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#13743616
The New York Times wrote:Across Europe, Irking Drivers Is Urban Policy

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By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
Published: June 26, 2011


ZURICH — While American cities are synchronizing green lights to improve traffic flow and offering apps to help drivers find parking, many European cities are doing the opposite: creating environments openly hostile to cars. The methods vary, but the mission is clear — to make car use expensive and just plain miserable enough to tilt drivers toward more environmentally friendly modes of transportation.

Cities including Vienna to Munich and Copenhagen have closed vast swaths of streets to car traffic. Barcelona and Paris have had car lanes eroded by popular bike-sharing programs. Drivers in London and Stockholm pay hefty congestion charges just for entering the heart of the city. And over the past two years, dozens of German cities have joined a national network of “environmental zones” where only cars with low carbon dioxide emissions may enter.

...


The article goes on to describe the ways European cities are phasing out cars.

Amazing that the USA and other parts of the anglosphere seem to live in an alternative reality where car-use is a positive thing that needs to be facilitated.
By Lensky1917
#13743714
QatzelOk wrote:While American cities are synchronizing green lights to improve traffic flow and offering apps to help drivers find parking


QatzelOk wrote: The methods vary, but the mission is clear — to make car use expensive and just plain miserable enough to tilt drivers toward more environmentally friendly modes of transportation.


But think of the fuel saved and emissions reduced by not having cars stuck in traffic and looking around all the time for a parking place. :?:
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By QatzelOk
#13743960
But think of the fuel saved and emissions reduced by not having cars stuck in traffic and looking around all the time for a parking place.

People aren't mindless automatons.

They won't drive around in circles for eternity if you remove parking.

Eventually, they either change their destination, or their means of transport, both of which cuts down on pollution, noise, and the destruction of public places.
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By Ombrageux
#13743975
Cars are a fine invention but, particularly in cities, they must tamed and made to serve human beings (and not human beings serve them, say by being forced to buy them to get anywhere because public transport is shit and stigmatized as for "coloreds only"). Overuse is one of the most obvious signs of decadence and evidence that a country values its pet pleasures of national independence (to not speak of the well-being of the planet).
By Aekos
#13756318
The methods vary, but the mission is clear — to make car use expensive and just plain miserable enough to tilt drivers toward more environmentally friendly modes of transportation.


:up: Europe.

As long as these measures are met by equivalent improvements in public transportation, this can only be a good thing, for the environment, air quality, economy...
By hip hop bunny hop
#13763514
Hmm. I don't understand methods that combat over use of cars by treating all car owners the same. I fail to see why Farmers & other rural denizens should be crucified just because urban and suburban yuppies insist on driving the most obnoxious vehicles known to man; why should they pay congestion fees and what have you when they're not at fault for Urban denizens constantly defeating initiatives to improve public transit?
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By Pleb
#13763534
hip hop bunny hop wrote: I fail to see why Farmers & other rural denizens should be crucified just because urban and suburban yuppies insist on driving the most obnoxious vehicles known to man


This guy's got it right. You can't aim carbon taxes at rural people without expecting a backlash against the urban green political class. Rural types were being green long before fair trade organic skinny lattes.

Another issue here is the relative density of the cities in Europe and the US. Most places I've been in Europe are sufficiently dense to support communal and pedestrian travel. I went to Lowell Mass, and they didn't even have footpaths going the half mile from the house I was staying in to the nearest supermarket! I tried walking it, and people thought I was crazy. And that's an old town on the east coast. I can only imagine it's much worse in the West, where space is at even less of a premium
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By Ombrageux
#13763589
Pleb - Whatever role geography or even, say, the inertial choice in the 1950s for suburbia and highways, Americans drive much larger cars than Europeans. There's no reason for this other than a preference for these vehicles over national independence, climate security or indeed American households' living within their means. This I would consider wasteful, perhaps decadent, and this wastefulness no doubt plays a huge role above and beyond individual car purchasing to affect larger infrastructure choices, urban planning and popular attitudes towards public transport.
By hip hop bunny hop
#13763594
Americans drive much larger cars than Europeans. There's no reason for this other than a preference for these vehicles over national independence, climate security or indeed American households' living within their means. This I would consider wasteful, perhaps decadent, and this wastefulness no doubt plays a huge role above and beyond individual car purchasing to affect larger infrastructure choices, urban planning and popular attitudes towards public transport.


