Are you suggesting that a footpath is safe?

My father got mugged at knifepoint on one. That is 100% not acceptable. It is a major reason why normal non-poor people encase themselves in cars.

My father wasn't even blind. He was just slightly old, maybe 50 years old. At that age, he could no longer sprint away.

The comment might sound ridiculous to the people who voluntarily use public transport, but your sampling bias is gigantic in that case.

People are downvoting because you're missing the point. The unsafety of the situation is not because of the mode of transport, but because of America's failure to deal with crime.

Here in Germany, crime rates have been declining pretty consistently [1], with homicides and robberies down from "low" to "very low". The thought of getting mugged on the street or on public transit is just absurd to me. I don't know anyone whom it happened to. It's something that happens on CSI, not in real life.

[1] Except for internet-related fraud and Crystal Method abuse (since these are still pretty new), and stuff like unlawful border crossing (because of the refugee situation).

Please don't break the guidelines by posting like this again.

> Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Well done.

You've just engaged in an ideological rant about muslim rapists in a thread about people being too old to drive.

You linked to the Gatestone institute, twice. Started by a known anti-muslim zionist and the reporting has been repeatedly accused of deliberate inaccuracies.

You also linked to WND twice. A publication known for perpetuating shaky conspiracy theories and white supremacism.

You chose two extremely right-wing (and unreliable) sources twice each. Not one countering article did you submit as a comparison.

We can all see exactly where you stand here.

You're reading a lot more into that than I intended. He brought up crime in Germany. The links do discuss muslim rapists, but I'm not ranting about it. The point is that his assertion of low crime is unreliable in an environment where information is suppressed.

> Are you suggesting that a footpath is safe

You mean they aren’t safe where you live?

Blimey. I’ve been attacked once, in total, and that was as a teen and an adult intervened within seconds.

I used to walk to school if I missed the bus (or if I wanted to miss mandatory religious activities), and that took me an hour. Sometimes I’d walk home afterwards, because the school had a then-novel internet connection. I’ve walked a few hundred kilometres around Berlin in the last few months, and explored several other European cities by walking around on foot for hours each day. If you go to Venice, your only options are foot or boat, and the boats don’t go everywhere.

Sorry to hear that your father went through this.

You may care to consider that people get held up in cars, even in their own homes.

If you're really concerned about mugging in public areas, there are basic safety steps that everyone can (should) take. Stick to well lit areas; don't wear headphones; don't use your phone; avoid any situation that doesn't feel right. If possible plan your route. In other words, have your wits about you.

Also, re the non-poor encasing themselves in cars. Crime increases when people perceive an increasing gap between the haves and the have-nots. Does this mean the rich should use footpaths to reduce mugging? Probably not. But it might mean that public transport should get major investment so it's not seen as a shitty option only for the poor. If that's really how it's seen, everyone who has no option but to walk must feel constantly pissed off.

I know several people who have been injured in car accidents through no fault of their own (While being in a car). Wouldn't you want a method of transportation which is safe for you?