4 ms·

Dubai is a horrible place to be a pedestrian, at least the areas I briefly visited. Everything is at a huge scale so the distances are extreme, and obviously th

by prawn 9y ago

Dubai is a horrible place to be a pedestrian, at least the areas I briefly visited. Everything is at a huge scale so the distances are extreme, and obviously the climate doesn't help at all. I wonder if anyone has ever built a city, or significant part of a city, with either a purely subterranean transport layer, or all pedestrian layers a storey above? (Obviously I'm talking beyond a subway system.)

seanmcdirmid 9y ago
Canadian cities (sans Vancouver) seem to have a lot of pedestrian tunnels (often doubling as downtown malls). In HK you can get pretty far underground as a pedestrian in some parts (you can basically walk between subway stations in an underground labyrinth to avoid rain). Also, Minneapolis has a nice skyway network. Then there is La Defense in Paris where the pedistrian level is above street level.
- 52-6F-62 9y ago
  Yeah Toronto has the PATH system and you can get around much of the downtown core that way (though I prefer not to...). Toronto itself is really quite walkable for hours in most directions if you live downtown. However to get to anything in further reaches of the city—Scarborough, Etobicoke, or Vaughn—it's far better to have a car. Living downtown and visiting the zoo on transit is a long stretch ;) Calgary also has a skyway network (called the Plus-15 http://plus15.com/ http://plus15.com/). Living there one winter was odd to me after Toronto—you'd never see anybody on the streets. And downtown Calgary is reasonably quiet on a normal, nice day. That said that town is also quite walkable—though it's best parts are relegated to certain parts of the city that are separated by less interesting areas. Victoria, BC is one of my favourite walkable places so far. I also really enjoyed my time in Montreal, but I'm a little conditioned to the cold.
eganist 9y ago
> a storey above? To seanmcdirmid's point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Skyway_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Skyway_System
xbmcuser 9y ago
It has become a lot more pedestrian friendly compared to 15 years ago my first visit and 1 year ago my last visit. But the problem of afternoon heat cant be solved.
dwild 9y ago
In Montreal, we have the largest underground complex called "The Underground City". It's a series of tunnels of a total of 32 km that allow going almost everywhere downtown (add to that the subway and soon the electric train, we could say almost everywhere in the city) without going outside.

by prawn 9y ago

seanmcdirmid 9y ago

Canadian cities (sans Vancouver) seem to have a lot of pedestrian tunnels (often doubling as downtown malls). In HK you can get pretty far underground as a pedestrian in some parts (you can basically walk between subway stations in an underground labyrinth to avoid rain). Also, Minneapolis has a nice skyway network. Then there is La Defense in Paris where the pedistrian level is above street level.

52-6F-62 9y ago
Yeah Toronto has the PATH system and you can get around much of the downtown core that way (though I prefer not to...). Toronto itself is really quite walkable for hours in most directions if you live downtown. However to get to anything in further reaches of the city—Scarborough, Etobicoke, or Vaughn—it's far better to have a car. Living downtown and visiting the zoo on transit is a long stretch ;) Calgary also has a skyway network (called the Plus-15 http://plus15.com/ http://plus15.com/). Living there one winter was odd to me after Toronto—you'd never see anybody on the streets. And downtown Calgary is reasonably quiet on a normal, nice day. That said that town is also quite walkable—though it's best parts are relegated to certain parts of the city that are separated by less interesting areas. Victoria, BC is one of my favourite walkable places so far. I also really enjoyed my time in Montreal, but I'm a little conditioned to the cold.

eganist 9y ago

> a storey above? To seanmcdirmid's point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Skyway_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minneapolis_Skyway_System

xbmcuser 9y ago

It has become a lot more pedestrian friendly compared to 15 years ago my first visit and 1 year ago my last visit. But the problem of afternoon heat cant be solved.

dwild 9y ago

In Montreal, we have the largest underground complex called "The Underground City". It's a series of tunnels of a total of 32 km that allow going almost everywhere downtown (add to that the subway and soon the electric train, we could say almost everywhere in the city) without going outside.