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Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

greeneuropeanjournal.eu

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Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#511

Post by swiftcoder »

Saline9515 wrote: post #502
darkwater wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are totally off. Never lived in Paris but I lived in Barcelona for many years, during the transformation to be more car-hostile and bikes and pedestrians friendly. I spent there my 20s-30s and left when I had a family but due to (public) school scarcity in our neighborhood and rent prices. But mobility was not the issue at all. It was actually a pleasure bring my daughter to her kindergarten by bike and t…

Barcelona is in Spain, on the Mediterranean, where the weather is fair all year long. It's not the case in many parts of the world. Bicycles are a rather dangerous mode of transportation, and I wouldn't use it with kids, especially in a city.

Dangerous why? Because of all the cars?

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#512

Post by Saline9515 »

ses1984 wrote: post #491
Saline9515 wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a reason among others, but this bike-centric policy (pedestrians nor public transport are the priority) led to an exodus of families [0]. I am among them, as I realized pretty quickly that it's a real pain to move around, buy groceries, go to the doctor, and so on with very young children in Paris, especially if you don't own a car. And now you have to deal with the uncivil behavior of the cyclists, moreover. It…

There are loads of factors at play, to lay the blame of this demographic trend solely on bike-centric policy is, if I’m being very very generous, lazy. Since it’s the telegraph, about a foreign city, I would assume it’s disingenuous. The article doesn’t even call out bike centric policies: > “It is the result of a quarter-century of policies that have made life harder for families and the middle class. Construction w…

My message starts with "it's a reason among others".

And bike-centric policies have led the city to invest in bike lanes, rather than in the aging public transport and to remove surface parking, making it almost impossible to own a car if you have a family. All of this is in the article that I linked.

An unexpected casualty of this is that it's now complex to get trade workers to come to Paris for construction jobs, and, funnily enough, public works to build bike lanes are more costly as trucks and workers spend a lot of time in the traffic now.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#513

Post by vjk800 »

nonethewiser wrote: post #249
vjk800 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh yeah, public transportation is fucking horrible. Still, it is basically the only viable way to support a large population density and not turn everything into a wasteland of parking lots and car lanes. Let's face it: cars just take an order of magnitude or two more space than e.g. metro for the same number of passengers and, in big cities, space is a very scarce resource.

But why wouldnt I prefer having orders of magnitude more space, given the option?

If you think the time spent traversing all that space is completely worthless. Otherwise it makes sense to make things dense so that people can mostly reach whatever things they want to reach by walking a short distance or taking a quick tram connection, etc.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#514

Post by rcpt »

Saline9515 wrote: post #415
darkamaul wrote: post #232

While the current Paris administration has its detractors, its policies, removing surface parking, expanding bike lanes, and lowering speed limits, have done tremendous good for air quality (see the Airparif study for details in [0]). Paris may not yet be at Amsterdam’s scale, but only 5 % of daily trips in the city are made by car. It’s staggering that roughly 50 % of public space is allocated to cars [1], despite t…

It's a reason among others, but this bike-centric policy (pedestrians nor public transport are the priority) led to an exodus of families [0]. I am among them, as I realized pretty quickly that it's a real pain to move around, buy groceries, go to the doctor, and so on with very young children in Paris, especially if you don't own a car. And now you have to deal with the uncivil behavior of the cyclists, moreover. It…

The article says that families are leaving because of high rent.

I personally love it when my kids have freedom of movement. Every family we know is the same way. Carting them around all day and then sitting and waiting at various activities just plain sucks.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#515

Post by stetrain »

ascagnel_ wrote: post #476
stetrain wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is also a gradient of density and walk/bike-ability between NYC, one of the densest cities in the country, and super spread-out car-dependent cul-de-sac suburbs, but the US often skips those middle steps. Small towns where your kids can get to their friend's house by walking or biking a couple of blocks over can be great for raising a family, as opposed to all of their friends' houses being in a different gated…

They exist, but in New Jersey -- most of the "cities" (with the exception of downtown Jersey City and downtown Newark) would be called streetcar suburbs in an earlier time. I live in one of them, and it's great: I have a small, private backyard, but I'm also Sadly, it's illegal to build streetcar suburbs in most of the US today, because outfitting every house with a private driveway, setbacks, etc., would move everyt…

