If I had a dime for every time somebody made this reply, I’d have a lot of dimes.
Nobody has ever said that. What people are saying is that the private automobile is the worst way to move masses of people in cities. They command ungodly amounts of space, make everything more expensive thereby, and aren’t even good at moving masses of people.
You want to increase the capacity of your road? You can:
spend millions adding lanes and possibly destroying houses
turn a lane into a dedicated bus lane
turn a lane into a bike lane
hell, pedestrian areas have higher people capacities than car lanes
Yes, you are right. You are talking of moving people inside cities. I am talking about a) getting in and out of the city and b) moving goods into and out of cities. None of the usual demands in this group ever even starts to address this.
What usually works better for moving people in and out of cities is park-n-ride setups where you setup a giant parking lot in the suburbs next to a metro station. People can just ditch their car outside the city and proceed using public transit. I often do this in Montreal, for example.
For goods, it’s a similar setup but with big trucks transferring cargo to smaller trucks; this is already pretty common.
And once people use bikes all over and you can get rid of the 10.000 parking spots, you can build much more local small shops. Nobody loves going to Walmart and nobody will if there are small local shops around the corner where you can simply walk to
Bikes ain’t gonna work for people coming from far outside the city. I’m not talking about commuting distance, I’m talking about people who live in rural areas 2+ hours away from a city that need to come in occasionally. Having them make the whole trip by car necessitates maintaining car infrastructure in the city center, which will soon be co-opted by suburbanites. This use-case needs a bi-modal strategy.
You think that doesn’t happen in the Netherlands? It’s called public transportation. Trains, busses, trams, metro. People take their bikes onboard if they have to, get into the city, cycle the last little bit, and it’s done
Also, if you gotta commute 2 hours you need a different job
I’m not talking about commutes, I’m talking about going to the city for an appointment/shopping/conference/concert/sightseeing/etc.
But yeah, cycling the last mile works in the Netherlands between cities or suburbs because they are relatively well served by inter-city transit, but what about places like this random dairy farm . Can this guy just take his bike to downtown Amsterdam?
No, but should be able to take a bus. Even so, let him use a car I don’t mind, that’s what they’re for. Long distance transit, heavy hauling. The problem is with 95+% of the trips that are 4 miles and under where people drive their enormous pick-up trucks all empty. You can do those by bike.
Edit:
Just an example of what happens when you start reworked more and more car cities into people cities. You can still get there by car, it’s just that public transport and bike and walking is easier so why wouldn’t you
That’s exactly what I was saying a few comments up. There’s a use-case for cars, and there needs to be a way to get into the city when you arrive by car. Any good solution will probably involve parking the car somewhere outside city limits, otherwise it’ll probably be co-opted by suburbanites.
If I had a dime for every time somebody made this reply, I’d have a lot of dimes.
Nobody has ever said that. What people are saying is that the private automobile is the worst way to move masses of people in cities. They command ungodly amounts of space, make everything more expensive thereby, and aren’t even good at moving masses of people.
You want to increase the capacity of your road? You can:
Yes, you are right. You are talking of moving people inside cities. I am talking about a) getting in and out of the city and b) moving goods into and out of cities. None of the usual demands in this group ever even starts to address this.
What usually works better for moving people in and out of cities is park-n-ride setups where you setup a giant parking lot in the suburbs next to a metro station. People can just ditch their car outside the city and proceed using public transit. I often do this in Montreal, for example.
For goods, it’s a similar setup but with big trucks transferring cargo to smaller trucks; this is already pretty common.
Just use busses and trams
And once people use bikes all over and you can get rid of the 10.000 parking spots, you can build much more local small shops. Nobody loves going to Walmart and nobody will if there are small local shops around the corner where you can simply walk to
Bikes ain’t gonna work for people coming from far outside the city. I’m not talking about commuting distance, I’m talking about people who live in rural areas 2+ hours away from a city that need to come in occasionally. Having them make the whole trip by car necessitates maintaining car infrastructure in the city center, which will soon be co-opted by suburbanites. This use-case needs a bi-modal strategy.
You think that doesn’t happen in the Netherlands? It’s called public transportation. Trains, busses, trams, metro. People take their bikes onboard if they have to, get into the city, cycle the last little bit, and it’s done
Also, if you gotta commute 2 hours you need a different job
I’m not talking about commutes, I’m talking about going to the city for an appointment/shopping/conference/concert/sightseeing/etc.
But yeah, cycling the last mile works in the Netherlands between cities or suburbs because they are relatively well served by inter-city transit, but what about places like this random dairy farm . Can this guy just take his bike to downtown Amsterdam?
No, but should be able to take a bus. Even so, let him use a car I don’t mind, that’s what they’re for. Long distance transit, heavy hauling. The problem is with 95+% of the trips that are 4 miles and under where people drive their enormous pick-up trucks all empty. You can do those by bike.
Edit:
Just an example of what happens when you start reworked more and more car cities into people cities. You can still get there by car, it’s just that public transport and bike and walking is easier so why wouldn’t you
That’s exactly what I was saying a few comments up. There’s a use-case for cars, and there needs to be a way to get into the city when you arrive by car. Any good solution will probably involve parking the car somewhere outside city limits, otherwise it’ll probably be co-opted by suburbanites.