Dutch people cycle an average of 2.6 kilometres each per day. If this pattern was replicated worldwide, the study suggests, annual global carbon emissions would drop by 686 million tonnes.
This mammoth figure exceeds the entire carbon footprint of most countries, including the UK, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Australia.
No I’m telling you they were designing for the car after the second world war. Just like in north America(North America cities started a bit earlier). Most north America cities were also not build for cars, but bulldozed for the car.
Amsterdam for example also had plans to build a highway into the city (lucky the lack of money and opposition stoped it) and bulldozed some streets already for heavy car design. The rest of the city streets where full of cars and parking.
Here is what the Damrak looked like
But after the stop de kindermoorden (child murder) protest(and many more) it slowly started changing. Now everytime a street is renewed it is to today’s standards including people focused design.
Also keep in mind the old city of most European cities is pretty small. The argument “BuT tHe cIty Is olD” only works for maybe 20% of a city the rest is build after the 1900 or for sure not medieval.
And this is also not just a big city thing. Every city, Town or Village(and also outside it) has the same rules for street design. Amsterdam for example really sucks te ride a bike I think. There are many better cities in the Netherlands.
But you can also look like a city like Rotterdam, a city designed for the car in the Netherlands. It’s not great but it still has room for bikes and public transport. And some projects to make the city more people friendly.