7 Cities That Are Starting To Go Car-Free
Urban planners are finally
recognizing that streets should be designed for people, not careening hunks of
deadly metal.
After over a hundred
years of living with cars, some cities are slowly starting to realize that the
automobile doesn't make a lot of sense in the urban context. It isn't just the
smog or the traffic deaths; in a city, cars aren't even a convenient way to get
around.
Traffic in London today
moves slower than an average cyclist (or a horse-drawn carriage). Commuters in L.A. spend 90 hours a year stuck in traffic. A U.K. study found that drivers spend 106 days of their lives looking for parking spots.
Now a growing number of
cities are getting rid of cars in certain neighborhoods through fines, better
design, new apps, and, in the case of Milan, even paying commuters to leave
their car parked at home and take the train instead.
Unsurprisingly, the
changes are happening fastest in European capitals that were designed hundreds
or thousands of years before cars were ever built. In sprawling U.S. suburbs
that were designed for driving, the path to eliminating cars is obviously more
challenging. (And a few car-loving cities, like Sydney, Australia, are going in the other direction, and
taking away pedestrian space on some downtown streets so there's more room for
cars).
Here are a handful of the
leaders moving toward car-free neighborhoods.
MADRID
Madrid has already banned
most traffic from certain city streets, and this month, the car-free zone will expand even further. Stretching over more than a square mile,
the area will still allow neighborhood its own residents to drive, but anyone
else who enters will be hit with a fine over $100. It's one step in a larger
plan to completely pedestrianize central Madrid in the next five years.
Twenty-four of the city's busiest streets will be redesigned for
walking, not driving. Before the street
layouts change, cars will also be discouraged in another way: Now the dirtiest, most
polluting cars in the city have to pay have to pay more to park.
PARIS
Last year, when smog
levels spiked in Paris, the city briefly banned carswith even-numbered plates. Pollution dropped as
much as 30% in some areas, and now the city plans to start permanently
discouraging cars. In the city center, people who don't live in local
neighborhoods won't be able to drive in on weekends, and that rule could soon
roll out to the whole week.
By 2020, the mayor plans
to double the number of bike lanes in the city, ban diesel cars, and limit
certain high-traffic streets to electric cars and other ultra-low-emission
vehicles. The number of drivers in the city is already starting to drop. In
2001, 40% of Parisians didn't own a car; now that number is 60%.
A new satellite city planned in Southwest China could serve as a model for a modern
suburb: Instead of a layout that makes it necessary to drive, the streets are
designed so any location can be reached by 15 minutes on foot.
The plans, designed by
Chicago-based architects Adrian Smith and Gordon Gill, don't call for
completely banning cars, but only half of the road area will allow motorized
vehicles. The city will also connect to the larger, nearby city of Chengdu with
public transit. Out of an expected population of 80,000 people, most will be
able to walk to work in local neighborhoods. The project was originally planned
for completion in 2020, but that may be delayed—it's currently on hold because
of zoning issues.
HAMBURG
Though Hamburg isn't
planning to ban cars from its city center (as has been misreported elsewhere),
the city is making it easier and easier not to drive. A new "green network," which will be completed in the next 15 to 20 years, will
connect parks across the city, making it possible to bike or walk anywhere. The
network will cover 40% of the city's space. The city is also covering up
sections of the infamously crowded A7 autobahn with parks—so neighborhoods that
were once hard to cross on foot will soon be more inviting.
HELSINKI
Helsinki expects a flood
of new residents over the next few decades, but the more people come, the fewer
cars will be allowed on city streets. In a new plan, the city lays out a design that will transform car-dependent suburbs into dense, walkable communities linked to the
city center by fast-moving public transit. The city is also building newmobility-on-demand
services to streamline life
without a car. A new app in testing now lets citizens instantly call up a
shared bike, car, or taxi, or find the nearest bus or train. In a decade, the
city hopes to make it completely unnecessary to own a car.
MILAN
The smoggy city of Milan
is testing a new way to keep cars out of the city center: If commuters leave
their vehicles at home, they'll get free public transit vouchers. An Internet-connected box on the dashboard keeps track of a car's location,
so no one can cheat and drive to work. Each day someone's car stays at home, the city sends a voucher with the same value as a ticket
on the bus or train.
COPENHAGEN
Forty years ago, traffic
was as bad in Copenhagen as any other large city. Now, over half of the city's
population bikes to work every day—nine times more bike commuters than in
Portland, Oregon, the city with the most bike commuters in the U.S.
Copenhagen started
introducing pedestrian zones in the 1960s in the city center, and car-free zones slowly spread over the next few decades. The city now has over 200
miles of bike lanes, with new bike superhighways under development to reach
surrounding suburbs. The city has one of the lowest rates of car ownership in Europe.
None of these cities are
planning—yet—to go completely car-free. And it's possible that may never
happen; it's likely that future cities will have at least a small fleet of
self-driving electric cars on hand that can eliminate some of the current
challenges around parking, congestion and pollution. But it's also clear that
urban planners are finally recognizing that streets should be designed for
people, not cars.
http://www.fastcoexist.com/3040634/7-cities-that-are-starting-to-go-car-free?utm_source=mailchimp&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=fast-company-weekly-newsletter&position=2&partner=newsletter&campaign_date=01162015
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