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

• wiredpancake 1y ago
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• maxlin 1y ago
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  • falcor84 1y ago
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  • koakuma-chan 1y ago
    What do you have against Lightning McQueen
    • maxlin 1y ago
      Well in this situation that he broke my shop's whole facade and possibly pinned me behind the counter :D
      • Cthulhu_ 1y ago
        Ka-chow!
• stephen_g 1y ago
  I think the thing that really struck a chord with me about car-centric development, as someone who lives in a city with fairly poor public transport (by certain standards, it would actually be quite good if it were in the US) and where driving is the norm for getting around - Prioritising cars actually makes things worse for drivers. We spend many tens of billions of dollars a year on roads in my state and traffic in the cities (and the highways between the biggest population centres in the south east corner where most of the people live) just keeps getting worse. When you give people real alternatives (convenient, frequent public transport, more cycling infrastructure, better planned cities so you can walk and cycle to things you need nearby) that actually gets people off the road and that is the one thing that can reduce traffic (apart from somewhere having a dwindling population). Focusing all out infrastructure spend and making cars the primary mode continues to make car driving worse, but people get angry when too much money is spent on public and active transport, because “not enough” is being spent on road infrastructure. So politicians spruik their “congestion busting” road spending, and it keeps getting worse. It’s wild. As someone for whom driving was just the default, I came around full circle.
  • giraffe_lady 1y ago
    Simply & beautifully satirized by the "bro just one more lane bro, bro I swear just one more lane and it'll fix the traffic bro," meme from a few years ago. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/one-more-lane-bro-one-more-lane-will-fix-it https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/one-more-lane-bro-one-more-la...
    • tialaramex 1y ago
      "One more lane" is so much easier to ridicule because of America, so thank you.
    • colejohnson66 1y ago
      Katy Freeway's at 26 and counting! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_10_in_Texas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_10_in_Texas
    • dijit 1y ago
      I actually counted these two: https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/002/417/129/282.png https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/002/417/129/282... If it's an average of 1.2 persons per car (which is the typical average) and counting roughly 1,200 cars on those images (in aggregate) it would take roughly 28-29 rail cars to transport this number of people. That's 3-5 trains worth. All that traffic could have been saved (in theory) by 3-5 trains. I don't imagine a train would serve all those people, but imagine the massive dent it would make to have good train systems between large population centers.
  • markus_zhang 1y ago
    Public transit needs a lot of money and time so I'm not sure it's even doable for many NA cities. One middle point I think might be more reachable is to build good transit for the busiest part of the city (downtown) and build large parking lots around the terminals, so people can still drive to the terminal and then switch to bus. I live in a suburb on the Montreal island and this is the model the city is trying to build IMO.
    • 1y ago
• markus_zhang 1y ago
  People also drive cars, so a better title is: Made for pedestrians, not cars.
  • Unmixed0039 1y ago
    No, people walk, run, shop, sit, use a bike and use a car, cars are just cars. If something is "built for cars" its just built for one of many tings people do. If its "built for people", it should be built for most of the tings people do.
    • vixen99 1y ago
      You learn something every day.
    • markus_zhang 1y ago
      Well people who drive probably cover much less road when they are not driving.
• flanked-evergl 1y ago
  In Norway the public transportation in Oslo has become so bad that it's essentially no longer reliable. If I want to get somewhere in time, I have to use a car or a bicycle. Also, the violence and sexual assaults on public transport is getting worse, the times that it does work it's completely overloaded, and the prices are insanely high and quite frankly becoming unaffordable with the insanely high inflation and interest rates. A city that was altered greatly to accommodate pedestrians has become a city that does not accommodate anyone. This is likely to be the outcome in other cities that take similar measures, governments always fail eventually, once it becomes impractical to use cars the country's economy will suffer greatly as a result, because there will come a time when the government just decides they don't care about public transport anymore and it can be as horrible as possible because nobody has any choices anymore.
  • octo888 1y ago
    Not to be a doomer but I think public transport has peaked in many places in Europe except the big famous standouts like Netherlands, Switzerland, Luxembourg etc The UK government for example is reducing subsidies for the railway and raising prices sometimes even 12-14% per year. This would be unimaginable 10 years ago. We have many railway workers who feel underpaid and some that feel they deserve the same pay as speciality doctors. This gets directly paid for by price rises. It is strike again /again/ for the railways. I think the time is now that governments don't care about public transport
    • flanked-evergl 1y ago
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    • panick21_ 1y ago
      This isn't really true. Lots of investment in public transit in the Nordic countries. Austria is doing quite well. Switzerland of course to. Italy is doing better then many would have expected 20 years ago. In Paris they are building some of the most massive expansion in a long time, and even many smaller cities are building tram lines, and the TGV is putting up record numbers. In the Baltic a massive rail expansion is happening. Former eastern countries like Czechia still have a good rail system and starting to upgrade it. Poland is upgrading in many places as well. Spain has globally the best construction cost for new infrastructure and they are expanding things like Madrid metro. The UK is doing badly as usual as of recently but despite the price rises, their network is incredibly full and well used. But I wouldn't take the UK as typical.
• IFC_LLC 1y ago
  It's all fine and dandy until you realize that economy pays a big buck for faster and more comfortable ways of transporting a body. (And it's been this way since time memorial). You either transport your body fast, or you are missing out. And the greatest thing to miss out is an opportunity. While programmers can live in one room for years and just use Zoom for everything, others can't. Sorry to say, but most of my European friends who were much anti-car, have changed their opinion after... buying a car. Being able to move in whatever direction at whatever time and being able to carry some stuff in your trunk makes your life convenient. Add to that the privacy and your personal AC and you won't be able to top it off. In South Africa personal vehicle means security at night. The only places where this works are the places where: 1. People live for retirement and pleasure. 2. The road infrastructure is just straight hell. (Like Portugal. It's bad in Lisbon. It is terrible in there). 3. Where you are not under any circumstances can be robbed by a random person on a street. So, the so-called cars problem is not something solvable. You just have to handle other factors to and cars will follow. I've seen cities where improvement in economic and social conditions led to the development of nice pedestrian and bike infrastructure.
  • woile 1y ago
    You can transport your body faster by walking than by taking a car. But of course, this depends on how you design a city. If I have a supermarket 5 minute walk from home, is going to be faster than taking the car out, and finding a parking lot and finally walking to the supermarket. And let's not forget, that if you want a more fair society, you cannot assume that just everybody can afford a car. I went to university by bus and it was a horrible experience. I could only dream of the modern cheap electric vehicles. But still, the city I studied has barely any infrastructure for this, and you risk your life every time, even though it would be PERFECT for this.
    • wiredpancake 1y ago
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  • CalRobert 1y ago
    Car infrastructure isn’t faster though, because it pushes everything apart. Noth America is a vast sea of parking with a building sprinkled here and there, so a five minute bike ride to shops with little parking is replaced by a thirty minute drive to a big box with 12 acres of parking.
