THE VIDEO SHELF · urban planning
The Dumbest Excuse for Bad Cities
Not Just Bikes takes on the common excuse that a country is simply too big or spread out for good transit and walkable cities. The video argues that city density and short everyday trips matter, not national size or overall population density.
Why HN readers recommended it
HN users cite it as the standard rebuttal whenever someone says that America is too big for rail or good urban design.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- Not Just Bikes
- Topic
- urban planning
- Format
- explainer
- Level
- general
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 4
- HN mentions in dataset
- 9
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2023–2026
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
The size of Canada really isn’t a valid excuse for Canada’s poor public transit, nor is Canada’s population. Notjustbikes posted a good video rebutting this argument a few days ago: [VIDEO]
jtakkala on Hacker News · 2023-06
In Maps Distort How We See the WorldHAH that is one of the most ridiculous excuses... and is also directly refuted: [VIDEO] ^^ "Not Just Bikes"
pierat on Hacker News · 2023-08
In Armed with traffic cones, protesters are immobilizing driverless carsThis argument is just.... wrong. For a video describing how wrong it is, refer to Not Just Bikes: [VIDEO] For text and numbers: Shenzhen urban area is 1,748 km2. Atlanta is 353.04km2. Los Angeles City is 1,299 km2 (yes the metro area is quite larger, …
sofixa on Hacker News · 2024-03
In Tesla's $25,000 Car Means Tossing Out the 100-Year-Old Assembly Line
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.
