[HN Gopher] Mayor of Paris removed parking spaces, reduced the n...
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Mayor of Paris removed parking spaces, reduced the number of cars
Author : heresie-dabord
Score : 219 points
Date : 2026-03-21 13:12 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.cnn.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.cnn.com)
| hshdhdhj4444 wrote:
| This article has such a weird framing.
|
| It keeps repeating how the cleaner air is so good for tourists.
|
| But tourists visiting Paris for a week don't get the majority of
| the benefit from cleaner air.
|
| The Parisian residents living there throughout the year do.
|
| Maybe because it's CNN, an American outlet, they're focused on
| the "tourist", but these benefits have mostly accrued to
| Parisians.
|
| Also, the 4% increase in traffic jams is minuscule when compared
| to other large cities across the world (outside of maybe NYC,
| since it implemented congestion pricing over that period). Paris
| has not escaped the wrath of the SUV, and a large part of the
| congestion cities across the world are seeing is solely down to
| cars becoming bigger.
| lefrenchy wrote:
| How does an SUV cause more congestion than a sedan? That seems
| untrue to me.
| Schiendelman wrote:
| Have you ever tried to park an SUV versus parking a sedan?
| obsidianbases1 wrote:
| Great point.
|
| Additionally, driving a small sedan myself, if there is a
| parking spot (not parallel, normal lot spot) in between two
| SUVs, there is a good chance that spot is useless, even in
| my small car.
|
| Just last night, I was parked perfectly (I had to stop and
| admire my work because what follows), but still had to
| squeeze out with my door undoubtedly touching the SUV, and
| it wasn't even a large size SUV.
|
| I really hope waymo takes of and makes it economical to
| stop owning a car, and reduce the necessity of parking lots
| consp wrote:
| > there is a good chance that spot is useless, even in my
| small car.
|
| Totally off topic but I've seen two smarts side-by-side
| in one parking spot, on a right angle to the parking spot
| making exiting the spot easy. Now that's efficient. And
| they still were less parked on the road than any big SUV
| or worse.
| calvinmorrison wrote:
| fewer cars per foot, less visibility, etc? If there's a sedan
| in front of me I can see whats going on, if there's a UPS box
| truck, i cannot even see the light 150 feet away.
| troupo wrote:
| Here's a helpful comparison
| https://www.carsized.com/en/cars/compare/opel-
| astra-1998-cou...
| InsideOutSanta wrote:
| That's an amazing website; thanks for linking it.
| Apparently, lengthwise, my car easily fits _between the
| wheels_ of a Ford F-150 without even touching them. My car
| 's full height is substantially below where the F-150's
| windows begin. That car could probably drive over my car
| and barely even notice it.
| curtisblaine wrote:
| Not so helpful; the cars are from two different generations
| at two different price points. Try
| https://www.carsized.com/en/cars/compare/bentley-flying-
| spur...
| airstrike wrote:
| Also why are front and rear not overlays
| vel0city wrote:
| You're calling out different price points while then
| choosing a $200k car. Which, you picked that car because
| it's an exceptionally long sedan.
|
| How about we choose a different SUV?
|
| https://www.carsized.com/en/cars/compare/bentley-flying-
| spur...
|
| I see _far_ more suburbans on the road than all models of
| Bentley.
|
| People aren't choosing SUVs because they're smaller than
| sedans. They're choosing them because they're bigger.
| Macha wrote:
| Because old and new cars never have to interact on the
| road?
| troupo wrote:
| Here's comparison with Albarth https://www.carsized.com/e
| n/cars/compare/abarth-500-2016-3-d...
|
| Here's Audi A1 (I used to drive this one, including
| taking another person and a kid on a ski trip): https://w
| ww.carsized.com/en/cars/compare/audi-a1-2018-5-door...
|
| Volvo's own insanely huge and long V60 is still shorter
| than XC 90 https://www.carsized.com/en/cars/compare/volvo
| -v60-2018-esta...
| kibwen wrote:
| One of the major problems with cars is the terrible lack of
| density. Per-occupant, a car occupies more space on the
| roadway than any other form of passenger transport. And as
| cars get larger, that lack of density gets even worse.
| There's only so much space on the road, so something has to
| give.
| efavdb wrote:
| When I look at traffic in my city, I rarely see it caused
| by full packing. Rather throughout seems to be the issue.
| lukeschlather wrote:
| Throughput is directly proportional to the volume of
| cars, and SUVs have larger volume. Technically perhaps
| surface area, but there is a psychological effect to
| height. I believe people also give taller vehicles more
| space as a rule.