• powvans 1y ago
  This is really amazing to see trending on HN. I spent a couple days in Pontevedra this summer while walking the Camino de Santiago. It was absolutely delightful and what I experienced aligns with the article. The old town was filled with wide streets almost exclusively for walking, cafes and restaurants that sprawled into plazas, and people young and old enjoying the car free public space. It was one of the first stops on our trip through Spain and as an American it was stunning. In America the contrast is stark. Most of our public spaces prioritize cars instead of people. I’m lucky to live near the beltline in Atlanta. It’s incredible to see how people flock to the beltline for a car free experience. It’s such a rare thing in America. Where it exists you can see that there is tremendous demand for it. Supply on the other hand is unfortunately very difficult to deliver.
  • deltarholamda 1y ago
    >Where it exists you can see that there is tremendous demand for it. Everybody loves public transit until they get panhandled for the jillionth time, or they witness (or experience) violence, or some other anti-social behavior sours the whole thing. I spent some time in NYC during the Giuliani years, after the city did a lot of work cleaning it all up: stopping turnstile jumpers, removing graffiti, more police, etc. It was great. You'd get the occasional guy that jumps on, makes a speech about how he's raising money for something or other, and walks around trying to sell chocolate bars. And there was the occasional dangerous person, insisting on getting up in your face. So long as this sort of behavior remains at a very low level, something like maybe once every couple of weeks, that's probably okay. But public transit loses all appeal if it happens often. If it rises to the level of violence, everybody starts thinking about the suburbs. Public transit requires a certain level of unspoken agreement. "We will all behave in this manner." If this unspoken agreement is broken often enough, then it must be enforced. If it is not, and other options present themselves, people will choose the other options. This happened en masse many decades ago in America. Those that could decamped for other places where their social expectations were met. I'm a big supporter of urbanism. I loathe the time I spend in my car, and I don't even have that far of a commute, but I have zero other options if I want to live where crime is low and the schools aren't dysfunctional. Until this is addressed, there is no argument about commuter density or efficiency of movement or anything else the proponents of public transit like to talk about that will make a lick of difference. The worst argument anybody can make is "but that's just life in the big city!" If so, then I'm not going to live and raise my family in the big city. Airy-fairy principles of efficiency or an arguable notion of convenience will not take precedence over safety and quality.
• cm2187 1y ago
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  • nemomarx 1y ago
    If the union strike is so inconvenient, management should agree on a deal promptly.
    • cm2187 1y ago
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      • loloquwowndueo 1y ago
        Can’t say I’ve ever heard anyone equating unionized workers to terrorists.
        • seszett 1y ago
          It actually happens quite often in France coming from right-wing politicians. Strikers are "hostage takers", demonstrators are "vandals", etc. It's all part of the theatre to discredit opposition.
          • loloquwowndueo 1y ago
            Interesting. Thanks for sharing!
      • giraffe_lady 1y ago
        Is that a demand any group has actually made of him?
        • cm2187 1y ago
          It actually was under Chirac. But you can transpose that logic to any hostage situation of your choosing.
• djoldman 1y ago
  https://archive.ph/9z7IP https://archive.ph/9z7IP
  • stanac 1y ago
    Thank you, this comment should be higher (maybe even sticky), we managed to kill the original server (504).
• oldpersonintx2 1y ago
  Fifteen-Minute Cities and Chat Control are brought to you by the same people
  • SilverElfin 1y ago
    Yep. It comes down to attacking the options and freedom individuals can have.
    • bigyabai 1y ago
      Curious to read this in the history of two accounts who were so personally offended by online speech in the following week. The bible did warn ye: "Speak of the devil and he shall appear."
• CalRobert 1y ago
  My favourite thing about living in the Netherlands is that kids have freedom. They can bike to school, their friends’ houses, sports, town etc and parents aren’t their taxi. Growing up in suburban California I was basically in an outdoor prison until I could drive.
  • mettamage 1y ago
    > Growing up in suburban California I was basically in an outdoor prison until I could drive. Having grown up in the Netherlands and having a decision to make where we want our kids to grow up (US spouse), this feels painful to read. I suppose the SWE salaries aren't worth it. Also this is one of the best towns to cycle in the Netherlands: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-TuGAHR78w&ab_channel=NotJustBikes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-TuGAHR78w&ab_channel=NotJu...
    • CalRobert 1y ago
      Agreed, last summer we contemplated moving back to CA for work but wouldn’t want that for our kids. And hello from Houten :-). If you’re here and want to talk bikes maybe we could have a coffee some time!
      • jonasdegendt 1y ago
        Hacker News bike meet when? We'll have to get jerseys! :^)
        • CalRobert 1y ago
          Sounds good! I’m in Houten :-)
    • rollcat 1y ago
      Shout out to @NotJustBikes in general. Infrastructure should be built for humans first. This benefits cars as well: more accessible for walking / cycling / public transport = less congested for when you do need a car.
• nerdjon 1y ago
  I really wish the US could get more of this. I know here in Boston this has been a hot issue with the summer shutdown of Newberry on Sunday. Drivers will come out of nowhere and complain, will start suddenly caring about people with disabilities (of course in no car areas we will figure out how emergency vehicles, deliveries, and people with disabilities will get around). Sure our public transit system needs a lot of work, but that is not an argument for keeping the current car centric system we have in place now. Cars obviously have their use cases and I can also understand why most of the US will never do this. But the car culture within cities is insane.
• mytailorisrich 1y ago
  Taking car transport to the extreme is bad, but the narrative that life in a small flat and commute by public transport is the future is dystopian, too. The "air pollution" argument is disappearing fast as well with the ongoing transition to EVs. What we need is a good balance. Pedestrians, bicycles, public transport, and cars.
  • CalRobert 1y ago
    How is it dystopian? I loved having a small flat in a city where I biked everywhere. When I needed a car I used on demand rentals.
  • daveliepmann 1y ago
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    • mytailorisrich 1y ago
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      • Zigurd 1y ago
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        • SilverElfin 1y ago
          They do get the benefits of cars either directly or indirectly. People live better lives and the economy works better when you can travel at the speed of a car straight to your destination, instead of dealing with the slowness of cycling or public transit.
      • deleted 1y ago
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      • pirates 1y ago
        > I feel like I stepped into a meeting of an anti-car cult... Every single thread or post about anything adjacent to cars or public transportation devolves into this. There is hardly any nuance, little effort is made to respond in good faith, and there are insults and insinuations thrown around all the time. Anyone perceived as being on the “wrong side” is instantly given a label and mocked. You don’t even have to be overzealous about it. Even the most benign comment will have someone piling on usually. “Just one more bus bro”
• abraxas 1y ago
  North Americans visiting Europe often grapple with why they enjoy European cities more than North American ones. It's often perceived as an architecture issue ("Europe has historical buildings that we don't have") but very few notice that the main difference is the urban scale and the resulting walkability. The Netherlands has plenty of modernist and even brutalist architecture yet every city there is a pretty nice place to be. This is because they know how to scale cities to human centric proportions. The layout of buildings together with the connective tissue of tram lines, bike lanes and sidewalks is what makes their cities alive and safe, not elaborate building facades (although they have some of that as well).
  • Cthulhu_ 1y ago
    Important to note is how most cities have two (or more) zones; the old inner city for leisure, tourism, shopping and going out, the suburban areas around it where most people live, and industrial / office building estates where most people work. Amsterdam is a great example [0] and well-known for a lot of tourists, with the city center being the tourism hub, the zones around it for living, west/northwest for industry/shopping, south for highrise offices and football stadiums, etc. Most tourists won't go that far out though. [0] https://www.amsterdamsights.com/about/neighborhoods.html https://www.amsterdamsights.com/about/neighborhoods.html
    • abraxas 1y ago
      I spent two weeks in Amsterdam South where I rented an apartment. Commuting to the centre on a tram or even cycling there was no problem. Even though the centre is where most tourists hang out, the surrounding neighbourhoods are just as walkable and bikeable as the inner city.
