People Hate the Idea of Car-Free Cities—Until They Live in One
People Hate the Idea of Car-Free Cities—Until They Live in One
Removing cars from urban areas means lower carbon emissions, less air pollution, and fewer road traffic accidents. So why are residents so resistant?
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Is there a FAQ about living in car free cities? For example, how do you travel to another city? What do you do if the city has high slopes making walking and biking too hard? Or how do elders deal with what other citizens would take for granted in terms of mobility?
how do you travel to another city?
Usually by bus or train.
What do you do if the city has high slopes making walking and biking too hard?
Walking is good for you, biking is not too popular in cities with slopes, but electic bikes are changing that.
Or how do elders deal with what other citizens would take for granted in terms of mobility?
There is definitely less mobility, but that is part of getting older isn't it? Usually they just walk a bit slower and use busses and taxies.
Or how do elders deal with what other citizens would take for granted in terms of mobility?
Electric mobility scooters as well. I'm sure those are capable of much better range now, and it should keep getting better, and everything they need would ideally be close by
And what about cities with cold winters and tons of snow? 10 minutes outside here is no joke
I live in Toronto, and I don't have a car. I use buses and subways for most of my commute in winter. Along with these options, I use bikeshare (public bicycle rentals) in every other season. There are people who bike even in winter but I'm nowhere close to that hardcore.
I've spent maybe $250 on uber in urgent/lazy situations in the last one year - that would've been a monthly auto insurance payment.
I waited for a bus for around 20 minutes in -18°C a few weeks back. The biggest problem was that I had overdressed so I started sweating and had to unzip a layer.
An important fact that people who have only ever lived in suburbs miss is that you don't have to commute thaaat far thaaat often when you live in walkable cities. My cousin who lives in a suburb, drives for ~20 minutes to get to the closest big box store. I have 5 options for groceries in a 1 km radius and one of them is just one block over. So, I don't even need a bus for groceries, let alone a car. We have seniors who definitely shouldn't be driving walking around with grocery carts on the sidewalks. So, reducing car dependency improves mobility - not the opposite.
I drove from Dallas to Toronto in 2017 (you know, for fun), and I was amazed not only at how trim almost everyone looked but also at how many fucking people were on bicycles. Coming from the concrete jungle that is DFW, it was genuinely inspiring.
I'm happy to report that the number is cyclists is increasing every year with the addition of more bike lanes and a growing network of bikeshare stations. :)
You dress appropriately for the weather and the city actually bothers to clear the bike path quickly when it snows. Oulu does it that way.
Why Canadians Can't Bike in the Winter (but Finnish people can)
Basically, proper bike infrastructure and snow-clearing make a world of difference. It's not nearly as bad as it seems if you just put on a coat and get going.
I'm going to let you in on a secret, even though our Canadian cities are shit for people with a car there are still thousands of people in every city who get by year after year without one, because they can't afford to buy one.
Not having a car sucks, but it is not a death sentence and would be a hell of a lot better if our cities didn't assume everyone had one.
Something like this?
https://ebikehaul.com/products/q-runner-all-weather-4-wheel-mobility-electric-scooter
It's still speed limited, it's not a car.
Edit: that is a tad expensive though, would need to get costs down
Wouldn't the elderly be a huge benefiter of a car free city? You get old enough or frail enough that you can't drive. Then what?
I like in a city that provides free busses and trains to those aged 65+ if they ride in off peak hours, and it's heavily used. This is in a city designed around cars.
Also "car free" doesn't have to mean literally zero cars allowed, but just build and layout the city so you never have to use one for daily errands.
I live next to a grocery store and it's literally the best thing ever, grocery trips take 10 minutes max, I only end up using the car on weekends for hobbies or to visit family and friends.
From what I've seen from Not Just Bikes, there's also car-sharing. There are services to make it super easy to borrow a car for as little as a few hours if you just need to lug some furniture or something.
"Car-free cities" gave the wrong idea. I'd call them walk-friendly cities instead, but I guess that ship has already sailed. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and first-hand experience.
The term "city" can actually be confusing too since it might mean the most central district of a metropolitan area, or it could mean the whole metropolitan area. There is some desire to make the most central parts car free in the way you thought (usually street by street in the centre of the CBD etc), but generally the broader area will not be.
I live in suburbia and the grocery store on the edge of my neighborhood is accessible via a dirt desire path. This beats so many of my friends neighborhoods, but these numbskulls couldn't pour the 20 feet of sidewalk to connect the commercial to the residential, even though the sidewalk has a 2 foot long spur where it should be. 100% car brained.
Still, running to the store on my bike is just as fast as driving, if not a few mins faster.
For example, how do you travel to another city?
