How to Stop People from Using Your Street as Their Own Personal “Need for Speed” Racetrack

It’s a problem that has gone unchecked for over a century, or at least since the first time a greasy teenager figured out that with enough time, patience, and daddy’s money, you can make a car sound just like in the movies, as long as you drive it downtown so the sound can echo off all the buildings. If you’ve ever had the displeasure of living in a dense urban area, you already know exactly what I’m talking about, but for the uninitiated, I’ll set the scene.

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That’s where you live now. Pretty nice, huh. You didn’t do too badly for yourself did you? Really put your nose to the pavement and all that bullshit. You saved up, put in the extra hours at the job you hate, and you always had an eye for this historically preserved neighborhood. Wow mom, you say, I can’t believe that this house is so old that even Thomas Jefferson probably saw it with his own eyes! And your mom will nod and apparently merely the notion that Thomas Jefferson might have looked at something and now it still exists makes this house worth in upwards of seven figures on the open market. Cool there’s a kitschy coffee shop a block away where the barista has the world’s most annoying mustache and haircut combo. And guess what else, there’s even a vegan bakery in what used to be slave quarters right down the street, how convenient because I gotta have my fucking muffin in the morning man. At least, I like the idea of having a muffin every morning on my way to work. The neighborhood even has a compost program where a raccoon is the logo, that’s so cute. This is exactly what you were looking for. Now you can finally fully embrace the post-hipster proto-yuppie lifestyle you’ve long pined for since that first time you heard Innerspeaker in college. This was your stupid dream, but it was your dream, and you got it. Good for you.

Night falls on your dream home.

You’ve just spent the whole morning, afternoon, and evening moving in and now the sun is setting on your day and you are feeling exhausted, yet accomplished. You ordered in some pizza from Domino’s (what? just because you have expensive tryhard taste, doesn’t mean you can’t use those old coupons you found in the bottom of one of the boxes you unpacked this morning. Besides, all the pizza joints around here suck and the only good pizza is in New York anyway, because there’s actually real Italians there, plus the mineral content of the East River, at least that’s what someone on a podcast told you, so what’s the point of even trying to go anywhere else, the end result is the same, whether it’s Papa “N-word” John’s or that new place that has a pun in its name where they serve craft beer and put “artisanal” toppings like eggplant or gorgonzola on their pizza. Plus it’s just for you, it’s not for your friends or someone who might judge you and also even if it was it’s kinda like bro why are our individualized consumer choices so intertwined with our self-identity now, like it’s just fucking pizza guys I don’t think I’m better than anyone else because I turned my nose up to Domino’s, I’m just hungry and I have the coupon, and for all of the reasons listed above, I’m going to use it and I won’t feel bad about it) and now you’re pleasantly satiated and feeling drowsy. Time to rest up, you think to yourself, on the first night in my dream home, to wake up to what will be first day of the rest of my life.

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Not so fast.

ENTER: guy with armband tattoo, cool vape addiction, and way too strong of an opinion about the superiority of driving a “standard” behind the wheel of one of the greatest travesties to ever make it off the factory floor, a subaru impretzel std with the headlights changed to a cool color like purple and the windows tinted and probably a bumper sticker that says “Cops are are friend”

Your new worst enemy

You thought you were going to get some well-deserved shut-eye after everything you’ve been working for your entire adult life finally came to fruition? Think again, because the guy driving this car has other ideas, and he’s about to turn onto your street.

A sonic boom thunderclaps its way down the avenue, the sound rudely ricocheting off the densely packed buildings as Mr Pretzel decides to use your new street as his own personal Need for Speed racetrack, at the peril of every pedestrian’s safety, every other motorist’s safety, and the safety of the peace of every resident quietly cherishing a personal summit on the first night in their dream apartment (that’s you).

What the hell, you think to yourself. What causes people to do this? Why would anyone try this? Who thinks that’s cool? You look down onto the street from your window. You note that no panties have dropped and no titties are out after this tantalizing display of macho suave. No one claps. No one cheers. No one even seems to notice but you.

I guess that’s just a part of life livin in the big city, you muse to yourself. I guess it’s no big deal. It’s a small price I’m willing to pay if it doesn’t happen all too often. But as the days turn into weeks and the weeks turn into months, you notice this happens far more frequently than you thought it would. In fact, you begin to believe that it’s actually not worth the small price to pay. I mean really, it’s actually very unsafe. I mean, people’s lives are in danger here and for what? Because this guy wants to drive fast. Like there’s literally highways and shit if you wanna do that. Why drive like that where there’s people walking around everywhere? You begin to think, they must do this because they like to be annoying. Those people just savor the fact that I’m upstairs enjoying my peaceful evening and they come ripping through with no bearing for anyone but their own sick pleasure. What can be done? You’ve got to do something.

And that’s where I come in. You see, I’ve got a great way to fix this problem that plagues every person with the misfortune of living in an urban area. No one talks about it enough. We talk about pollution in an environmental sense, we talk about pollution in a cosmic sense, we even talk about pollution in a philosophical sense. But no one talks about pollution in an auditory sense, and if they do, they don’t do it enough.

Here’s my solution: add speed bumps every 15 feet to roads located in downtown or urban areas. At the end of the day, a “downtown” “walkable” area is supposed to prioritize the pedestrian over the motorist. When they were built, it was before cars even existed. We can accommodate cars, sure. We basically have to. Just ask any municipality that’s approved building garish parking garages in city centers since the dawn of the automobile. At this point, fighting the existence of the car seems futile. But we can at least hinder this quite frankly unnecessary degradation of quality of life (making my car go vroom vroom) in urban areas by simply adding a 3-inch asphalt bump into every single road at 15 foot intervals. This solves the problem by preventing quick acceleration in a vehicle in city centers thus making it inherently more safe for the pedestrian, who is (or at least should be) the priority.

How this solution might look on your street. Note that this is a prototype image. Also note how effective this would be.

I know what you’re thinking. 1. “That would be ugly af” 2. “What about cops chasing ppl thru the city” 3. “clutching pearls that degrades the integrity of the historical city center” 4. “We should just go back to horse and buggy then you fucking idiot.” These are all valid criticisms. I don’t care. But I will offer you this:

1. What’s uglier, speed bumps or subaru imprezas? Checkmate
2. Fuck the police. Also, no one can go fast, c’mon now. With how slow people will have to go, those clown ass bicycle cops will finally have their time to shine, on the off-chance a high-speed chase actually goes through a downtown area (not likely, especially once this genius plan is implemented)
3. Right, like having infinite lines of cars parked along these “historic” streets doesn’t already degrade the integrity of a city center. If we wanted to, as a culture, preserve historic integrity, we would have done what Europe did and just make every city center pedestrian only and keep cars out altogether. We didn’t, so we have to suffer the consequences. But honestly, I think this is as American of a plan to treat our historic cities as there ever was: add the same shit they put in mall parking lots to our historic cities. We already have Starbucks and Urban Outfitters everywhere anyway.
4. Ok, I agree with you. Now what?

If there is any true justice left in these United States, this plan will be implemented tomorrow in cities worldwide. I can only hope to be a mouthpiece for those too ashamed or embarrassed to speak out about it themselves. We’re fighting the good fight America. Keep these hot rods off our streets! Speed bumps, or America gets humped!