Imagine no maintenance, warning labels, hurry, storm sewers -- a world with less suck
Worldchanging's challenged its readers to complete the sentence "Imagine no..." with scenarios for a world where the suckitude has been removed:
Imagine no hurry. Imagine no hectic deadlines, frantic commutes, meals on the go, or interrupted vacations. Imagine having more time. It’s not a pipe dream. Living more sustainably, in more compact communities with more innovative tools will save us enormous amounts of time that we waste today -- time that we can use to spend with our family and friends. So the next time you find yourself grabbing food at the drive-thru, imagine a world where you have time for a long lunch with friends. Imagine no hurry.LinkImagine no maintenance. Imagine not needing to own your own car to enjoy the benefits of driving. It's not a pipe dream. Already car sharing companies and other business like them that allow you to drive a car when it’s convenient, while they handle the maintenance, insurance, fuel and parking. And it’s not only cars. Sharing services have sprung up for everything from lawn mowers to bicycles to designer handbags. So the next time you find yourself waiting at the mechanic's garage for an oil change, imagine it was your last. Imagine no maintenance.
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So... in the future, computers will mean we will have more leisure time?
Ahem.
imagine not having to lock everything
No warning labels? I just unpackaged a cordless screwdriver. It warned me to wear safety glasses or a face mask when operating it. This is not a high-speed drill that's going to fling sawdust everywhere, it's a 2.4v screwdriver that the package claims can do 130rpm. I don't think warning labels are going anywhere.
Imagine no storm sewers. Imagine communities where rain is used to grow gardens and wash clothes, instead of being channeled underground through massive tunnels, carrying oil and garbage from our streets into our rivers and waters.
Awesome. A world where my basement is flooded. That water has to go somewhere and it better make it to the rivers and streams at some point or they're going to dry up. I'm sure the mosquitos would love the rain barrel they think I need, so they can breed in large numbers and give me West Nile.
Imagine a world full of realists and critical thinkers who can tell fantasy from reality.
As for companies where you can "share" a car? They're called Hertz and Avis.
imagine a fresh install
Imagine hover bacon...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjatRkpSa5U
Ah...... Wavedance all ready caught it..... car sharing is pretty much a concept that Avis and Hertz have figured-out.
Home Depot has also come-up with a sharing concept around tools and tractors.....while U-Haul has introduced a concept of sharing moving supplies.
Yea, but Avis and Hertz are EXPENSIVE. I've always thought there should be some really cheap car hire run by councils or something. I normally live in Madrid where I only got a driver's license last year when I was 27, mostly because it's effing expensive and I'm still paying off the classes and everything. Every single 45 min class costs 35 euros and you are only allowed to learn how to drive in a certified driving school. Many people sneak around driving with an eye out for the guardia civil or the police but it's illegal so most of my life I've had my handy transport pass allowing me unlimited bus, train, and metro transport for one month so I didn't really need a car. But sometimes you do need a car, and I wasn't rich enough to be shelling out money on AVIS and Hertz all the time, sometimes you just need the car to get down to Ikea for 2 hours. If renting cars were really cheap, I wouldn't EVEN think of buying a car, and less cars around.
Imagine no cynical dickweeds whose first reaction to any suggestion of improvement is, "Can't Do! Can't Do! The name of that horse is Can't Do!"
You may say that I'm a dreamer. That is all.
Please do continue posting dreams. We need more wonderful, wonderful ideas, and the good sense to discuss them in a civil manner.
@8: That's what friends/roommates with cars are for. I've been on both sides of the equation, and Ikea's a nice opportunity to spend some quality time together.
Jardine, I dream of a world in which you could type a few words--say, "rain barrel mosquito"--into a special type of web page (call it a "search machine", or maybe give it a cute name like "Voogle"), and get the answers to your problems. It's such a crazy idea, it's gotta work!
Personally, I like driving. I'd be glad to drive an electric hover car that leaves a trail of posies behind it. However, said car has yet to be invented.
I also enjoy taking public transportation (mainly the subway). That also has not been manufactured in my home town.
I think the real dream is--imagine a world where hard costs are not our biggest anxiety.
I'm imagining already.
I haven't seen any of it.
Where are those share-a-car companies?
Etc..
Imagine no G.O.P. Republicans.
Rent-a-car companies are a bit different than car-sharing.
Companies like iGo and zipcar allow you to rent a car hourly (usually with a deposit or small monthly fee, though iGo has plans that don't require that) and go.