    • panick21_ 1y ago
      Cities always have many areas. And of course the outer areas are not as good as the tourist focused inner city, but they are generally still pretty good urbanism. Even European subburbs are generally better, smaller roads, more mixed use, more trees, more dynamics, more commercial and building times mixed in. The extreme separation between building types that became the standard in US zoning-codes simple never happened to the same extent in Europe.
• whatever1 1y ago
  That’s cute. But if you don’t have the public transportation infrastructure & enough housing it’s totally infeasible. People who drive the cars are not the city residents. They are the ones who cannot afford living in the city and have to commute from far away.
  • eigenspace 1y ago
    This is a very backwards way of looking at the issue. The public transportation infrastructure and denser housing used to exist throughout north American cities, but was bulldozed to make room for comically wide roads, oversized single family houses (increasinly occupied by empty-nesters not utilizing all the now empty space), parking lots, malls, and big box stores. Car centric design caused these problems, and moving away from car centric design is how you fix them.
    • whatever1 1y ago
      Did they also bulldoze the skyscrapers that we are missing to house all of the suburbs population in the cities ? It’s nice to believe in fairytales, but what you are proposing is effectively cutting access of poor people to opportunities so that the rich can bike to their cafe safely.
      • eigenspace 1y ago
        Skyscrapers add density but they're only part of the solution. North American cities have plenty of skyscrapers and plenty of single family homes but they have a servere lack of dense multi family housing units. > It’s nice to believe in fairytales, but what you are proposing is effectively cutting access of poor people to opportunities so that the rich can bike to their cafe safely. This is such a stupid populist argument. It's poor people that are hurt the most by lack of access to affordable dense multi family housing units in north american cities. Making poor families move further and further away from cities to find housing and then waste multiple hours a day sitting in traffic (and waste huge amounts of money on cars) is a ridiculous solution to affordability in cities. It's rich people who can afford detached single family houses close to city centers, or fancy condos in skyscrapers. It's everyone else who are better served by more modest 3-4 story tall dense housing units.
• dominojab 1y ago
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• nakamoto_damacy 1y ago
  I was walking in a narrow street in Granada, Spain yesterday and two guys on their scooters where going at 40mph, on a street meant mostly for pedestrians. They pollute like cars (the stink is the same, even if smaller engine.) When people talk about cars ruining cities designed for walking, they should include scooters. They look cute in movies but they are not so pleasant to have around in practice. I don't mind the electric scooters the type you stand on because if you're going really fast on a narrow pedestrian and you hit someone it won't be so fatal, and you will get hurt probably equally, so people generally don't ride them at maximum speed. Also, they're essential for take-away food delivery.
• techlatest_net 1y ago
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• outime 1y ago
  Pontevedra has around 80K inhabitants, so it's practical to design it this way. But when cities are much bigger, problems start to arise. Not everyone can afford to live in the center (nor is there space for them, and building taller than a certain number of meters or floors is often forbidden for various reasons), so people begin moving farther out. Sure, there's public transport... but only until it takes six times longer than driving a car - and that's not even counting all the issues public transport has in many places, which some people deny even exist, although doesn't matter to me because I just experienced them first hand way too many times (I have never owned a car until recently). At that point, you might as well move farther out to a nicer house, less expenses and just drive a bit longer.
  • tirant 1y ago
    It's not about being bigger, but having high population density. Obviously in larger cities it will take longer to travel from one extreme to the other, but that is a similar problem as trying to travel to another city. Trips that are 20km long need to be treated as such, no matter if they're in the same city or not. Some suburbs in Barcelona and Madrid have more than 20K hab/km2. And they are expected to have as low car transit as other European cities with around 3K to 6K hab/km2. It is obvious that even though lots of people might be able to switch to alternative ways of transportation car is still extremely useful for many use cases. The solution is the right city design: more populated areas in the district centers, and less densely populated areas towards the outskirts. Spain is terrible at this, as they design high density areas everywhere. Americans do the opposite, it's mostly all low density. A balanced solution is how dutch cities are designed. You can live in your own garden house, while having access to commerce, offices in higher density areas, just by 5-20minutes by bike (up to 5-6km).
  • Etheryte 1y ago
    Cities can scale far further than that and cars make the situation worse, not better. The Amsterdam metropolitan area houses in the ballpark of two and a half million people, most of them not living in the city center.
  • notTooFarGone 1y ago
    >Sure, there's public transport... but only until it takes six times longer than driving a car if everyone is driving, noone is. This is simple game theory and a system fault happens when there are too many cars. You can't widen city streets. For example: public transportation in NY is often faster and cheaper than a car + parking.
• alerighi 1y ago
  The problem that car solved years ago, is the following: you can develop a city without cars up to a point where the distance that you have to move to get to your work, or the supermarket, the hospital, etc is at max some km, let's say not more than 10/20. That has the consequence that all people wants to live in the city center, and not in peripherals areas. This has the consequence of making the cost of an house (or rent) go up to a point where most people can't even afford it, while the salary that you get in the city rests more or less the same. Having a lot of people concentrated living in a small place produces also other unwanted effects, that lower the quality of living. Cars allow us to develop our society not in big cities, but in rather small towns, without ugly skyscrapers of 20 floors but with nice houses where everyone can afford, for example, to have its own property, with its own garden, its own peace, without having being forced to share its living space with people he didn't choose. To me cars, and now also remote work, are a benefit because they allow us to live in a more sustainable way. Thanks to car we can think of reclaiming villages where all the population migrated to the cities in the past years. Example in Italy, where I live, why should I go to live in Milan, where houses cost 10 times the rest of the country, while having a car and a job that allows me to remote work at least half the week I can live in a small village near Milan and reach it by car when needed? To me a society without cars is a less free society, in fact the development of the USA to me is to take as an example, while where they didn't have cars is the Soviet Union, and look at it...
  • eigenspace 1y ago
    If you haven't discovered the problems with this model, then it's only because not enough of your neighbours have had the same idea. Look around at places with very high car use (especially in North America) and you'll discover that this solution simply does not scale. Cars take up a gigantic amount of room on roads, and even gigantic highways like Onatrio's 401 [1] just have not been able to keep up with the level of sprawl that occurs when people move out of the city to surrounding suburbs and commute into the city by car. Adding lanes to the highway does not help and just induces more traffic on it, and it also causes all the surrounding villages to sprawl outwards until they become indistinct blobs that merge into the nearby metropolitan city. Trains are a much better solution to this problem because they have way better throughput, don't destroy cities with massive highways and parking garages, and encourage denser development that lets nearby villages retain their character and size. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario_Highway_401 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario_Highway_401
• pjmlp 1y ago
  First sort out how people can manage to visit cities without having to own a car on first place. Most European villages and town are unreachable without cars. Some can already consider themselves lucky if there is a daily connection into one direction. Everyone likes to think we are all living in Paris, Berlin within city boundaries.
