In fact I’ve met so many Londoners who never even bothered to learn to drive.
In my experience, it’s generally American cities that require a car rather than European cities. Generally speaking of course, you get good and bad city designs in all countries.
I didn’t learn to drive until I was in my 30s and used to spend my 20s travelling the length and breadth of the U.K. and Europe. I even had a long distance relationship at the time too. A long distance relationship that worked because we are now married.
Sometimes I might have to plan a journey in advance (to figure out the route) but there were plenty of times I just went where the wind took me (proverbially speaking). And frankly even after learning to drive, smart phones weren’t invented yet and satnavs were luxuries, so you’d often still need to plan ahead even if you could drive.
So no, driving needn’t be an essential life skill for everyone. And that doesn’t mean they have a limited perspective either. On the contrary, if you cannot imagine life without driving then it is your perspective which is limited.
Huh?
Other countries might not even allow you to apply for a learners licence unless you have a specific visa.
So if you’re a young adult and travel a lot, it might not even be possible, let alone practical, to earn a license.
Which is precisely why I didn’t learn to drive until I was in my 30s and ready to start a family.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Driving_Permit
That scenario adds up, it just wasn't what I thought when I saw "short periods".
Sure, some of them will drive. But I’ve also known plenty of people who cannot drive because they spend their time backpacking or who work a couple of years in one county then move to another.
But a couple of years is a huge amount of time. If you put in just 4 hours a week you'll be done in no time. Not knowing how to drive in that situation is because of not caring very much, not because of moving around. And the vast majority of what you learn stays relevant when you move.
Sure, if you put 4 hours a week into any activity you’ll soon get good at it. But the crux of the issue is whether that activity is seen as a priority or not.
> Not knowing how to drive in that situation is because of not caring very much, not because of moving around.
They didn’t care because they were moving around a lot.
And frankly it doesn’t really matter what the reason is. Regardless of whether it is a practical or preferential justification, the end result is the same: plenty of people manage just fine without learning to drive.
I find it weird that this concept is so alien to some people. But I guess that’s a good example of the diversity of the readership on here.
This doesn't seem to be about travel at all. It's just that some people don't get a license.
It's not that the concept is alien, it's that the justification you gave isn't really true. It doesn't make it a "whole lot harder to learn to drive". Moving around has almost no effect on getting some driving lessons.
But you’re not going to have a car if you haven’t already learnt to drive.
> This doesn't seem to be about travel at all. It's just that some people don't get a license.
They don’t get licenses because they’re travelling.
Time is finite, not everyone wants to use it learning to drive.
> It's not that the concept is alien, it's that the justification you gave isn't really true.
It was literally the reason I learnt to drive so late in life. It was the reason many of my friends either learnt to drive later in life or still don’t even drive now.
You might not relate to us but that doesn’t make it untrue.
> It doesn't make it a "whole lot harder to learn to drive". Moving around has almost no effect on getting some driving lessons.
It does if you don’t have a fixed residence. What address are you even going to put on your provisional license?
And if you’re going to spend 2 years max in any one place then you’re there to soak up experiences, not spend it learning to drive.
Look, I get some people see driving as a priority. But not everyone is programmed that way and not every place on earth requires a car to get around. You say this isn’t an alien concept to you yet you fail to accept that people like me exist. So I don’t really know what I can say further
Like, come on, if you're somewhere for two years it's not the 25 hours that make the difference.
And sure put the address you've been at for an entire year.
It's not a "whole lot harder". You personally didn't want to, and that is fine.
"be hugely costly and still only result in a license that isn’t immediately transferable to other countries (eg you have to hold a license for x years before you can drive abroad and/or older than x years old)"
So I'm going to ask again, what kind of countries issue you with a licence that isn't immediately transferable to other countries? You can get an international driving permit literally the same day you pick up your regular licence, there is no time limitation on that - or if there is where you live, please educate me so I know better.
So you couldn’t pass your driving test then immediately drive abroad.
