The thrust of RTH Editor Ryan McGreal was that, referring to the study, 'in an academic, peer reviewed study that concluded Hamilton's one-way streets are 2.5 times as dangerous as our two-way streets.' To which I responded:
Robert D, we've already done that in an academic, peer reviewed study that concluded Hamilton's one-way streets are 2.5 times as dangerous as our two-way streets.
And yet this, directly from the study:
"From 1978 to 1994, there were 2,091 children aged 0 to 14 years in Hamilton injured in pedestrian-vehicle collisions; 344 were injured on one-way streets and 1,747 on two-way streets. The rate of injury for children ages 0 to 14 years was 2.5 times higher on one-way streets than on two-way streets (46.4 vs 19.6 per 100,000 children, per 100 km, per year)"
So while the numbers tell us that more children were injured on two-way streets...in fact, by a factor of about five times...the incident rate was lower on them than on one-way streets.
Then maybe this statement is the most accurate? "In the end, it might be, as Zeeger describes, that it is necessary that one-way streets are safer in some situations and two-ways streets in others."
Now, at the time of this editorial being written, that comment of mine had been 'downvoted' by four readers.
And I'm still trying to get my head around it.
Let's see; I quoted directly from the study Editor Ryan referenced...I didn't inject any bias of my own, I didn't launch into an ad hominem attack, I didn't broadcast a contrary agenda...
...and yet of the six people who 'voted' (essentially gestures of approval and disapproval, agreement and disagreement), two-thirds 'didn't agree' with what I said.
Sixty-six percent of those taking the time to 'quantify' my comment 'disapproved' of what I said.
Huh?
I simply pointed out that Editor Ryan had essentially cherry-picked his statistics, and suggested a better, more reasoned way of approaching the conclusions the study came to.
And for this I was 'downvoted'.
Harrumph.
I don't happen to care whether someone agrees or disagrees with me. I'm not looking to make friends when I contribute to a discussion, and the notion of somehow 'validating' myself by way of garnering 'Upvotes' seems not only pretty insecure, but immature.
As I've said previously, the 'voting' feature on RTH and sites elsewhere seems one of the most backward developments in the effort to increase discourse. In a nutshell, it's a 'Death by a thousand cuts' way of obliterating a person's opinion. It doesn't add anything to the discussion, it tends to marshall people into their separate ideological dogmas...and it's rude.
Again, if someone wouldn't make a similar gesture in 'real Life', breathing the same air as the person they disagree with (and I'd bet a kajillion dollars that almost no commenters on RTH would; 'Net courage' and all that, donchaknow...), then why would they do it online?
Never mind the indisputably bizarreness attached to disagreeing with quoted statistics.
"You're entitled to your own opinion. You are not entitled to your own facts.'
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I'm always interested in feedback, differing opinions, even contrarian blasts...as long as they're delivered with decorum...with panache and flair always helping.