  • randunel 1y ago
    The topic is about cities, not about rural areas. No cars in cities, simple. This concept will probably blow your mind: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_and_ride https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_and_ride Imagine a city without personal cars in its inner limits. Residents who decide to own a personal car can park it in a Park&Ride which also includes unlimited transit access for the duration of the parking. Deliveries, you say? Those aren't personal cars, but I'll comply. Businesses will be able to drive in the cities, within the permitted times/routes. Emergency vehicles? Those aren't personal cars, either. They're also allowed.
    • pjmlp 1y ago
      I live in Germany, and don't need any lessons in Park and Ride. What I need is a transport infrastructure that cares about people that live outside city central area. Maybe it will blow your mind that with P+R some of us take about 2h to come to work, versus 45m with a car. Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy? P+R isn't even a known concept.
      • randunel 1y ago
        Show me a city which banned personal cars and we'll check whether P+R transit to anywhere within is 2h. You can't, because there is no such city. It's personal cars that slow down transit, including preventing new rails being built to not dismay cherished drivers.
        • pjmlp 1y ago
          Pity that such miracle cities don't exist for people living in the suburbs, with their 4x connections on average, from door to door.
• throejd84mrifmr 1y ago
  How about we enforce existing laws first?!!! It is dangerous for pedestrians to walk on sidewalks, because cyclists on their electric motorbikes are driving there 30 mph! Aggresive off-leash dogs are everywhere! Entire cities, parks and streets are one big dog toilet!
  • okokwhatever 1y ago
    can't understand why your opinion is down rated. You're so right pal.
• alfor 1y ago
  So a tax financed site telling how it's great to have more tax and regulations. Not surprising. Find it very weird to have government trying to gerrymander things just as we are on the cusp of EV transition and autonomy. Go take a ride in a Tesla with FSD, the future is here, let it come in, get out of the way. In a few years with autonomous vehicles the need for vehicle ownership wild radically decrease and with that a huge need for parking space will simply vanish. What I suggest instead: make electricity super cheap use all the ways possible create space for charger system but let brands compete( don't over regulate) Allow autonomous system to operate, be a trailblazer in the field.
  • Raudius 1y ago
    The car-centric alternative requires more expensive infrastructure and more aggressive zoning regulations Your EV argument does not address the main issue of urban sprawl in car-centric design and how the ever-increasing infrastructure costs (and decreased revenue: parking lots dont create wealth) are bankrupting cities.
• AlexandrB 1y ago
  One factor here is the perception of safety. To choose public transit over a car, you have to feel safe walking to/from the station and you have to feel safe riding the train. This is especially true if you are at a physical disadvantage because of gender, disability, age, whatever. Because it's a perception thing, this is not just about statistics. A dirty, chaotic subway station just feels threatening to passengers. I've ridden public transit in a bunch of cities, and this makes a huge difference to how welcoming the experience is. Hong Kong is #1 for me. The trains and stations are clean enough to eat off of - probably cleaner than my car. On/off boarding is fast and orderly even during peak travelling hours. This is not a universal, and there are definitely cities where I would hesitate to take public transit if I had some other choice - which is the root of the problem when you're trying to convince a population to fund and use such a system instead of bringing their cars.
  • sebstefan 1y ago
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    • AlexandrB 1y ago
      No amount of "transit is more efficient" statistics is going to convince someone to ride it if they feel unsafe. Pretending that these are not real concerns just makes sure that we'll keep building monster highways.
      • sebstefan 1y ago
        There's no amount of convincing that is going to make them feel safe, you need to get them to use it, and change their opinion that way. They're not gonna use it unless you build it, and they're not gonna use it unless it becomes more convenient than the car. Right now you've got 3 unreliable bus lines, each bus 30 minutes apart, service stops at 8pm and the schedule is useless because they get stuck in traffic. Consequence is, nobody uses it and there's always a crackhead in the back (they're part of the population that actually uses it to get around even when it's inconvenient) My point is, you can clean busses regularly (and you should but -), you can put a cop on every bus, you can do a lot of things to improve "the feeling of safety", but it's not going to offset inconvenience, and you won't need to do all that if you just make public transport the most convenient way to get around in your city. Except cleaning them. You'll still need to clean the bus.
• mykowebhn 1y ago
  There are (at least) two Youtube channels, Ray Delahanty | CityNerd and Not Just Bikes, that really drive home the point in their videos that car-centric cities really stink. https://www.youtube.com/@CityNerd https://www.youtube.com/@CityNerd https://www.youtube.com/@NotJustBikes https://www.youtube.com/@NotJustBikes
  • loudmax 1y ago
    The Not Just Bikes channel really makes clear the benefits of living in an environment that isn't designed around cars, but also the challenge of designing such an environment. You can't just plop in some busses and bike lanes and expect immediate improvement, you really need to think about transportation holistically. This means considering how cars, trucks, busses, bikes, pedestrians and everything will interact. The Netherlands is lauded as a model, but it took them decades to get where they are today. This isn't to say that we can't do it in the US or Asia or anywhere else, but that we should be clear-eyed about the magnitude of the challenge.
    • Vinnl 1y ago
      This is true, but urban mobility in the Netherlands was already great a few decades ago. It's just that once you get to that point, further improvements aren't that controversial anymore, because the benefits are obvious. Thus, the situation just kept on improving, and is doing so to this day.
      • Doxin 1y ago
        While true, it's also important to remind that until the 70s we were on a path to MORE car traffic, MORE traffic deaths, etc. It took a significant protest for the tide to turn. Google around for "Stop de kindremoord" -- which translates to "Stop infanticide" -- to see the sheer scale of it all. There's plenty of english language articles on the topic. Long story short: change is possible, but rarely easy. Even in places where it seems like things have always been like they are now.
        • 1y ago
• unglaublich 1y ago
  Don't forget to throw out the stinking loud gas mopeds and motorbikes while you're at it!
  • Ekaros 1y ago
    And taxis. Or whatever new bullshit name they use.
• baby 1y ago
  I'm always wondering how Americans feel traveling to Europe and being able to walk in cities. It must be so surreal that they either have to move, or they can't fathom that these cities are practical to live in.
  • jhickok 1y ago
    Believe it or not, we do have cities in the US with walkable areas :) I am in Madison, Wisconsin and we have a number of areas like State Street where walking is the norm: https://visitdowntownmadison.com/ https://visitdowntownmadison.com/ By and large this is not the case but it isn't as if it's unimaginable what it would be like.
    • baby 1y ago
      I've visited Madison and really liked it, but I wouldn't compare it to the walkability of any European city
  • betaby 1y ago
    > traveling to Europe and being able to walk in cities All of Greece is car oriented. Of course if you stay near Acropolis you get the impression of walk-ability. Spain outside of the historic city centers is car oriented. Average mileage traveled by car per person in Germany is about the same as is in Canada. I can continue your generalization about my home city - Montreal. Which is walk-able .. but not really, see the second part here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yDtLv-7xZ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yDtLv-7xZ4
  • Workaccount2 1y ago
    New York City at least is extremely walk able/bike able and car unfriendly.