Edit: I cannot find any detail on that so maybe this isn’t the case any longer. Learn something new everyday :)
Woodworking and the wiring of houses are also basic life skills, I imagine. I'll try to learn them when I get there. But so far, I've never wanted for the need to drive a car.
Traveled all over the world. Lived in 8 different cities. Never needed a car.
I am confused what you think you need a car for?? It is such a strange stance. Where have you gone that I can not go? Public transport exists. So do private tour buses.
The further away from city suburbs, one might get a lucky 1 bus per hour if at all.
My wife grew up in the suburbs of an even smaller city. It took about 10 minutes to reach that city center by bike, but almost everybody drove because the road connecting the suburb to the city center feels very unsafe on a bike.
Many cities are only city in name, and in practice more towns aspiring to be cities, specially in southern and eastern Europe.
Here is one anecdote, Portalegre might be a nice city, as Northen Alentejo capital in Portugal, yet those 20 km on average from the neighbouring villages aren't that nice to do on bycicle specially during Summertime with temperatures up to 45 degrees celsius. And if you're thinking about taking a bus, better save money for a taxi, unless you're willing to spend the whole day in the city, as there is only one bus into each direction connecting the neighbouring villages to the city.
Besides, your statement was an absolute so the GP only needed one of example to disprove you yet gave you two.
There are plenty of cities in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, Croatia,... where it doesn't hold.
You know, those that people from the cities you listed love to rent cars for their vacations, and enjoy what many locals can't afford.
And no, they weren’t all capital sized cities.
I also don’t understand what vacationing has to do with anything when I was talking about expats.
Plenty, it shows not wanting to endure the actual pain locals have with local transport system, if one exists at all.
But this conversation is about people who don’t drive. Not people who do.
You’ve warped the discussion so far off it’s original topic that your entire premise here is now just one stupid straw man argument.
To get back on topic: nobody is disputing that there are people out there with driving licenses (well durrr!). It was to explain why some people (ie not all) are content without learning to drive.
I live miles out of from London and get the train in. Almost nobody I work with live in the city and none of them drive in. In fact you wouldnt want to drive in London.
This has been true for so many European cities, Cambridge, Chelmsford, York, Amsterdam, Paris, Berlin, etc. all are very accessible for non-car owners.
Anyone who claims you need a car to live in a European city is someone who hasn’t experienced many European cities ;)
It is no accident you only listed capital sized cities.
I’ve noticed this trend you have of defining things in absolute terms despite the evidence being transparently not. Which I normally make an effort not to reply to your silly comments however on this occasion didn’t check who the commenter was before responding. Which is basically a longwinded way of saying I’m not going to continue on with this absurd exchange any further.
Just don't pick Lisbon, Porto, Madrid, Barcelona, Rom, Napel, Milano, Athens, Zagreb for the actual experience.
Here is a suggestion, country side in the middle of the country, or one of the Mediterrean or Atlantic island.
But I suspect that’s intentional behaviour. You don’t want people to agree, you are actively seeking out an argument. Because if you wanted a sensible discussion you’d see that our two points were complimentary rather than contradictory.
How exactly would you change London to be more like tokyo? As the simplest question - which areas of London would you demolish to make room for high density Japanese housing? Alternatively, if you're going to build wide, how would you connect those areas with the centre, if building new metro lines is pretty much impossible in London for historical reasons?
"London's issue is political will, because too many wealthy and politically connected people currently profit from the current status quo"
That just sounds like saying "it's the elites fault, dude". Like, sure, but please propose any actual solution.
You don't need your neighbors permission to build, everything is basically by-right where you follow well a well defined housing code vs. needing special approval for every little thing. Just get out of the way and stop needing a license to do anything and you will see how quickly the market will sort it out in London. The people of London will decide THEMSELVES, what to demolish or not once given permission to do so, no central planning needed.
