There’s congestion in German cities too. The point isn’t to drive away. During rettungsgasse, nobody goes anywhere. They just make way by stopping to the sides.
The problem in NY is that the cars are too big for the lanes to do that.
Comment on America is fucked
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 1 week ago
There’s no place for anyone to move to. The congestion is such that you cannot get out of the way. The Van Wyck alone will slow an ambulance to 3-5mph because of traffic. You cannot get out of the way if there’s no place to go!
bstix@feddit.dk 1 week ago
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 1 week ago
There are no lanes to move aside into. It has nothing to do with vehicle size or “driving away”. I really don’t know what to tell you, I’ve spent plenty of time in several German cities as well as US cities, the comparison isn’t there. There are no breakdown lanes or shoulders to move into in many places to make room for emergency vehicles. You’re welcome to argue all you want, but I drive in and around NYC regularly so I’m more than familiar.
albert180@piefed.social 6 days ago
You don't need an extra lane, if the traffic on your side moves to his right side and the other side moves to their right side, there would be plenty space in the middle for the ambulance to pass
KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 week ago
The problem in NY is that the cars are too big for the lanes to do that.
the only place available for people to do this is parking lanes and bus/bike lanes.
boonhet@lemm.ee 1 week ago
Yes, when there’s an ambulance behind you, you take a parking or bus or bike lane. Hop a fucking curb if you have to. It’s the one thing all the big ass SUVs should be good for in the city.
gerryflap@feddit.nl 1 week ago
There seems to be quite some space there compared to what I’ve seen emergency vehicles use here in the Netherlands. Recently there was one traveling across a pretty narrow bridge and a road that normally allocated 2 cars. The traffic was completely stuck and yet somehow the emergency vehicle got enough space to travel through. It outpaces me while I was racing down the bridge on a bike. That was more crowded and narrow than this. People went everywhere with their car to create a way for the emergency vehicle
echodot@feddit.uk 1 week ago
Yeah but they do actually just stop. If there is a siren anywhere in the area, and everyone just stops driving their car. Even when there is somewhere to go, no one ever does.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Yeah that’s usually at an intersection where the only place to go to is into a red light with crossing traffic. A quick search of laws in the US shows no relief for motorists just because there’s a fire truck behind you trying to get through. If you run the red light to make way you could be ticketed (even though it would be real asshole to issue the ticket), and if someone hits you while you run the red or move into tbe intersection to make way it’s your fault. So there’s a lot of disincentive to move in those cases. Where I live people all move over if they can. Otherwise they stay put to be predictable and let the emergency vehicle use the breakdown lane or oncoming traffic. Worst thing is when people cluelessly start randomly trying to outsmart the ambulance and cause a clusterfuck of cars that nobody can get past. US drivers have fuckall for discipline.
echodot@feddit.uk 1 week ago
I feel like this is mostly your fault for letting 12-year-olds drive, which seems to be the US norm.
Hey have you attended high school education? Great, here is a gun feel free to drive like a maniac who has no concept of lane discipline.
Americans make the Italians look considerate
RunawayFixer@lemmy.world 1 week ago
As if the usa is the only country in the world with congested rush hour traffic. I’ve been in streets that were way more tightly packed + chaotic than this and people would still clear a path for vehicles with sirens. The emergency vehicle would only be able to go 20 to 30 kmh without a motorcycle escort, but that’s still significantly faster than what we’re seeing here.
What we’re seeing in this video, is that (some) vehicles that are directly in front of the ambulance move out of the way, but vehicles that are a tiny bit further ahead, don’t even try. If a vehicle that is directly in front of the ambulance can move out of the way, then a vehicle that is 30 places ahead, is also able to move out of the way, but they don’t even try … What should happen is that as soon as drivers hear a siren, they should start looking for where it’s coming from and then clear a path, and drivers should also especially not be driving into the path that others are clearing. Instead it seems like these drivers wait till the siren is right behind them and only then some start to move out of the way.
Looking for excuses in American exceptionalism reads like a case of “we’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas”. This particular problem is something that can be easily improved upon by a public awareness campaign and some light fines for those that keep obstructing after the campaign has been running for some time. But what’s obviously even easier than that, is finding an excuse to continue doing nothing about the problem.
illegible@discuss.tchncs.de 1 week ago
Part of the problem is that the “rugged individualism” that America was founded on also equates to entitlement. The last generations that truly had it rough, where a community spirit was important to surviving are dying or gone, and no one has learned their lesson. Yet.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Well, I guess you’ve got it all figured out then. Just stupid Americans, right?
RunawayFixer@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Yeah, absolutely. Americans making excuses as to why solutions that work in other countries, would not work in the USA, are a scourge on your society. Your lives could be so much better if you lot stopped falling for that American exceptionalism propaganda and stopped inventing reasons to not do anything about known problems. And now that you’ve turned into a banana republic, I’m done being polite about it.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 1 week ago
A retort that completely disregards the reasons why it doesn’t work in some major cities based on the sole example presented here while you make sweeping judgements conflated into an overall judgement of everyone living here. Wow. Fuck right off. Really. Blocked.
i_ben_fine@lemmy.one 1 week ago
Yes. With video evidence.