    • baby 1y ago
      I live in New York as a European and damn, it's very pedestrian unfriendly, you have to cross these large roads everywhere, so much noise pollution, roads are so large. It's still the most pedestrian friendly city in the US, and that's why I'm here, but incomparable with Europe
• Sharlin 1y ago
  In my city (Tampere, Finland, pop. ~260,000) the annual number of traffic accidents leading to injury has halved since 2010. A big driver has been the decision in 2015 to lower the speed limits on all local streets from 40km/h (25 mi/h) to 30 km/h (~20 mi/h), with appropriate traffic calming measures implemented where necessary. (Industrial zones are exempt.) A map link showing the current state: https://kartat.tampere.fi/oskari?zoomLevel=7&coord=327979.56718540326_6820416.5703343395&mapLayers=1918+100+raster,2787+100+&uuid=0ee42977-540a-42e6-9107-bc9767d00fac&noSavedState=true&showIntro=false https://kartat.tampere.fi/oskari?zoomLevel=7&coord=327979.56...
  • asimovDev 1y ago
    I hope the traffic calming measure is the speed display that shows a sad face when you are speeding.
    • Sharlin 1y ago
      Well, there are a couple of those. But mainly we’re talking about the basic things: narrowing lanes, speed bumps, raised zebra crossings, preventing through traffic, rebuilding intersections as roundabouts and so on. The key points to preventing speeding are * reducing drivers' perceived safety, and * making it more uncomfortable for the drivers to speed.
  • fransje26 1y ago
    That's an area surrounded by a lot of water! TIL that Nokia originated in Tampere. Thank you for the information sharing!
    • Sharlin 1y ago
      A lot of water indeed, and it’s not even considered a part of what’s called the Finnish Lakeland proper! [1] And yep, Nokia is literally the name of the town it originates from. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Lakeland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_Lakeland
• darkamaul 1y ago
  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 their minimal share of actual mobility. And I'm all in favor in further reducing car lanes, parking spots... [0] in french - https://www.airparif.fr/actualite/2025/comment-la-qualite-de-lair-sest-elle-amelioree-entre-2012-et-2022-paris https://www.airparif.fr/actualite/2025/comment-la-qualite-de... [1] https://www.transportshaker-wavestone.com/urban-transports-spatial-footprint-much-space-used-transports-city/?utm_source=chatgpt.com https://www.transportshaker-wavestone.com/urban-transports-s...
  • Saline9515 1y ago
    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's the same everywhere, as most European cities are dominated by 20-35yo people. They vote for green parties and then move out when they have children, as they realize that the policies they supported are not child- or family-friendly at all. The extreme example is Seoul, with its zones where kids are forbidden. It's a shame, as families require more public services and infrastructure (hospitals, schools, playgrounds, swimming pools, and so on), but they are being pushed away by childless youngsters who hate cars. Unfortunately, no middle ground seems acceptable for this crowd, so I'm unconvinced that it will change. Another negative aspect is that cyclists do not use public transportation, so they lead municipalities to decrease investment in this sector, which is, however, the most inclusive, safe and efficient way to move people around. This is also seen in Paris, where the bus speed has never been so slow, the fleet is aging,, while the city hall spends like a teenager on a weekend trip with daddy's credit card on new bike lanes. In the EU at least, the next nail in the coffin will be the low-emissions zones that will make it prohibitively expensive to enter/leave the center, forcing families to leave metropolises altogether. [0] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2025/09/06/why-the-middle-class-are-fleeing-paris/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2025/09/06/why-the-mi...
• paganel 1y ago
  That's how the EU liberals are losing the last drop of good-will that they have from the general (lumpen) populace. But good for them they all stand behind gentrification.
• meetpatelcurry 1y ago
  [dead]
• panick21_ 1y ago
  What this article doesn't mention is that economically, people are so much more productive then cars. The land value of your city will be so much better if you have a walkable city. Walkable is always the start, then you map bikes, and public transport on top. You will have city that is economically productive and vibrant.
• knolan 1y ago
  I feel like a bit of a failure when it comes to transport. I tried for many years to cycle to work in Dublin covering 25km on an ebike, but gave up after several nasty incidents that almost resulted in serious injury (for example my head almost going under the wheel of a van). I've experienced so much hatred, verbal and physical violence from drivers — and I'm the kind of cyclist that is fully lit, clad in high-vis and stopping at all traffic lights. About a year ago I started to take the bus. My commute went from an hour on the bike to over two hours. Spending four hours a day on a bus to travel such a short distance is not a fun experience. The bus meanders through a city choked with traffic. It's often faster if I get off and walk that part of the journey (I've checked). I enjoyed cycling for the most part. It was great for fitness and clearing my head. The parts of my commute away from cars were beautiful but there was a significant risk of death or serious injury every time I got on the bike. More and more drivers are buried in their phones. Cycle or bus and you'll see this. The bus was slowly killing me. It was hard to work as the crowded bus wobbled around narrow Dublin streets along with various degrees of anti-social behaviour. I got off the bus angry and frustrated and groggy. I've just bought a small little electric car and I can get to work in around 40 minutes. I don't have to listen to other people's loud voice calls or TikToks that are so loud they penetrate through ANC. I don't have to ask someone to make space on the seat they are occupying all by themselves and their bag and endure the dirty looks for it. I don't have to wait and wait for buses that never show up. I hate the bus. I hate that I hate the bus. I feel like a failure for having to buy a second car but I fucking tried! I'm happy in my car. It's fun to drive and it makes me happy and guilty. I feel like I have so much more freedom. I'm not tied to the bus schedule which placed very tight limits on my time, and the bus frequently didn't show. Otherwise it would take much longer to get home. I can stop by somewhere on the way home and pick something up. Like the bike, I am by myself in the car and I can decompress. I can sing if I want. It makes no sense for a 25km commute to take two hours. Its madness. By travelling from one suburb to another via the city centre the bus becomes wholly impractical. A public transport system has to work so that people leave their car at home. London worked for me, I got the tube everywhere. Valencia has an amazing public transport system. Dublin is completely broken.
  • sensanaty 1y ago
    This is a problem when the public transport system isn't built with these exact issues in mind. You're right, it shouldn't take 2 hours for that commute, and all the other issues you pointed out are legitimate. The problem is that the infrastructure hasn't been adapted to make things better for the people using public transport. As a comparison to the Netherlands, public transport always has right of way vs regular traffic, they have their own dedicated lanes that traffic isn't allowed into (this includes taxis! They can use the public transport lanes) and even their traffic signals treat them preferentially. I take a bus very often, and quite often it won't stop at a single red light because the traffic lights are programmed to help the flow of public transport, despite the street it travels on having 5 or 6 different traffic lights. In many cities, only public transport is allowed in some of the denser streets too, so they don't have to compete with other drivers on the road. Trams, metros and trains are pretty obvious as to why they work so well. Same with bike lanes. First of all, whenever they can be they are wholly separated from the main traffic and live in their own independent lanes. If a bike has to join regular streets, they have the right of way and these situations are kept at an absolute minimum. The streets and intersections themselves are also designed so that drivers are forced into driving safely via traffic easing measures and low speed limits. Plus, everyone here bikes, so there isn't the same type of animosity or stigma you see elsewhere because drivers understand what it's like to be a cyclist and view it as a normal thing. So it's not your fault and you shouldn't feel bad, it's the fault of your government for not investing into proper public transport infrastructure. They are trying to squeeze in public transport infra into existing road infra, whereas what they should be doing is redesigning the current infra to make sure public transport is better integrated. And, guess what, the roads here are still awesome for drivers! Other than the centers of the bigger cities, there isn't much congestion to speak of and the highways are of extremely high quality (to the point we have a billion memes about feeling the bumps of Belgium as soon as you cross the border). It's not like NL is a car-free utopia, something like 65% of people still have cars, the difference is that there are alternate options that are just as good, and often better than driving. That's the secret sauce to good public transport.
