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Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

nltimes.nl

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Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#151

Post by rsynnott »

mpclark wrote: post #74
Symbiote wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I opted out of all tracking on Facebook, so now it serves me the average shite I assume gets shared a lot. Half the crap is people ranting about the speed limit in Wales, the other half is vandalism of low emission zone cameras and signs in London.

Well, from where I sit it looks like one formerly popular political party has seen what's coming up in its horoscope and has pinned its last hopes on turning these quality-of-life measures -- which it previously vociferously supported -- into a wedge issue by whipping up a frenzy around ThE wAr On DrIvErS!11!

Weird culture-war stuff (some of which it feels like they've more or less invented for the purpose) appears to be pretty much the entire Tory manifesto nowadays.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#152

Post by rsynnott »

thejackgoode wrote: post #69
warrenmiller wrote: post #15

This is wonderful. remember : Cities aren't noisy, Cars are noisy.

Also, sirens are noisy and nobody even talks about regulating them adequately

Sirens are _necessary_; being noisy is the point. Probably not a huge amount you can do there (beyond enforcing that they are only used where appropriate, but in most well-run emergency services that's largely not an issue). Anecdotally, living in a medium-sized (~1.5 million people) city, I don't hear them that much, except when walking along a road near my house that leads to a major hospital.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#153

Post by macleginn »

meheleventyone wrote: post #134
macleginn wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an aside, speed-limit enforcement in Iceland outside of Reykjavik is almost nonexistent. On the ring road, which goes around the whole country and has a strict but reasonable limit of 90 km/h (few cars but tons of bumps and sudden turns + a lot of low visibility due to bad weather), there are no more than 10 speed cameras, so everybody is driving at their own discretion.

The only place I’ve got a ticket was in the countryside so YMMV!

Yes, they do exist, but they are clearly marked, including on the maps, so you need to do only a minimum amount of adaptation. On the other hand, most of the examples of egregiously bad driving I noticed were in Reykjavik, and in the countryside drivers are generally very careful (modulo tourists who suddenly slow down, stop, or even reverse a bit to take a photo or smth).

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#154

Post by mcv »

dagw wrote: post #63
shortcake27 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean by suffer? I’ve never had any problem driving at any speed in any car apart from crawling (1-2km/h) in a manual.

Current petrol engines are designed operate at optimal efficiency in the 60-90 km/h range. Electric cars on the other hand can operate efficiently at much lower speeds due to how electric engines work. Efficiency here primarily refers to km/unit of energy. So if you care about minimising pollution in the city centres it's much better if all cars can drive either 70 km/h or not at all through city centres.

ICE cars tend to have gears, and can drive very well in lower gears. You don't want to do 30 in 4th gear.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#155

Post by Symbiote »

Muromec wrote: post #109
pjc50 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The mere suggestion of this in Oxford has caused people to go completely mental and invoke all sorts of WEF conspiracy theories. It might work but the public transport alternatives need to be the working default first.

I heard the one about 15 minutes cities. Which is like normal quality of life aspiration, but then tinfoil hat goes “… and then they will put a wall around it”. It’s ridiculous

The crazy thing is this conspiracy is being spread by the people who bemoan the loss of freedom for their children/grandchildren -- it's not safe for children to play outside like we did, too many cars; used to be able to send the kids down to the shop to buy pop, etc.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#156

Post by mcv »

arlort wrote: post #83
badcppdev wrote: post #52

I think it's really funny how humans can't help but use round numbers. 30 kph = 18.64 mph 20 mph = 32.19 kph So safety rules around the world are based on arbitrary length systems. I'm all for lower speed limits for safety but I feel there is still things to be worked out in suburban settings where long arterial(?) roads carry large amounts of traffic in large cities.

2 km/h when you're reducing from 50 to 30 is a negligible difference, and round numbers are easier to keep to on analog/digital speed gauges, and easier to set manually on cruise control systems

It's not like anyone ever drives exactly that speed anyway. It's all approximations. We don't need 4 digits of precision here.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#157

Post by shortcake27 »

nvm0n2 wrote: post #88
irdc wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not surprisingly, the socialism is blatantly obvious. Seeing as the social democratic[0] PvdA is currently the largest political party in the Amsterdam city council[1], with the greens a close second, that's all in line with what the people of Amsterdam want. This is Europe. Socialism isn't a scare word here. If anything, it's a rallying cry. 0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_democracy 1. https://en.wikipedia…

Maybe you should ask some older eastern Europeans what they think about socialism, before haughtily speaking for everyone who lives in Europe. Socialism and its national variant wrecked Europe in the 20th century. People celebrated when it ended. To call it a rallying cry given that history is quite gross.

This argument is often brought up as “proof” that socialism doesn’t work, yet completely ignores the reality of late-stage capitalism.

Of course boomers love capitalism when in the 60s a factory worker could easily pay off a huge house, two brand new cars every 3 years, and support a family of 5 on a single income.

But that isn’t capitalism today. Young people are working themselves into the ground just to share a room in a house with 6 other people, barely able to put food on the table.

What do you suppose the current generation will say about capitalism when they get old?

Wealth is flowing from poor people to rich people at an ever increasing rate. It’s no wonder alternative economic systems are gaining in popularity.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#158

Post by Symbiote »

hgomersall wrote: post #94
thejackgoode wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, sirens are noisy and nobody even talks about regulating them adequately

In the UK, hearing a siren is exceptionally rare. AFAICT, they overwhelmingly prefer lights only, saving sirens for a narrow set of circumstances.

Except in London, where hearing a siren is so common people (other than drivers) don't react.

Re: Amsterdam preparing to lower speed limit to 30 kilometers per hour

#159

Post by mcv »

wink wrote: post #133
Vinnl wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In many (also newer) urban areas in the Netherlands, narrow streets and cobbles are used intentionally to encourage lower speeds. The "30" sign is more of a last resort in that sense.

cycling on cobblestone sucks though, so not sure how that really works out :P (Let's assume there's no dedicated cycle path next to the cobblestone road, guess it depends)

The Dam square in the centre of Amsterdam has extremely bumpy cobblestones. It's not impossible to bike on, but even for bikes it's more comfortable if you go a bit slower than usual, which might be the intention.

The lines between the lanes are made from much smoother stone though, so when I'm in a hurry, I just ride on those lines.

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