| marcosdumay wrote:
| Throughput in congestion is determined mostly by how
| quickly drivers react to the opportunity to move and how
| many points of attrition are in a path. Both of what are
| impacted by the number of cars and how well they break or
| accelerate, not by their size.
|
| There's space to claim large car cause attrition, but
| that's completely dependent of the local properties of
| the streets.
| kibwen wrote:
| The footprint of the car matters. When cars get 5%
| longer, the same number of people in cars takes 5% more
| roadway, which adds up quickly, because the difference
| between smoothly-flowing traffic and jammed traffic is a
| fragile equilibrium dominated by breakpoints.
| Furthermore, heavier cars accelerate and decelerate
| slower than lighter cars, which has a compounding effect
| on decreasing overall throughput.
| bluGill wrote:
| That isn't true. Most of the space a car takes is empty
| as you need long distances between cars.
| lukeschlather wrote:
| That larger cars cause diminished throughput is pretty
| solidly demonstrated through a variety of modeling and
| real-world traffic analysis.
|
| https://www.researchgate.net/publication/365069344_How_th
| e_r...
| vel0city wrote:
| You have a fixed amount of space to put stuff. If the stuff
| gets larger, can you put more or less stuff in that space?
|
| So now we have at least the same number of people trying to
| put their stuff in that fixed size space, but their stuff got
| bigger, does that make it easier or harder for them to put
| their stuff in that space? Will they have to compete more or
| less for that space?
|
| Seems like a pretty obvious one to me.
| magicalhippo wrote:
| Here the large SUVs make everyone else drive slower in the
| city, because they're so big the driver has poor visibility
| and thinks they need several feet more than they do in
| clearance, and so drive almost in the middle of the road.
| Others then have to go real slow to not get dinged up on
| either side.
| frnx wrote:
| The new large cycling strips that appeared in the last 5-6
| years are so good. At commute time there are frequently jammed
| with /cyclists/, but let's face it it's miles better than being
| stuck in a car. I shudder to think about the alternative where
| each cyclist was instead alone in a small car, this wouldn't
| even fit on the roads.
| suddenlybananas wrote:
| I do wonder how many cyclists in Paris are really replacing
| cars versus replacing metro usage. Obviously, it's still good
| for people to cycle as well since the metro can be insanely
| crowded at times, but living in Paris, my impression is that
| the people who cycle are the kinds who would have been
| unlikely to own a car in any case.
| saltysalt wrote:
| Exactly.
| nchagnet wrote:
| That's a really good point, I hope at the very least it
| enables a "car -> public transport -> bikes" flow. So even
| if these people were taking the metro, all that extra metro
| space can accomodate car-owners who wish to switch.
| kergonath wrote:
| > I do wonder how many cyclists in Paris are really
| replacing cars versus replacing metro usage.
|
| That's not necessarily a problem, particularly for
| saturated lines like the 13.
| philamonster wrote:
| I would love to be on what amounts to a group ride to and
| from work safely. That has to do wonders for all kinds of
| things both physical and mental. If it were safe I would do
| it year round.
| recursivegirth wrote:
| I would rather float to work like the Swiss.
|
| https://www.businessinsider.com/switzerland-workers-
| commute-...
| tw-20260303-001 wrote:
| Yeah, unless you're a pedestrian. Cyclists in NL in cities
| like Utrecht or Amsterdam are worse than car drivers.
| david-gpu wrote:
| As a pedestrian, I would rather risk a crash with a
| cyclist than with a car.
| tw-20260303-001 wrote:
| As a pedestrian I would hope that those cyclists remember
| when they're pedestrians too. Both can kill you easily.
| But cars don't sneak up on you silent from behind when
| you're on a sidewalk.
| financetechbro wrote:
| Unless they're EVs tho right
| tw-20260303-001 wrote:
| You reckon EVs drive on a sidewalk? Maybe you consider
| moving. Seems like you're surrounded by idiots.
| thrance wrote:
| > Both can kill you easily.
|
| What a ridiculous statement. Motorized vehicles are
| involved in the vast majority of road casualties. You are
| much, _much_ more likely to die from a car accident than
| a bike accident.
| convolvatron wrote:
| as a former pedestrian only and bike rider for the last 5
| years, we really do have to admit that bike riders can be
| real assholes. whether or not the level of injury is the
| same, it definitely feels an unwarranted physical threat
| to have a biker shoot past you from behind or run you
| down in the crosswalk.
| albedoa wrote:
| _Do_ we have to admit that in this sub-thread? Your
| sentiment is better placed where we are not currently
| deriding the absurd take that "both can kill you
| easily". There is no recovery to be had here.
