Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars • Hacker News Board

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#131

Post by mwfunk » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:24 PM UTC

ethanbond wrote: post #109

superuser2 wrote: post #102

I feel compelled to dissent against initiatives to directly take cars off the road, rather than improve alternatives. Growing up in the suburbs without a car, I was really excited about carless urban life. Then I actually experienced it (Hyde Park, Chicago). I'm on the opposite corner of the neighborhood from the business districts, so a little errand like CVS or the grocery store is around half an hour by foot each…

If you take cars off the roads, people will rebuild (well, reorganize) their cities to account for it. Public transit obviously needs to be better pretty much everywhere in the US, but people also don't want to pay to make it better. I'm a proponent of simply wiping out parking in most areas. That will incentivize people not to drive, therefore to walk/transit, therefore to value the transit systems and the design of…

I've become very skeptical of any plan to just get rid of something that people need and use, in the hope that that will magically force the issue and usher credible alternatives into existence years down the line. It's sort of like a government trying to reduce government spending by cutting taxes (i.e., the "don't feed the beast" approach). Such efforts never end up reducing spending, rather they just create an environment in which debt and chaos are constantly increasing.

I get the idea behind it- "let's just start doing everything according to our desired outcome, and the parts that don't fit will somehow come into line on their own". It's very seductive but I've learned to avoid the temptation to think that hard problems can be solved in this way.

I feel like this is a problem-solving antipattern that I see over and over again and it just never works- not just in government, but in software engineering, in management, even in interpersonal relationships. People get frustrated that they can't change other people, so they decide to simply move everyone to some new way of doing things without any sort of plan for how to deal with the fallout. They think it will create an environment where the people who are negatively affected will spontaneously start conforming to the desired behavior due to some invisible hand of incentivization, but I've never seen this strategy applied in any context where it worked out. It's always just a rat's nest of unintended consequences and misery.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#132

Post by forgotpwtomain » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:31 PM UTC

ethanbond wrote: post #109

superuser2 wrote: post #102

I feel compelled to dissent against initiatives to directly take cars off the road, rather than improve alternatives. Growing up in the suburbs without a car, I was really excited about carless urban life. Then I actually experienced it (Hyde Park, Chicago). I'm on the opposite corner of the neighborhood from the business districts, so a little errand like CVS or the grocery store is around half an hour by foot each…

If you take cars off the roads, people will rebuild (well, reorganize) their cities to account for it. Public transit obviously needs to be better pretty much everywhere in the US, but people also don't want to pay to make it better. I'm a proponent of simply wiping out parking in most areas. That will incentivize people not to drive, therefore to walk/transit, therefore to value the transit systems and the design of…

> It's a serious issue of sunk cost, but eventually we need to bite the bullet and start moving in the other direction.

This might have been true sometime in the seventies - but its entirely a moot point now. Public transportation has nearly no future in the US since self-driving cars will pretty much solve this with 10-15 years and so much better than public transport has or would have.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#133

Post by superuser2 » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:32 PM UTC

ethanbond wrote: post #118

superuser2 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes a LONG time to build out serious transit infrastructure. Like 30 years (see Seattle's recent ballot initiative). You're asking basically an entire generation to have shitty mobility for most of their working lives, so that they will vote to build trains for their children. More likely they will just leave the cities. Cities do adapt to poor mobility: local businesses get to charge huge markup because they do…

You're asking basically every generation after us to have shitty environmental health and shitty cities for the entirety of their lives. Also, if you need a car to be mobile enough to live your life, you already have shitty mobility. You should have the ability to live your life without having to pay the tens of thousands of dollars that owning a car demands [0]. You could get rid of cars and with all that newly avai…

>shitty environmental health

People would lose essentially nothing by stepping down from SUVs/crossovers to compact sedans/hatchbacks. We could start there. There's also the issue of average age: driving an older car is a classic case of negative externality. Driver saves money, everyone else suffers for their worse emissions and fuel efficiency. These are both excellent targets for tighter regulation.

My argument here is that policy should be at least net-neutral on quality of life.

If you "simply wip[e] out parking" and don't do anything else, I claim that's bad policy because it reduces quality of life.

If you wipe out parking AND deploy electric buses or whatever such that people's lives at least don't get worse, then I'm with you.

>There would also be a significantly reduced strain on pretty much every social institution there is.

Except, of course, the transit agency, which has to actually have the funding and the competence to step up its game to not only stay neutral under increased demand, but also improve enough that drivers' quality-of-life is flat.

Local services are also funded by local economic activity, which generally requires that people have viable transportation.

> before the cultural reorganization into self-sufficient neighborhoods.

Which do you think is better for consumers: a whole bunch of hyper-local monopolies, or citywide competition and economies of scale? Economics provides very little support for the former.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#134

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:34 PM UTC

sogen wrote: post #125

superuser2 wrote: post #102

I feel compelled to dissent against initiatives to directly take cars off the road, rather than improve alternatives. Growing up in the suburbs without a car, I was really excited about carless urban life. Then I actually experienced it (Hyde Park, Chicago). I'm on the opposite corner of the neighborhood from the business districts, so a little errand like CVS or the grocery store is around half an hour by foot each…

Odd, I walk a lot, I live near 4 drugstores, 4 supermarkets, about five 7-11, many restaurants, big stores like Macy's etc, all by walking 10 minutes at most.

