Western Standard - Utopian 15 minute city plans pushed by the WEF

00:00:00.000 concept of 15-minute cities, and that concept has been around and making news around the world as

00:00:05.300 we've got these authoritarian-minded city planners and urbanists pushing this plan in the developed

00:00:10.540 world. Now, the notion of 15-minute cities isn't new, and ideologically driven bureaucrats and 0.98

00:00:16.160 politicians have been trying to implement this sort of thing for quite some time now.

00:00:19.860 With the World Economic Forum, though, jumping on and promoting the conception, people are finally

00:00:23.540 sounding the alarm bells on the concept, and they should. Now, no, we're not going to see walled

00:00:28.040 World War II-style ghettos being erected in cities, as some alarmists have been claiming. Existing

00:00:33.100 neighborhoods aren't going to be bulldozed to create packed, roadless communities either.

00:00:37.020 But the 15-minute city plans, they're more subtle, and they'll typically be implemented incrementally.

00:00:42.340 Cities embracing the plan will cause no significant economic and social damages. They try to create

00:00:47.260 impossible urban utopias, and adherence to the ideology will become ever more forceful as citizens

00:00:52.920 reject these plans. So what are these 15-minute cities anyways? Well, a 15-minute city is a planned

00:00:59.360 community where any and all services can be reached through walking or bicycling within 15 minutes or

00:01:04.600 less. A simple and nice-sounding concept on the surface for those who don't like the idea of

00:01:09.600 traveling, and I guess who are in good enough shape to get around. The problem is the whole concept's a pile

00:01:14.860 of unworkable, idealistic hogwash, particularly in North America. I mean, to make a 15-minute city

00:01:21.340 viable, the urban density has to be far higher than pretty much any city in North America offers.

00:01:27.040 Having employment, schools, groceries, entertainment, and government services all available within a 15-minute

00:01:33.420 walk or bicycle ride means packing a whole lot of people into a small area to sustain those services.

00:01:39.140 And while proponents like to point to some trendy communities and cities that are packed with

00:01:42.820 restaurants and stores and services within walking distance, these communities also have

00:01:46.580 extremely expensive real estate, and the small specialty stores and services charge high prices

00:01:51.400 to maintain themselves. Cost of living is challenging enough for people already. Whether you like them

00:01:56.540 or not, big box stores help keep necessities affordable for people. So love or hate retailers like

00:02:01.780 Walmart, Superstore, and Home Depot, it can't be denied they keep their prices low due to their size and

00:02:06.560 taking advantage of economies of scale. Now, how many of those big box stores would it take to be within a 15-minute

00:02:12.100 walk or bike ride in every part of the city? Likewise, the government services can't be everywhere.

00:02:17.580 Government services are expensive and inefficient enough as it is. So how would you like to have a

00:02:20.920 passport office every 10 blocks or so? Come on, guys, this isn't reasonable. Now, some of the proponents

00:02:25.840 like to point to cities like Paris and Shanghai and New York as examples to follow. Well, all of these

00:02:31.000 cities, for one thing, I mean, some of them are ancient. The other thing is they're already high-density

00:02:35.700 environments. And then look at the cost of living. What's it cost to rent an apartment in Manhattan

00:02:40.040 these days if you can afford to even find one? What, six, seven thousand a month? Come on. Most North

00:02:45.180 American cities as well have six-month winters where walking and bicycling can be uncomfortable, if not

00:02:50.220 impossible. Imagine how it would be for seniors. But density zealots, they ignore that reality. The biggest

00:02:55.980 obstacle for those who want to see 15-minute cities, though, is consumer demand. People just don't want to live in

00:03:01.260 them, especially after a pandemic that drove people into working from home and living in the suburbs. And that's what

00:03:06.360 ends up driving the authoritarian streak. And that's when it gets dangerous. If people don't want to live

00:03:09.680 in high-density ghettos, then, well, they'll need to be encouraged, right? That encouragement, of course, 1.00

00:03:14.380 usually comes in the form of taxing or penalizing and demonizing people living in suburbs or driving

00:03:19.000 automobiles. Progressively run cities are pursuing charters and legislation to reach out and force density

00:03:25.120 standards on neighboring communities. They won't block people from leaving, but they want to create a

00:03:29.240 regulatory form of an iron curtain to make sure that if people leave, they won't find life any better

00:03:33.940 anywhere else. The goal of 15-minute cities isn't to make the world a greener place or to pursue some

00:03:39.480 kind of societal equity, though, of course, that's what they always like to claim. No, the goal is

00:03:42.900 control. That's why the World Economic Forum likes it. The main enemy for authoritarians in this thing is

00:03:48.500 the personal automobile. It empowers individuals and allows them to escape urban living. Residents

00:03:54.020 locked into high-density communities who are dependent on public transit are under the thumb of the

00:03:58.820 state. It's easy to control people when you can control their ability to move. That's why 15-minute

00:04:03.680 cities hold such appeal for authoritarians with a WEF. Just think of how effective a social credit

00:04:08.960 policy of citizen control could be if citizens are completely dependent on the state for their

00:04:13.120 movement. Cashless, carless, and living in a crammed enclave, citizens would truly live by the whim of

00:04:19.100 the state. A nightmare for free-thinking individuals, but a wet dream for elitist authoritarians who

00:04:24.740 envision themselves, of course, at the top of the pile. Of course, as with every socialist paradise,

00:04:29.540 the political elites won't live among the masses in those ghettos. You don't need to look at the 1.00

00:04:33.940 way things turned out in the Soviet Union and how that all ironed out. You know, long row houses where

00:04:38.980 the political elite, though, lived outside of the city in some nice acreages. The 15-minute cities

00:04:44.660 will fail, but the ideologues pushing those concepts could push us all to the brink of bankruptcy and

00:04:49.620 trying to make them work. The only question is how far are we going to let them go before we push back?

00:04:53.860 How long will we keep electing progressive adherence to the WEF agenda and, you know,

00:05:00.340 putting them into positions of municipal leadership? Yesterday's conspiracies keep turning

00:05:04.740 into today's realities. We can't bury our heads in the sand on what the push for 15-minute cities

00:05:10.260 is all about. So yes, it's time to start talking about these things. Canadian Shooting Sports

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Western Standard - February 08, 2023

Utopian 15 minute city plans pushed by the WEF

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