|
| > whether or not the level of injury is the same
|
| It is not the same.
| tw-20260303-001 wrote:
| > There is no recovery to be had here.
|
| Of course there is. The world isn't black and white. I
| said "could", there are many shades of grey in between.
| Don't be such an absolutist, like your truth is the
| truest one.
|
| > It is not the same.
|
| Well, ... it depends, no?
| convolvatron wrote:
| sorry, I just really don't like this glib response that
| while I might be unnecessarily aggressive and threaten
| you, its not really not a problem since the likelihood
| that I'll actually _kill_ you is much lower than if I
| were the same idiot driving a car.
| tw-20260303-001 wrote:
| It's ridiculous because it doesn't fit your narrative. A
| bicycle hitting you are 15mph is going to fuck you up one
| way or another.
| NeutralCrane wrote:
| You are not making a good faith argument when you refute
| this person by saying this "doesn't fit your narrative"
| two comments removed from you telling another person that
| you have no interest in their statistics because of how
| you feel.
| 1718627440 wrote:
| Motorized and bikes are not exclusive.
| david-gpu wrote:
| Have you looked at any actual data about the rate at
| which drivers and cyclists kill people in your area? Can
| you even find news about the last time a cyclist killed a
| pedestrian in your city?
|
| Because I keep an eye on the official Police stats in
| Toronto and it is eye-opening. Statistically, drivers
| kill people, and cyclists don't. It is not even remotely
| close.
| jay_kyburz wrote:
| Just a single anecdote, but one death made the papers
| here last year because it was an e-bike that hit and
| elderly gentleman. The e-bike had been modded and the
| media was suggesting the cyclist faced jail time as a
| result. (if I remember correctly)
| david-gpu wrote:
| Terrible news. How many people were killed by drivers
| since then? What happens when you look at a decade worth
| of data?
| tw-20260303-001 wrote:
| I don't care about your stats. The fact is: cars move in
| their dedicated space. Most of them obey most of the
| traffic rules. Bicycles and scooters zoom past me on the
| sidewalk and it doesn't make me feel safe. Neither having
| to jump over them on a sidewalk. I'm young, I can, but my
| mother cannot and it's a problem for her. So take your
| stats and read them alone. Thanks, I take a car. I'm from
| the generation who doesn't have their noses glued to
| mobile phone 24/7.
| david-gpu wrote:
| Sorry to hear that your mom is struggling. It sounds like
| you are going through a lot.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| How often do cyclists kill pedestrians relative to
| drivers?
| jfengel wrote:
| On a nice day it's fantastic to be out, but Paris can be cold
| and rainy. They really need to have a plan for those days,
| too.
|
| Paris Metro is pretty nice, and reaches most of the car free
| area. But I'm not sure if it can handle all of the cyclists
| if they're all trying to avoid a deluge.
| nchagnet wrote:
| I live in the Netherlands where the weather is arguably
| tougher than in Paris (rain, cold and wind for large
| portion of the year) yet everyone bikes year in year out.
|
| And not just young active people, it's a habit found across
| all age groups, parents bike their children to school (or
| with them if old enough, etc.)
|
| All that to say I wouldn't worry too much about the
| feasibility issue, it's really more of a mindset to adopt,
| and it's happening more and more in France.
| prpl wrote:
| In amsterdam, few people wear modern/synthetic rain coats
| as well. Just riding around in the rain with what I
| assume must be waxed duck out something
| jacquesm wrote:
| Paris has one thing that Amsterdam does not that makes
| cycling more challenging: elevation. (Ok, Amsterdam has
| bridges but those are for the most part really short and
| momentum is enough to carry you across).
| nchagnet wrote:
| Oh I agree. When I lived in Lyon, who is also quite bike-
| friendly, it was a lot more challenging than Amsterdam.
|
| But with electric bikes becoming more affordable,
| hopefully the gap can eventually close.
| jacquesm wrote:
| I've become utterly addicted to my e-bike. You can have
| my car, but my e-bike stays.
| consp wrote:
| I seriously consider 6-7bft headwind far worse than any
| hill. Won't get that in large cities but a bit out that's
| normal cycling weather.
| jacquesm wrote:
| That's true, we can have some serious wind here.
| microtonal wrote:
| I cycled to work every day in Southern Germany, which had
| even more elevation, it was not a huge problem, you get
| fit enough in now time. Older people just use e-bikes.
| jacquesm wrote:
| > Older people just use e-bikes.
