Driving trucks through crowds is the new 9/11. That’s what they’re saying.
Hijacking an airplane is a lot harder now, but any jackass with a credit card can rent a yank-tank and drive it into a pedestrian rich environment. That’s a much larger attack surface, and we can’t reasonably defend from it without oppressive surveillance and other personal freedom restrictions.
A street closed to traffic in a gentle country might be closed with a light temporary barrier, or it might be closed with removable bollards sized to stop the largest vehicles that could try to access the area
Glasgow closes roads for their fringe festival with reinforced concrete highway dividers
A closed to traffic part of my town has a slow road leading up to it and a line of bollards, two of which can be removed to allow vehicles in when they’re allowed
It’s not hard to close a road in a way that keeps vehicles out
That great. All we need is a ton of removable bollards installed in and around every location where people will congregate on foot. Easy, that’s just every mall, convention hall, farmers market, community festival, school, workplace, sports venue, religious institution, government office, hospital…
Places that get pedestrianised one time each year do it with strong temporary barriers. Permanent car free places do other things to keep cars out
They plant trees
They install heavy concrete plant pots
And some that want to perform security use bold stainless steel bollards
It is harder to protect street sides, things like slowing down traffic (with road design, not speed limits) can help, adding protected bike lanes can help
Trucks and SUVs are being weaponized today in the same way airliners were weaponized in 2001.
What ?
Driving trucks through crowds is the new 9/11. That’s what they’re saying.
Hijacking an airplane is a lot harder now, but any jackass with a credit card can rent a yank-tank and drive it into a pedestrian rich environment. That’s a much larger attack surface, and we can’t reasonably defend from it without oppressive surveillance and other personal freedom restrictions.
A street closed to traffic in a gentle country might be closed with a light temporary barrier, or it might be closed with removable bollards sized to stop the largest vehicles that could try to access the area
Glasgow closes roads for their fringe festival with reinforced concrete highway dividers
A closed to traffic part of my town has a slow road leading up to it and a line of bollards, two of which can be removed to allow vehicles in when they’re allowed
It’s not hard to close a road in a way that keeps vehicles out
That great. All we need is a ton of removable bollards installed in and around every location where people will congregate on foot. Easy, that’s just every mall, convention hall, farmers market, community festival, school, workplace, sports venue, religious institution, government office, hospital…
Places that get pedestrianised one time each year do it with strong temporary barriers. Permanent car free places do other things to keep cars out
They plant trees
They install heavy concrete plant pots
And some that want to perform security use bold stainless steel bollards
It is harder to protect street sides, things like slowing down traffic (with road design, not speed limits) can help, adding protected bike lanes can help
Is that supposed to be an idea/excuse?
Edit: Read in style “Don’t give them ideas.”