Foreshadowing the psychological effects of living in 15 minute cities..

Hi ATS,

I have been keeping up with the news about the proposals for 15 minute cities, and of course always considered them a horrible idea. However, I realised something the other day - my experience of life over the past ten years, as the result of a disability which massively limits my mobility, has been that I've lived in a de facto 15 minute city for most of that time, because I am limited by frequently severe pain, meaning I never feel up for much more than very local travel in the car to run errands. For some years I was able to bear it because I had an online life which occupied me, I would watch a lot of Netflix, Amazon & SKY TV, along with using a popular e-reader app named Scribd. I also have quite an imagination, and would find myself working on design projects, and certain written projects also. Everything went reasonably well for some time.

But recently, it's as if I've passed through an event horizon in terms of my tolerance of being so strictly confined, and I feel incredibly claustrophobic to know that all my limited travel is literally within a 15 minute radius of my home - always driving the same streets, knowing the nuances of the traffic & footfall patterns in various places, visiting certain places - doctor, dentist, supermarket, hospital, corner shop, post office & so on, never with any actual leisure time other than occasionally walking the dog on a local field when I feel up to it (which isn't often). My friends, few as they are, live outside my 15 minute environment, so if I ever wanted to visit them, or visit family beyond that limit, I'd be scuppered with fines or simply having no right to travel that far.

Of course in my life as it currently exists, I have been able to travel for the occasional holiday further afield, and I've visited family who are further away also - but in the main, I have been incredibly confined. And I tell you, after a while, even with the most flexible & humble/accepting mindset, knowing my limits & accepting God's grace to live within my confines - still, after a few years, it's psychologically damaging to still be trapped here, in this same as always environment. I have begun to dream of the day when my Grandma's house will be sold & we can finally move out of area somewhere new - but it's grating on me that it could well still be many months before that happens, and in the meantime, I'm stuck with these streets, these routines, these boring places of necessity, this total lack of leisure activities.

I assure you, a 15 minute city is psychologically unworkable over the course of extended periods of time. Sure, if you happen to live in the city centre it might be more bearable for you for a couple of years max, but even within that time you would be going stir crazy. It's not necessarily actually having access to leave whenever you want that would highlight the unworkable nature of the plan - it's psychologically knowing that you are literally trapped within a relatively small environmental radius which will drive you nuts. Knowing that I'm stuck here, enduring the same old, same old, is sending me around the bend. I cannot wait for the day when circumstances shift & I can move the family out to a new environment. I feel like I'm suffocating here, in the 'mundane inescapable', and after ten years, the damage that being so limited has done to my psychological wellbeing is very evident, in my own analysis of how I'm doing now, compared to how I was doing when I was twenty-eight. Even though I'm a 'better person' now than I used to be, I can feel very clearly that a vital spark of 'the self-driving knowledge of liberty' has been put out within me, leaving only a murky shadowy candle flame where once a brilliant flare - boldness of thought, and a sense of adventure - used to live. The 'verve' of life has been drained from me, and although I have a content spiritual life, my practical life leaves a LOT to be desired. I think that if I had not had a calm & confident spiritual life, I would have ended up having a psychotic break as a result of the isolation & the knowledge of the limitations imposed by my disability & the concomitant financial circumstances of my life (which put me in the 'renting not buying' category - and trust me, although I therefore 'own nothing', it certainly hasn't made me 'be happy'...) F@CK YOU, Klaus Schwab.

15 minute neighbourhoods will lead to immense, widespread psychological trauma & mental illness for just about every person who is subjected to them. We are not designed for the very idea of confinement existing within us, affecting our life with the knowledge that we are trapped, held hostage in a small area, not permitted to travel beyond the boundary. I truly believe there will be riots & revolutions if they try to fully enforce these 15 minute neighbourhoods permanently. The residents of Oxford & Canterbury in the UK are getting seriously riled up already, though at this early stage they're still being quite polite about it all with the authorities whom they are challenging. That will not last. Guaranteed.

There will come a point, when the gloves will come off. Like keeping three gorillas in a ten foot cage, at some opportune moment they will stop working the glass independently, they will work together, the glass will be shattered - & the zookeepers will bear the wrath of those three who were so rudely held captive in such an unjust manner. The only other long-term outcome would be a massively high suicide rate, as people lose all hope of enjoying a truly acceptable standard of freedom ever again. Like rats who can no longer see the chink of light which represents hope of escape from a pool of water deep underground, as soon as the darkness closes in, they will stop swimming & allow themselves to simply drown in that darkness.