But it doesn't because the current system benefits those elites. Any time large amounts of special permission is needed to get anything done, creates the space for corruption in which a bureaucrat can benefit through bribes of one form or another.
What your basically acting like is acting like you can't exercise and eat right to lose weight while you have no mental issues, financial issues, health issues, disability or age issues blocking you from doing the basic things. London has the money, ability and ground where all this is possible. It's a form of learned helplessness in front of a system that has given you no way out.
Perhaps the real London elites are the clay underneath the city which makes tall buildings more expensive.
Yeah, maybe some elites will get to renovate their houses. Who cares. Large apartment buildings would get built with huge numbers of units to help drive down rent.
Didn’t they open a new one last year?
- Ask for 90% of the buildings to be less than 120% of the average price.
- Have lottery system for lot allocation
- Make it easy for groups and communities to buy lots
- Cap the lot prices per sqf
- Evaluate the projects on the community impacts vs $$$
See also this to understand how capitalist architecture makes everyone miserable: https://youtu.be/VoYZlyBHyQM
When buying a car you have to prove you have access to a drive way
that's step one
The problem is that housing in Tokyo is very small, and most Westerners (particular Americans) simply can't fathom living in it, and it would never be allowed to be built there. Westerners need to change their expectations.
40% of the housing problem is whatever the fuck is going on in the banking system -> it enables us to commit all of our life savings for the rest of our productive lives to pay for a roof over our heads. It's like a hostage situation with the highest bidder.
> You would probably have to demolish large areas of London and replace them with high-density housing to match demand - but obviously that's never going to happen.
So true, my friend is not even allowed to raise your roof by 20 cm to create an extra room in the loft.
The planning system here is so crazy, I am confident it's like 40% of the problem.
Not to say that there isn’t something else going on.
How can Berlin, a city with ample free space and free buildings still see a massive increase in housing prices if it was a simple issue of supply and demand? There's undoubtedly something else much fishier going on.
Here in most places it is because supply is suppressed by government policy and the planning and approval process. Want to add a room to your house? That could be 10's of thousands in planning fees if it is even allowed and it still could be denied. Want to turn your laundromat into an apartment complex? Denied: the proposal will cast shadows across a lot where the city is thinking of building a playground for a local school[0].
Overall its very much in the interests of those who own property to keep more from being built and they naturally act for those interests.
[0]Not hyperbole - this is an actual example.
Nah. There's still a lot of fairly low-quality, low-density housing in areas near the centre of London. In fact, just about everywhere you look there are residential towers under construction: there must be hundreds of them going up right now! There is still plenty of scope to greatly improve the quality and efficiency of housing in London without sacrificing open, green spaces.
Live somewhere for at least 35% of a year (more than 1/3rd), then most of that tax goes away since it's a 'primary residence'. (35% to allow for moving as well as possible 'sunbird' / 'winter/summer homes', while still catching anyone who treats housing as an 'investment' (a tax upon the poor))
So the end result, the poor pay more?
Instead, what Vancouver did was simply tax empty housing.
Why is that framing preferred over "landlords, who reduce housing supply by keeping properties off the market"?
If you want to get to the root of the problem, look at the development process. Start with your local zoning laws. It is insane how tightly prescriptive they are, usually, and they generally have lots of density-limiting provisions like mandatory parking, maximum floor to area ratios, maximum heights, minimum setbacks, etc.
And then there's the planning/approval process.
They don't reduce housing supply for living, but they do reduce housing supply for owning. Normal people being able to own the house that they live in seems like a reasonable societal goal to me, but the current economic climate is making that harder and harder as houses move into the hands of landlords (private and commercial).
Yes, the world needs some amount of rented housing, but a huge percentage of people renting now want to own, just to have stability and control over their living environment.
Also, re-property costs. It’s mostly speculative. If we banned foreign non-resident buyers and disincentivised buy-to-let landlords then prices would be much lower.
To answer your point to "live further out" as in actually pay enough for housing that it covers the ticket costs you're talking about Birmingham and beyond hour commutes.