And the cost to buy into these developments where they do exist suggests a supply and demand imbalance. Near me a new-ish 'town center' development with a mix of apartments, shops, restaurants, grocery store, townhouses, and single-family homes is easily double or triple the price of an equivalent house in a standard cul-de-sac neighborhood a 15 minute drive away.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#516

Post by strken »

uyzstvqs wrote: post #439

Something I said a couple days ago: > It's not an either-or. You can have streets which are car-friendly, bike-friendly, and pedestrian-friendly at the same time. Just look at the Dutch, they've been doing it for years. That is until recently in some big cities, though, where some less knowledgeable politicians have also adopted this false populist either-car-or-bike concept. Though the traditional principle still ap…

To me, whether there's enough space for cars and walkability are both part of how dense a city is. Leaving room for cars must make a city less dense and usually less pleasant for pedestrians as well; in the same way, a suburban area with single family homes and limited low-rise apartments needs car infrastructure because public transport gets worse the longer each trip is and the fewer riders there are.

You can accommodate both regions within one city, but they can't overlap without compromising one or the other (edit: although this compromise is a desirable middle ground for some people). Note that Pontevedra built huge free parking areas on the outskirts of its urban area. For their whole city it's not either-or, but in any given place they've had to make a decision.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#517

Post by Saline9515 »

zozbot234 wrote: post #499
Saline9515 wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, if you live in the most expensive part of the town, which is often the epicenter, it may be ok. However, not everyone can afford this, or justify the expense, especially since you are pitted against childless couples that don't have to support children financially. Also, the presence of bikes on the sidewalk makes it hostile for vulnerable pedestrians, and generally turn a pleasant experience (walking in a city…

If bikes (not cars) are making a city "hostile to vulnerable pedestrians", that seems like a very good problem to have compared to the average car-centric city.

Bikes and cars. But cars have their own space (the road) and rules (red lights, crosswalks...), whereas cyclists ride at full speed on the pedestrian's space (the sidewalk).

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#518

Post by rcpt »

Saline9515 wrote: post #447
solarexplorer wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really depends on the city/quarter where you live. I live in the center of Barcelona and had no problems with two small kids at all. Supermarkets, real farmer's markets, hospitals, pharmacies, schools, etc are all within 10min walking distance. I work from home, but I could walk to the office it I wanted to. I don't have to leave the city at all. Eventually I gave in and bought a car, not because it was necessary…

Yeah, if you live in the most expensive part of the town, which is often the epicenter, it may be ok. However, not everyone can afford this, or justify the expense, especially since you are pitted against childless couples that don't have to support children financially. Also, the presence of bikes on the sidewalk makes it hostile for vulnerable pedestrians, and generally turn a pleasant experience (walking in a city…

Childless couples aren't competing for 4 bedroom apartments. The problem is that cities forbid construction of those.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#519

Post by eCa »

okr wrote: post #503
oldsecondhand wrote: post #487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problems you mentioned are policing and welfare problems, both things that America sucks at.

Or it becomes too expensive like in germany. Then it will suck too.

€58 a month for all local/regional public transport is very cheap.

Where I am, in another part of western Europe, a single-region ticket is normally ~30-50% more expensive than the all-of-Germany ticket.

Re: Pontevedra, Spain declares its entire urban area a "reduced traffic zone"

#520

Post by zozbot234 »

SoftTalker wrote: post #407
bombcar wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rush hour is more of a problem than people will admit; the biggest issue with public transit (in general) is that it is horribly "unprofitable" (for whatever you want that to be) except curing crush-time. At the extremes, a bus (or worse, a train) with one driver and one passenger is obviously worse than one person in a car. But transportation is not Car vs the World™ no matter how many people (online) want it to be.…

> At the extremes, a bus (or worse, a train) with one driver and one passenger is obviously worse than one person in a car. Or driving with no passengers at all, not uncommon for the buses where I live at certain times and routes. It's sort of a chicken and egg problem. You can optimize equipment usage by running more buses on heavily used routes but you can't encourage new ridership on new routes without running eno…

Minibuses are a thing. You could easily run them at off-times and on more sparsely-used routes.
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