Can't wait :)
Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
281–290 of 619 posts
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#282Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm personally uncomfortable driving even really nice cars, 'cause you have to pay careful attention to not kill someone. I mean, driving can be fun or exciting - but it's not comfortable or relaxing, I would argue, at least not driving in places where there are other people. On public transit, on the other hand, I can relax and read and pretty safely ignore the world. Worst case someone grabs my kindle or my phone a…
> On public transit, on the other hand, I can relax and read and pretty safely ignore the world. Worst case someone grabs my kindle or my phone and runs. That surely isn't really the worst case. This happened last Friday in Madrid, just days after someone pushed a mother and her child in front of a train in Germany (and killed the child): https://twitter.com/el_pais/status/1157564725015851008 ? Granted, it's still a…
This is news because it's so rare.
My sister's best friend being killed at age 17 walking on a residential road wasn't news. It isn't even rare, it's a leading cause of death for teenagers.
The dead motorbike rider I saw lying in the road didn't make the news. This is so common ambulance staff call bikers "organ doners".
The "accident" (gross negligence, IIRC) when about 15 were killed on the motorway, including one of my dad's colleagues, did make the news.
Railway (and even bus) deaths are orders of magnitude less frequent.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#283Earlier 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…
I have a different experience - with 3 kids, in a 2M city does't even have a great transport infrastructure (Bucharest). School/kindergarden is within walking distance. Highschool is farther away, indeed (because that's what the elder kid chose - she wanted a school outside the neighbourhood), but she still goes there by public transit. In fact it's probably faster by subway than by car, in the morning. Kids go to english classes, drawing classes, swimming etc. either by walking or public transit.
Maybe it "helps" that the public roads are congested, and I simply wouldn't have time to take them anywhere by car. It definitely helps that I live in a good/central neighbourhood that is well covered by public transit.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#284Earlier quoted context omitted.
London has incredible public transport and only one line has no AC so it’s hot (edit) this is completely wrong, actually quite a few lines lack AC.. On being overcrowded - sure, during rush hour. Even then you marvel at the TfL’s efficiency - during rush hour I’ve counted one underground train every 20 seconds. 20 seconds! And this keeps on going for an hour or more.
Huh? None of the deep lines have AC
Really? I was under the impression Central was one of the few. Maybe it’s an air circulation thing, but for someone reason I can only think of the northern and central as being insanely hot. Will google.
edit you’re right I’ve just changed the post above.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#285Spent 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…
Never needed a car in the past four years in Milan and the year before in Bologna, Italy, and when it happened I could rely on car-sharing services or very cheap rentals.
But I'm originally from Rome, where I spent most of my life, and without a car in Rome you're pretty much f*ed.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#286Earlier quoted context omitted.
> people find time on public transit more pleasant, and are willing to do more of it. My knowledge of "popular" underground (London) or metro (Paris) lines makes that very unlikely, they're hot, way overcrowded, and odd-smelling when they don't outright stink. Very useful and convenient, and can be pleasant outside of peak hours, but back when I worked in Paris despite not being a morning person I switched my work ho…
London has incredible public transport and only one line has no AC so it’s hot (edit) this is completely wrong, actually quite a few lines lack AC.. On being overcrowded - sure, during rush hour. Even then you marvel at the TfL’s efficiency - during rush hour I’ve counted one underground train every 20 seconds. 20 seconds! And this keeps on going for an hour or more.
Are you sure we live in the same city?
The Central line during summer is so hot it wouldn't be legal to transport cattle on it.
The Northern line regularly has packed platforms going north in the morning.
The Metropolitan has been undergoing "modernisation" for over a decade...
EDIT trains also frequently run late OR early
They break under the slightest deviation in nature - rain, snow, heat and leaves on the track all caused breakdown in service every year
And let's not forget the dreaded "signal failure".