• dinkblam 1y ago
  > Made for People, Not Cars cars are just people that move from A to B. if there is no sensible way to move where you need to go it is not a city made for humans but just hostile to people and their requirements. i need exactly 63 downvotes please, don't be cheap.
  • fsflover 1y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45196547 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45196547
• nonethewiser 1y ago
  I feel like this common conversation is missing a dimension. Car vs. public transport is too flat. I prefer that cities are walkable and have good inter and intra public transport. So I'm with the anti-car crowd on that. However, I do not prefer cities in general. So I'm with the pro-car people on this one. I enjoy the trend of spacious car-friendly suburbs and rural areas. I value the space and freedom over the conveniences of the city.
• alistairSH 1y ago
  I love this quote from the mayor: The fact that you park your private car in a public space is crazy: if you don’t have room for your freezer, do you put it on the sidewalk?
  • nonethewiser 1y ago
    I dont think its a very good analogy. I completely understand dedicating space to public transport instead of cars. But dedicating space to cars seems entirely reasonable in isolation, because the city has an interest in making it possible to get there. Parking spaces store cars - but is that their entire function? Or is that just an aspect of enabling people to drive into the city? Consider the fact that you cannot in fact store a freezer in a public parking space. Nor even a car, actually, beyond a certain period of time, precisely because it's all about enabling movement.
    • alistairSH 1y ago
      Yeah, it's a not perfect analogy. But, when talking about the expectation* that every public space have acres of free-to-use public parking, it makes a fair amount of sense. * In my experience, this is a very common expectation in the USA.
    • EE84M3i 1y ago
      Many places have on street parking that is used by residents (e.g. you get the "have to move my car twice a month because of street sweepers" effect). It's possible that's what the quote is referring to. Compare Brookline MA, which allows on-street parking, but only during the day to neighborhoods in Boston proper which has free on-street parking permits for residents.
  • tfrutuoso 1y ago
    I don't pay nearly weekly road taxes for my freezer. I pay for my cars and bikes, so that the law grants me that ability to park. It's easy to understand.
• xyzelement 1y ago
  I love walking - both in places as a tourist, in NYC where I lived most of my life, and in my small north shore Long Island town today. But similar to any other "product" the evaluation depends on the user's needs. As a single guy I loved that NYC was dense and walkable - because that meant (among other things) literally millions of date-able women within a 30 minute walk radius of my house. Great! Now as a dad of 3 I don't care about that at all - and the lower density suburb let's me have a backyard for my kids and makes shopping easy, or taking the kids to activities (yes you can do all those things without a car but people chose not to when they have choice) There should be some sort of mom-friendliness factor in these conversations. If my whole town is old people, terminally single younger people and migrants (as seems to be the case for the city in question) then high density walk ability is perfect. What's the density and transportation situation in places people actually have kids?
  • stetrain 1y ago
    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 communities up and down a 4-lane 45mph highway and where the line of cars picking up kids from school each day backs out onto the road and blocks traffic.
    • ascagnel_ 1y ago
      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 <15 minutes on foot from multiple public parks, restaurants, shops, etc. 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 everything far apart enough to significantly hurt walkability.
• freetime2 1y ago
  These threads always turn into fights between car vs. non-car people. But the answer should just be more of everything. More bike lanes, car lanes, buses, trains, parking, etc. Close a street or two off to car traffic, maybe just on weekends initially, to create a nice walkable downtown area. People always seem to talk about these things like it's one size fits all, when needs vary massively from one city to another. And even from one neighborhood to another. Bike lanes and public transport will reduce traffic congestion as long as they are well-designed and people actually use them. And being able to get into a car and drive somewhere is incredibly convenient when traffic is light and parking is plentiful.
  • sebstefan 1y ago
    Where do you put the "more car lanes"? Houston is almost entirely lanes and parking, they're still congested. At which point do you have enough car lanes? The rest of the lanes sure; a fully used bike lane like Boulevard de Sébastopol is worth 8 lanes of car traffic. That helps. But more car lanes?
    • freetime2 1y ago
      > Where do you put the "more car lanes"? I'm not very familiar with Houston, but a quick google search shows that there is a big project underway right now to add more lanes in Houston [1]. So it would seem that civil engineers there have found a place to put more car lanes that they think will help with traffic congestion. > At which point do you have enough car lanes? As long as Houston is growing (currently it is the second fastest growing city in the US), I don't think there will ever be enough. They need to continuously improve their transportation infrastucture to keep up with a growing population. As I said above, I think this should include bike lanes and public transportation too. But if engineers identify a solution to alleviate traffic congestion by building more roads, then I think that is worth considering, too. [1] https://www.txdot.gov/about/newsroom/local/houston/i45-construction-begins-in-houston.html https://www.txdot.gov/about/newsroom/local/houston/i45-const...
  • nonethewiser 1y ago
    I would say more of everything but NOT all in the same place.
• wonderwonder 1y ago
  I am going to be downvoted for this but I am not wrong. The thing most mass transportation advocates need to understand when it comes to the US is that we don't want cars necessarily for convenience, we want them to be able to avoid other people. We don't want to have to endure the constant micro aggressions of other passengers. We certainly don't want to have to endure the assaults, murders and rapes that happen. We don't want to be forced to mix with the most violent of society while unarmed and packed liked sardines. Every argument you make about cars being more dangerous are 100% valid, we just don't care. We would rather die 10 times due to an accident than a violent murder. Its just our nature. Until you can get crime to essentially zero or ensure either an armed officer in every train car or allow citizens to carry mass transportation will not be a thing in the US. Especially not in Red states. I'm talking complete removal of all inconveniences, including things as minor as someone playing their music loudly on a blue tooth speaker. This murder of the Ukrainian woman combined with the treatment of Penny essentially killed any hope of mass transit being popular in Red states for the next 100 years. I am not arguing for or against Penny's actions I am simply stating the effect that it had on most people that support what he did, the same people that would need to support mass transit for it to catch on. Again I am not arguing numbers here, mass transportation is obviously statistically safer than car travel by a massive degree. I am arguing human nature. We will not subject ourselves to criminals and intentional violence when there is an alternative no matter how much more dangerous that alternative ends up being
  • Zigurd 1y ago
    [flagged]
    • wonderwonder 1y ago
      Why would I move to Texas when Florida is perfect
      • Zigurd 1y ago
        Having been in Miami area traffic, I have to concede the point.
• Gud 1y ago
  Writing this on a tram in Zürich. At this hour(peak hours) they depart ever 2-3 minutes or so. Walking distance is 50 meters. It feels great. Now let me hear your objections to why public transport could never work at your location
  • Saline9515 1y ago
    Public transport usually requires a medium-to-high density to be sustainable. However, it can get saturated - in Paris, the subway and the trams are full for long periods during the day, even at midnight! It makes the experience really unpleasant when you have no alternative.