[deleted]

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#135

Post by ocschwar » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:35 PM UTC

hellsch wrote: post #126

I live in Barcelona and most of the people are not happy. A simple math problem for you in order to understand why. Currently with a top speed of 50kmh the average speed is 36kmh. Now reducing the top speed partially to 10kmh how fast will be the average? Well, it can be argued that the traffic will shift to the faster streets on the periphery of the super blocks, so this streets will have to grow in order to be able…

Driving at top speed just means you wait longer at the next red light. Average speed will probably not drop at all.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#136

Post by ethanbond » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:43 PM UTC

mwfunk wrote: post #131

ethanbond wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you take cars off the roads, people will rebuild (well, reorganize) their cities to account for it. Public transit obviously needs to be better pretty much everywhere in the US, but people also don't want to pay to make it better. I'm a proponent of simply wiping out parking in most areas. That will incentivize people not to drive, therefore to walk/transit, therefore to value the transit systems and the design of…

I've become very skeptical of any plan to just get rid of something that people need and use, in the hope that that will magically force the issue and usher credible alternatives into existence years down the line. It's sort of like a government trying to reduce government spending by cutting taxes (i.e., the "don't feed the beast" approach). Such efforts never end up reducing spending, rather they just create an env…

It's not really the same at all to your tax analog. The difference is that Congress has the ability to reduce spending and to cut taxes.

With the car problem, no one entity has the power to devise nor enforce a holistic solution. Of course, with the exception of a fascist overthrow of the state that tears down cities and rebuilds with central planning. The government can't just come and take people's cars away – you have a right to own a car (more or less). You don't, however, have a right to a parking spot, and it takes just a small city committee meeting to affect change.

That's not to say people won't get hurt by this, but it needs to happen for the good of everyone. Suburbia is bad for the earth and everyone on it. We need to start making some tough decisions... 30 years ago.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#137

Post by unabst » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:44 PM UTC

After reading the article I was ready to book a one way ticket to Barcelona! City looks amazing, the traffic diagrams are on point, and I just love the sound of the word "superblock" (so nintendo). But after reading all the HN comments, I think I'm good where I am...

Tokyo is amazing without a car. Most people live on the outskirts, which is still only 20 or 30 minutes away by train, and without a car, there is no search for parking. Trains come every 5 minutes. Shibuya, Shinjuku, Ginza, Akiharabara, Harajuku... Of course, the money and sacrifices made for infrastructure are insane.

LA is amazing with a car as long as you know the freeway exits and know where to park. Santa Monica, DTLA, Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Koreatown, San Gabriel.. Good food, good people, good weather, and wide straight streets (compared to Japan). It's a little spread out, and DTLA is still a bit too tiny and too dirty to brag about, but culturally, it has to be the melting pot capital of the universe. You can't tell if someone is rich or poor, black or white, high or drunk, a man or a woman... and no one could care less. Good freedom.

But my favorite city so far has to be Fukuoka. A miniature Tokyo, but with better food, lower cost of living, and is small enough to get around with a bicycle. Very attractive dialect, and very attractive people. It's also an hour to Tokyo by plane, and business men ride 747s like getting on a train.

I'm currently in LA.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#138

Post by prodigal_erik » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:46 PM UTC

gkya wrote: post #129

jonknee wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really want to add that I detest uber and the like for attempting to kill local businesses replacing them with lower quality cheaper services. Uber in no way replaces local businesses with lower quality cheaper services. In most markets it is replacing corrupt monopolies with a higher quality product. In the other markets it is just a higher quality product.

Please give examples.

Uber has never told me to wait an hour for a car that doesn't show up. If an Uber driver were to pad my bill by taking a bad route, I could complain and get a price adjustment. Uber always accepts credit card payments.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#139

Post by ricardobeat » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:46 PM UTC

superuser2 wrote: post #102

I feel compelled to dissent against initiatives to directly take cars off the road, rather than improve alternatives. Growing up in the suburbs without a car, I was really excited about carless urban life. Then I actually experienced it (Hyde Park, Chicago). I'm on the opposite corner of the neighborhood from the business districts, so a little errand like CVS or the grocery store is around half an hour by foot each…

Your experience is a direct result of car-oriented city planning. It will be very hard to undo.

Re: Superblocks: how Barcelona is taking city streets back from cars

#140

Post by superuser2 » Sat, Aug 06, 2016, 10:48 PM UTC

ricardobeat wrote: post #139

superuser2 wrote: post #102

I feel compelled to dissent against initiatives to directly take cars off the road, rather than improve alternatives. Growing up in the suburbs without a car, I was really excited about carless urban life. Then I actually experienced it (Hyde Park, Chicago). I'm on the opposite corner of the neighborhood from the business districts, so a little errand like CVS or the grocery store is around half an hour by foot each…

Your experience is a direct result of car-oriented city planning. It will be very hard to undo.

Indeed. I simply claim that directly taking the cars away from car-oriented cities without taking steps to undo their car-oriented nature is not a good idea.