Omnibus Stupid MFers in the news thread (Part 2)

The BBQ Pit
3501

Unless there’s further information you didn’t quote, the distance can’t be calculated, because we don’t know where on 61st and 79th they live. If he lives at 61st and 1st and his kids live at 79th and 11th, that’s easily going to be an hour’s walk.

The real solution is for him just to rent a parking space that won’t require him to cross 60th to go uptown. If he’s claiming that he lives on 61st and doesn’t rent a parking space, because it’s always possible for him to find street parking, he’s just plain lying.

3502

Or use the subway. Or a bus. Or a cab.

3503

It’s possible that the walk is thirty minutes. How can anyone expect someone living in Manhattan to walk for that long?

Or he can just say nine bucks is too much money to spend to see his children.

3504

Sure, he’s a whiny, privileged idiot and I have no sympathy for him, but the linked article is also wrong in claiming that it’s a “twenty minute walk”. That would only be true if they live close to due north of him.

3505

Really? We’re going to nitpick over that?

3506

Lazy journalism annoys me. If you don’t like it, you can not respond, and then “we” will no longer be nitpicking it.

3507

I’m bored. Using Google Maps, it appears that walking from very eastern E 61st Street to very western W 79th Street might take about an hour. Surely that’s too far to walk to see one’s children.

3508

And cross the hellscape of Upper East Side Manhattan?

3509

That’s assuming one is willing to walk from the East Side to the West Side. I didn’t think Manhattanites crossed that line.

3510

Oh, just what I already estimated off the top of my head? Cool. It’s irrelevant whether it’s “too far to walk”, since there are multiple other transportation modalities he could use, or he could just pay the nine bucks and STFU. I agree that this guy is a jerk, not sure why me pointing out that the article is poorly written is so triggering for you.

3511

Bravo to you.

3512

I’ve heard the Central Park Wilderness is simply impassable.

3513

Worse yet, much of that hour-long walk would be through Central Park! He might be inadvertently exposed to fresh air, natural beauty, or possibly even birdsong. Oh, the horror!

3514

Impassable, I say!

3515

Seems to me that if you can afford to own a car in Manhattan, nine bucks isn’t even the kind of expenditure you ought to notice.

3516

He can also choose to park somewhere that isn’t pointed right at a toll reader.

3517

It’s much like crossing the Darien Gap in Central America. Bandits, jaguars, and alligators, oh my!

3518

Maybe things have changed, but as the child of a Manhattanite with many NYC friends, I have known no one with a car in the city. It wasn’t unusual for my family to walk more than 70 blocks at a time.

3519

I think that guy has a point. Suppose his kids lived at 90th St., or 100th. Suppose he just wanted to drive somewhere north, but he happens to be on a one-way avenue that forces him into the congestion zone before he can turn around. Seems a little unfair to charge someone who doesn’t want to go into the zone, but is forced to by the circumstances, regardless of how far north they end up going.

It’s not the end of the world. I suspect that people who live between 60th and 61st will find places to park that don’t force them to go south if they don’t want to.

3520

Isn’t the whole point of charging people to drive into a congestion zone to reduce the number of vehicles in the congestion zone?