this post was submitted on 11 Aug 2025
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Fuck Cars

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[–] DrunkEngineer@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

50' ROW is plenty wide enough for big American firetrucks. The usual standard is 20' unobstructed width; i.e. two 10' travel lanes. NACTO specifically recommends against lane widths greater than 11' because that induces excessive speeding. Any traffic engineer recommending a big wide stroad for "safety" (especially 15 foot!! lanes) should have their license revoked.

[–] chiliedogg@lemmy.world 0 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Our pumpers are 10' wide and our ladder trucks 11'. You can't build legally a private driveway to your own house less than 12' because of fire truck access requirements.

If you have an 11' firetruck making an emergency call on a 20' roadway and there's a commercial vehicle on the same road going the opposite direction, you've got a problem.

[–] DrunkEngineer@lemmy.world 4 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Your equipment must be non-standard, because 102 inches is the regulation width of ladder truck (8.5'). Maximum legal width for commercial truck is also 8.5'. Unless the commercial vehicle is an oversized load, it will not block the firetruck. Add some bike lanes (with mountable curb) and you get even more space.

Wider lanes width is only needed if you are building high-speed Stroad -- and you are in the wrong Sub if you think those are a good idea.