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Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

theguardian.com

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Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#601

Post by notyourday »

kevstev wrote: post #522
nrjames wrote: post #100

Raleigh converted Fayetteville Street to pedestrian only back in 1977. It ended up killing all of the businesses there. https://www.wral.com/news/local/story/163829/ The city reopened it to traffic, however, and "revitalized" the area, resulting in a booming downtown economy: https://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2007-may-learning-... I love pedestrian districts in cities. Copenhagen comes to mind. However, pedes…

Contrary to that anecdote, Jersey City (across the Hudson river from Manhattan), created a no-car zone near one of its busier subway stops and what was once a dead-zone after 8pm is now an extremely vibrant place filled with bars, restaurants and shops. Proximity to mass transit and having density that already discourages driving helps.

It has nothing to do with car free streets and everything to do with the Jersey City being on the other side from Manhattan with rents being 50% or lower than the rents in Manhattan and Jersey city being accessible by PATH.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#602

Post by bsagdiyev »

gascan wrote: post #498
autokad wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

definitely agree. in fact, one of the biggest dangers of accidents is difference in speed on the roads. Its my understanding that this is one of the primary reasons for a speed limit (note if you drive too slow you also get a ticket), which is to limit the variance of speed.

Do you have a source for that? I had always understood the speed limit as simply being an objective, statutory codification of the subjective notion of "appropriate maximum speed for conditions" Which fits well with dynamic speed limits cropping up in places that get regular bad weather

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio....

There is the source for California -- I see it gives exemptions for safety and law (I assume for road works, etc) but generally speed limits are objective based on conditions. It doesn't mean you can drive slow and impede other traffic traveling around you though, which is why there are laws for it. I don't see it enforced as much in San Diego, but when I lived in the Lake Arrowhead area it was enforced quite often on the highway up and down the mountain.

Quick edit -- that law is for highways, I haven't checked whether this also applies for other types of roads.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#603

Post by notyourday »

kristiandupont wrote: post #254
sxv wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I grew up (Huntsville, Alabama), if you saw a pedestrian or cyclist around town you would assume they are homeless. After living in SF and Montreal and traveling in Europe, I can't see myself going back to a "car-first" city. Which sucks because that's pretty much all the US offers.

New York, SF, Boston and San Diego are quite nice for walking IMO. But it's definitely more prevalent in Europe. My commute here in Copenhagen consists of a 10 minute bike ride and it makes me happy every day.

> New York

Oh please. Call spade a spade - you are talking about Manhattan, Dumbo or Williamsburg, Harlem and newly gentrified, serviced by subway places with white cafes and bars and restaurants loved by the lily white people working in tech or in finance. The thing is... it is a very small part of NYC. People in Queens take a car to get to a subway because it takes thirty to fourty minutes to get to it otherwise and after that it takes another hour and half to get to the place of work, but hey, who cares about Cinthia Lopez that cleans the desks on clowns working at Google that want to bike to work from their $6k/mo apartments.

You are not talking about Queens or Bronx or Bed-Stuy; you are not talking about Crown Heights or Inwood, or Washington Heights or Staten Island (it is also NYC even though people really like forgetting it).

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#604

Post by munk-a »

eanzenberg wrote: post #597
huebomont wrote: post #569

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not because they can't though. Because they think they can't. Most cities in the US could do this with some adjustments to public transit, and by managing regional transit much better - for example it's insane that the default for suburban rail line stations is the "park and ride" - huge parking lot surrounding the train station, rather than using that area for residential development close to transit.

No... because they literally can't without massive upheaval of where schools, offices and shops are located.

Shops can move with the times, schools can continue to have buses to get kids there and offices can stay where they are as long as they'd like.

Banning vehicles has been shown to greatly increase shopping revenue and improve the healthiness of the area, so if a few businesses suffer, poor them... I'll not shed a tear for the strip malls.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#605

Post by dragonwriter »

bsagdiyev wrote: post #602
gascan wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source for that? I had always understood the speed limit as simply being an objective, statutory codification of the subjective notion of "appropriate maximum speed for conditions" Which fits well with dynamic speed limits cropping up in places that get regular bad weather

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio... . There is the source for California -- I see it gives exemptions for safety and law (I assume for road works, etc) but generally speed limits are objective based on conditions. It doesn't mean you can drive slow and impede other traffic traveling around you though, which is why there are laws for it. I don't see it enforced as much in San Diego, but whe…

> Quick edit -- that law is for highways, I haven't checked whether this also applies for other types of roads.

Note that “highway” in California law has a very broad definition; see https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio....

