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It looked like yet another weird symptom of San Francisco tech culture: a cluster of people sitting on the side of a road, working at desks placed within the boundaries of a parking space.
But WePark—a project led by San Francisco-based web developer Victor Pontis—was actually a manifestation of an idea that has become more popular in the last few years: Cities use space inefficiently and prioritize cars over people. The people at the desks were attempting to reclaim a sliver of space for human use. "Car parking squanders space that can be used for the public good—bike lanes, larger sidewalks, retail, cafes, more housing," Pontis said. "Let's use city streets for people, not cars." (There are also WePark franchises in France as well as Santa Monica.)
Pontis said he got the idea from a Twitter exchange in which Github's Devon Zuegel pointed out that eight bicycles could fit in one park spot instead of a car. Urbanist Annie Fryman, responded, suggesting that the metered parking spot be used as a coworking space instead.
Source: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/pajgyz/rogue-coder-turned-a-parking-spot-into-a-coworking-space
(Score: 5, Touché) by bradley13 on Monday May 06 2019, @11:27AM (15 children)
What a brilliant idea! I always wanted to work while breathing exhaust, listening to traffic noise, and worrying about being hit by a passing car. Not.
Cities use space inefficiently and prioritize cars over people.
Um...people have to get into the city somehow. Most American cities are so spread out that the main means of transport is the car. That's a feature (or flaw) of city design, and won't be solved by narcissistic gits occupying parking spaces with desks.
If they really dislike cars so much, they could always move to someplace that prohibits cars. [wikipedia.org] Note that US cities are generally only represented by very small pedestrian areas - there's that city-design problem. Go to other countries where cities are much denser, and many entire towns are car-free.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Booga1 on Monday May 06 2019, @11:38AM (9 children)
No kidding. The photo of people sitting at a desk in a parking space makes them look outright idiotic. Who the hell wants to haul a desk and furniture to some random parking space so they can sit there for eight hours?
In some cities it might get them rude looks, nasty comments, or worse. Like this lady that was using a parking space to BBQ [6abc.com] then up-and-died when tried to get her to move so they could park.
Heck, they even decided to charge money for this stunt:
Depending on the rules, taking the spot for the whole day is usually forbidden, even if you do pay for it. Charging to rent it back out probably isn't in the guidelines either.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @12:37PM (1 child)
You wouldn't say that if they drove their desk to work. Maybe Elon Musk and come up with a "Workus" model. It would be like a Prius, but a desk (with more horse power and better range).
(Score: 2) by Booga1 on Monday May 06 2019, @04:21PM
What, like this guy's desk? [youtube.com] :)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Monday May 06 2019, @01:43PM (5 children)
If someone has a desk job that can be done anywhere a parking space can be rented, then why can't that job be done from home?
Another idea, a large employer could create remote hub offices. Smaller remote offices with the facilities of an office, but with a smaller number of people, closer to where groups of employees live.
Reminds me of an ancient Dilbert cartoon: (not exact quotation, but the gist of it . . .)
PHB: you expect me to give you a paycheck to work from home on a project with vaguely defined goals and objectives, and progress that is difficult to quantify and measure?
Dogbert: I was hoping for direct deposit.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 06 2019, @08:20PM (3 children)
Calling the spirit of MDC....
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday May 06 2019, @09:56PM (2 children)
I guess I'm too old or too young or something to get that one.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 06 2019, @10:09PM (1 child)
Michael David Crawford, homeless programmer and Soylenti. RIP.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday May 07 2019, @02:22AM
I remember that now, but would not have associated it with the initials.
Every performance optimization is a grate wait lifted from my shoulders.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @11:00PM
Because that would require managers to do more work than look around the office and see how many chairs have butts in them.
(Score: 3, Funny) by fliptop on Tuesday May 07 2019, @03:25AM
Apparently, some people don't have a problem [improveverywhere.com] w/ it.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by schad on Monday May 06 2019, @12:07PM (4 children)
Yeah, this is a little weird. WePark's beef isn't that "cities... prioritize cars over people." It's that cities don't prioritize the people that WePark likes (people who don't have, would prefer not to have, or would at least be willing not to have, cars).
This is especially moronic in the US, where in the majority of the country cars are absolutely mandatory. There are really very few places where you can get by without a car at all. And, somewhat paradoxically, the less you need your car, the more time it spends "wasting space" in a parking spot. I'll certainly agree that a parking garage is a better place for a seldom-driven car than alongside the street, but then I imagine we'd see these people squatting in a parking garage and complaining that it should be turned into an apartment building.
Some people are just looking for excuse to be outraged. The specific reason doesn't matter so much.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @01:01PM (1 child)
Even worse is.. why didn't this guy rent the parking place, and put a tent with 4 beds in it?
Isn't that helping more? Helping the homeless?
Yet.. the city will evict those homeless too. But I guess evicting people with laptops is some horrid social evil, right?
Right?
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday May 06 2019, @09:25PM
> Yet.. the city will evict those homeless too.
I know, right?
Last time I arranged for a friend to host a whole bunch of undocumented homeless guys in the back of a truck in Texas, all hell broke loose because of some A/C problems...
*ducks*
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 06 2019, @03:14PM (1 child)
There. FTFY.
And big thank yous to the auto industry and Robert Moses for prioritizing auto industry profits over the good of the nation.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday May 06 2019, @09:26PM
How is that flamebait?
How is it even controversial?
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr