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Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

theguardian.com

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Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#651

Post by ghaff »

thinkharder wrote: post #599
gascan wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source for that? I had always understood the speed limit as simply being an objective, statutory codification of the subjective notion of "appropriate maximum speed for conditions" Which fits well with dynamic speed limits cropping up in places that get regular bad weather

I started to reply to thinking there was a federal minimum speed limit but decided I should confirm what I believed and glad I did because I was wrong. In the US, states have full control over the speed limits that are set on both the state hwys and the interstate freeways within that state. That said, I'm pretty sure every freeway I've ever been on had a posted minimum 45mph speed limit, and bikes are not allowed. W…

>That said, I'm pretty sure every freeway I've ever been on had a posted minimum 45mph speed limit, and bikes are not allowed.

There are exceptions, especially in the US West, where interstates may be the only path for miles and miles through some mountain ranges. Of course, they mostly have wide shoulders where people ride.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#652

Post by bertil »

corndoge wrote: post #544
bertil wrote: post #531

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>> Life in the Spanish city that banned cars >> ban cars > unrealistic statements You, sir, are funny.

The United States is not Spain. Nitpick all you want - the vast majority of populated places in the US will never ban cars, at least for the foreseeable future.

corndoge, it sounds like you assume that (an unnamed) we has to be in the United States.

I’m going to sorely disappoint you there…

However, if you want to talk about the United States, I would agree with you that it’s going to be expensive to shift the suburban sprawl away from personal vehicles. As much as that particular urbanisation failure is seen as typically American, it’s far from the exclusive option there. You will be surprised to learn that there are dozens of millions of Americans living in cities dense enough to justify not using cars as the default transport mode (“banning” isn’t a very accurate description of what that city did).

https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-most-crowded-city-in...

Electric scooters or bikes, typically the dockless kind, combined with existing (but re-inforced) public transport sounds doable, especially if you invest the same order of magnitude as local authorities spend on highways. That would require little investment (most of it would be private and from people keen on giving away billions).

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#653

Post by ghaff »

gascan wrote: post #590
simonsarris wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Church st in Burlington VT partially closed to cars starting in 1980 (based on Stroget in Copenhagen) and ongoing into 2005 with more and more blocks carved out for pedestrians only. It has been very successful. Why did it work, when Raleigh failed? What needs to be "considered carefully", exactly? (The large college nearby definitely helps in VT's case. But what else?) https://www.churchstmarketplace.com/ https://ww…

Just speculating, but looking at the photos from Fayetteville, it was totally car-scale. Sure, it was pedestrian-only, but just look at the pictures of the locale. Huge buildings, long distances, wide street. This is not the best example but the first to pop to mind- compare to Pearl Street Mall, in Boulder, which seems to be doing well: https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0180565,-105.2792529,3a,75y,... Which, just skim…

Among the differences are that the University of Colorado is right there and Boulder has been a fairly affluent town for a long time (even before the relatively recent immigration of Google, etc.)

Also, let's not overstate the differences. The actual pedestrian mall on Pearl is just a few blocks long. And Fayetteville in Raleigh these days, while not car-free, is part of a very walkable area of downtown Raleigh with lots of restaurants, a few hotels, some shops, new condo construction, some major businesses, the convention center, government offices, etc.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#654

Post by rospaya »

elcapitan wrote: post #126

One of the most interesting experiences in my life was visiting Tel Aviv on Yom Kippur. On that day all car traffic is prohibited (also TV stations are offline etc). It was absolutely amazing. Tel Aviv is a city with large roads and usually extremely busy. On that day, cyclists ride over the highway, kids play on the streets. I never felt that directly before how invasive the normal car situation is. Here's a photo h…

How accessible is Tel Aviv for pedestrians? I'm visiting soon and wonder how complicated it will be without a car.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#655

Post by 3pt14159 »

z0r wrote: post #624
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #561

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an attack on character and a bit disingenuous. If a rich person proposed a good idea, would we not listen to them because they are rich?