....right! So let's treat people whose livelihood requires they own a fullsize truck the same as suburbanites who buy them for the prestige! Why differentiate between someone who buys a Wrangler and lives outside Hosmer South Dakota and someone who lives in Orlando Florida? After all, Florida gets snow sometimes! Besides, with a population density of about 2 people a square mile, South Dakota has no excuse not having a mass transit system!

.....
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By Pleb
#13763598
Sure, but Britons drive bigger cars than Italians (or at least it seemed so on holidays.) After driving around winding little Umbiran roads in a five door saloon, I came to the conclusion that environment is the determining factor on choice of car size (along, of course, with petrol prices and other market factors like state subsidies)

Big cars offer a better driving experience if your surroundings permit.
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By Ombrageux
#13763606
HHBP - Yes, I'm sure the majority who own SUVs and hummers do so because their are professionally required to.

Pleb - I'm not disputing that. I am merely stating Americans value these vehicles, perhaps because of your "driving experience", more than they do national independence, climate security or living within their means. If Americans prefer their "driving experience" (or "American way of life") more than the other things I mentioned, that is their choice...

It's their problem and no one else's concern... unless their love of this "driving experience" happens to eff the planet a little more or involves invading and/or supporting dictatorships in oil-rich nations :|
By hip hop bunny hop
#13763872
HHBP - Yes, I'm sure the majority who own SUVs and hummers do so because their are professionally required to.


I said pick up trucks, and I'm calling for differentiating between people who need an SUV or a truck for reasons geographic or commercial and those who buy them for the fun of it. I fail to see how calling for a policy that differentiates between these groups is worse than using a one-size-fits-all approach?

Seriously, are you just ignorant of how many Americans live outside cities (yes, including outside suburbs), or are you just pretending that somehow a Prius would do fine on a gravel road in a Dakota winter?
Last edited by Cartertonian on 25 Jul 2011 13:16, edited 1 time in total. Reason: ad hominem content removed
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By Ombrageux
#13763984
HHBH - Obviously many Americans might need their vehicles for professional regions. Many do not. There's no sense hiding behind a minority who due to justify a generalized trend. Americans import more oil than the Europeans - despite the fact 40% of their oil consumption comes from domestic sources and despite the fact that U.S. population is 40% smaller. Geography cannot account for such a massive difference.
By Piano Red
#13764201
Ombrageux
If Americans prefer their "driving experience" (or "American way of life") more than the other things I mentioned, that is their choice...


Well at least you're sensible enough to realize that it is Americans' choice, and that what dalliances that Europeans might indulge in for the sake of environmental concerns do not need to be wholly embraced or even fully considered by Americans.

more than they do national independence


That's a nice rhetorical flourish and all, but not much else. Americans have national independence.

It's their problem and no one else's concern... unless their love of this "driving experience" happens to eff the planet a little more or involves invading and/or supporting dictatorships in oil-rich nations


Apparently it's not enough of everyone else's concern to actually challenge the US on it though. :|

Or stop doing business with America, or buying American products, some of which are those same very vehicles that so many campaign against.

Geography cannot account for such a massive difference.


Surely you're joking...right? The continental US is over double the size of Western Europe in overall scale, and dominated by a vastly more open amount of terrain that historically (and only until relatively recently) was very hard to navigate from coast to coast.

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Frankly Ombrageux...your line of reasoning is really just an indication of a highly biased Eurocentric viewpoint that either fails or just rejects any degree of relativism between differences in transportation methods (and mindsets) in North America vs. Europe.
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By Ombrageux
#13764204
PR - What exactly does driving an SUV or a Hummer have to do with the geographical differences between Western Europe and the United States? :eh:

Yes geography is an issue in rural areas but the US population is actually much more geographically concentrated than you seem to think.

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Each American president since the first Oil Shock has talked about the value of energy independence to the United States' national independence. None have done anything about it. Americans prefer their "driving experience" to energy independence, even if it means indirectly and/or directly subsidizing disagreeable foreign regimes, even if it means having a permanent military presence in a certain oil-rich part of the world.

The inability of Americans to face up to this issue, even as their soldiers have been dying in the "Greater Middle East" for the better part of two decades, and its been a major contributor to their trade deficit and unsustainable household debt, is frankly beyond me. I may be a little abrasive in saying this but it doesn't make it any less true.
By Pants-of-dog
#13764229
hip hop bunny hop wrote:Hmm. I don't understand methods that combat over use of cars by treating all car owners the same. I fail to see why Farmers & other rural denizens should be crucified just because urban and suburban yuppies insist on driving the most obnoxious vehicles known to man; why should they pay congestion fees and what have you when they're not at fault for Urban denizens constantly defeating initiatives to improve public transit?


