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[roadman65]

I ‘ve noticed that when many users just post their opinions or suggestions on what a road should be or not be, many other users act like the person making the opinion or suggestion is a person of authority within the governing body of the roadway in question.  Therefore the other users behave like your idea is going to implemented, and it needs to stop.


I’ve seen it mainly on fictional where someone suggests that an interstate number be changed for what that person believes would work and instead of respecting that users suggestion they attack him like the idea is a mortal sin and label the user’s idea as “crazy.”

Granted, people like Ethanman and Dieselsabb were annoying and they never quit trolling people with their absurd suggestions, but attacking a person who thinks I-82 should be a N-S odd number is overkill.

Then there were other suggestions on fictional too, that were treated as if the person making the suggestion worked for the DOT in charge and was going to make the suggested change and start to act worried.  I can’t tell you how many heated arguments between users erupted ( with many between the same two all the time over different ideas) happen over a harmless topic.

I used to visit a tourist forum where many would complain about tolls and prices there and no one would intervene like we would here if the same suggestion was passed.  No one gone anal over a harmless suggestion on those tourist forums about travel, like we do at AARoads.

According to some person I’ve met in person off this forum, who witnessed many of it, he has seen many new users leave the forum as a result of blunt up front criticism of a harmless suggestion.   It seems we insult people we haven’t met or know who they are here.

Come on, it’s about topics that we can’t discuss elsewhere as roads seem to be eccentric to others off the forum.

[Max Rockatansky]

In the case of one particular recent new user I’m more frustrated they bombarded more serious threads with FritzOwl-like ideas.  This was worsened by the fact that many of us tried to be reasonable and explain the real world scenarios which would prevent said ideas from happening.  Granted, this did start on a non-fictional board and has since migrated to the Fictional Board. 

For me I do get a little frustrated when I see myths perpetuated by users on Facebook pages like FWJ and Roadgeekery bombard the forum amongst the user base.  That’s my thought though as someone who actually takes historic research seriously and tries to share it whenever possible.

[webny99]

I just stopped here on the way to Serious.

[jp the roadgeek]

Well, TheAlan360 seemed to be serious and we all know how that turned out

[abefroman329]

You know who was dead serious?  dzlsabe, that's who.

[roadman65]

In the case of one particular recent new user I’m more frustrated they bombarded more serious threads with FritzOwl-like ideas.  This was worsened by the fact that many of us tried to be reasonable and explain the real world scenarios which would prevent said ideas from happening.  Granted, this did start on a non-fictional board and has since migrated to the Fictional Board. 

For me I do get a little frustrated when I see myths perpetuated by users on Facebook pages like FWJ and Roadgeekery bombard the forum amongst the user base.  That’s my thought though as someone who actually takes historic research seriously and tries to share it whenever possible.

I prefer FWJ as no major arguments erupt there.  There was one, however on FWJ, over US 20 verses US 30 for the true coast to coast US Route still alive today. I let the guy win cause he was hell bent on not considering the Columbia River at Astoria, OR to be sea level, but had arguments that the Boston Harbor is at Sea Level, so US 20 from Newport, OR to Boston is the only coast to coast left as US 30 is still ten miles from Sea Level via the mighty Columbia.

To me it’s not worth arguing over what route is coast to coast as there are far better things to be concerned.  Many of us here argue over silly things. We even have a moderator on here who worries about correct spelling and gets nasty when you either accidentally or ignorantly misspell a word. Spelling is the least of our problems.  There are far worse things also than misspelling words especially when Spell Check misspells words constantly and is accepted as the true look out for us by the cyber world.

[roadman65]

You know who was dead serious?  dzlsabe, that's who.

Well he attacks peoples character when he was here then and also implied that all people outside Chicago don’t count.  Not to mention his personal website where he admits he’s a professional troll.

[NE2]

Because nobody cares about the 50th LOLOL LET'S BOMB 238.

[kphoger]

It seems we insult people we haven’t met or know who they are here.

This is true.  It's much easier to be mean on a keyboard than it is in person.  I'm probably guilty of this more than anyone, and I owe everyone an apology.