My point is that it is a lot easier to argue against cars when you make a good living and can afford the nicer parts of the city. When your choice is a crappy car commute or a nightmare commute via trains and public transit, and the places in your budget for you to live in don't have "cute restaurants" or "well groomed parks", things are not so cut and dry. Cars improve quality of life for many people and it's downri…

You're confusing cause and effect. The effect of having cars everywhere is that we end up with cities where the downtown core is hyper dense and the extents are flat. What we want is the opposite. Six storey mid rises. And commutes via trains and mass transit are only nightmares when they're all trying to get to the same place and they're 3rd class citizens to cars and trucks.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#657

Post by justtopost »

tomtheelder wrote: post #443
GauntletWizard wrote: post #416

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The area your talking about, where there's little places where kids can play: it's called the Suburbs. Growing up in the suburbs, cars went slow enough that we could play in the street. The neighborhood grocery was about two miles away and we could walk or ride our bikes, and we had plenty of friends houses along the route should we need to stop. There's not the density of little shops that you might find in SF, but…

> The neighborhood grocery was about two miles away and we could walk or ride our bikes, and we had plenty of friends houses along the route should we need to stop. This doesn't sound like the typical American suburban experience, and I think what you are describing is almost heading in the direction of the best existing solution for non-city living, which is the "village" style denser towns that you see in Europe. T…

Having lived in dozens of suburbs moving around in life, it seems very typical to me. Even challenging neighborhoods buried in sprawl would lead to local zoning opening up for shops. The problem often solves itself. Where I live now only had one nearby market within driving distance, but market pressure opened 2 more. Its almost as if there is profit in these overlooked planning issues and people like to win it.

This urban-centric thinking is odd to me. I do not want to live so far away from the natural phenomenon of earth, and I think it is unhealthy that so many want to push that lifestyle on everyone. It rings absolutely hollow to me to have effortless transport to a thousand places all manmade, and mostly devoid of non-domesticated plant and animal life.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#658

Post by sxv »

jimmaswell wrote: post #489
sxv wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I grew up (Huntsville, Alabama), if you saw a pedestrian or cyclist around town you would assume they are homeless. After living in SF and Montreal and traveling in Europe, I can't see myself going back to a "car-first" city. Which sucks because that's pretty much all the US offers.

I lived on a college campus for two years without a car, with on-campus amenities and a very walkable town right next to it. Now that I live elsewhere with a car, I can't see myself ever going to a pedestrian-only area. I just do not like having to walk everywhere. The closest on-campus food was a five minute or so walk away from my dorm room, which doesn't sound like a lot, but I didn't like having to walk even that…

I felt similarly while at college.. until I got a bike. Urban bicycling has changed my life entirely. Did you ever try it? What used to be a 20 minute walk becomes a 5 minute glide. In SF and Montreal, google maps even acknowledges that most routes are fastest by bike.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#659

Post by lmm »

ajmurmann wrote: post #629
guelo wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree, slow the cars down. I've seen good results with "road diets" where 4-lane roads are converted to two lanes for cars and more space for bike lanes and center turning lanes. Also, adding pedestrian activated lights to stop cars.

Why do we need to slow down and even stop cars if we in your proposal even have a dedicated bike lane? Why not put up a small barrier between cars and bikes and have everyone go their own way? Speed limits on the US already are insanely slow compared to most of Europe and the bike thing seems to work better their regardless. We need more diverse infrastructure for different modes of transportation. I want trains that…

As a cyclist I've seen too many barriered-off cycle lanes that left me trapped and unable to go where I wanted to go, so if my choice is the main road or a cycle lane behind a barrier, I'll stick to the road. Separate lanes make sense for between-city highways, but inside the town speeds are already low enough - and space limited - that we ought to be able to share.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#660

Post by expathacker »

chadash wrote: post #232
elcapitan wrote: post #126

One of the most interesting experiences in my life was visiting Tel Aviv on Yom Kippur. On that day all car traffic is prohibited (also TV stations are offline etc). It was absolutely amazing. Tel Aviv is a city with large roads and usually extremely busy. On that day, cyclists ride over the highway, kids play on the streets. I never felt that directly before how invasive the normal car situation is. Here's a photo h…

Just to clarify, there is no law that I know of prohibiting car traffic on yom kippur in Tel Aviv. However, since this is the most important holiday of the year, even many Israelis who don't celebrate other holidays will celebrate this one. I believe that virtually all businesses are closed that day, even those that don't close on other Jewish holidays (again, not illegal to operate, but customary). So in practice, f…

Sure, the Jewish Israelis celebrate and observe Yom Kippur. The Muslims in occupied Palestine? The military makes uses force to ensure they don't leave their ghettos. "Strong moral code".

https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-to-close-of-west-bank-g...

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