    • GeoAtreides 1y ago
      Man, you really public transportation, you've been all over this thread sniping every positive comment about public transportation
      • Saline9515 1y ago
        I love quality public transportation. The problem is that most of the time people make cities less car-friendly, but don't improve public transport, as it's expensive and their electorate wants bike lanes, making the situation worse for everyone. In my city, they removed the parking space near the farmer's market, but didn't add any bus line or renovate the tram, which doesn't allow disabled people or just strollers to hop in. How are we supposed to come there?
        • gs17 1y ago
          > The problem is that most of the time people make cities less car-friendly, but don't improve public transport, That's my complaint too. We've added plenty of things to make driving worse where I am, but there's no real alternative presented. I can walk a mile to a bus stop in the sun where the bus may or may not show up for an hour (they promise they will improve it eventually) and will then drop me off somewhere I still have to walk most of a mile from. They made the road to the bus stop a bit worse to walk on and I gave up. I would love to not have to drive. But I'm not really given the option, I'm just given less parking so that there's a nice bike lane I can jump into when someone comes barrelling down the sidewalk.
• epolanski 1y ago
  Prioritizing people is by any means the way to go, but it's not hassle-free. It has an impact on businesses and delivery operators that end up being obstructed. Ideally I think one should move towards layered cities, pedestrians on the ground while beneath them roads, parkings and especially train and train carts thrive.
• tim-fan 1y ago
  I'm hoping for a self driving taxi + trains combo to maybe solve the problem. For one a self driving taxi fleet could take up vastly less space - you'd no longer need one car per person, you'd need far fewer parking spots, most cars could be single or double seaters again taking less space and running more efficiently. The space savings could be used to boost rail-based public transit options, which would see more adoption as self driving taxis make last-mile transport cheaper and easier. A bunch of positive feedback loops driving public transit adoption and improvements. Result is cleaner and more efficient transport for all, and vast amounts of space returned from serving cars to serving people. At least that's the dream!
• uyzstvqs 1y ago
  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 applies to about 99% of the country's roadworks, and it works really well. Adding onto that, sentences like "made for people, not cars" absolutely validate my point that this is nothing but populist activism. I'm hoping that we can all have a honest, intellectual discussion on how to make infrastructure better for everyone. Just make sure to always remember in every discussion about this topic: it is never either-or, not even in the densely populated Netherlands.
  • tuesdaynight 1y ago
    I understand where it's coming from, but I have to disagree about the populist activism part. I don't think that pedestrians should worry about how to fit cars in their proposed solutions. That's something for the car proposers to do. It's not like the other way around is different. Just take a walk in any big city and you will see how pedestrians are a second thought in most of the roads.
    • uyzstvqs 1y ago
      I'd argue that the design of public infrastructure should be a discussion which every citizen is equally involved in, with the goal of finding a solution that works for all. Chanting an us-versus-them narrative does nothing but stifle this discussion, and accepting it as legitimate results in decisions being made by special interest groups (team-car or team-pedestrian) rather than the residents whom actually make use of the infrastructure in question.
  • zozbot234 1y ago
    You can have streets which are car-friendly (for exceptional or emergency purposes where you need the car) by getting rid of all frivolous car use. There's no feasible alternative, because congestion always destroys car-friendliness except in very sparsely populated areas. And you can only eliminate that congestion by promoting more scalable alternatives to the use of private motor vehicles.
• cognomano 1y ago
  TL;DR: «Only “necessary traffic” is allowed in Pontevedra: vehicles used for emergency and public safety, public services (including garbage and water trucks, etc.), transportation of people with reduced mobility, and accessing private garages are permitted 24/7. However, loading and unloading for commercial supplies, home delivery, transporting bulky objects, and house moving and related activities, are permitted only during certain hours.»
• felineflock 1y ago
  Urban is usually associated with panhandling, trash, public urination and crime. > "Galicia is mainly and historically ruled by the right-wing Popular Party"... (Galician Nationalist Bloc) So they likely have much stricter standards of what constitutes acceptable urban behavior... ... than, say, New York, where very recently a person with 30-year criminal history has allegedly killed a couple... ... or in Charlotte, where an Ukrainian refugee was fatally stabbed in the light rail.
  • vkou 1y ago
    Or Memphis, which is smack dab in the middle of a permanently Republican supermajority state, yet has three times the murder rate and twice the robbery rate of NYC. Is there a charitable explanation for why people cherrypick a single homicide in a metro of 8 million people and somehow act like it's proof for the downfall of liberal democracy? Especially when by most relevant metrics, illiberal democracy performs dramatically worse?
    • SilverElfin 1y ago
      Because you can gauge how you feel when you walk through the cities and realize something is off with this narrative. I suspect a lot of crimes aren’t tracked or classified properly in the data we see from cities in blue states, to support their policies. Or that victims are exhausted by the lack of prosecution and sentencing, and stop reporting things.
      • vkou 1y ago
        > I suspect a lot of crimes aren’t tracked or classified properly People don't under-report or misclassify homicides. > when you walk through the cities and realize something is off with this narrative. I happen to live in one of those war-torn anarchist cities that was claimed by Fox and friends to be an open charnel pit back in 2020, and I assure you, there is something off with a narrative. Specifically, the narrative that my city is a lawless hellscape. That narrative (along with the sudden and immediate need for the military to be illegally deployed in it) is back, by the way.
• Simon_O_Rourke 1y ago
  This would lead to literally murder in my part of upstate New York. Heck, my neighbor will even park on his own lawn to avoid the ten foot walk from the pavement.
  • Tade0 1y ago
    I had a neighbour like that, only it was right in front of our apartment building. Needless to say, we didn't get along.
• bethekidyouwant 1y ago
  I have never once in my life seen someone with groceries on the metro. I have no car and kids.
  • SilverElfin 1y ago
    I did. The person had bags all around them, things rolling out of them, and at one point dropped a box of coke cans on me that thankfully didn’t explode. The situation looked terrible and completely impractical. But people helped him gather his things.
• Tade0 1y ago
  This linked article and the comment section remind me how I admire American maximalism. No half-measures - want to be able to drive everywhere? Let's bulldoze whole cities to make them car-oriented. Tired of the concept after a few generations? FUCK CARS, let's have Pontevedra everywhere. Meanwhile there are places in the US that managed to preserve a more balanced approach. Take for example the borough of Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania: https://maps.app.goo.gl/Fgs9pBLmGCgWbtLGA?g_st=ac https://maps.app.goo.gl/Fgs9pBLmGCgWbtLGA?g_st=ac At first glance it looks like a typical car-oriented landscape, but note the presence of sidewalks. There's on-street parking, but hardly any driveway visible, because they're at the back, connected to one-way alleys. That is brilliant. On one hand the area is fully walkable, on the other everyone gets to live in their detached house with a garage and whatnot. You can drive, but you can also walk. Hell, you could probably even cycle through those alleys as cars use them only to park, so they won't be speeding through there.
• andy12_ 1y ago
  This is nice and all for tourists and people that live in the city center. But then if you don't live in the actual city and need to drive for half an hour to reach the city, spend half an hour searching for parking, then take a half an hour bus, then it's not so funny.