Rural folk should have to pay congestion fees if they drive in the city, as that is the reason for which congestion fees were designed. If rural folk want to stay in their rural areas, they do not have to pay such fees. Nor should they (or would they) have to pay for toll fees, parking fees in the city if they stayed outside of the city. Nor would they ever pay carbon taxes levied by the city at those drivers who live in the city.

The should (and probably will) have to pay carbon taxes and those taxes that are then used to maintain the highways, as they use those services (i.e. fuel and transportation infrastructure).

Pleb wrote:This guy's got it right. You can't aim carbon taxes at rural people without expecting a backlash against the urban green political class. Rural types were being green long before fair trade organic skinny lattes.


That is the commonly believed myth. But urban populations use significantly less energy per capita and create significantly less greenhouse gases per capita as well. This is because we do not drive cars, get our energy from large projects that benefit from economies of scale, and live in small dwellings.

Pleb wrote:Another issue here is the relative density of the cities in Europe and the US. Most places I've been in Europe are sufficiently dense to support communal and pedestrian travel. I went to Lowell Mass, and they didn't even have footpaths going the half mile from the house I was staying in to the nearest supermarket! I tried walking it, and people thought I was crazy. And that's an old town on the east coast. I can only imagine it's much worse in the West, where space is at even less of a premium


This is true, but this is because most North American cites were built after the car was popular, while most European cities were built before such time.

hip hop bunny hop wrote:....right! So let's treat people whose livelihood requires they own a fullsize truck the same as suburbanites who buy them for the prestige! Why differentiate between someone who buys a Wrangler and lives outside Hosmer South Dakota and someone who lives in Orlando Florida? After all, Florida gets snow sometimes! Besides, with a population density of about 2 people a square mile, South Dakota has no excuse not having a mass transit system!


hip hop bunny hop wrote:I said pick up trucks, and I'm calling for differentiating between people who need an SUV or a truck for reasons geographic or commercial and those who buy them for the fun of it. I fail to see how calling for a policy that differentiates between these groups is worse than using a one-size-fits-all approach?

Seriously, are you just ignorant of how many Americans live outside cities (yes, including outside suburbs), or are you just pretending that somehow a Prius would do fine on a gravel road in a Dakota winter?


You seem to have this odd idea that municipalities can make laws for people who do not live in those municipalities.

Tell me, how often do you need an SUV for a plowed and salted road in downtown Minot during the winter?

Piano Red wrote:Surely you're joking...right? The continental US is over double the size of Western Europe in overall scale, and dominated by a vastly more open amount of terrain that historically (and only until relatively recently) was very hard to navigate from coast to coast.

Image

Frankly Ombrageux...your line of reasoning is really just an indication of a highly biased Eurocentric viewpoint that either fails or just rejects any degree of relativism between differences in transportation methods (and mindsets) in North America vs. Europe.


People are confusing two separate discussions.

One is about regulating car traffic within cities. This is what the OP is discussing.

The other is about regulating car traffic between cities. This is what you seem to be discussing.
By hip hop bunny hop
#13764349
The should (and probably will) have to pay carbon taxes and those taxes that are then used to maintain the highways, as they use those services (i.e. fuel and transportation infrastructure).


Eh? Rural denizens already pay fuel taxes which go to maintaining highways.

That is the commonly believed myth. But urban populations use significantly less energy per capita and create significantly less greenhouse gases per capita as well. This is because we do not drive cars, get our energy from large projects that benefit from economies of scale, and live in small dwellings.


Really, Urban populations don't drive cars? People in Los Angeles don't drive cars? Kansas City & St. Louis have magically sprouted wonderful mass transit systems? Urban populations use more energy per capita; the "studies" you refer to merely extrapolate information from a few select cities and apply them to all cities. This is idiotic.

You seem to have this odd idea that municipalities can make laws for people who do not live in those municipalities.


Care to elaborate as to why? I don't understand what you're getting at, buck.

Tell me, how often do you need an SUV for a plowed and salted road in downtown Minot during the winter?