|
| Or those with bad legs. Raises hand.
| stef25 wrote:
| > the Netherlands
|
| It's completely flat and the obvious reason why everyone
| cycles. Nothing to do with mindset, like you're somehow
| superior to the rest of EU.
| david-gpu wrote:
| Bicycles have had gears for almost a century, and they
| allow to tackle hilly areas easily. Also, the Netherlands
| is notoriously windy, and a headwind is just as difficult
| as a hill.
|
| No, what makes the Netherlands different is their street
| design prioritizing safety rather than speed at all
| costs. When the streets feel safe from speeding drivers,
| more people choose to ride a bike.
| stef25 wrote:
| > Bicycles have had gears for almost a century, and they
| allow to tackle hilly areas easily.
|
| Assuming everyone but you is retarded.
| david-gpu wrote:
| Not at all. I simply suspect that you are uninformed
| about why cycling is popular in the Netherlands. In the
| 60s the Netherlands was just as flat as it is today, but
| it wasn't a cycling paradise. It all changed with the
| campaign "Stop de Kindermoord" (literally translated as
| "Stop the Child Murder"), which began in 1972.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycling_in_the_Netherlands#
| His...
| nchagnet wrote:
| Considering I'm not Dutch, you may feel reassured there
| is no superiority feeling at play here.
|
| I agree with another commenter that while flat, the
| Netherlands have their own hurdles (biking with a strong
| headwind on the banks of the IJ is not easy, even if
| flat), and I definitely agree that their city design is
| what makes this unique.
|
| I lived in various parts of France growing up, and I can
| assure you there are flat cities there, yet biking in
| them felt very risky at best.
| IneffablePigeon wrote:
| This "nobody cycles in bad weather" is a tired myth. Yes,
| there's some truth in it but cycling numbers past the
| traffic counters in my city in the UK (very similar
| climate) dip by 10-30% in winter months, and the higher end
| of those is mostly leisure routes not commuting ones. The
| Netherlands has a lot of rain and much more cycling than
| most other places.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Summer here is on Tuesday. The rest of the year it is
| rain, alternating with fog, snow & ice.
|
| Nah, jk, it's a beautiful day today and I'm thinking of
| going for a ride.
| p_j_w wrote:
| This is overblown. I visited Tokyo recently and a friend of
| mine was constantly riding his bike around in the middle of
| a cold and snowy winter. He wasn't the only one, either.
| enriquto wrote:
| > Paris can be cold and rainy
|
| I cycle in Paris every week, and the only annoying
| experience climate-wise is the extreme heat you can get
| some days in july and august. If it's cold or wet, you can
| just wear appropriate clothes and be comfortable. But if
| it's sunny and 35degC, you are going to be drenched in
| sweat no matter what! Of course, being in the metro those
| days is even worse...
| microtonal wrote:
| I have cycled every working day in The Netherlands and in
| Germany for years (in Germany it was 22km per day) and I
| would often cycle a bit recreationally in the weekends. It
| really isn't an issue at all. I just have a waterproof
| jacket (one of those that circulate air as well), water
| resistant shoes, and rain pants. On very rainy days, I
| would put on the rain pants and would arrive mostly dry.
|
| It is not really an issue.
|
| The only thing that was slightly meh was the yearly ~two
| weeks of thick snow in Southern Germany. It increases
| effort a bit, but still not a huge issue and the cycling
| roads got cleared pretty quickly.
| bethekidyouwant wrote:
| I would almost believe this, except for your shoes get
| absolutely soaked.
| alamortsubite wrote:
| Not necessarily. I have a pair of Gore-tex Nikes that are
| amazing.
| microtonal wrote:
| They don't, Gore-Tex Eccos with high-enough collars.
| (Gore-Tex does have other issues though.)
| hamdingers wrote:
| Put on a jacket.
|
| One of the saddest effects of car-dependency is people
| forgetting how to dress themselves for the weather.
| consp wrote:
| You haven't been in a bicycle-jam until you've been before an
| open bridge just before the university colleges start in the
| Netherlands. Hundreds of cyclists trying to squeeze through a
| tiny bottleneck. Still costs less time than by going in a
| car.
| drnick1 wrote:
| > At commute time there are frequently jammed with
| /cyclists/, but let's face it it's miles better than being
| stuck in a car.
|
| Cycling is wonderful, except when it rains, when it's cold,
| when it's hot, when it's windy, or when you want to carry
| stuff. So it's not a practical solution 80% of the year.
