Re:Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
by konart on Wednesday August 07, 2019 @03:07AM
(#20632550)
>If they're going to two different schools, most likely one of them is going to secondary school and can ride their own bike, or one of them is going to a special needs school and gets picked up. At least, that's how it works around here.
My other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20632459
As for the 'secondary' school - I, for example, was attending a Gymnasium as main and a musical Lyceum as a secondary. Both since 6-7 years old. And that's pretty common over here.
Re:Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
by mcv on Wednesday August 07, 2019 @05:02AM
(#20633022)
A single kid going to two different schools is extremely rare here, but as it happens, that's exactly what my son has doing since he was 8: a regular school just around the corner, and a "day a week" school for gifted children which is a bit further away. I take him there by bike. A car wouldn't add much value for me there.
But Amsterdam is a sizable yet compact city, which makes everything easy to reach. In a differently designed city, or a smaller town where you might have to travel to another town, things can be completely different.
In a city designed for walking and bicyling, you can do that by bike. And once they're old enough, they can do it on their own bike.
Of course the city needs to be designed for that. In a city designed only for cars, you're going to need a car for everything. The big issue here is: how do we want to design our cities?
> now imaging you have two of them going to two different schools, each 40 minutes walking distance from home, different directions and your office in somewhere else too.
If they're going to two different schools, most likely one of them is going to secondary school and can ride their own bike, or one of them is going to a special needs school and gets picked up. At least, that's how it works around here.
In any case, I don't consider 40 minutes a suitable distance for walking: take a bike. It's only a few minutes that way.
That said, my wife did insist I get a driver's license when we had kids, and I did. I rarely use it, and certainly for moving kids around the city, a light cargo bike is more practical in Amsterdam.