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The Dumbest Excuse for Bad Cities

Not Just Bikes · 3.1M views · 2023-06-19 · 13:00

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Overview

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.

On Hacker News

HN users cite it as the standard rebuttal whenever someone says that America is too big for rail or good urban design.

Recommended by 4 HN people across 4 months · HN mentions 2023–2026

Topics

Transit, cities & urban planning
Search by tags
urbanismpublic transitcar dependencedensityrail

What people said

CalRobert · 2026-01 · Recommendation

This is irrelevant, though, since the size of the country isn’t what determines where people go. It’s not like trains got less practical when Alaska got admitted to the union. Sprawling, low density, single use zoning, combined with parking minimums, have much more to do with it. Here’s a video that explores the topic if you’re curious [VIDEO]

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sofixa · 2024-03 · Recommendation

This 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, but so is Shenzhen's). The average length of a trip in the US is 19.63 km. This is simple basic stuff. There is absolutely nothing that makes Americans uniquely need tank-sized vehicles with 1000km range, even with the uniquely terrible urban design that most American cities have.

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pierat · 2023-08 · Recommendation

HAH that is one of the most ridiculous excuses... and is also directly refuted: [VIDEO] ^^ "Not Just Bikes"

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Sources

Video by Not Just Bikes, played through YouTube.

Data and selection notes

HN summaries and labels may contain AI errors. HN dates refer to discussions, not video publication.

HN Library: HackerTube export (2026-10-31) and open-index/hacker-news. Upstream summaries and classifications may contain AI errors.

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