| gambiting wrote:
| God I hate this argument so much - it's just such an
| obviously incorrect statement which is always hard to win
| against because then the other side will always say "well
| what if you live in Novosibirsk and it's -60C outside, WHAT
| THEN CYCLISTS" - well nothing, if you live there then yeah
| I guess it doesn't work. But if you live in London, Paris,
| Warsaw, Barcelona, Talin or Stockholm it just doesn't hold
| water , and these are places that get very hot, very cold,
| get plenty of rain, snow and wind. It's like that old thing
| about beetles being too heavy to fly but also they can't
| read so they don't care - somehow cyclists in these places
| just get on their bikes and get to work and carry stuff and
| stay dry or cold or warm and it's _fine_ , despite what the
| internet thinks.
| marc_g wrote:
| I'm with you. As someone who cycles every day, just put
| the right clothes on when the weather calls for it, and
| if you need to buy a sofa, then rent an hourly car for
| ten bucks.
| hectdev wrote:
| I've been to Copenhagen in the dead of winter with snow
| on the ground and my mind was blown by how many bikes
| there were on the streets. It really is an adaptable
| activity.
| mcv wrote:
| Get a rain coat, a warm coat, take it off, and make sure
| you've got a big crate on your bike.
|
| Wind does suck. I can't help you there.
| occz wrote:
| Electric assist helps with the wind.
|
| Or just building some fitness, which in my experience
| comes automatically when you bike
| drnick1 wrote:
| Unless you have a place to shower and change at work or
| wherever you go, biking is utterly impractical. That's
| also assuming you have a safe place where to leave your
| bike, and that your commute is like 10 miles or less.
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| I often say that when cycling I don't mind the cold, the
| rain or the wind, only when you get all three at once it
| gets bad.
| throw-the-towel wrote:
| Well IDK, as a pedestrian in Paris I hate cyclists way more
| than I hate cars. Cycling in the Netherlands is wonderful;
| here, it might well have been a mistake.
| jay_kyburz wrote:
| I don't love the waist high black poles that separate the
| roads from the cycle lanes on some roads. They are not
| visible enough.
|
| When we were there a few years ago we saw a young woman on a
| bike slam into one on her morning commute.
|
| I nearly nutted myself a few time too.
| iamkonstantin wrote:
| I think it's no easy task to reform a city away from being car-
| centric. In my home town of Ghent (in Belgium), we've had
| several iterations of a traffic plan that gradually reduces the
| number of parking spaces, rises taxes and car related costs,
| makes streets one way or deprioritises cars (e.g. a car doesn't
| have priority over a bike anymore) etc. It's not easy but the
| city today is a lot more liveable than it was when all this
| started.
| skeletal88 wrote:
| But then public transport has to improve also. You cant make
| owning a car impossible without offering alternatives.
| tikhonj wrote:
| None of the changes in the comment make owning a car
| impossible, they just make driving marginally less
| privileged over walking and biking.
| the_biot wrote:
| No, it's worse than that. The city council very much
| implemented an anti-car (harassment) policy, to the point
| that car owners felt hounded by their own council's
| policies. It seriously wasn't a matter of "marginally
| less privileged".
| TimK65 wrote:
| Motorists are incredibly fragile. I'm glad Paris has had
| a mayor who could stand up to their entitled whinging.
| yulker wrote:
| Interesting how correctly naming them motorists sharpens
| how "the default" is often to be presumed drivers and
| pedestrians and cyclists are marginal
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I don't know that it's a helpful distinction. A lot of
| people do it all - drive, walk, bike, and take public
| transit. Only in this kind of discussion do I see people
| declaring it a team you have to choose.
| dwedge wrote:
| Motorists are an easy scapegoat but without alternatives
| it's just political handwaving. And most people are
| motorists.
|
| Take my city for example. I work in an office block
| around a 15 minute walk from the centre, which has free
| parking for employees. Monday this week the city
| announced that the land is now paid parking to the city
| _effective immediately_. When it was pointed out they
| they hadn 't provided any of the necessary signage or
| machines for this, they decided it was illegal to park
| there at all, with fines and tow trucks for non
| compliance. An email from them suggested "cycling or
| using public transport as the weather is nicer".
|
| I cannot stress this enough. No warning, no compromise,
| no other use for this land, just an immediate draconian
| announcement.
|
| It's very easy to call another group entitled if you're
| not one of them
| enriquto wrote:
| > the city announced that the land is now paid parking to
| the city
|
| what a strange way to put it... why didn't they just say
| that they are not using any more taxpayer money to
| finance _your_ parking space? Land in a city is not "for
| free".
|
| > It's very easy to call another group entitled if you're
| not one of them
|
| yeah, well: my point, exactly!
