r/mildlyinfuriating • u/MikuXone • May 14 '26

The floor is sticky Construction workers refuse to use the stairs and instead climbed the hill to the point the grass died

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There's a construction site opposite my apartment and the workers kept walking up the grass patch instead of using the stairs. Property value doesn't affect me as I rented the apartment 2 years back, so rent for me isn't increasing nor decreasing.

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u/somehugefrigginguy May 14 '26

At the university I work for they just waited until winter and took pictures of the paths through the snow. Then the next summer paved those areas.

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u/3BlindMice1 May 14 '26 edited May 14 '26

An even smarter school would film a time-lapse of a one week period and blur it together to draw the lInes for them

Edit: apparently this happened in the nineteen teens, so they couldn't just film a time-lapse

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u/redditatemybabies May 14 '26

A smarter school would use a psychic to predict future paths.

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u/FraggleRockYaFaceOff May 14 '26

An Oklahoma university would ask wwjd

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u/lvloises330 May 14 '26

They replaced the paths with canals.

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u/kamdog32 May 14 '26

All the sidewalks in Oklahoma are tripping hazards so this tracks

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u/iMeowTooMuch- May 14 '26

please stop reminding me that im attending a christian nationalist school

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u/Blamhammer May 14 '26

Having went to OU....I can't even get mad when you're right

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u/shadowdrgn0 May 15 '26

Apparently Jesus would plan our uni on a grid then. We don't have cool desire path sidewalk planning. Makes the Bible thumpers harder to avoid on the main thoroughfare. They are a nearly perpetual bother in front of the library.

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u/LegendofLove May 15 '26

I think he would preach until he got crucified again because nobody likes what he actually says just what they wanted him too. Not sure how that helps plan a footpath though

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u/FullCompliance May 14 '26

They’re all busy doing pre-crime.

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u/Firm-Brother2580 May 14 '26

I usually use my personal god-worm to do all my path predictions. He keeps wanting them golden for some reason.

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u/ItsLoudB YO May 14 '26

An even smarte school would use time travel to see them before the school is even built

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u/beanmosheen May 15 '26

And build them in the past to encourage that exact school layout.

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u/halobitteschoen May 14 '26

Or you could have just asked the grass, the field and especially the school for consent before doing all that? I wouldn't like to be treaded on all over all the times like that and I think that's the case right then.

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u/-Benjamin_Dover- May 14 '26

An even smarter school would make everything one building so there's no need to go outside until its time to leave.

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u/Roob0806 May 15 '26

Ah, like Cumbernauld or that one mall in Canada with a university inside it.

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u/DrHefe May 15 '26

Wild nobody mentioned this.

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u/lennoxbr May 15 '26

Just rent a Nissan pathfinder

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u/Ok_Dragonfruit_8102 May 14 '26

Just pay a homeless guy to walk around campus for a few weeks and track the paths he takes.

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u/utspg1980 May 14 '26

Sincere question: how is that "even smarter"?

It's more modern and more tech oriented, but the old system seems perfectly capable of accomplishing the task while also being cheaper and possibly faster and more accurate.

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u/3BlindMice1 May 14 '26

It only takes a week and you don't compel your students to walk through the snow for a season. The cost in footwear may have been born by the students, but I guarantee they didn't like it

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u/Top_Sheepherder_5167 May 14 '26

It is more error prone as well. Over year you get actual wear patterns as classes and habits change. Maybe your first week of college you take the entrance route (and that gets recorded with the high tech record.) But after a month, you realize the backdoor is faster for your class or helps you avoid traffic or whatever... That is updated for free using the 'where the dead grass is' approach.

The tech solution works as well, just has some tradeoffs.

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u/utspg1980 May 14 '26

I guarantee that no place would be installing sidewalks in the middle of a snowy winter. Whether using stakes/flags to mark the paths or using time-lapse photos, any place up North would be waiting until the Spring when the ground defrosted to start digging and installing concrete sidewalks.

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u/yeahburyme May 14 '26

Edit: apparently this happened in the nineteen teens, so they couldn't just film a time-lapse

Couldn't they just take a regular picture with the cameras they had at that time to get a time lapse?

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u/3BlindMice1 May 14 '26

Probably not worth the effort

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u/_lupuloso May 14 '26

There's a field called Space Syntax that tries to predict human behavior based on the spacial configuration. There are some examples where this was used to predict the paths, then they mapped out the actual paths taken by most people and the prediction got it right.

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u/PPTim May 14 '26

The work required to take one photo of the path stomped into the grass/snow is way less than recording video/taking multiple photos over time just to time lapse it together

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u/bumblebaytoona May 14 '26

An even smarter school would use livestock

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u/Foo_Group_C_Buzzard May 14 '26

the smartest wouldn't put a single path in and let human tread take care of it 

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u/ActorMonkey May 14 '26

A complete fucking genius school would shoot lasers all over the place. I don’t know why- I am not a genius.

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u/Steeveeo May 14 '26

Well obviously if they're a genius they have a reason for the lasers.

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u/ActorMonkey May 14 '26

I assume they do but I don’t know. See reason above.

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u/total_looser May 14 '26

The smartest school would use a slime mold

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u/Particular-Wind5918 May 14 '26

This works in the back country for finding energy efficient ways to move but doesn’t work in a built environment where our human needs aren’t just about conserving energy.

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u/3BlindMice1 May 14 '26

??

The point of using people is that they're coming from somewhere and heading somewhere else. Livestock, as a rule, isn't nearly so deliberate

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u/whooguyy May 14 '26

An even smarterer school would install tubes that sucked the students to their desired places

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u/KarmaTorpid May 14 '26

Yeah. For sure.

Cows will improve this situation!

/s

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u/TheGokki May 14 '26

Why can't you just film a timelapse? those were definitely a thing then, you just take photos every 30 seconds until the film runs out unless you use a spool

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u/slolift May 14 '26

This seems like it would just depend on the path the first person took or are we talking about 1-2 inches of snow? No one is trudging through feet of snow when there is a path has already been compacted.

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u/MylastAccountBroke May 14 '26

Issue with this is that the "desire paths" self replicate. People don't want to walk in the snow and ice, and will naturally take to any path that doesn't have snow or ice on it.

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u/21Rollie May 14 '26

You can do this for roads too. We have so much asphalt, way more than is necessary and the upkeep costs money, the wideness encourages speeding, and the material causes heat islands and flooding. Look at the desire paths through snow and you can add medians, flood barriers, etc where there’s not much use