“Highway” is a way or place of whatever nature, publicly maintained and open to the use of the public for purposes of vehicular travel. Highway includes street.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#606

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

shoguning wrote: post #274
crikli wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But privately owned gasoline-guzzlers are an archaic solution to the transportation problem, and they are not effective in today's society." Don't assume that every place is like the place you know. Visit the US, particularly the Midwest, and you'll come to understand why privately owned gasoline-guzzlers are the only solution to this particular transportation problem. The major cities are too dispersed with countle…

The design and density of cities will change even in the Midwest. Inter-city transport can and will change. From Wikipedia: "There was a dense system of inter-city railways in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but after the decline of passenger railroad in North America in the 1960s, the inter-city lines decreased greatly and today the system is far less dense." Wisconsin used to have inter…

It's not going to change for the thousands of small towns where mass transit can't be realistically employed.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#607

Post by analog31 »

corndoge wrote: post #466
sunshinelackof wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even Portland and Eugene love to boast how bicycle friendly they are, but neither are really commutable by anything besides a car for most people. Which is why most cyclists are so prolific -- it's hard to be a cyclist by circumstance. Riding your bike inherently comes with crossing a dozen intersections beaming with cars that treat you like you don't belong on the road. A solution is to level the planes of separatio…

Cyclists really don't belong on the road. It's such an odd collective viewpoint that a vehicle which virtually always travels far below the speed limit should be allowed alongside vehicles that travel at the speed limit. I think this is because we conflate the benefits of cycling and the value of making our public infrastructure amenable to cycling with the opinion that cyclists should share highways with cars. It's…

I think there's a happy medium that already works fairly well. I live in a fairly bike-friendly mid-sized city. For the most part, cyclists stick to designated bike paths and neighborhood streets, where traffic is minimal. Someone who's riding a bike on a main trunk road is either inexperienced, or trying to prove something. Most people eventually find ways to avoid those roads.

For me, high speed and low speed are both OK. I take longer rides that get me out onto the trunk roads where people drive 55+, but they usually give me plenty of room. What I'm not OK with is congested roads where drivers are not controlling their cars -- if someone stops suddenly, there will be a crash.

The city is gradually adding bike lanes on the more congested main roads when there isn't a good alternative. They're also designating some side roads as "bike boulevards" with "traffic calming" features that effectively discourage cars.

A way of planning for bike paths is if bike traffic gets heavy enough on a road, then set aside a portion of that road for bikes and leave the rest for cars.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#608

Post by jodrellblank »

eanzenberg wrote: post #597
huebomont wrote: post #569

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not because they can't though. Because they think they can't. Most cities in the US could do this with some adjustments to public transit, and by managing regional transit much better - for example it's insane that the default for suburban rail line stations is the "park and ride" - huge parking lot surrounding the train station, rather than using that area for residential development close to transit.

No... because they literally can't without massive upheaval of where schools, offices and shops are located.

"They literally can't change, because that would involve having to actually change".

They only want change that doesn't involve money, effort or change, or what?

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#609

Post by gpm »

alkonaut wrote: post #258
gaius wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So some kind of semi-private transport (e.g. shared autonomous cars) is probably required You can have the on-demand voice-activated self-driving car experience right now: it’s called a taxi. Is that viable for all your use cases?

Taxi prices would have to be substantially lower for taxi to be a viable alternative. Perhaps for some of the use cases there could be better utilization (meaning cheaper) taxi, e.g. a taxi picking up my kids for school could also pick up a few more.

To everyone above wondering why people think self driving cars will help. This is why.

Eliminate the driver and taxis become way cheaper (probably cheaper than owning a car). That means people like alkonaut here will be far more interested in just not owning their own car that sits idle except when they are personally driving it. Which reduces the amount of space we are spending on car storage.

Re: Life in the Spanish city that banned cars

#610

Post by yellowapple »

electricslpnsld wrote: post #446
sunshinelackof wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even Portland and Eugene love to boast how bicycle friendly they are, but neither are really commutable by anything besides a car for most people. Which is why most cyclists are so prolific -- it's hard to be a cyclist by circumstance. Riding your bike inherently comes with crossing a dozen intersections beaming with cars that treat you like you don't belong on the road. A solution is to level the planes of separatio…

> Even Portland and Eugene love to boast how bicycle friendly they are, but neither are really commutable by anything besides a car for most people. Which is why most cyclists are so prolific -- it's hard to be a cyclist by circumstance. Riding your bike inherently comes with crossing a dozen intersections beaming with cars that treat you like you don't belong on the road. I commuted by bike for two years or so in Po…

Pretty sure that's less about you being a bicyclist and more about you being in Oakland.
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