| bluGill wrote:
| You miss the larger point not mentioned: all those
| motorists will be mad and looking to vote for someone
| next election that will undo it all.
| input_sh wrote:
| Your job in _any_ political office is not to leave
| everything as-is and to cement yourself into that
| position, but to make marginal improvements, even _if_
| doing so costs you the next elections or inconveniences
| people (hopefully only temporarily).
|
| Most of those marginal improvements can only be seen as
| something positive in retrospective, not while they're
| being made. While they're being made, they'll always be
| unpopular, as the voter base is usually not keen on
| defending the people that are currently in charge. That
| doesn't mean they won't show up in the next elections,
| just that they are quieter in the meantime.
| dwedge wrote:
| I'll be totally honest in that I don't know what the
| arrangement was before, but that free parking was
| previously enforced by permits so it's a reasonable
| assumption that it was not at the tax payers expense
| stef25 wrote:
| > Motorists are incredibly fragile
|
| Until you throw yourself in front of my car
| alamortsubite wrote:
| > > Motorists are incredibly fragile
|
| > Until you throw yourself in front of my car
|
| Fragile with regard to their egos, as illustrated here.
| jadyoyster wrote:
| Imagine how "hounded" everyone else feels by driver
| friendly polies in other cities.
| Mawr wrote:
| The starting point is anti-anything-but-a-car, so it's
| understandable that in the process of getting to any sort
| of parity you'd feel like it's "harassment".
|
| It's like claiming getting rid of slavery is
| "harassment", because your unfair privileges are being
| taken back.
| hamdingers wrote:
| When one is accustomed to privilege, equality feels like
| oppression.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Generally, restrictions on cars make public transport
| better automatically, as they make buses work better.
| zahlman wrote:
| It certainly helps the buses move more efficiently, but
| it can't do much about things like bus stop placement, or
| just generally _sense of place_ as you start or end your
| trip.
| alamortsubite wrote:
| > it can't do much about things like bus stop placement
|
| Why not? Fewer cars means more room for bus stops.
| zahlman wrote:
| Because there has to be a place where the bus stop could
| sensibly be. A history of car-centric design often
| eliminates those opportunities.
| alamortsubite wrote:
| I see. I think you're talking about stop placement on a
| higher level? Removing street parking can free up room
| for lots of extra stops, which can help with bus
| bunching: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bus_bunching
| zahlman wrote:
| I'm talking about what you physically see, or even step
| over, at the actual physical location where you're
| contemplating putting the bus stop; which is there
| because people were only thinking about cars when doing
| the zoning and construction.
| bluGill wrote:
| car centric areas put their front door far from anyplace
| a but can easilly get. Either the but slows everyone else
| down because it is going in and out of all these parking
| lots and cul-de-sacs, or the walk from the but stop to
| where you are going is already your entire travel budget.
| alamortsubite wrote:
| I think it gets confusing because we start out talking
| about cities but we'd also like to include other areas
| that are overrun with cars in the conversation. Buses in
| Ghent and Paris aren't going to be navigating parking
| lots and cul-de-sacs, no matter how much car
| infrastructure is removed. We can free up a lot of room
| for bus stops, though, which helps keep buses moving
| smoothly.
| mantas wrote:
| Not really. Unless the restriction is to take a generic
| lane and dedicate it to buses. But if restriction is to
| take a generic lane and give it to bicycles, then both
| cars and buses sit in the same traffic jam.
| stalfie wrote:
| Alternatives naturally become more viable over time as more
| and more people find car use impossible, but its kind of
| hard to tell in advance which lanes of public transport are
| most necessary to improve. So imo the best solution is just
| to do it, and then see what happens and adapt. It's too
| hard to plan out everything in advance, and if you try you
| get deadlocked politically and nothing ends up happening.
| So you just find the best lever you can to reduce traffic
| immediately, and just start pressing it. But you warn
| everyone that you're pressing it, and when you do so you do
| it slowly.
|
| The reality is that a lot of traffic is simply unnecessary,
| and dissipates once you add some friction. The most extreme
| example of that is the rise of remote work during and after
| Covid. As it turns out, none of these people actually
| needed to go anywhere.
|
| And more generally, cars induce their own demand simply by
| virtue of being the fastest and most comfortable option,
| and they shape the environment around them to depend on
| them. Small local shops get outcompeted by distant
| behemoths due it being more convenient to drive. People
| move to a large house in a distant suburb rather than a
| small apartment because they know it's just thirty minutes
| away from work by car anyways. The easier it is to drive,
| the more entrenched driving becomes. And any way you slice
| it, undoing that process will cause pain, so you might as
| well go ahead and start, because you're never going to find
| a way to prevent the consequences anyway.
