[HN Gopher] Public Staircases
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       Public Staircases
        
       Author : pshaw
       Score  : 129 points
       Date   : 2021-12-17 20:03 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (tinyletter.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (tinyletter.com)
        
       | cafard wrote:
       | LA: I remember a notable one on the Silver Lake side of the ridge
       | separating the neighborhoods of Silver Lake and Echo Park. My
       | recollection is that it had no handrail.
        
       | sqs wrote:
       | My town (Mill Valley, California) has dozens of public steps and
       | paths (https://www.cityofmillvalley.org/DocumentCenter/View/1565/
       | SL...), including the Dipsea steps
       | (https://stairwayfreedom.weebly.com/mill-valley--
       | sausalito/th...).
       | 
       | My favorite, though, is the Central-Mid-Levels escalators and
       | steps in Hong Kong
       | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central%E2%80%93Mid-
       | Levels_esc...).
        
       | dnautics wrote:
       | Havens alley in San Francisco is beautiful, if you are ever near
       | the curvy part of lombard street, it's a block away.
        
         | pimlottc wrote:
         | I'm partial to the multiple tiled stairways leading up to
         | Grandview Park in the Sunset.
        
       | mmahemoff wrote:
       | I thought they might mention the most famous public stairs in
       | recent years - The Joker Stairs
       | (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joker_Stairs). They've become a
       | tourist attraction to the inconvenience to locals.
        
       | delgaudm wrote:
       | It's my understanding that Pittsburgh has more public staircases
       | than virtually any other city. There are over 700 staircases, and
       | many are quite long.
       | 
       | http://www.frontiernet.net/~rochballparks2/towns/pgh_steps.h...
        
         | anodyne33 wrote:
         | 739 officially documented. Laura Zurowski is on a project to
         | visit them all and pairs lovely prose with her trips on IG.
         | 
         | https://mis-steps.com/
        
         | myself248 wrote:
         | Many years ago, I was in the passenger seat on a road-trip that
         | had a brief stop in Pittsburgh, to get lunch with some friends
         | before we moved on. I absentmindedly commented, as it was
         | summer and many folks were wearing shorts, that a _lot_ of
         | people here _really great legs_.
         | 
         | As the thought coalesced in my mind about why that might be the
         | case, the driver responded "Maybe it's from trying to work the
         | clutch pedal on these hills!"
        
       | pixelmonkey wrote:
       | If you love public staircases, you should probably spend a few
       | days in Perugia, Italy+. Explained a bit here:
       | 
       | https://www.chasingtheunexpected.com/perugia-medieval-city/
       | 
       | +: I lived there for 6 months in 2005. A lovely small Italian
       | college town (small city) that is nothing but hills and medieval
       | staircases, alleys, and arches. It feels like living in an
       | Escherian or Borgesian maze. It's wonderful.
        
         | ianbicking wrote:
         | A while ago I was perusing the hillside communities in Lima,
         | Peru on Google Maps [1]
         | 
         | It's pretty rough. But it made me wonder if some of these now
         | quaint hillside communities in Italy would have felt more like
         | Lima. Now they've reached a certain mythic quality, but at one
         | time the higher up you were probably the lower class (because
         | access is annoying and difficult), and what is now well
         | maintained may have been more crude and decayed.
         | 
         | Another bit of weird hillside architecture [2]
         | 
         | [1]
         | https://www.google.com/maps/@-12.0647469,-77.001966,3a,75y,1...
         | 
         | [2]
         | https://www.google.com/maps/@-12.0658476,-76.9996591,3a,75y,...
        
         | stemlord wrote:
         | Nice. Lisbon is also notable for its staircases.
        
       | lancebeet wrote:
       | The problem with staircases being used for seating is that this
       | robs them of their ability to function as passages. This is
       | generally not a problem with wide outdoor staircases in city
       | centers, but it certainly is when it comes to staircases in or
       | near public transport stations, such as the one shown in the
       | article.
        
       | twelvechairs wrote:
       | Reminds me of Bernard Rudofskys 'In praise of stairs'. A great
       | piece of writing available in a freely borrowable chapter here
       | https://archive.org/details/streetsforpeople00rudo
        
       | rexf wrote:
       | The stairs as better benches comparison is great.
       | 
       | It also mentions the [Los Angeles
       | Loop](https://socalstairclimbers.com/los-angeles-loop/) which I
       | had never heard of. Interesting post
        
         | msla wrote:
         | > The stairs as better benches comparison is great.
         | 
         | They are until you have a physical disability which makes it
         | hard to pull yourself back up after sitting on a stair.
        
           | randomdude402 wrote:
           | I don't think anybody was suggesting to remove benches and
           | replace them with stairs.
           | 
           | The existence of stairs is not an attack on disabled people
           | this time.
        
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       (page generated 2021-12-18 23:02 UTC)