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Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

forbes.com

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Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#801

Post by asdff »

textread wrote: post #558

I was finding it difficult to stick to cycling. Hearing my plight, an avid cyclist friend of mine suggested me to try a trick:- Get a 3 way folding cycle such as the Brompton. Now, play around with hybrid modes of transport. My programmer's brain loves building abstractions neatly on top of each other. Folding my cycle and carrying it onto another form of transport brings a smile to my face every time. The biggest to…

Last mile is a hack. I use a skateboard which is even easier to tote around, albeit might not be so easy for commuting unless you know how to skateboard already or want to learn. Any walk time estimates on google maps are cut down in half or more.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#802

Post by throw8383833jj »

gambiting wrote: post #414
CydeWeys wrote: post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like your underarching problem here is housing costs.

Sure but like.........people always say that (for example) in London you can't live closer to work because houses/flats are too expensive. Ok, I mean that's true, but how are you going to solve that? It's a gigantic city which is already full to the brim, with literally 1000+ years of building on top of every single square inch of land available. You would probably have to demolish large areas of London and replace t…

It always comes down to two things: Land cost, and building cost. You get those two down and you'll see housing costs come down.

Land cost can be brought down by building furthere away from the center or in the countryside -> have smaller villages or towns outside of london.

As for building costs. How about we talk to developers and ask them what the biggest building costs are? Often times, it's regulation, regulation regulations. Get rid of all the ones that are causing high prices: at least this should be done in certain areas to allow those who want low cost housing some options.

200 years ago, Henry david thoreagh built a cabin for 28$. That's about 3000 dollars in today's cost. and back then the average person was able to pay off their house in just 10 years! The average house cost about 800$ which was about 800 days of unskilled labor (1/5th of what it is today if you include prop taxes) If it could be done then, then why can't it be done now? why has our standard of living dropped so much, that it's actually considerably lower than it was 200 years ago?

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#803

Post by ericd »

tremon wrote: post #739
b112 wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So landlords, who provide housing for those not ready/able to buy, now raise rents dramatically? So the end result, the poor pay more? Instead, what Vancouver did was simply tax empty housing.

landlords, who provide housing for those not ready/able to buy Why is that framing preferred over "landlords, who reduce housing supply by keeping properties off the market"?

They don't reduce housing supply. The same number of people are living in that building as would be if the building had been sold to them.

If you want to get to the root of the problem, look at the development process. Start with your local zoning laws. It is insane how tightly prescriptive they are, usually, and they generally have lots of density-limiting provisions like mandatory parking, maximum floor to area ratios, maximum heights, minimum setbacks, etc.

And then there's the planning/approval process.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#804

Post by megablast »

nradov wrote: post #542
hnlmorg wrote: post #488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

London has really good public transportation and, as this article mentions, lots of people in London do cycle to work (half of all the offices I’ve had in London has had an on-premises bicycle “shed”). In fact I’ve met so many Londoners who never even bothered to learn to drive. In my experience, it’s generally American cities that require a car rather than European cities. Generally speaking of course, you get good…

It seems so bizarre that an adult would never learn to drive. Like you might not need to drive for daily city life but it really limits your options if you ever want to travel.

Bullshit.

Traveled all over the world. Lived in 8 different cities. Never needed a car.

I am confused what you think you need a car for?? It is such a strange stance. Where have you gone that I can not go? Public transport exists. So do private tour buses.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#805

Post by ryukafalz »

tremon wrote: post #781
ryukafalz wrote: post #762

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You always end up with muddy splashes on your trousers. If you cycle then better not wear nice shoes or light trousers, which again limits where/when you can effectively use a bicycle as a way of commute. Does your bike not have fenders?

I suspect his bike might not even have a saddle.

That would indeed do a number on the nether regions.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#806

Post by smugma »

raphaelj wrote: post #36

Somewhat unrelated to the article, but I live in a mid-size EU city and dumped my car for an e-bike a few months ago. Surprisingly, it hasn't been that hard (my GF kept her car, and I have a car-sharing subscription): Pros: - Immediately stopped having insomnia. Better feel overall; - about €300/month in additional disposable income. That's basically a free lunch everyday! - significantly faster if parking is taken i…

I have an eBike but rarely use it. My main concern is theft. However, I frequently use Lyft eBikes to get around town (SF) but I don’t have the same concern for my car getting stolen if on the street for an hour (or all day at our offices in a locked room).

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#807

Post by hnlmorg »

nradov wrote: post #661
ausp wrote: post #550

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm one of the no-license London populace, and travel more frequently than most. I don't find that it has limited me at all. On the occasions when I absolutely need a car instead of the existing options, taxis are available.