Land cost can be brought down by building furthere away from the center or in the countryside -> have smaller villages or towns outside of london.
As for building costs. How about we talk to developers and ask them what the biggest building costs are? Often times, it's regulation, regulation regulations. Get rid of all the ones that are causing high prices: at least this should be done in certain areas to allow those who want low cost housing some options.
200 years ago, Henry david thoreagh built a cabin for 28$. That's about 3000 dollars in today's cost. and back then the average person was able to pay off their house in just 10 years! The average house cost about 800$ which was about 800 days of unskilled labor (1/5th of what it is today if you include prop taxes) If it could be done then, then why can't it be done now? why has our standard of living dropped so much, that it's actually considerably lower than it was 200 years ago?
Our standard of living had massively increased since Thoreagh's shed, in part because of regulation requiring it. I'd be surprised to learn you can't build a shed for $3000.
I’ve never seen this not be the case.
Are European cities organized differently or something? I’ve never see affordable living within biking distance of a business district, in the US. Prices are usually double.
US cities are built around the car. This means more space dedicated to parking, which means less space for homes and businesses, which means things are farther apart, which means people need cars.
It’s a negative feedback loop.
Of course, failure is subjective: car-based cities have been essential for the car industry because many inhabitants are completely dependent on having a car.
I think that’s more likely “and rebuilt according to the old plan”. Very few German cities escaped with limited bombing damage.
https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/air-war-germany-map/:
“Of the 54 largest cities (>100,000 inhabitants) in Germany, only four survived without significant damage: Lübeck, Wiesbaden, Halle and Erfurt.”
Eg, in many US cities, it is illegal to have a bakery on the ground floor of an apartment building.
Though, bottom line, my point is US and EU cities were designed very similarly from 1940 until 1970
There was and is scarce 'city planning' in Europe because there is scarce planning that can be done. The majority of cities have emerged in the middle ages at the latest, and there is nothing that can be done to 'plan' them. Even for the peripheries (as they are called) this is so: They formed around the villages or remote settlements in the peripheries of the cities, so there was no planning there at all.
The closes that can be said to be built 'around cars' would be the urban construction of gated communities or high rises in the peripheries. But they still were not built around cars - those communities can still perfectly live within their own locale by having access to everything. The only difference that requires a car would be those people having jobs in the city and having to drive 20-30 minutes every day to the city and back.
> Though, bottom line, my point is US and EU cities were designed very similarly from 1940 until 1970
That is patently false.
Though, the reason why 1940 - 1970 is so important is because it is post-war and a lot was rebuilt in Europe while at the same time there was a lot of growth in American cities (the baby boom; federal investment in roads, etc..), and both European and American Urban growth and reconstruction were heavily influenced by "Modernism" [2][3]. "European engineers were sent in flocks to the US to learn from the environments in which these revolutionary ideas were playing out, returning with tabula rasa development plans to realise their own modernist dreams." [4]
Modernist Urban planning ideas started in the 1910's and on, but it wasn't until 1940 that there was the mass of opportunity for rebuilding and the funding to implement those ideas. "Modernist principles have shaped city-building since the beginning of the twentieth century. Numerous authors draw a connection between modernist discourse within planning practice and the rise of the Fordist paradigm (Irving 1993; Calthorpe and Fulton 2001; Sandercock 1998). In following these principles, the North American built environment has taken the form of low-density sprawl. This development pattern is characterized by a dominance of single-family housing, a reliance on automobile transportation and a strict separation of land uses." [5]
A key difference is that US civil engineers still are quite influenced by Modernism. For example, US traffic engineers continue to optimize for the throughput of vehicles on city streets rather than the throughput of people [6].