In the case of one particular recent new user I’m more frustrated they bombarded more serious threads with FritzOwl-like ideas.  This was worsened by the fact that many of us tried to be reasonable and explain the real world scenarios which would prevent said ideas from happening.  Granted, this did start on a non-fictional board and has since migrated to the Fictional Board.

I think 'bombarded' is the operative word there.  I get much less irritated when someone new posts a handful of crazy ideas, but I get quite a bit more irritated when someone posts sixty crazy ideas across forty different threads.  And, when he defends every single one of them to the death, then that just makes it even worse.

It's no excuse for the rest of us to be mean, of course, but it sure does make my blood boil hotter.

To me it’s not worth arguing over what route is coast to coast as there are far better things to be concerned.

I think you meant coat to cost.

[Scott5114]

I find it interesting that so many people on a forum just about roads, seem to care least about the actual roads themselves. I thought everyone on here would be like FritzOwl, or even more so, about being picky with numbers, lanes, consistency...etc

A five year old can draw new freeways on a map. A ten year old can assign numbers to them that follow the numbering scheme.

But in the real world there's more to it than that. There is not an infinite amount of money to be spent on every aesthetically pleasing map-line that could be drawn. We have to pick and choose between those and taking care of the roads we've already got. Real life people will be affected, for good and ill, because of the decisions a road project makes. And because, as Americans, we're fortunate enough to live in some semblance of a democracy for the time being, the DOT cannot just dictate to the people that the road plan says this and that's just the way it's going to be. Because of democracy, those real life people will have input on the project and can substantially affect how and whether it's built. We generally agree that although this can be annoying, it's better than the alternative.

Put simply, plans like FritzOwl's are boring because they just represent someone taking a map, drawing a line on it, and not thinking it through any further than that. That's not interesting because anyone can do that, and it's not a realistic depiction of what the road building process would look like. To get a new freeway built, you have to convince the people that would be paying for it (i.e. the locals) that if they spend $X on a new freeway they will receive more than $X worth of benefit from it. If you can't be bothered to show how you would do that for the most receptive audience on the planet, a bunch of roadgeeks, what fun is it to read the proposal? After all, with no justification for it, it probably wouldn't even reach the public hearing stages.

People here like proposals that they can imagine actually being built someday. If you can put together a proposal, plausibly explain who it would benefit and why, and how you might avoid people's both objections and budget-destroying obstacles, that makes a fictional highways proposal interesting, and that's when you'll see people light up and enjoy discussing it.

[SkyPesos]

I don't mind FritzOwl as much, as he keeps his fictional musings in his own thread. Meanwhile, the new guy with like 30 posts per day average a week after joining are serious about their "fictional" plans being implemented in reality and keeps bombarding non-fictional threads with them, so we treat their plans more critically and seriously than someone that knows their plan is fictional.

And my guess about the I-82 numbering (as well as the numbering of I-238 and I-99, etc) are that they're dead horses we're continuously beating, so they're getting old at this point.

[hbelkins]

I don't post or even read Fictional all that often, but I draw the line between ideas that are realistic vs. ideas that are dumb on their face.

Discussing alternate numbers for I-99, or giving interstate designations to the toll roads in Oklahoma or former toll roads in Kentucky, are things of merit and are actually feasible changes.

Proposing a freeway blasting through Yellowstone NP is one of several possible examples of nonsense proposals.

A serious idea deserves serious discussion. A truly ridiculous idea deserves ridicule. A little common sense goes a long way.

[skluth]

I don't mind FritzOwl as much, as he keeps his fictional musings in his own thread. Meanwhile, the new guy with like 30 posts per day average a week after joining are serious about their "fictional" plans being implemented in reality and keeps bombarding non-fictional threads with them, so we treat their plans more critically and seriously than someone that knows their plan is fictional.

And my guess about the I-82 numbering (as well as the numbering of I-238 and I-99, etc) are that they're dead horses we're continuously beating, so they're getting old at this point.

Back in the day (as the saying goes), FritzOwl did his musings all over the place until he was restricted to Fictional.