How the hell are you going to get there? In rural areas it's standard practice that only paved roads recieve any support from the county for snow removal; meaning anyone who either (a) lives on a gravel road, or (b) work requires them to travel on a gravel road, needs 4 wheel drive and healthy ground clearance during the winter months. So, this isn't just limited to ranchers, farmers, and dairy farmers and those who live in unincorporated small towns and what have you. Rather, even those who live in Minot often need 4 wheel drive, seeing as how Agriculture is the most important industry in the state, and going out to these businesses necessitates 4 wheel drive.
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By Pleb
#13764354
Community Policing :lol:

CYCLISTS AND SUITS NEED NOT BE AT WAR WITH EACH OTHER
Monday 25th July 2011, 1:37am
JULIET SAMUEL

TENSIONS between the City’s suits and its many cyclists – from couriers to tourists – have reached boiling point, The Capitalist hears.

One disgruntled cyclist pulled over recently on Bishopsgate has been in touch to relay exactly why it is that City of London cops are out in force, lurking under trees and behind lamp-posts, to catch errant cyclists running red lights and the like.

“Why do you waste your time with this?” our cyclist inquired of the bobby who stopped him.

“It’s the suits,” our copper replied with a shrug. “They hate cyclists.”

Or, in the more gentile language of his press office, it’s “community policing” on behalf of the suits.

More precisely: “Ninety-five per cent of the people in the City wear suits, so if you’re responding to people wearing suits, you’re responding to the people in your community,” a spokesperson for City of London police explained.

Not to mention that the suits tend to go to more City ward meetings than do the cyclists.

Of course, in the interests of full disclosure, The Capitalist ought to confess that she is often to be found cruising through the City on a bike – but just as often in a suit jacket as well. Perhaps there’s the beginnings of an entente cordiale in that.
By Pants-of-dog
#13764505
hip hop bunny hop wrote:Eh? Rural denizens already pay fuel taxes which go to maintaining highways.


Yes. And perhaps one day, the taxes will be high enough that they actually pay for oil and transportation infrastructure.

hip hop bunny hop wrote:Really, Urban populations don't drive cars? People in Los Angeles don't drive cars? Kansas City & St. Louis have magically sprouted wonderful mass transit systems? Urban populations use more energy per capita; the "studies" you refer to merely extrapolate information from a few select cities and apply them to all cities. This is idiotic.


I never said that people in urban areas do not drive cars. I said they drive less cars than rural people.

NY state has 10,749,952 registered vehicles, 1,962,231 of which are from NY city.

NY state has 11,285,831 registered vehicles, 3,348,733 of which are from NY city.

Stats from here: http://www.nydmv.state.ny.us/stats.htm

So, the entire state has 1.05 drivers per car. The city has 1.71 drivers per car. In other words, the number of drivers per car is higher in the city than in the state average.

Here is a website discussing the environmental problems with cities. I will quote the relevant information:

Often, energy use per capita is less in an urbanized area than in a rural area due to energy efficient apartments, attached housing and mass transit.


http://www.livinglandscapes.bc.ca/thomp ... d/ch4.html

hip hop bunny hop wrote:Care to elaborate as to why? I don't understand what you're getting at, buck.


People are confusing two separate discussions.

One is about regulating car traffic within cities. This is what the OP is discussing.

The other is about regulating car traffic between cities. This is what you seem to be discussing.

The laws that cities make to curb car use have no effect on rural people. Because rural people do not live in cities.

hip hop bunny hop wrote:How the hell are you going to get there? In rural areas it's standard practice that only paved roads recieve any support from the county for snow removal; meaning anyone who either (a) lives on a gravel road, or (b) work requires them to travel on a gravel road, needs 4 wheel drive and healthy ground clearance during the winter months. So, this isn't just limited to ranchers, farmers, and dairy farmers and those who live in unincorporated small towns and what have you. Rather, even those who live in Minot often need 4 wheel drive, seeing as how Agriculture is the most important industry in the state, and going out to these businesses necessitates 4 wheel drive.


In other words, you agree that people who only drive in urban environments do not need an SUV. Thank you.
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By QatzelOk
#13765429
In what was perhaps the best way to derail a thread about sensible transportation, hiphop wrote:I fail to see why Farmers & other rural denizens should be crucified

The crucifixian meme is in the bible, not in the transportation debate.

We are looking at finding the least consumptive ways for people to live their lives. Having a hundred million suburbanites drive alone into the core in their Explorers and Renegades is probably not very wise with resources.

We will also need to reduce the cost of agricultural transportation, which is why suburbia was a particularly stupid use of land.

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