Revolution or suicide.

Which sounds more suicidal?

Exactly.

I think the psychological studies being carried out by the WEF & the administrators of Oxford & Canterbury ULEZ/ '15 minute city' zones likely don't properly take account of these factors. It is unworkable at scale, and I truly hope we manage to stop them from seeking to enforce these zones 'en masse' throughout the nations. If they try to enforce them, people will eventually realise it's a cold choice between revolution or suicide - then the fightback will truly begin.

Cheers,



FITO.

Your 15 minute city is for example is Tokyo. Tokyo is losing people due to the confinements of living in small boxes. The young moving in and tourist seems to be keeping the city night lights on these days.
People need space and land. In Hong Kong many of the high rises have green area where the tenants grow some vegetables. In Singapore, same thing. Many areas are 15 minute living conditions, but the elderly suffer from many mental illnesses.

a reply to: FlyInTheOintment

Geez , that kind of Reminds me of Industrial Chicken Farms Only with People instead . That is a Bad Idea Doomed to Failure Indeed Unless it was Forced on you ..........

It almost seems like you need human contact and it won't matter whether in a 15 minute city walk or a 12 hour walk through New York City if you don't put yourself out there and go looking for it.

When your grandmother's home is sold I hope you research your new location for the social offerings/groups that you will be able to join.

Good luck and I hope it all works out well for you.

a reply to: FlyInTheOintment

Here in the States, I have met people fairly recently that have never even thought to venture beyond what we call a local County. I.. I cannot fathom this behavior. Also, I hate that you can get fined there in Jolly Ol' for traveling too far, and I know you don't mean to where a passport is needed.

Anyway, I know this whole worldwide mess goes past the mundane and into the energetics of the spiritual.
Stay strong, fam. Oh, on that, Stateside a "Strong City" is one declared a U.N. warzone on the citizenry.

God bless

IMHO, the brainwashed slaves of a global corporatocracy won't object to 15-minute cities. They'll welcome them. We're talking about a society that is in love with their smart phones, their social media, and their satanic "technology".
The Brave New World and 1984 are upon us. Aldous Huxley said it best:
"People will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think."

Being a country lad, like waking up in the morning and throwing the curtains open and looking over woods and fields, when I was younger I worked in a couple of cities, Coventry and Birmingham (small by US standards) but I found them very oppressive and was glad to get out.

The biggest point is, if you have a 15 minute city, psychologically if it's voluntary or compulsory. That's the mind killer. If it's voluntary you make the choice for good or bad, it's your choice. But when it's compulsory then they are taking your free will out of the equation and that is the psychological crime.

As for rebelling, no chance. The only way to stop this is from the top, through the politicians. And if they wont do it means they are for it and I will guarantee you if you try to rebel you will have more forces (either police, army or some group that they will set up) to come and beat you to the ground. You might think that there is not enough "officers" to do that? The numbers come out of the woodwork. Look at the demonstrations in Canada, France, Netherlands and the UK.

a reply to: FlyInTheOintment

You do know 15-minute-city only means everything a person needs for their day to day life should be in a 15 minute radius walk/bike?
How is that a distopian nightmare? That's actually sadly the first good idea that came out of the city planers 'work group' for centuries!

Let's assume we have an ordinary family of 2 adults and 2 kids. He goes to work the next city, driving distance now: 45 minutes one way, 90 minutes per day, plus costs for car. 15 minutes city with the bike 30 minutes total. One full hour of lifetime just turned to leisure/hobby/social instead of cursing at the world in a traffic jam. And money saved too.
She because the kids are still too small to work does shopping and getting the kids to tennis/ballet/whathaveyou let's say 4 total appointments per day each 1/2h one way for simplicity 4h total driving time as opposed to 2h in a 15-m-c.
2 hours saved.

It doesn't mean they can never go anywhere outside that radius. But it saves a buttload of energy, exhaust and lifetime.
How on Earth can anybody be scared by that idea?
That's the real conspiracy: how can every #ing proposal be a reason to cry for some folks?

a reply to: FlyInTheOintment

Wow, you've perfectly described my experience during and since COVID. "We", my wife and I, hardly travel anywhere anymore except to the local Church, which in a town of 400 people is more a social outlet than anything else. We do go to the Walmart and the Grocery store in the nearest "town" of 17,000 which is 34 minutes away and occasionally have to travel to another town 45 miles away to the auto dealer for service.

