Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

economist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

261–270 of 619 posts

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#261

Post by fnord123 »

closeparen wrote: post #192
gibolt wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that average Parisian commute is slower, but more pleasant. Walking and taking in the environment is certainly more positive for the body and mood (on average). You also encounter tons of other people, building social value, even without any direct interactions. Reading or daydreaming also become options when not focused on the road. Time isn't the only measurement. You are probably correct that the average Ame…

Depends on the environment and the people. I'd often take the long way through campus: pleasant architecture and landscaping, light filtered through tall buildings and trees, chance encounters with classmates and professors, lots of porous buildings with stuff going on. The walking parts of my Bay Area transit commute, on the other hand, were urine vapor mingled with pot smoke, harsh direct sunlight bouncing off conc…

>dozens of homeless people in varying levels of distress

The homelessness problems in the US vs EU is a whole other topic.

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#262

Post by praptak »

13of40 wrote: post #167
JDiculous wrote: post #123

Spent the last 6 months in Seoul and the surrounding cities in Korea. Never needed a car. You can literally do everything without a car, everything is a short walk. I truly believe it makes a huge positive impact on happiness when you can just walk anywhere instead of having to drive. Also you'll notice that in Korea/Japan there are way more small businesses and things to do (eg. karaoke, cafes, etc) because people o…

I went fishing today and had to drive some very sketchy, not-on-google-maps dirt roads to get to the first spot I tried. What happens to that sort of thing once we're all living in walkable condos and depending on driverless Uber for exceptions?

I guess this becomes like horse riding. You can still do that and it's not even that expensive.

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#263

Post by jacquesm »

r00fus wrote: post #224
codebolt wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many kids do you have? Any more than one and car becomes necessary in my experience.

Are you talking about shuttling your kids to school? I know in Japan most kids 6y+ just take themselves on public transport or walking. How is it done in other countries?

In NL it is mostly bikes. Even for larger distances (10 km and up).

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#264

Post by pencillr »

JDiculous wrote: post #123

Spent the last 6 months in Seoul and the surrounding cities in Korea. Never needed a car. You can literally do everything without a car, everything is a short walk. I truly believe it makes a huge positive impact on happiness when you can just walk anywhere instead of having to drive. Also you'll notice that in Korea/Japan there are way more small businesses and things to do (eg. karaoke, cafes, etc) because people o…

When I moved to the USA for a few months from Europe, I was surprised by the fact that you simply can't walk to places. There are so huge spaces between things except for maybe city centers. (I was mostly in CA and FL)

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#265

Post by maelito »

rayiner wrote: post #170

I’m personally not a huge fan of driving everywhere. But I wonder whether HN’s view on this isn’t out of touch with the average middle class American’s. The average American commute is 48 minutes round trip, significantly shorter than France (71 minutes), Italy (65 minutes), or Spain (61 minutes): https://www.oecd.org/els/family/LMF2_6_Time_spent_travelling... That’s mainly because Europe has higher public transit us…

The recent yellow vest protests in France are interesting for your focus. I believe most of it is driven not by the not-so-high petrol price, but by combination of two facts in France : Real estate is very expensive in cities, more and more disconnected from the average income; jobs are mostly in these places. In short, the tendency is that most French people can't afford to live where they work, or don't want to live in a smaller flat, hence their commute time.

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#266

Post by fdfsdfadsfxffff »

jdnenej wrote: post #129
JDiculous wrote: post #123

Spent the last 6 months in Seoul and the surrounding cities in Korea. Never needed a car. You can literally do everything without a car, everything is a short walk. I truly believe it makes a huge positive impact on happiness when you can just walk anywhere instead of having to drive. Also you'll notice that in Korea/Japan there are way more small businesses and things to do (eg. karaoke, cafes, etc) because people o…

In the same situation as you. Currently living with parents out in the suburbs. Plan to move later so I don't need or want a car but I'm basically stuck at home when not working. The only thing there is to do here is cycling which is relatively safe but you can't realistically get anywhere so I do it just for sport. The car culture is pretty bad in Australia as well.