That seems like a very limited perspective. I've been to many places in the world where taxis don't run. Being able to drive is a basic life skill, like knowing how to swim or cook a meal.

Many of the people I’ve met who cannot drive are actually some of the most traveled people I know. In fact spending short periods in lots of different countries makes it a whole lot harder to learn to drive.

I didn’t learn to drive until I was in my 30s and used to spend my 20s travelling the length and breadth of the U.K. and Europe. I even had a long distance relationship at the time too. A long distance relationship that worked because we are now married.

Sometimes I might have to plan a journey in advance (to figure out the route) but there were plenty of times I just went where the wind took me (proverbially speaking). And frankly even after learning to drive, smart phones weren’t invented yet and satnavs were luxuries, so you’d often still need to plan ahead even if you could drive.

So no, driving needn’t be an essential life skill for everyone. And that doesn’t mean they have a limited perspective either. On the contrary, if you cannot imagine life without driving then it is your perspective which is limited.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#808

Post by throwaway894345 »

olau wrote: post #724
throwaway894345 wrote: post #651

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The newer style of cargo bikes can for many families replace a car This very much feels like "in addition to" rather than replacing a car, at least in the US. My wife and I (without kids) tried living without a car in one of the largest, most walkable cities in the US and it was doable, but it's just soooo much nicer to have a car. Coordinating rentals or even ride shares are a lot more tedious than jumping in a ca…

> Lastly, cycling is probably always going to be less safe than getting around by car (we can and should improve cycling safety, but I don't know that we're ever going to get to parity with driving) I think you're biased towards where you live. Where I live, cycling is definitely not considered risky, there are plenty of bike paths, and many people do indeed let their children bicycle as their primary means of transp…

I’m not biased by where I live, cycling is riskier statistically than driving pretty much anywhere, including bike-friendly Netherlands:

something like 70% of total distance traveled is by car (https://www.statista.com/statistics/449436/netherlands-modal...) and yet there are fewer annual motorist fatalities than bicycle fatalities (207 cyclist fatalities versus 175 motorist fatalities in 2021: https://www.statista.com/statistics/523310/netherlands-numbe...).

EDIT: cycling in the netherlands is about 685% more dangerous than driving per https://www.cbs.nl/en-gb/news/2020/31/decline-in-road-fatali.... Of course, this isn’t a like-for-like comparison since the distance traveled by car skews more toward the more dangerous highway miles while cycling skews heavily toward the much safer local/city streets—if you account for that, the difference becomes even more pronounced.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#809

Post by acchow »

raphaelj wrote: post #36

Somewhat unrelated to the article, but I live in a mid-size EU city and dumped my car for an e-bike a few months ago. Surprisingly, it hasn't been that hard (my GF kept her car, and I have a car-sharing subscription): Pros: - Immediately stopped having insomnia. Better feel overall; - about €300/month in additional disposable income. That's basically a free lunch everyday! - significantly faster if parking is taken i…

It absolutely amazes me that places like Amsterdam, London, etc build so much safe bike infrastructure when the weather is so dreary. And despite the weather, of course people will use it because it feels great and is so fast!

And yet, here we have California (especially LA) with the best cycling weather but barely any safe cycling routes. LA is laughably bad with tons of "bike routes" that are just the rightmost car lane shared with bicycles.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#810

Post by magnuspaaske »

acchow wrote: post #809
raphaelj wrote: post #36

Somewhat unrelated to the article, but I live in a mid-size EU city and dumped my car for an e-bike a few months ago. Surprisingly, it hasn't been that hard (my GF kept her car, and I have a car-sharing subscription): Pros: - Immediately stopped having insomnia. Better feel overall; - about €300/month in additional disposable income. That's basically a free lunch everyday! - significantly faster if parking is taken i…

It absolutely amazes me that places like Amsterdam, London, etc build so much safe bike infrastructure when the weather is so dreary . And despite the weather, of course people will use it because it feels great and is so fast! And yet, here we have California (especially LA) with the best cycling weather but barely any safe cycling routes. LA is laughably bad with tons of "bike routes" that are just the rightmost ca…

In Scandinavia the attitude is "there's no bad weather, only bad clothing" and going outside and feeling the seasons change is awesome. I find it kind of funny when people in Florida or California will have all this great weather but then end up spending so much time in indoor climate controlled environments from their house to their car to their office.

The weather in the Northern Europe really doesn't stop you from being outside any more than the weather elsewhere does (counting forest fires and hurricanes as things that'll keep you indoors).

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