| jstummbillig wrote:
| Honest question: What is the hard part? If you took all of
| that stuff and did it as quickly as you could somewhere else,
| what's would be the biggest issue? People + resistance to
| change of any kind?
|
| The outcome seems so obviously good. I have never heard of
| anyone complaining about a city becoming less car centric,
| but maybe somehow it's an under-represented story?
| alistairSH wrote:
| Effectively NIMBYism, but for cars. The political backlash
| would stop all progress. People don't like change, even for
| the better.
| gotwaz wrote:
| Well I sold off my car after realizing I enjoyed the bike
| ride to work. Then a year later an older family member had
| a health crisis requiring hospital visits at all possible
| times of the day and night for many months. Couldnt always
| rely on cabs and that was the only time I regretted selling
| the car. But we got through it with friends and fam sharing
| transport duties. Quite a crazy period so I could imagine
| it becoming real complicated for certain issues.
| pizza234 wrote:
| There are places where car is simply _the_ mean of
| transport - to the point where using the car is preferred
| to literally a five minutes walk.
|
| In contexts like this, using a car is perceived as a right
| - restricting usage doesn't make people think "I'll take
| the chance to use the bike", rather "How the f*ck do I get
| there now?".
| apothegm wrote:
| The trouble is that the backlash occurs even in places
| that are pedestrian and transit dominated.
| pandaman wrote:
| You have not heard people complaining about cities impeding
| traffic, likely, because of the bubble you live in. That is
| the thing that makes regular people to run for the city
| offices. A whole lot of recent "urbanization" is not going
| to survive for long because of this IMHO.
| jfengel wrote:
| It's a good illustration of why solving climate change isn't
| just a matter of individual actions. We need to reconsider
| the whole infrastructure, and you can't do that from the
| bottom up.
| Gud wrote:
| The cities were recently reformed to be car-centric(1960s)
| and can be easily reverted.
|
| All it takes is an understanding how fucked up it is to
| operate a 2 tonne personal vehicle everywhere you go(if you
| are able, which most people aren't, legally or mentally),
| spread the general knowledge and make a long term commitment
| to public transport, walking and bicycling.
|
| :-)
| stingraycharles wrote:
| > But tourists visiting Paris for a week don't get the majority
| of the benefit from cleaner air.
|
| You're missing the point: tourists are good for the city. If
| Paris gets a reputation of being polluted, tourism will
| decline.
| zamadatix wrote:
| Paris is consistently somewhere in the top 10 cities worldwide
| by number of tourists per year and this is an extremely
| important factor to the city. Even if if Le Monde was writing
| this in French the impacts to/from tourism would be relevant to
| the article.
| goldenarm wrote:
| Travelers are more sensitive to sudden changes. I got sick in
| Sicily on day one of my vacation because of how bad the air
| was.
| dismalaf wrote:
| > Paris has not escaped the wrath of the SUV, and a large part
| of the congestion cities across the world are seeing is solely
| down to cars becoming bigger.
|
| Europeans don't drive Suburbans. They drive crossovers that
| are, if anything, shorter than the equivalent sedan or wagon.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| So do Americans in many cites like Seattle.
| dismalaf wrote:
| Fair. When I'm in Canada I do see enough big trucks and
| SUVs though, versus Paris or Prague (the two places in
| Europe where I regularly visit/live) where the number is
| basically zero.
| bluesounddirect wrote:
| I agree, CNN has always had a weird angle to its bias. I am by
| no means a FOX news nut . I really think a lot of american
| "news" now is similar to How The WWF ( World Wide Wrestling
| Federation/ World Wrestling Entertainment) isn't a Sport. CNN ,
| FOX, MSNBC/MSNOW , Newsmax etc aren't news but unfunny
| entertainment.
| dwg465 wrote:
| I mean it's a "CNN Travel" article...of course it's going to
| focus on Paris as a travel destination.
| dfxm12 wrote:
| Cleaner air is still good for tourists & the article is part of
| the _Travel_ section of this publication.
| zahlman wrote:
| When did the fad for compact cars end? Where did all these SUVs
| come from? Why do drivers want to lug all this extra weight and
| space around with them all the time?
| yulker wrote:
| the default car should have been a one person car. we split a
| normal one lane into two narrow lanes.
| kube-system wrote:
| In some places it is
|
| https://adventure.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Hero-
| Gettin...
