Oddly I’m learning the Trump crowd really wants to employ these tactics today with glee against all those that won’t shut up about everything they don’t like.
Yes we never really know what someone else is up to. Often they can be straight up A-holes, but there are those in emergency situations.
When driving especially my truck and camper many were confused why I pulled over so often to let vehicles by on 2 lane roads. I slowed down in passing sections to manage traffic behind me safely to pass. They were expecting people to hold them up as it is everyone else for themselves especially when passing lanes come and the slow pokes only speed up for those. The worst are those that ride in the passing lane without moving over and get into the I’m going to show them and block them in.
I loved driving down in the states with several lanes to the highway with lanes for every speed. I could pick a lane and not hold up people that wanted to go faster than the 80 miles/hr in Texas. 80 m/hr is pretty fast for a loaded truck and camper so I was relieved I didn’t need to hold up people in these situations especially people like me in my Volvo 850 T5 that have places to go!
We are trying to add more bike lanes to city centers in places in Canada at the cost of existing car lanes.
I use to bike everywhere as a young teen in my rural area but once I had access to a car those days were left behind me.
The issue is many people commute daily in from the suburbs over a hour away (up to 120kms or like up to the distance of Hanko to Helsinki) by highway, other roads, and biking these long distances isn’t as feasible for those that live outside the city cores which so many do. In the East many drive up to 2 hours each way due to traffic conditions.
It’s a huge challenge to rework the suburbian sprawl to the affordable housing in the outlying areas.
In North America we don’t think anything of driving 4 hours for a road trip on a weekend. I think that could mean going through a few countries in Europe and often we haven’t even left a state or province after 8 hours of driving.
In the west the transit system has vast distances its trying to cover for a lot less people than in the east. It’s overloaded often and there’s not enough of it in many places. It’s a tricky issue with not enough population condensed into a smaller area.
The suggestion of 15 minute cities is viewed as evil oversight by government by some of the car culture people in the rural areas. While it would make more sense to have people living closer to their higher paying jobs many just can’t get use to this type of thinking outside of the city cores which many left decades ago for the promise of safety in suburbia.
During covid it was proven working from home is a pretty good option for many so that is a partial solution, however many companies have called these workers back to the offices and the congestion has returned.
Then there is the issue of the homeless in many of the city cores and the rampant bike theft.
For me I do wonder coming from a wet most of the time in winter Vancouver how those that commute by bike in the rain stay dry?
I’ve been fortunate to spend some time traveling down the west coast and into the south west then to the east of the US. I’ve also been lucky enough to travel through the west to the east in both Canada and the US too. Outside of New York I’ve not really made it to the east coast though.
Big differences are in some areas like city versus rural but as others have stated the borders don’t mean as much of a difference like opposite coasts within a country does. Geography certainly does seem to be more important.
Provincial /State boundaries can be a difference in some cases but more for the big cities versus the rural areas that share the borders.
Like the US in Canada the divide is often rural versus city, then primary industries beyond the French vs the English.
One big difference I did pick up in my US business trips is for large factories or businesses to be located in small town USA when in Canada the city centers would be the normal place for those types of industry. The rural Canadian areas are much more reliant on resource harvesting and tourism. They often hold their nose about tourism in some cases as a necessary evil. They really don’t want hordes coming to ruin it all.
I will say the absolute vastness of the US southwest made me realize there’s a lot of territory to try to unit and it’s a bigger job in the US with the sheer numbers and then the differences being boiled down to 2 major groups politically that have a real say.
In Canada we have 5 main political parties and then on the provincal level they can be pretty different from each other. Eventually we will end up with just 2 parties with enough elections but that will not be in my lifetime thankfully.
I think the biggest things for me are the terror of the US gun violence that just seems to be waiting around every corner depending on who you talk to or the need to gather arms to take on the government is a daily need. I’ve seen just a few packing weapons and I’m not sure I trust their ability to be a good guy if the need was to arise.
Unfortunately the mass shootings daily in the US are the few times a week reality and are pretty great for gun sales I suspect. Then followed by being bankrupted by US health insurance costs or a lack of it and being ill in the US system. The cost of drugs seems pretty insane too.
I’ll take the feelings of mostly being safe in Canada but others would disagree with this much like many would say the same thing about violence in Mexico. Canadian Healthcare is slow but you won’t be financially ruined by it yet.
Media is pretty different depending on your leanings. We can be pretty overpowered by the US media machine. Canadians can often know more general info than Americans about their own country and history at times. Canadians struggle to know more about Canadian history than US history.
The rage filled entertainment news of the US is not as common here but we get so much of a diet of US media our folks at times will parrot the same US talking points without realizing it doesn’t apply to many Canadian situations. When the vaccine objectors started protesting, they were fighting for US constitutional rights within Canada. They didn’t understand the right for Manitoba to join Canada wasn’t the same right as the US’s declarations.
Unfortunately these idiots have taken on flying Canadian flags all the time like our US cousins, becoming a hijack of our reserved flag waving as their identity. It’s ruined the previous typical flag waving we would do for Canada day and sporting events. We are not at nationalist as our southern neighbours. The rest of us look at these idiots with disdain and do not want to be associated with them. It’s almost at the same level as those that fly rebel flags in the US.
I’ve been fortunate to meet some wonderful people in Canada, Mexico, and the US. The geography of these countries can be quite stunning in areas without a doubt.
There are many differences but there are great similarites on a individual level. To paraphrase what George Carlin said, people individually can be fantastic but it’s a problem when they start to group up and when it’s 2 3 7 10 14 then you can start to get real problems.
At first glance it reminds me of a 1990s video game where they don’t have the polygons and the graphic card horse power to display what a Pontiac Aztek would look like.
Working through some of that now but the sweating and then cleaning the sweat off is making it worse. Still need to figure out a system where cleaning them doesn’t invite the fogging after. I think if I never sweated on them I would be fine for fogging up.
I went to Columbus a few years ago and I was surprised how every restaurant I went no matter if it was a hole in the wall or a fine dining establishment they all had a version of Mac and Cheese on their menu.
From a simple version to versions with lobster I tried them all. Years later when I was in Montreal I noticed a similar theme where they all offer their version of Poutine.
I couldn’t imagine if KD made Poutine it would taste anywhere near what I ate in Montreal just as regular KD was nothing like the stuff I ate in Columbus that week.