In chicago they put them near public transit hubs to make picking them up even easier. Adding up the monthly cost of gas, maintenance, insurance and car payments even if you use the service daily it's entirely possible to still come out ahead!
My girlfriend's college is in the suburbs and there was zero public transit options to get her there. Plus her classes were at night over the winter. She used igo and spent less getting to class than she did on books for the semester.
They stock hybrids and low-emissions cars too. I'd love to see these companies expand.
it all boils down to free energy. someone get off their lazy ass and invent free energy already.
Imagine whirled peas.
The author ignores one thing: more time doesn't mean less hurry. Although hours of labour have decreased significantly since the 19th century, people today (arguably) seem to be more stressed than ever.
Go to Budapest. There are no "to go" cups, except in the insidiously infiltrating American franchises, still few enough now.
Cafes have coffee and conviviality. The only disposables on the table are generally one paper napkin, and occasionally, the paper wrapper of a straw (and the straw).
Less hurry is possible, but it's (har har) hard work; but of a sort that feeds forward nicely.
Hands-free-phone law in CA? No matter -- I don't talk on the phone in the car.
Mulitasking generally isn't for YOUR benefit, it's for someone else's. You've been colonized to think otherwise. Even if you work for yourself.
Stop it. If you can't, ask why. Fix that.
I work part time. I give up a lot of stuff, which turns out to mostly waste my time and money anyways. I just took a random three-day road trip, in my old reliable station wagon, with my eldest dog, up the California coast.
Excessive gadgeteering, even with a BoingBoing view, is still pointless capitalism. Choose wisely. That shit sucks a lot of cash and brain time!
I don't need to own a car because I live in New York City. As for car sharing, I already do that with zipcar. I have long lunches whenever I choose to, because I choose not to work for oppressive employers (or I used to work for one, and I quit, because the lifestyle sacrifice was too great). A great lifestyle is available to those who don't settle for less.
@naepflin:
Speaking in insanely broad terms, Americans tend to put less value on free time than they do on money and 'stuff'.
Say that to anyone and I assure they'll say "not me", but dig deeper and you find how many people are working longer hours at jobs they don't like to get stuff they don't need.
What kind of stuff? Gadgets, tvs, expensive versions of things they could have much cheaper (clothing, cars, housing) not to mention totally useless tosh like "bling".
All those are fine things, if you can afford them. If you can't you start digging a credit hole to perpetuate your lifestyle. Then one day something gives (APR adjusts, medical emergency, job loss, death in family) and suddenly the whole thing gives in.
The best advice I ever received was "When buying something ask 'do you want this or do you need this'. No shame in wanting something, even something silly and extravagant, but don't confuse want and need."
Imagine no fantasies.
Imagine no pipe dreams. It's not a pipe dream.
I liked the article in general, until we got to the end.
Imagine no yard sales? That sounds like a sad future, where you don't have the opportunity to give up some of your stuff in exchange for some pocket money, or where you can't wander around nice neighborhoods, enjoying the weather, and sifting through collections of used stuff to find the diamonds you don't even know you need yet. I love yard sales, swap meets, and various flavors of the same.
Imagine no underwear...
imagine no .. gettin' stuck behind someone drag-assin' through the loop during rush-hour on my walk from or to the train. dang. people with time on their hands. whatever happened to 'hustle and bustle'? let's pick up the pace! it's not like we're gonna live forever! (i value my free time, and *don't* want to spend it in pedestrian gridlock on lasalle...)
"Awesome. A world where my basement is flooded. That water has to go somewhere and it better make it to the rivers and streams at some point or they're going to dry up."
Well, ok, no. Right now the way we channel water does a lot more to degrade local water body quality and create flooding then systems that are a lot less concrete channelized. All the localized flooding that seems to increase as the years go by? That's largely a result of land use and building practices. If houses and retention/detention and receiving water are sited properly, nobody's basement should flood except during a hundred year storm (because most storm water systems are speced for the 25-50 year storm. And I make no promises for houses built primarily on sandy soil. Though they mostly don't have basements anyway.).
Additionally, the less we have concrete pipes taking water someplace and the more we just have planted ground the less runoff there is. Which means more water is absorbed into the ground before it gets to the receiving body, or depending on how it's planted, it's slowed down and you get less localized flooding. And having it absorbed in the ground/flowed through plants increases water quality.
/Landscape Architect student (I'm just took a class on storm water management, can you tell? :)
I like storm sewers. They make sure my house doesn't get flood damage.