During and since COVID we practically NEVER eat out and when, on the odd occasion we have to travel to the "city" where my father lives, we bring our own food and never leave the hotel room.

The only way I can describe this life is (and its not a good description) that it's like living without a horizon; there's no sense of anyway forward; it's as if we are living, waiting for the next shoe to drop.....the next disaster. All of the places we go as described above, except the church it seems as if everyone around us is "sketchy"; don't trust anyone and want to get out of the "store" before the next "shooter" comes in or before some gang of thugs looking to make trouble shows up. Restaurant service is awful and since COVID we no longer trust restaurant staff to be "clean" and there's always the suspicion that the cooks or wait staff will spit in our food because we are white. (and that does happen).

Thankfully I won't live long enough to see the 15 minute cities where I live, i.e., in the US. The US simply isn't set up for it and recent articles everywhere indicate that the population is choosing to live in remote suburbs, away from the crime, filth, insecurity, and homelessness of the cities, (not to mention the deplorable school systems). The "arrangement" of these suburbs doesn't lend iteself very well to the 15 minute "city" concept; they are semi-rural, spread out and typically centered around schools and strip type business centers that feature grocery stores, a pharmacy, etc.

I am sorry to hear of your disabilities; and of your situation of limited mobility. Hopefully something will improve for you. I'd recommend going rural when and if you can. The future of "packed" humanity is bleak.

a reply to: FlyInTheOintment

15 minute neighbourhoods will lead to immense, widespread psychological trauma & mental illness for just about every person who is subjected to them. We are not designed for the very idea of confinement existing within us, affecting our life with the knowledge that we are trapped, held hostage in a small area, not permitted to travel beyond the boundary.

You can access all of the essential resources in a 15 minute radius or diameter, you also can leave the city entirely and cross state lines all year long until you run out of gas money. What you are describing is hyperbolic.

a reply to: Peeple

How on Earth can anybody be scared by that idea?

Really? I don't know where you live but if you lived anywhere in the US you'd know the 15 minute city is a disastrous proposition for the US. Thankfully, because of the layout of most US housing, it will never happen and where it is happening, Chicago/New York, they're becoming dystopian urban hellscapes that feature random acts of violence, broken-dangerous transit systems and homeless people littering the streetscape causing, along with the excessive crime levels, businesses to leave creating food and pharmacy deserts.

The last place in the world any sensible person would want to live in the US is a "15 minute" city. That's about all the time that person would have before being mugged and then stomped half to death only to be delivered to some awful, understaffed and filthy Hospital to be left to bleed out in a hallway.

a reply to: TonyS

Yeah well the pilot projects are in the UK. Smaller, better cities.
I haven't heard anybody propose that for the USofA, did you?

last thing the world needs is to condense more people into smaller living quarters. we need to be scattering people throughout the vast lands. everybody should be far away from their neighbors as much as possible and free to live as peacefully as possibly as a family unit. only way to do it

a reply to: Peeple
Wow, how naive can you be. Please go and look into the City of Londons ULEZ zone. This is the ultimate part of the 15 minute cities. Yeah everything within 15 minutes, but what if your elderly mother lives outside the "zone", or you work outside the zone. Whoops, you WILL get charged so much a mile and only allowed to leave your zone 10 or 12 times per year. Try and get away with it? The cameras not only get your number plate but also your face is recognised.
Coming to a town near you.

a reply to: crayzeed

Wow how paranoid can you be?
I am afraid you'll have to show me your source for all of that?
Because the only thing I am aware of is a little fee? And after everything you saved on gas and nerves during the rest of the week every sunday with your mother will be that much sweeter.

HELP!!! I'm too old to learn how to put videos on here. Someone please put a couple on for peeple. About ULEZ zone and other UK cities.

a reply to: crayzeed

London official city planning office, not 2nd hand

a reply to: Peeple
Please wait. They've got the inch wait for the foot. And if you believe they wont do that then there is no hope.

a reply to: crayzeed

I believe if we don't seriously start reorganizing our # there's no hope.

a reply to: FlyInTheOintment

London and some parts of New York have been '15 minutes cities' for years now.

Its simply an initiative to favor pedestrian travel and public transit over car traffic, and in a lot of the cities in Europe have these barriers put in place to do exactly that. Most of the old towns and cities weren't planned to have everyone and their uncle travel by car to go two blocks for whatever it is they're buying.

If you live in a superb or the country it will have no impact on you at all. Cars aren't going anywhere.