As a European living in Australia (Melbourne, specifically), I'm horrified by the cycling infrastructure. It's such an afterthought most places, and you're usually not separated from fast-moving cars. Sometimes the cycle lane literally cuts across a car lane — super dangerous. I don't miss much about the Netherlands, but I definitely miss the cycling amenities. You're a first-class citizen on the road in a way that's hard to describe to cyclists here (especially the fervent ones).

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#267

Post by ginko »

konart wrote: post #243
namesbc wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine a world where instead of having to strap your screaming kids in to a car seat for an hour drive in traffic, you walked along a pedestrian street, your kids kicking a ball around, you visit a couple stores, see your kids off to their school, and then walk a couple more blocks to work. When school is over your kids walk safely back home by themselves because there aren't cars out there threatening their lives.…

I don't thing this is what codebolt was talking about. If you can one kid - there is no problem really. Walk him or her to school in the morning, ask grandmother to bring them back etc. When you have more than one - it is entrily possible they will end up going to different schools and after the school one of them had to go to the music shool and the other one to his hockey team or something etc etc. You simply can't…

Even as an elementary school kid I walked to school by myself or with class mates. My older brother, being in middle school by then would walk over to the next train station in the next town and take the train to his school by himself. I would do the same later-on. If your parents brought you to school every day you'd probably have been made fun of by all the other kids.

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#268

Post by adrianN »

IloveHN84 wrote: post #180
JDiculous wrote: post #123

Spent the last 6 months in Seoul and the surrounding cities in Korea. Never needed a car. You can literally do everything without a car, everything is a short walk. I truly believe it makes a huge positive impact on happiness when you can just walk anywhere instead of having to drive. Also you'll notice that in Korea/Japan there are way more small businesses and things to do (eg. karaoke, cafes, etc) because people o…

Don't let be fooled by the "tourist impression". Staying for some days isn't the same as living in a place, involving commuting to work, bringing children to school, etc Every city looks nice as a Tourist, but then it's hard if you live there and in the false zone of the city (=farest away)

American cities definitely don't look nice as a tourist. SF for example is terrible if you don't Uber everywhere.

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#269

Post by qkls »

13of40 wrote: post #167
JDiculous wrote: post #123

Spent the last 6 months in Seoul and the surrounding cities in Korea. Never needed a car. You can literally do everything without a car, everything is a short walk. I truly believe it makes a huge positive impact on happiness when you can just walk anywhere instead of having to drive. Also you'll notice that in Korea/Japan there are way more small businesses and things to do (eg. karaoke, cafes, etc) because people o…

I went fishing today and had to drive some very sketchy, not-on-google-maps dirt roads to get to the first spot I tried. What happens to that sort of thing once we're all living in walkable condos and depending on driverless Uber for exceptions?

In Helsinki there are multiple good fishing spots that are accessible with public transport. You can also visit two national parks using regional bus.

Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

#270

Post by arkh »

gibolt wrote: post #174
rayiner wrote: post #170

I’m personally not a huge fan of driving everywhere. But I wonder whether HN’s view on this isn’t out of touch with the average middle class American’s. The average American commute is 48 minutes round trip, significantly shorter than France (71 minutes), Italy (65 minutes), or Spain (61 minutes): https://www.oecd.org/els/family/LMF2_6_Time_spent_travelling... That’s mainly because Europe has higher public transit us…

Maybe that average Parisian commute is slower, but more pleasant. Walking and taking in the environment is certainly more positive for the body and mood (on average). You also encounter tons of other people, building social value, even without any direct interactions. Reading or daydreaming also become options when not focused on the road. Time isn't the only measurement. You are probably correct that the average Ame…

> Maybe that average Parisian commute is slower, but more pleasant.

LMAO. Try Ligne 13 or Ligne 1 for your commute. Or any RER.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b22yKsTvynQ Pleasant is not the first word coming to my mind. And you're gonna enjoy the experience a lot more during the winter (lot of homeless people live there because it's 30°C) or summer.

Post reply on HN