On the other hand, around the 1970s affluent European urban planners pushed back on "Le Corbesier" style planning and "Modernist planning fell into decline. "By the late 1960s and early 1970s, many planners felt that modernism's clean lines and lack of human scale sapped vitality from the community, blaming them for high crime rates and social problems.[59] ... Modernist planning fell into decline in the 1970s when the construction of cheap, uniform tower blocks ended in most countries" [7]
[1] https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20130722-revolution-in-pa...
[2] https://www.archdaily.com/604056/north-america-s-radiant-cit...
[3] [How a Controversial European Architect Shaped New York](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-controversial-...)
[4] [Story of cities #36: how Copenhagen rejected 1960s modernist 'utopia'](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/may/05/story-cities-...)
[5] http://www.etsav.upc.es/personals/iphs2004/pdf/003_p.pdf (page 3)
[6] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-09-30/a-swiss-l...
[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_urban_planning#Mode... - "Reaction against modernism"
-----------------------
Beyond the above, the more extended exerts below I believe make the same point I made. I would find it interesting where these are patently false:
> "Modernism: In the 1920s, the ideas of modernism began to surface in urban planning. The influential modernist architect Le Corbusier presented his scheme for a "Contemporary City" for three million inhabitants (Ville Contemporaine) in 1922. The centrepiece of this plan was the group of sixty-story cruciform skyscrapers, steel-framed office buildings encased in huge curtain walls of glass. [....] He segregated pedestrian circulation paths from the roadways and glorified the automobile as a means of transportation. "
> "Reaction against modernism: By the late 1960s and early 1970s, many planners felt that modernism's clean lines and lack of human scale sapped vitality from the community, blaming them for high crime rates and social problems.[59]
> Modernist planning fell into decline in the 1970s when the construction of cheap, uniform tower blocks ended in most countries, such as Britain and France. Since then many have been demolished and replaced by other housing types. Rather than attempting to eliminate all disorder, planning now concentrates on individualism and diversity in society and the economy; this is the post-modernist era.[59]"
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_urban_planning#Mode...
"Modernist principles have shaped city-building since the beginning of the twentieth century. Numerous authors draw a connection between modernist discourse within planning practice and the rise of the Fordist paradigm (Irving 1993; Calthorpe and Fulton 2001; Sandercock 1998). In following these principles, the North American built environment has taken the form of low-density sprawl. This development pattern is characterized by a dominance of single-family housing, a reliance on automobile transportation and a strict separation of land uses." (page 3)
"A significant individual embracing these values was the Swiss architect Le Corbusier. Beginning his practice in the late ‘10s, he wanted to correct the ‘chaos’ of the city and create an ideal order. His impact on modernist planning thought is incalculable, and his ideas were widely applied in cities during the 1950s and ‘60s." (Page 4)
"Following a 1926 US Supreme Court decision to safeguard property values from noxious land uses and neighbours, zoning became accepted as the principal planning tool (Hall 1988). The result was the strict separation of work, home, marketplace and social life. This move to create areas dedicated to specific purposes, and to remove uses that conflict produced single-use central business districts, uniform housing tracts, and dispersed shopping centres and recreational facilities." (Page 6)
"Transportation policy during the 1950s and ‘60s focused primarily on increasing vehicle capacity on roads. Analytical tools considered highways and cars only, while ignoring community design and public transit considerations. Instead of deciding where development should go, engineers just looked at projected traffic trends and designed infrastructure in an attempt to accommodate them" (Page 7)
"Inherent in the modernist project was a belief in the ‘tabula rasa.’ As a result, enormous areas were cleared with completely new environments inserted. Again, Le Corbusier led the drive with his unrealized 1925 proposal to demolish historic Paris north of the River Seine (except selected monuments that would be moved), and to replace it with eighteen 700-foot towers (Moe and Wilkie 1997)" (page 12)
Thats not correct. Some noticeable percentage of German cities and some cities of the war-affected regions were rebuilt. And most partially. The re-architecting of Paris does not have any relevance to cars since it happened in 19th century.