It's also important to remember here that many here, including me, are 'on the spectrum' which means it's often harder to understand context. I know I've pissed off people here, sometimes intentionally, but often it's just a misunderstanding and we're agreeing while looking like we're disagreeing. Often I even find myself arguing minor points that matter very little outside the main point; it's easy enough to do with the nature of threading. And sometimes one of us is just wrong or we just have different opinions. I think many of us here (including me) don't like that others have different opinions.

Frankly, I find some posters devotion to the grid almost religious in nature.  Yes, this is an opinion. The grid is a guide and from my POV only the most egregious violations (e.g. I-99) bother me while highways that cross each other and only violate the grid in at one end (e.g., I-40 and I-44) don't bother me at all. Just using this as an example. If you disagree, fine. But, IMO, you're wrong. But this is fundamentally an opinion.

[SkyPesos]

Frankly, I find some posters devotion to the grid almost religious in nature.  Yes, this is an opinion. The grid is a guide and from my POV only the most egregious violations (e.g. I-99) bother me while highways that cross each other and only violate the grid in at one end (e.g., I-40 and I-44) don't bother me at all. Just using this as an example. If you disagree, fine. But, IMO, you're wrong. But this is fundamentally an opinion.

I have no issues with numbering as long as a part of a route is in the grid. I've always thought that I-71 and I-74 (midwest) are fine, but apparently, there are people that want I-74 between Indy and Cincy renumbered as a western I-66 or I-68 because it's south of I-70 at that point.

[webny99]

To me it’s not worth arguing over what route is coast to coast as there are far better things to be concerned.

I think you meant coat to cost.

Me to.

[Max Rockatansky]

I don't mind FritzOwl as much, as he keeps his fictional musings in his own thread. Meanwhile, the new guy with like 30 posts per day average a week after joining are serious about their "fictional" plans being implemented in reality and keeps bombarding non-fictional threads with them, so we treat their plans more critically and seriously than someone that knows their plan is fictional.

And my guess about the I-82 numbering (as well as the numbering of I-238 and I-99, etc) are that they're dead horses we're continuously beating, so they're getting old at this point.

Back in the day (as the saying goes), FritzOwl did his musings all over the place until he was restricted to Fictional.

It's also important to remember here that many here, including me, are 'on the spectrum' which means it's often harder to understand context. I know I've pissed off people here, sometimes intentionally, but often it's just a misunderstanding and we're agreeing while looking like we're disagreeing. Often I even find myself arguing minor points that matter very little outside the main point; it's easy enough to do with the nature of threading. And sometimes one of us is just wrong or we just have different opinions. I think many of us here (including me) don't like that others have different opinions.

Frankly, I find some posters devotion to the grid almost religious in nature.  Yes, this is an opinion. The grid is a guide and from my POV only the most egregious violations (e.g. I-99) bother me while highways that cross each other and only violate the grid in at one end (e.g., I-40 and I-44) don't bother me at all. Just using this as an example. If you disagree, fine. But, IMO, you're wrong. But this is fundamentally an opinion.

It was more a case of Fritz posting his ideas into Fictional threads created by other users.  A general thread was created for Fritz and he’s mostly stayed there since.  Come to think of it I don’t believe Fritz has ever posted outside the Fictional board.

[NWI_Irish96]

Frankly, I find some posters devotion to the grid almost religious in nature.  Yes, this is an opinion. The grid is a guide and from my POV only the most egregious violations (e.g. I-99) bother me while highways that cross each other and only violate the grid in at one end (e.g., I-40 and I-44) don't bother me at all. Just using this as an example. If you disagree, fine. But, IMO, you're wrong. But this is fundamentally an opinion.

My opinion is that the grid should be rigid for the x0 and x5 interstates. For any other 2di, it ought to fit in the grid at some point, with two considerations.

1) the nature of our cities requires some diagonal interstates and renumbering a long interstate each time it crosses and x5 or x0 is impractical Example: I-69 is between I-65 and I-75 from Indianapolis to Port Huron, but then violates the grid south of Indy. It's impractical to change its number each time it crosses an x5, which would require 4 additional numbers once it's all built.

