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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

#961

Post by unity1001 »

seadan83 wrote: post #956
seadan83 wrote: post #955

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Yet, there are still quibbles around this as many European cities were rebuilt many times. > Thats not correct. Some noticeable percentage of German cities and some cities of the war-affected regions were rebuilt. And most partially. The re-architecting of Paris does not have any relevance to cars since it happened in 19th century. You stated that there was not a lot of urban planning in most European cities as th…

@unity, my original statement was this: "My knowledge is that European urban planning was very similar and car centric until the late 60s." I think the citations quoted above from multiple sources generously support this. Again, that is not at all saying that all of Europe was rebuilt in the 1950s-1960s willingly and entirely to be car centric. But, the _planning_ of new construction/reconstruction were similar durin…

> But, the _planning_ of new construction/reconstruction were similar during that period in both the USA & Europ

That's where you go wrong. There isnt 'urban planning' in Europe because there isnt any space to plan anything. What could be called 'urban planning' in Europe is laying out subway tracks, maybe demolishing a run-down shanty neighborhood to build apartments. Thats it. Naturally there is no way to plan anything around cars. The most you can do is to eat up a little sidewalk in the biggest avenues in the biggest cities to make one more lane for the main street. And that's what was done for ~80 years.

> I think the citations quoted above from multiple sources generously support this

They dont. You moved on to 'urban planning was like that' argument from 'built like that'.

> European urban planning was also, at one time somewhat recently, largely car centric

Repeating it wont make it so. It wasnt, and still isnt. Aside from some part of Germany that rebuilt its destroyed cities and built autobahns, entire Europe was about tiny cars and tiny streets, leave aside any phenomenon like suburbs.

You cannot extrapolate from 'Le Corbusier and his friends liked cars and wanted to demolish cities' to 'city planning was like that'. If city planning was really like that (if it actually existed that is), then Le Corbusier and his friends would get their way and entire cities would have been rebuilt.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#962

Post by Dylan16807 »

hnlmorg wrote: post #954
Dylan16807 wrote: post #951

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can take a car with you when you move. And leases exist. This doesn't seem to be about travel at all. It's just that some people don't get a license. It's not that the concept is alien, it's that the justification you gave isn't really true. It doesn't make it a "whole lot harder to learn to drive". Moving around has almost no effect on getting some driving lessons.

> You can take a car with you when you move. And leases exist. But you’re not going to have a car if you haven’t already learnt to drive. > This doesn't seem to be about travel at all. It's just that some people don't get a license. They don’t get licenses because they’re travelling. Time is finite, not everyone wants to use it learning to drive. > It's not that the concept is alien, it's that the justification you g…

I understand your lack of priority, I just think you're misattributing how much of that comes from being mobile and how much is just how you are.

Like, come on, if you're somewhere for two years it's not the 25 hours that make the difference.

And sure put the address you've been at for an entire year.

It's not a "whole lot harder". You personally didn't want to, and that is fine.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#963

Post by gambiting »

snozolli wrote: post #915
gambiting wrote: post #529

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>How many times have you hit someone while riding a bicycle? I never have. I suppose I should stop paying for car insurance then, since I never had an accident either. Or maybe more accurate example is that I shouldn't worry about the safety of my car, since I never actually hit anyone with it. >>How much harm do you suppose it would do, leading to "massive legal trouble"? There was a cyclist in london recently who…

I suppose I should stop paying for car insurance then, since I never had an accident either. Ah, yes, because cars and bikes represent totally comparable risks to others. Now you can go cite some more wildly improbable anecdotes, notable entirely because of how exceptional they are, as a response. I'll be over here looking at the 1.3 million people who die in car accidents around the world and not caring about e-bike…

>>Ah, yes, because cars and bikes represent totally comparable risks to others.

The point is that "I don't see a point in doing X because X has never happened to me" is not a good argument.

Let's try a better comparison then - maybe I should cancel my cycling liability insurance, because I never hit anyone with my bike then?

>>I'll be over here looking at the 1.3 million people who die in car accidents around the world and not caring about e-bikes at all.

I don't see how that's relevant to what I said - you will be punished more harshly if you cycle where you shouldn't. The number of people who die in car accidents bears no relation.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#964

Post by petrusnonius »

matsemann wrote: post #118
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…

> - might be impossible depending on work or children; The newer style of cargo bikes can for many families replace a car. Have two kids seated in the trunk of the bike and drop them off at kindergarten, then continue biking to work and pick them up on the way home. Those are a bit on the pricier side, though. Still cheap compared to a car, but people often look at them as something "extravagant" or "in addition" to…

Brompton lets you try before you buy.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#965

Post by petrusnonius »

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…

I have an electric Brompton. If they were lighter they’d be a dream. At the moment they’re very limiting.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#966

Post by docmars »

thiht wrote: post #480
docmars wrote: post #460

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

That's such bad faith.

Until it happens, and then what say you? And faith? In a secular religion with a shaky track record of alarmism and embarrassingly failed predictions, and then using them to corner companies and individuals into an unhealthy guilt complex about... existing?

Yeah.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#967

Post by rnk »

em500 wrote: post #167
rnk wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't quite make sense, "it's difficult to avoid having a car because you can't store it"? Can you elaborate? I'm interested what life is like in these cities that charge drivers so as to reduce cars in the road.

I think you misread GP: he's saying that in inner London it's difficult to have a car, not to avoid having one, mostly because parking space is very limited. What exactly are you interested in, about life such cities? I live in Amsterdam, haven't owned a car for over a decade (which doesn't mean that I never drive one), and haven't really missed it (even with a primary school aged child).

Sorry, just saw this. I do some sports that are 50 miles from the city, and there's no public transportation, not even any private transportation. Skiing is one such activity, but hiking and camping in the summer time. I do recognize that I'm using energy to do these things. I'd love to take a bus. Actually in my west coast city, during the summer they have bus service to a number of area hiking trails, within 10 miles of the city. But these other farther away activities are out of that reach.

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#968

Post by antihero »

syntheweave wrote: post #748
sharkweek wrote: post #678

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I consider myself a pretty strong cyclist, and I was huffing and puffing trying to keep pace with my wife and kids on the ebike.

Having experienced widely varying amounts of power output with the local bikeshare bikes, their varied condition and assisted vs non-, I don't have any illusions here - it's just a different experience to be able to spin it once and feel the bike boost you up to max effort. Even the heavily built bikeshare frames can easily outclass a road bike, if there's no mechanical issue. Although there often is - the chains, ge…

The e-bikes here are generally quicker off the mark at lights but that lasts like ten seconds before a decent road bike or legs zips by them because they’re limited to 15kmph

Re: Cyclists now outnumber motorists in City of London

#969

Post by antihero »

sharkweek wrote: post #678
antihero wrote: post #654

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the issue with the road bike idea?

I consider myself a pretty strong cyclist, and I was huffing and puffing trying to keep pace with my wife and kids on the ebike.

How though? They couldn’t been going that fast.
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