argue the space on the sidewalk has already been reduced and this plan would just limit punishment to those who truly deserve it. And if this is policy it should include the staff hours for parking inspectors. They could take note of areas where sidewalk parking often reduces space to below 1.6m and then have bollards or other barriers installed in these hotspots.

And, as I've also already mentioned, there should be more policies to encourage giving up on car ownership. I suggested free public transport for former car owners. New developments should include the need to build its own parking faculties on the property. Parking fees should be raised slowly but steadily. Resident parking only schemes could maybe push visitors to the area into public transport. There are more tools in that toolbox.

BTW I'm not a fan of this plan. My sense of what is possible, i.e. politics, just forces me to grudgingly accept this as a compromise. If you reduce the space for parking, say, by planting trees or other physical obstacles (which will probably cost more than this), you'll be voted out. Politicians are more pragmatists than idealists. Nobody will stay in office long with radical anti car policies - as much as I would personally support that.

In the context of small Munich alleys where space is scarce, where exactly should they build additional bicycle lanes that can be used by fire trucks? The shining examples of fuck cars infrastructure like Amsterdam and Copenhagen tend to be on flat land or the great infrastructure doesn't actually extend into the narrow capillary alleys that have been around since the middle ages. They also took decades to implement policies in increments to get to where they are. Munich is in my estimation probably at least a decade behind that.

I don't think I'm leaning too far out this window when I say: no, there isn't an optimal size. It depends on so many factors. How many people? Is this urban or rural? What's there neighborhood like? Facilities, public transport, doctors, grocery stores, etc.? What's the crime rate like? How long is the commute to work? People have different priorities and make different choices as a result.

In principle, I agree with you. And do you know why hardly any city government can put this rigorous approach into practice? Because they will be voted out in the next election. Because car ownership is still high. Realpolitik applies here.

Germans love a rule, love pea counting, and they will measure.

Your insane argument doesn't quite work for me when the mutual benefit of the practice was to provide ample space for fire trucks and ambulances on the roads. This is not a matter of the city just not giving a shit. They weighed their options.

Another aspect that wasn't touched upon in the article will also play into this: parking fines are a great way to get money into the city coffers. So it will probably pay off to get members of the Ordnungsamt - or the office of public order - who handle these things out in force armed with a tape measure and a camera and chi-ching for Munich's revenue.

Two things: this is an accepted practice all over the country and the traffic code has its own traffic sign for it when it is permitted. And the suggested amendment would only make it legal in situations where there would remain 1.6m of space for pedestrians, wheelchair users, and strollers. So the car parked in the image would remain illegally parked.

Munich has made a mistake of tacitly allowing this parking practice in areas where there isn't enough space, motivated by keeping roads accessible to first responders, which is not nothing. They have clearly made a mistake if everybody still owns a car when there s above average public transport. And people will still park like assholes. Under these plans (they haven't been approved yet according to the article), the assholes could be punished though. It would just not give fines out to everybody. This is a compromise solution in a bad situation.

I would amend the plans in two areas: the grumpy people of Munich should be allowed to smear dogshit legally on every car that doesn't leave 1.6m of space on the sidewalk (the article mentions a similar occurrence). And giving up car ownership should be rewarded with free public transport for a suitable amount of time.