> Beyond the above, the more extended exerts below I believe make the same point I made
They actually invalidate your argument - including the earlier excerpts: Modernist architects adopting car-centric ideas and high rises does not mean that they got to implement what they wanted to do in Europe. There is no such case of large-scale reconstruction of any European city around cars except the war-affected ones (and most partially), and all your excerpts just confirm that. They talk about how (the part of) a generation of European architects adopted modernist car-centric ideas - not them actually getting around to implement them. Its Le Corbusier proposing to demolish part of Paris in a furtive attempt, or him planning a high rise somewhere and whatnot.
Aside from that the excerpts explicitly demonstrate that car-centric cities were a US phenomenon. Not European.
Normally so. Because even the mere act of buying any zone in an average European city to demolish it would cost !enormous! amounts of money that nobody would be willing to spend. Leave aside the reconstruction. This is why the 19th century reconstruction of parts of Paris is the sole incident of this.
All of this, before the fact that most European cities do not have space - nobody can imagine demolishing an entire city to rebuild it with less density so that more cars could be used in sparse urbanization. Europe does not have that much space.
> Thats not correct. Some noticeable percentage of German cities and some cities of the war-affected regions were rebuilt. And most partially. The re-architecting of Paris does not have any relevance to cars since it happened in 19th century.
You stated that there was not a lot of urban planning in most European cities as they grew organically. My point is that many (over their _entire_) history were rebuilt many times, and in some of those instances with explicit urban planning. The example of Paris is to simply demonstrate this, not only was the city rebuilt several times, but once for the sheer sake of urban planning. This contradicts your statement: "There was and is scarce 'city planning' in Europe because there is scarce planning that can be done", Paris is _one_ (extremely prominent) counter-example.
>> Beyond the above, the more extended exerts below I believe make the same point I made
> They actually invalidate your argument - including the earlier excerpts: Modernist architects adopting car-centric ideas and high rises does not mean that they got to implement what they wanted to do in Europe.
I don't think that is correct, and hence it does not at all invalidate the argument. I'm not sure if you read all of the important quotes and the references. With the benefit of the doubt, I think proof by contradiction can demonstrate this. If modernist urban planners had no sway, and were not at all influential, then these quotes would make no sense (these are referring to Europe & North America):
- "Modernist principles have shaped city-building since the beginning of the twentieth century."
- "Modernist planning fell into decline in the 1970s when the construction of cheap, uniform tower blocks ended in most countries, such as Britain and France. Since then many have been demolished and replaced by other housing types. "
To further explore this point, (and this article I really encourage you to read in its entirety): https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/may/05/story-cities-...
> “There were these big freeway people, and then there were the counter streams that happened between 1960 and 1970 ... One group was pushing cars out of the city, while others were trying to push them in.”
If Copenhagen was _not_ built as a modernist, car centric city (during the 1950's-1960's), then why would there be a group pushing back against car centricism in the 1960's at all? What would they have been pushing back against? Were they pushing back against how cities were built an ocean away in North America? No.. they were pushing back against how Copenhagen was rebuilt with car-centric, modernist urban planning. I mean, the title of the article is: "how Copenhagen rejected 1960s modernist 'utopia'"
> Aside from that the excerpts explicitly demonstrate that car-centric cities were a US phenomenon. Not European.
Not quite, the excerpts show that there was a lot of influence back and forth. European city planners went to the US and were influenced, and vice versa. Corbusier even designed several blocks of NYC, and the influence was reciprocal, see quote:
- "European engineers were sent in flocks to the US to learn from the environments in which these revolutionary ideas were playing out, returning with tabula rasa development plans to realise their own modernist dreams."
> Some noticeable percentage of German cities and some cities of the war-affected regions were rebuilt. And most partially.
Considering the war effected huge regions of Europe.. that would have been: nearly all of Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, a third of France, and countless more as large areas were flattened several times over. Practically every German city alone was carpet and fire bombed many times. Hence, these are very, very large reconstructions, all at a time when Modernist urban planning was the dominant style of urban planning.