By comparison my experiences in Munich, China, Tokyo, Seoul, Singapore and Hong Kong have all illustrated what an efficient metro system can be. Though they obviously have 50+ years less infrastructure baggage to lit around
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#287Just left Paris this week. I was surprised to see how many electric scooters are on the road. But out of the experience riding them in central Paris, I found them - 1. being too expensive: riding Lime for 1.5 km cost me 4 euros, way more expensive than metro; 2. being difficult to ride: riding scooter is hard because the acceleration and brake is too sudden for beginners and it's easy to lose control when encountering hard obstacles on the road; 3. central Paris is not scooter-friendly because lots of road are made of stones and there are not many bike-routes as I see.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#288Earlier quoted context omitted.
London has incredible public transport and only one line has no AC so it’s hot (edit) this is completely wrong, actually quite a few lines lack AC.. On being overcrowded - sure, during rush hour. Even then you marvel at the TfL’s efficiency - during rush hour I’ve counted one underground train every 20 seconds. 20 seconds! And this keeps on going for an hour or more.
Are you sure we live in the same city? The Central line during summer is so hot it wouldn't be legal to transport cattle on it. The Northern line regularly has packed platforms going north in the morning. The Metropolitan has been undergoing "modernisation" for over a decade... EDIT trains also frequently run late OR early They break under the slightest deviation in nature - rain, snow, heat and leaves on the track a…
The Central line was the one I was thinking of. I was wrong and I’ve edited the post above.
The reason for this is clear tho - those lines are sometimes upwards of 100\80 years old.
It’s still probably the one of the best public transport systems I’ve ever encountered, and imo perhaps one of the best ones in Europe.
edit I haven’t been to Munich but I’ve been to Cologne & Berlin, I found London beat their transport systems particularly in clarity and signage. I find TfL signage systems to be some of clearest in the world, and I give them great credit for that. Their design is excellent and makes it virtually impossible to get lost.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#289I’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…
France is a weird case (or at least, the case I know better).
First of, a lot of those statistic tend to be skew because of Paris, because France tend to be very Paris-centric (its getting better, but Paris is still the center of "everything").
When it come to Paris, a lot of time, it's often faster to take the public transportation than your own car because of the systemic traffic jam at rush hour (which is common for this type of cities). But as more people move out of Paris or take the public transport or other form of transportation (the city has made a lot of effort to be more bicycle friendly in the last years), travel time by car actually start to decrease.
In my own city, car was almost always faster than public transportation. I had different commute time, from 1h30 to 10 minutes, and I could have always shave some of it by taking the car.
But for me, the 10-15 minutes I could have gain from taking the car was nothing compared to the comfort I was gaining by using the public transportation. I can just hop in a tram or in a bus, listen to my music, read a book, ... I don't have to do any of the mental effort that driving require, which is very valuable for me after a day of work. I also feel more safe, if my bus or my tram has an accident, I know I am more protected. And in general, I really do enjoy my city a lot more the less car there is. I grew up mostly in the country side and next the the amazonian forest. The noise, and most importantly, the awful smell created by car traffic is very disturbing to me. Staying for too long next to a busy street will usually give me nausea very quickly. I also feel safer as I don't have to worry about my surrounding has much. Since there is no car, I don't have to check if I am going to be run over. Finally, road are just plain ugly, I rather have green area, pedestrian way, and art lying around.
Its for these reason that I accept all the inconvenience that public transportation brings. I rather have a slightly longer commute by feel good in the city than the opposite.
Re: Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
#290Earlier quoted context omitted.
How many kids do you have? Any more than one and car becomes necessary in my experience.
I have one, I live in our second largest city (Aarhus). I’ve lived in Aalborg and Odense as well (two other relatively large cities by Danish standards). I’m 36 and I’ve never taken a drivers license because I’ve never needed it.
I am sorry but I've noticed to be a bit different in Copenhagen. I've been living here for 3 years, and the number of cars have grown quite a lot to my perception, specially between families (maybe just because they are luxury cars and Teslas everywhere).
I am 36 have one little child and feel like I am missing a bit of the country because I don't have a car, even if I have made few trips by train.
Also, a lot of my decisions are now driving by whether it is a short walk distance from home or not. Public transport in Copenhagen is respectful but a bit slow in my opinion (I am from NY), specially if I want to go to the edge of the city or suburbs - which I might want when I decide to settle roots here and buy myself a home (prices in Copenhagen are all time high).