2) new interstates come into existence where no number fitting into the grid is available, and wholesale renumbering in order to make it fit is impractical

[kphoger]

It's also important to remember here that many here, including me, are 'on the spectrum' which means it's often harder to understand context. I know I've pissed off people here, sometimes intentionally, but often it's just a misunderstanding ...

I have to keep reminding myself of that fact.  Unfortunately, I'm not so great at allowing that knowledge to actually influence the tone of my posts.

I have no issues with numbering as long as a part of a route is in the grid.

You must really hate the relationship between US-6 and US-20, then.

To me it’s not worth arguing over what route is coast to coast as there are far better things to be concerned.

I think you meant coat to cost.

Me to.

We should start a movement.

[Rothman]

It seems we insult people we haven’t met or know who they are here.

This is true.  It's much easier to be mean on a keyboard than it is in person.  I'm probably guilty of this more than anyone, and I owe everyone an apology.

Accepted.

[Scott5114]

It seems we insult people we haven’t met or know who they are here.

This is true.  It's much easier to be mean on a keyboard than it is in person.  I'm probably guilty of this more than anyone, and I owe everyone an apology.

Accepted.

Maybe the two of you can make up over a nice meal at Olive Garden.

[Rothman]

It seems we insult people we haven’t met or know who they are here.

This is true.  It's much easier to be mean on a keyboard than it is in person.  I'm probably guilty of this more than anyone, and I owe everyone an apology.

Accepted.

Maybe the two of you can make up over a nice meal at Olive Garden.

Never.

[kphoger]

Maybe the two of you can make up over a nice meal at Olive Garden.

  You're terrible...

[formulanone]

I just stopped here on the way to Serious.

I was going to give a detailed package of reasons, but this was the best response.

(Especially because I don't understand these drama-of-the-moment concerns.)

[index]

I don't post or even read Fictional all that often, but I draw the line between ideas that are realistic vs. ideas that are dumb on their face.

Discussing alternate numbers for I-99, or giving interstate designations to the toll roads in Oklahoma or former toll roads in Kentucky, are things of merit and are actually feasible changes.

Proposing a freeway blasting through Yellowstone NP is one of several possible examples of nonsense proposals.

A serious idea deserves serious discussion. A truly ridiculous idea deserves ridicule. A little common sense goes a long way.

I just don't see the harm or why it's so wrong. I think it can be valid and enjoyable to discuss fictional situations so long as it's not literally impossible, like building a bridge from California to Hawaii or something. For the people who want to discuss building an Interstate through Yellowstone, why not let them? The goal isn't common sense or realism so it should not be a concern. It's like walking up to a hot dog stand and demanding filet mignon.

I for one have discussed with friends, drawn up a bunch of weird maps, drawn up roads, and imaginged what would had to be cut out for I-95 to be extended to Key West. Of course, that, in real life, is an absurdly stupid proposal, but there's no harm in imagining it for the sake of imagining it. I enjoy it. If you don't like the thread, then just don't participate. Let people enjoy things, y'all. Nobody owns the hobby/interest of roadgeeking and doesn't get to decide what it is for somebody. It's toxic. There are plenty of more ridiculous threads with less substance than FritzOwl on this forum that people never have a problem with, like in Off-Topic.

If the entire internet was ran by this forum's members, nobody would have any fun. A lot of creative content on the internet is exploring fictional and impossible situations. There's no realistic or convincing timeline in which all the nukes on Earth are set off or Hitler takes over the world or if everything was free, yet there's videos on that that are enjoyable. Plenty of conversations I've had with people I know revolve around talking about made-up situations and what they'd entail. I don't see what's so different about some of the threads in Fictional Highways.

[kphoger]

I just don't see the harm or why it's so wrong. I think it can be valid and enjoyable to discuss fictional situations so long as it's not literally impossible ... I for one have discussed with friends, drawn up a bunch of weird maps, drawn up roads ... I enjoy it. If you don't like the thread, then just don't participate.

The issue is that, if a majority of the people don't enjoy it, then the whole thread becomes annoying for them.  If the whole thread is about a ridiculous idea, then they can simply ignore it.  But, if ridiculous ideas take over an otherwise fun and interesting fictional thread, then what?