Roadjunky Travel Forums

Hey Junkies

I ran across some interesting insights on what is happening to the world and travel by Alan Watts in The Book (On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are) from 1966 but more relevant today:

Quote:The speed and efficiency of transportation by super-highway and air in many ways restricts freedom of travel. It is increasingly difficult to take a walk, except in such 'reservations for wanderers' as state parks. But the nearest state park to my home has, at its entrance, a fence plastered with a long line of placards saying: NO FIRED. NO DOGS. NO HUNTING. NO CAMPING. SMOKING PROHIBITED. NO HORSE-RIDING. NO SWIMMING. NO WASHING. PICNICS RESTRICTED TO DESIGNATED AREAS. Miles of what used to be free-and-easy beaches are now state parks which close at 6 PM, so that one can no longer camp there for a moonlight feast.

Just try taking a stroll after dark in a nice American residential area. If you can penetrate the wire fences along the highways, and then wander along a pleasant lane, you may well be challenged from a police car: 'Where are you going?' Aimless strolling is suspicious and irrational. You are probably a vagrant or a burglar. You are not even walking the dog! 'How much money are you carrying?' Surely, you could have afforded to take the bus and if you have little or no cash, you are clearly a bum and a nuisance. Any competent housebreaker would approach his quarry in a Cadillac.

Orderly travel now means going at the maximum speed for safety from point to point, but most reachable points are increasingly cluttered with people and parked cars, and so less worth going to see, and for similar reasons it is ever more inconvenient to do business in the centers of our great cities. Real travel requires a maximum of unscheduled wandering, for there is no other way of discovering surprises and marvels, which, as I see it, is the only good reason for not staying at home. As already suggested, fast intercommunication between points is making all points the same point. Waikiki Beach is just a mongrelized version of Atlantic City, Brighton, and Miami.

I've been working as a door to door political canvasser for the past few months, and it is absolutely true that anyone who walks around at night is considered a suspect, especially after dark. Knocking on doors is another level... After dark, most neighborhoods become completely barren of life. I hate this society, and am ready to leave. Soon. Or destroy it. One or the other.

I've always been a big fan of just going for a walk for no other reason than to just get out and see the town. I've recently moved and was shocked to see that my new neighborhood doesn't even have sidewalks! When I go for walks these days I now have the pleasure of getting mean looks from drivers for making them slow down and go around me and occasionally have to dodge the driver who refuses to move over for me. Anyone know of a good city to move to where walkers are welcomed?

carpeisu, wal mart.

i don't think there's anywhere in the states you can walk except for new york and san fran.

LA used to be people friendly until general motors bought up loads of public land and ripped up the train tracks in the 20's so that demand for the automobiole would increase.

It's why i hate traveling in the US, actually.

In typical American style the places to walk are places you go to just walk, like national parks or the Appalachian trail.

I grew up on the east coast in New Jersey where there is a high population of recently immigrated Indians. The older family members can be seen walking around everywhere, as in India, along busy roads with no sidewalks, and in fact they are breaking the cultural rules by doing so. I can't count the number of times I've heard people remark with some racial slur about it.

I walked to school once, which took about 2 hours to cover the 5 miles. I remember almost getting run over.

I don't own a car now in California, and can get around with my bicycle ok here - there are plenty of bike paths. Socially though, it is still awkward. All of my friends have cars and constantly want to meet up 15 miles away or wherever.

I should be getting a tax break, or be lauded or whatever, for resisting the car urge. Instead I see movies like 'the 40 year old virgin' where the guy is ridiculed for not owning car. That's what American culture has become and I can't believe we accept that.

I'm sorry to hear that you had to grow up in New Jersey, Jim, lol. Oh well, guys. This system isn't gonna last. Gas may very well get up to $4 a gallon this summer if things keep going the way they have been. People will start changing their ways... or, we'll see the apocolypse and then the world will change. Either way, nothing matters.

Jesus, Ohio, lighten up, maybe we'll get fusion driven scateboards to coast around on in the near future, or wormhole teleports, Malthus was dead certain that by 1950 London would be 12 feet deep in horse shit.

yeah, well, once I get out of the states, I'm sure I'll be feeing better.

I'm sure I'll feel better when I'm sitting on a beach in Ecuador, or a mountain village in Peru. It's easy to get depressed and long for the apocolypse when you're stuck in the sinkhole of suburban America.