Train or car. Car free mostly refers to inner city trips, for special occasions it's totally fine to use a car (e.g. moving, buying something big, a weekend trip, etc)
What do you do if the city has high slopes making walking and biking too hard?
Bus, ebikes, other types of electric assist stuff, walking. Crazy steep slopes do put a limit on exclusively human powered mobility (i.e. walking and cycling), but those places are incredibly rare.
Or how do elders deal with what other citizens would take for granted in terms of mobility?
A walkable city features amenities close by, plenty of benches to rest, and a solid bus system. There are absolutely no issues for people with restricted mobility. This applies to people with disabilities as well btw.
In fact I would turn that question around: how do elders deal with the requirement to drive a car to get groceries, etc? Isn't that like super duper dangerous?
Thank you for your detailed reply. I was under the impression that cars and buses were out of the question. This clarifies a lot. Ebikes and electric devices, however, sound to me like something futuristic, probably because I live in latinamerica.
Steep-slope places are not the norm almost anywhere, but they are not really that scarce here. We probably would need to make some technological catch up.
About elders driving, well, it's common that they have cars although they can't/shouldn't drive them. Some younger ones can step in and volunteer, usually family members, but not only. An arrangement can always be made when young people hardly owns a car.
Ebikes and electric devices, however, sound to me like something futuristic
There are kits enabling you to convert a muscle bike (push bike) into an e-bike. If you get one with a torque sensor, then it will detect how hard you push on the pedals and drive the motor proportional to that force. So you still must pedal but it amplifies your effort which preserves the natural feel and control of pedaling. It essentially makes the hills go away; a hilly place becomes a flat place.
That sounds cool. I'd still prefer to take a bus to feel safer in my car-centric town, but one can imagine living somewhere you just fire up your EPV and be gone. I reckon it requires very engaged local authorities.
Steep-slope places are not the norm almost anywhere, but they are not really that scarce here. We probably would need to make some technological catch up.
No worries Switzerland and Austria have you covered. Gondolas are only suitable for people and lighter loads, but funiculars can carry a ton of weight and can be built quite steep indeed, Chile has quite a few of them. In less extreme cases there's good old rack railways. Funiculars are actually the oldest type of public transport in the world, invented before the industrial revolution, back then operated by water power (fill a tank in the top car, it will pull the bottom car up), and rack rail isn't exactly new. The oldest were built to get stuff up and down from castles. Gondolas of the Mi Teleficero type are quite a bit newer and can reach quite impressive throughput numbers as the gondolas are unhooked from the wire in stations to make it possible to have a fast wire while not having to sprint when getting on (usually they move about at like 1/2 walking pace in the stations but you can also stop them completely for the elderly).
how do elders deal with the requirement to drive a car to get groceries, etc? Isn’t that like super duper dangerous?
Judging by some folks I've seen driving around with oxygen tubes in their noses: They just drive. And, yes, it is dangerous.
It's cool and all, but trains have fixed routes that can't take you almost everywhere. Of course I'd prefer trains over highways, just stating the current fact. Take for example every city I've lived in Mexico: trains never were an option to travel between cities. That's changing, fortunately.
PEVs are still not very common around here, but that answers some questions. Thanks for your reply.
sensible places have enough railways that trains can practically take you everywhere, used to be that here in sweden we had railways even to teensy tiny villages a lot of the time.
Or how do elders deal with what other citizens would take for granted in terms of mobility?
Currently they alll use little electric mobility scooters, in cycle lanes when available, bacause its too dangerous to be any where there are cars here in Australia.
How do those with epilepsy get around, they can't drive at least they can't here in Australia. One lady with epilepsy I knew rode a little electric scoot, she loved having her independence.
What happens to people when they loose thier license in the US ?
I couldn't tell. Barely know the US and it's been a long time. Those were questions over the top of my head, out of curiosity, and coming from the wrong assumption that these cities were totally car-free with the only exception of emergency vehicles.
how do you travel to another city
Car co-ops is one way.
I have a car, but I'm also in one as it gives me access to different vehicle types that I sometimes need.
To get some places here I also need to take a ferry, and walking on and renting a car on the other end can be situationally cheaper.
What do you do if the city has high slopes making walking and biking too hard?
E-bikes and regular bikes with good gearing. And walking up slopes generally isn't too challenging it's just slow. Infrastructure can help here too by making sure there are paths that don't go up hills unnecessarily. Fast and frequent public transport provides another option where walking and biking is less viable.
For example, how do you travel to another city?
Trains and buses. Car as a last resort (preferably one that is hired rather than owned, and preferably electric rather than an ICE).
Or how do elders deal with what other citizens would take for granted in terms of mobility?
Elderly people can't (or shouldn't) drive either so better walkability = better for the elderly since it gives options to get around without relying on a car. Good infrastructure design can help with disability access, and many disabled people can't drive anyway.