• aynyc 1y ago
  To me, it's more than just reduce traffic, but a sign that government is investing in its people. In order for a traffic free/minimal zone to thrive, you need policies that promote affordable housing, policing policy that reduces crime without being "brutal". The population also must accept certain civil responsibilities as trust and respect must go both ways.
• numitus 1y ago
  Unfortunately, there is a lot of ideology in the issue of restricting car traffic in cities, for example, the Netherlands is often cited as an example, but they forget that it is one of the most motorized countries in the world (80% of families have a car, and 33% have two), and has one of the densest networks of motorways in the world, and 78% of trips in the Netherlands are made by car, and the average distance of a bicycle trip is only 5 kilometers. I do not argue that local restrictions or a ban on cars, especially in the center, make life more comfortable, but this does not mean that it is necessary to restrict it everywhere. I often ride a bike, but it is generally surprising that after a century of development of the car, the creation of comfortable climate control systems, noise insulation and multimedia, I am seriously asked to take children to school in the rain, wind or snow on a bike. For me, this sounds like regression
• chrisweekly 1y ago
  Sounds amazing. When I visited Venice in 1997, I appreciated the lack of cars about as much as the presence of the canals.
• potac 1y ago
  I'm from Pontevedra. It has been the major's long-term project (~ 20 years) to make the city for the pedestrians: and he's done it. This works mainly because of two things: 1) the city is small and it takes aprox 30 min to walk it entirely from end to end, and 2) it is mostly flat. Only a smooth hill from "orillamar" to "alameda/peregrina". Unfortunately, the major obsessed with getting rid of cars (which I am highly grateful) but forgot to provide reliable public transport to close-by villages (max 5km,i.e., Poio/Marin/Salcedo). This means tha people from these villages commute by car to the city, which has really poor parking capacity. And the most important thing: there are zero specialized jobs in Pontevedra. Either you are a public state worker, for which you need to pass an exam to lock a lifelong job with no possibility of being fired regardless of how incompetent you are, or you work in hospitality. My partner works in Santiago and I work in the UK. There is no future for us in our city unless we want to study and compete for a position with thousands of other Spaniards. I firmly believe the major should also prioritise quality jobs. It is pretty nice for tourists to experience a city with no cars, but the reality of most locals is that they either leave or settle to accept precarious jobs.
  • davidw 1y ago
    There are a lot of places with crappy job markets and plenty of cars. I'm thinking of southern Italy for instance. At least they put the city on the map for something positive. Better than being just another anonymous place with poor job prospects and, who knows, maybe getting some attention helps with the economy.
    • chrisco255 1y ago
      [dead]
  • abdullahkhalids 1y ago
    Thanks for the perspective. I think it's difficult for small cities like Pontevedra to create high quality jobs. There are not enough people to support rich doctors, lawyers, accountants and such. Factories can be established, but most people employed in a factory won't have a "high-quality" job. What other type of high-quality job could the city create? [1] population ~ 80k, but working population ~ 50k.
• neilv 1y ago
  I would love this. In my US town, which I believe gets high walkability scores, they've shifted more pedestrian-hostile in the last few years (while incidentally also managing to tick off many drivers and brick&mortar small business owners). For one thing, the "separated" bike lanes are hated by many drivers and business owners, and seem more dangerous for pedestrians than before. (Reduced visibility of cars, and now almost universal reckless freeway-like use by motorized e-bikes/scooters which more normal bikes are now mimicking.) Also, during Covid, they let restaurants spread out onto the sidewalks and street parking of very busy streets, and now this is not only pretty unpleasant and unhealthy seating for customers (desperate for even the slightest hint of what human-friendly planning could be like), but tends to be an obstacle course for people who just want to walk on the already problematic sidewalks. And in stretches of the sidewalk on major streets that don't have restaurants blocking them, at any moment, someone will come plowing through at full speed on one of those huge 'e-bikes' with the huge tires. The one a few nights ago, through dense walkers on the sidewalk of the central business drag along a main street, at high speed... the rider of the 'e-bike' the size of a large motorcycle was clearly paying close attention, and his face looked like he was operating at near the edge of his ability to avoid hitting anyone (which would cripple or kill them), with the confidence and judgment that comes from being barely 20. Which confidence should gamble only his own life and limb, not those of others. I think the bike rental stations on the sidewalks (now including e-bikes) also now lead to even sensible people being desensitized to riding the sidewalk, since you have to go some length of sidewalk with the bike just to access the station. Many people end up riding right up to it, and accustomed to that, even though it's illegal in at least some cases. (The first thing I would do is temporarily outlaw all the motorized bikes/scooters, except for people with official medical reasons, it's gotten so bad. Until we can treat them as motor vehicles with sufficient regulations, and re-educate people not to be completely stupid bordering on psychotic. Then, after correcting for all the backsliding on safety and street life, we can resume thinking about the cars, which, even though 4-wheel drivers have long been called "Massholes", lately the 4-wheel car drivers been paragons of responsibility, compared to 2-wheel drivers in general.)
• CHB0403085482 1y ago
  Relevant for USA: https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2023/04/07/car-free-cities/ https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2023/04/07/car-free-cities/ Do you want to live here? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-TuGAHR78w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-TuGAHR78w
• robbingtherob 1y ago
  The slow death of Europe by 1000s of cuts. Put migrant activity on top of that and bye bye. There is a posibility between "muh America is car-centric, and btw i am bad at driving so i hate driving" and "you have to walk even in bad wrarher and when you are 70, think about the climate bruh". HN are a special kind of nonsense crowd.
  • matusp 1y ago
    I live in a pretty walkable Spanish city, and 70-year-olds are having a blast here. Even when they can no longer walk and they need to use various mobility devices, they can use the pedestrian infrastructure to move around the city and hang aroun the bars with their friends and families (and they do it basically every day, as far as I can tell). The same population in the US would be basically homebound.
• javierbuilds 1y ago
  I am from there, and it's a bullshit law that does not think on people that can't afford electric or low emissions cars. Therefore, sooner or later, Court will erase that absurd law.
• fennecbutt 1y ago
  Tbf they should do this in London too. They're looking to pedestrianise Oxford Street, but who knows when that will happen as we need to allow plenty of time for the government to find the right contractors to shovel money at for a project delivered overtime and underbudget. A lot of it over here is for show, like ULEZ where huge range rovers are somehow exempt. Or where LTNs are always put on the richest streets in the nicest neighborhoods for reasons of "think of the wee children playing in the street" when there are plenty of children living outside of LTNs. Just a coincidence that all the properties inside an LTN are worth >£850k.
• tfrutuoso 1y ago
  I really love these posts almost as much as i love the signs blocking cars from a certain area of my city's center, except for -amongst the common sense exceptions- cars owned by the office of the mayor. Rules for thee, or something or other. Is it fair to have more public transportation, bike lanes, bus lanes, walkable paths? yes. Is it fair to lock entire urban areas from cars? Not at all.
  • RataNova 1y ago
    I think there's a distinction between limiting cars and banning them outright
    • tfrutuoso 1y ago
      Yeah, semantics. In the end, the outcome is the same.
• thefz 1y ago
  I mean look at Bologna, you can walk across the city centre and never get a single drop if it's raining. Same for the summer sun. Human-scale architecture and planning pays off.
• RataNova 1y ago
  This is the kind of story that makes you believe cities can change