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Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality

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

#461

Post by KJKingJ »

goodcanadian wrote: post #311
lanevorockz wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are ignoring the number one problem. Population Density, dense areas need public transport less dense areas require custom transport. You argument here is against small towns and in favour or ultra dense cities. Public transport is just a mean to complain.

I absolutely hate this argument. In Europe, you take the train and there is literal farm land in between stations. While there are lots of small towns and villages close together in a way that you don't necessarily see in North America, the average density is considerably less than Los Angeles, for example. There is no good reason LA couldn't be crisscrossed by trains instead of by freeways.

> In Europe, you take the train and there is literal farm land in between stations.

This is quite literally my commute. On the way home, I depart from a central London station and after about 20 minutes, I'm passing through farms and rolling hills. This isn't even a cherry-picked example with a new high speed line, it is a line that is about 150 years old!

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

#462

Post by Mashimo »

aivisol wrote: post #230

I was wondering how people who live in cities in carless mode manage when they have kids. Since I could not find by simply skimming the comments, I searched for "kids" keyword, but so far it only appears twice in 200+ comments. Do people move out of cities immediately when they have kids or they have no opinion about this topic?

I live in Denmark, don't have a kids though. While I bike myself I often see parents who transport their kids in bikes with 2 front wheels and a box. They also got a cover and are thus protected from the elements. Also busses and trains have areas for baby strollers. At some point kids can also bike them self.

I don't know how many are completely carless. I don't think I know a parent who is. Most have one car, but also use public transportation / bike when possible.

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

#463

Post by iguy »

noobermin wrote: post #346
neuronic wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spent 6 years in the US as a European. By far the worst part on a daily basis was the missing public transportation due to the enormous focus on cars. Many towns didn't even attempt to be accessible to anyone without a car. I sometimes waited for hours in NY state blizzards to catch a bus before I was able to afford a car. I walked 2-3 hours to a mall and to Walmart when all other students went home for break. Bus se…

There's an old conspiracy, although its accuracy is debatable, google the "General Motors streetcar conspiracy." Another potential possibility is many cities scrapped their streetcars for spare metal during WWII. Along with that, market forces and lobbying and policy by people like Robert Moses, the current form of America was created.

These things all happened. But a huge part is simply that people live in suburbs built at a time when people could afford cars. So they did. Just as their grandparents moved out to districts served by streetcars as soon as they could, for the same reasons -- affordable floor area, cleaner air, less noise.

The central part of most EU cities is pre-1914, when cars were a curiosity. And for decades after that, cars were nowhere near as affordable to citizens as they were in the US, because the US was just much richer in (say) 1960.

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

#464

Post by treden »

ensiferum wrote: post #429
sgift wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've used the S-Bahn for 20 years (nowadays I can use the U-Bahn) and sure, it has its problems, but you are very, very hyperbolic. Most of the time it works just fine, whether the weather is good or bad. Sometimes the central tunnel is blocked, which is a problem for a system with one tunnel. That's why we build a second one. Meanwhile, cars are stuck in traffic almost all the time. The only way to cross the city in…

That's just BS. Do you work for DB? ;-) Sure the U-Bahn is slightly better but with SBahn.. "störung" or "zug fällt aus" is the norm. Off the top of my head the last 5~6 rides I've taken with SBahn every single time the train was either: - late - a service was skipped - broke down half way through the journey Come to think of it actually just last week I was forced to take the train and ofc the next service "zug fäll…

Another Muenchener here, and I second ensiferum's take - Sbahn is significantly worse than Ubahn, in all measures. ie, if you want to go to the airport, you always schedule an extra hour, just in case you get dumped out in Ismaning or Unterschleissheim (with the confidently delivered excuse "dieser zug faehrt nicht weiter") and need to uber / wait for the next overly full train (whose signage may or may not be correct).

On top of that, unexplained, sudden, irrational waiting time extensions until finally 'zug faellt aus'.. really? if the train doesn't exist, just tell us so we can make other plans now and not in 30 mins. Besides, the posters communicating all of the recent schedule changes due to work are horribly complicated, written in long essay form when all they really need to say is what stops are out of service when (how non-german speakers navigate this nonsense is beyond the imagination). On top of that, the MVG's recent absurdist claim that all schedule changes will be conveniently available per MVG app :DDDD riiiiight... if you read the thirty page long yellow text!

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

#465

Post by 11235813213455 »

zwaps wrote: post #6
marcus_holmes wrote: post #2

Living car-free in Berlin is ridiculously easy. I have my own bicycle, but still grab a Jump bike when I've walked somewhere and need to get home faster/easier. But this is the summer. I haven't done the winter here yet. That'll be the test.

In the last winters it barely snowed in Berlin, so I know quite a few people who kept riding their bikes all through the year. Of course, use your head - if it is damp and then below zero, be careful. Common sense, really. If all fails, public transport is decent enough to get you anywhere on foot. It's not perfect, I think mostly because Berlin is spatially huge and comparably empty. Cities like Paris have a much mo…

cycling on snow is quite fun anyway, I've been doing that in Nancy (north-east France) for years, a decade ago

Now with climate crisis, it's not really snowing anymore there

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

#467

Post by [deleted] »

briandear wrote: post #372
flexie wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why people are down voting you, but I think this time it may not be the general HN negativity, but simply because they think you are attempting a bad joke. This is exactly how many parents in Copenhagen drive their kids around. I would say that around half of all young parents in Copenhagen get a transporter bike like this one. We were leaving Copenhagen for America shortly after our youngest was born but ot…

We have transporters in the US, they are called cars. And they have air conditioning. The entire world doesn’t have to be just like the Netherlands. Try riding one of those transporter bikes in the Colorado mountains in winter or in south Florida in the summer.

[deleted]

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

#468

Post by treden »

arkh wrote: post #270
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…

> 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.

Yeah, a pleasant stroll through the relaxing romantic fog of scooter emissions...

http://aqicn.org/map/paris/ https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-48762911

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

#469

Post by mymythisisthis »

marble-drink wrote: post #343
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…

You just can't compare commuting on time alone. If you commute by car then 100% of that time is spent sitting down either driving or stuck in traffic. If you commute by public transport then maybe 50% of the time is spent reading, and 50% is spent walking. If you commute by bicycle then 100% of the time is spent cycling. It's a shame that study only shows a mean aggregate. I'd be interested to see the raw distributio…

You're right, mean aggregates don't mean much in this situation. The USA is too diverse of a country. NYC people commute by subway, and walking. Sure it's a long commute but you have ample opportunity to stop and do other things on the way home. If you live in Montana, you can commute home by car, in 10 minutes. But in Montana you are stuck at home, once you get there. What is needed is a 'happiness of commute' index.

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

#470

Post by ekianjo »

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…

> You can literally do everything without a car, everything is a short walk

when you are young and single. By the time you have kids this changes everything.

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