> Because even the mere act of buying any zone in an average European city to demolish it would cost !enormous! amounts of money that nobody would be willing to spend.
I agree... to some extent. There are counter examples. The idea though that an entire city would be demolished is a straw argument. That is not to say that significant sections were not redone. Though that is still not entirely germaine, as the post-war gave this opportunity to rebuilt _entire_ cities, and huge sections of other cities. Further, there was also outward expansion during this time when there was a lot of new construction. EG: "These large housing projects, known as the "Grand Ensembles," were constructed by the French government from the 1950s through the 1980s to help ease the housing problems that were prevalent throughout the country. Many of these high-rise buildings and communities still exist today" [1]
[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/high-rises-of-the-parisian-s....
I think the citations quoted above from multiple sources generously support this. Again, that is not at all saying that all of Europe was rebuilt in the 1950s-1960s willingly and entirely to be car centric. But, the _planning_ of new construction/reconstruction were similar during that period in both the USA & Europe (and Europe by-and-large stopped their new constructions in that style around the early 1970s while the USA by and large did not). There is even a mention in one of the quotes of a lot of that construction having been torn down.
I'd say Warsaw, Prague and Paris are all great examples. Warsaw was completely rebuilt and downtown is car centric (looks very much like an American city). Prague was somewhat unscathed and has a very historic layout, Paris is a mix of reconstruction and historic urban planning. The point remains that there was a pretty specific car-centric urban planning style that dominated in Europe in the late 1940's-1960s.
All that is to say - European urban planning was also, at one time somewhat recently, largely car centric. It is really notable that stopped being the case and is an example for US cities - that they can also transform away from being fully car-centric.
That's where you go wrong. There isnt 'urban planning' in Europe because there isnt any space to plan anything. What could be called 'urban planning' in Europe is laying out subway tracks, maybe demolishing a run-down shanty neighborhood to build apartments. Thats it. Naturally there is no way to plan anything around cars. The most you can do is to eat up a little sidewalk in the biggest avenues in the biggest cities to make one more lane for the main street. And that's what was done for ~80 years.
> I think the citations quoted above from multiple sources generously support this
They dont. You moved on to 'urban planning was like that' argument from 'built like that'.
> European urban planning was also, at one time somewhat recently, largely car centric
Repeating it wont make it so. It wasnt, and still isnt. Aside from some part of Germany that rebuilt its destroyed cities and built autobahns, entire Europe was about tiny cars and tiny streets, leave aside any phenomenon like suburbs.
You cannot extrapolate from 'Le Corbusier and his friends liked cars and wanted to demolish cities' to 'city planning was like that'. If city planning was really like that (if it actually existed that is), then Le Corbusier and his friends would get their way and entire cities would have been rebuilt.
Sprinkle a bit of mixed used zoning, bike infrastructure and public transport on top.
I live in the outskirts of a city of almost 300 000, and can be in city center by bike in 20 minutes. I'm at work in 10 minutes.
Copenhagen: • City 183.20 km2 (70.73 sq mi) • pop 1,366,301 • Density 4,417.65/km2 (11,441.7/sq mi)
Kansas City, Missouri: • City 318.80 sq mi (825.69 km2) • pop 508,090 • Density 623.31/km2 (1,614.38/sq mi )
It blows my mind that people here put Europe as some kind of affordable walkable alternative. Some places are indeed walkable, but affordability is utterly atrocious by US standard.
Magical thinking will not make it so. My partner and I moved further away from the city where she works because we wanted to move in together and we can't afford rent or property where either of us used to live.
I work from home so most the time my car sits charging the driveway. However, all of my doctors are at least a half-hour drive away, my dental clinic is a 50 minute drive, my hobbies are anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour half drive away. The rest of my family is an hour away so no amount of moving will change these things without making the rest of them worse.
But bicycles will work fine for 10% of my travel except for there being no infrastructure supporting bicycling.