Though progress is often slow, city planners and politicians are gradually waking up to the fact that when cities offer safe and affordable alternatives to cars, we start to travel differently.
More and more young people are choosing bicycles, buses and trains over owning a car out of the sheer cost. In Berlin, it’s public transport, not cars, which is the coolest way of getting around.
In Copenhagen, a city that has a long held reputation for being bike-friendly, a whopping 62% of people choose to cycle their commute.
In the French city of Lyon, the number of cars entering the city has fallen by 20% compared to just a decade ago. As the city’s network of bike hire stations continues to grow, town planners are hoping for a further 20% decline.
In London, where cycle super-highways are becoming popular, the share of journeys made by car has fallen by a quarter since 1990.
Car free days are rising in popularity in many of the world’s largest cities, giving people a taste of what it’s like to live with less noise, traffic and pollution. Bogota was one of the first cities to introduce a car free day, and it’s now become so popular that it’s been extended to a full week.
Bogotá’s Ciclovía is fantastic! I was there in the mid-nineties and they closed a major artery, the Carretera Séptima, on Sundays. Here some pictures.
Only in a dominantly car-based system.
Many poorer countries cannot even afford such a car-based system. The use a system based on public transport which already shows that it is more economical.
That’s also a macro-economic argument against cars: They cost a lot of resources and money which is not well spent. Ultimately, money for gas ends up for drilling holes into the ground. For EVs, it is not much better. While a transport system based on bikes and public transport leaves far more money in the local economy.
Because rural areas have smaller population density, there are fewer passengers. In such places, there are usually fewer routes, bigger interval between buses, no service during nights and/or weekends. If you need to go somewhere where there is no direct bus line, you may need to take a long detour. Running buses where there are few passengers is uneconomical: an empty bus uses more fuel than a full car. Bicycles can help, but not everyone is fit enough to ride long distance. Also people don’t want to ride bicycles during rain, snow or heat. In such places, most people have cars. At least there is no shortage of parking space.