I just read this interesting post from BikePortland.org (via my favorite brother) about how turning off traffic lights in one small town in England actually decreased travel time and made everyone stop acting like bunch of toddlers with driver licenses.
I've actually seen something like this before and never stopped to think about it. When the power goes out on a light, people approach the light slowly, cautiously. They take turns, being very careful to make sure the next person in line is the next person to go. It's amazing. Drivers do this without getting together and talking about it or voting on it or even being told to. They just do it.
The really astounding thing to me is that this would seem to indicate that most people are not born selfish jerks, but are, in fact, constructed that way. I just picked up the book Lives on the Boundary by Mike Rose. Rose was accidentally put into special education as a young boy when his file was switched with another Mike Rose. By the time he emerged from school, he was truly special education, with all kinds of learning problems.
It seems that people are generally fine to bumble their way through life if they don't encounter too much interference from the system. And the system is made to churn out white middle class people, hence all the road blocks people who are marginalized--"on the boundary"--encounter as they attempt to simply live their lives.*
The video claims that "empathy is boundless," while road capacity is limited. Answers can be found in creating roads that "express equality" and give people the freedom to express their empathy. It's a beautiful sentiment.
Of course this doesn't come without problems. How are blind people supposed to cross the road, for instance? The video says they've been avoiding the intersection. And might I say, much as I hate to admit it, this is yet another example of how removing technology can simplify and equalize, supporting the concept of a technology myth.**
But if we can turn tired adult drivers from road rage maniacs to polite, caring citizens by flipping off the infrastructure, maybe this lends some credence to my new motto. Say it with me, everyone: "live in the chaos."
*Yes, I split an infinitive. Deal with it.
**I still love you, lolcats.
Love it!
ReplyDeleteOne of my axions is that we live in a designed world. Portishead had a system that was over-designed, and causing poor outcomes. By eliminating the unnecessary elements of urban design, and replacing them with a system with more immediate human control, they managed to improve their city. Kudos to them.
ReplyDeleteBut is empathy really unlimited? People are courteous in unusual circumstances, buy try setting up a dozen or so stop signs in a row, and we'll find out how good people really are. Our large impersonal roads are there because our large impersonal cities need a way to efficiently move lots of people from home to work to fun and back. Maybe I'm just a cynical bastard (or just from Los Angeles), but the rules are so strictly engineered because we are 1/8" of steel away from Max Mad-esque chaos on the roads.
Good essay, even if I disagree. "Lives on the Boundary" is a fantastic book, and should be required reading for anyone entering higher education.
Thanks for reading! Perhaps I should have clarified that I am skeptical about claims that empathy is boundless and suspicious of examples that show that letting people do whatever they want to do will give them the necessary agency to be successful in life. Perhaps they should have phrased it "capacity for empathy" is boundless. I love the idea that if people could be left alone they would for the most part be empathetic, since they would not be currently constructed as "frustrated driver" or what have you. The real trick is not to fall into the social constuctionist trap of thinking that you could ever look beyond the system or get out of it.
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