| pas wrote:
| in the US it has a few factors, one is that trucks are
| exempted from some mileage requirements, so suddenly
| manufacturers started making "legally truck" cars
| gostsamo wrote:
| The way I've heard it from drivers, suvs gives you elevation
| to observe the traffic and the mass to make your bad behavior
| problem of the other side while you gain real numbers safety.
| mitthrowaway2 wrote:
| That's a pure negative sum game though. The elevation gives
| you only a relative improvement in visibility if other
| vehicles don't increase in elevation in response, at the
| cost of sightlines for other road users and especially
| pedestrians, unless they wear platform shoes.
|
| The same of course goes with mass.
|
| Usually this kind of negative-sum-prisoner's-dilemma
| incentive matrix is resolved by government intervention
| which changes the payoff structure.
| gostsamo wrote:
| Well, in the absence of government, it is pure profit for
| the suv driver and for the car manufacturer who sells
| higher margin product. And fuck the pedestrians and those
| in smaller cars.
| toast0 wrote:
| Elevation doesn't have to be zero sum. My compact pickup
| (a class of vehicles that is barely manufactured anymore)
| is a little elevated and has an upright seating position,
| but it also provides good visibility for other street
| users. The space over the bed is clear (unless I'm
| carrying something big) and the rear and side windows are
| vertical and clear allowing vision through; the
| windshield is raked less than most other vehicles, so
| it's better for looking through.
|
| Of course, as I mentioned, compact pickup trucks are
| basically dead in the US. You can get a four door car
| with a three food bed that is marketed as a small truck.
| If you want a single cab and a six foot bed, you have to
| buy a full size truck and those are usually taller and
| bigger and less efficient than a compact truck would be;
| it can do bigger truck things, but I only need little
| truck things.
|
| Maybe the Bezos truck brings back small trucks to the US.
| II2II wrote:
| Things I noticed right off the bat: framing it as a tourist
| verses locals issue, a complete lack of numbers backing that
| claim, and the few numbers presented in the article have any
| context. I realize this is a travel article, but it seems to be
| more of a propaganda piece.
|
| Take the claim that the locals hate the changes. Well, the
| mayor was reelected. So they claim the voter turnout was low
| and people were complaining, so people obviously don't support
| it. Sorry, you can't make that conclusion. Under ordinary
| circumstances, 100% turnout would only tell you the overall
| support for a particular candidate or party, not a particular
| policy. A low turnout _may_ reflect an electorate who is not
| particularly passionate in any of the issues presented in the
| election, or it may mean something else. It was probably
| something else in the 2020 elections because those were
| anything but ordinary: they fell during the peak of pandemic
| uncertainty (i.e. March to June). So a flimsy assertion based
| upon flimsy evidence.
|
| Then there are the scanty numbers without context. A 4%
| increase in traffic jams since 2015 and 31% decline in bus use
| between 2018 and 2024. First of all, the words "bus use" sounds
| highly selective. It looks like the Paris metro has been
| expanding and modernizing rapidly in recent years, which would
| both take load off of busses and be disruptive to transit
| users. Oh, and that pandemic thing raises its head again. I
| don't know about Paris, but a lot of cities took a hit to
| transit ridership during the pandemic and some are claiming to
| reach pre-pandemic levels only now. Also, cyclists tend to be
| the whipping boy for traffic congestion. I can't speak for
| Paris, but the reality in my parts are that population growth
| and a surge in construction have been far more disruptive than
| cycling infrastructure.
|
| Sorry about the rant, but I'm sick and tired of the views of
| one segment of the population completely overriding the views
| of another segment of the population ... especially when there
| are assertions based upon assumptions and flimsy evidence.
| stackghost wrote:
| >But tourists visiting Paris for a week don't get the majority
| of the benefit from cleaner air.
|
| First impressions matter, though.
|
| When you fly into e.g. New York and they pop the door open you
| get that whiff of exhaust fumes. The city reeks.
|
| Vancouver on the other hand it smells like the ocean.
|
| Any improvement of air quality does matter for tourists and
| residents.
| 0xf8 wrote:
| Agreed the tourist POV center focus is bizarre AF. it's almost
| like they were afraid to ask Parisians or even other French
| natives regularly frequenting Paris what they thought and so
| they just went with tourists are happy...
| bluGill wrote:
| Tourists get the majority of the benefit because residents of
| paris are smoking which is makes clear air not really a
| benifiet for them.
|
| I thought the above needed a /s, but a check shows 30% of the
| people in France smoke. (I can't find city stastics)
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _This article has such a weird framing. It keeps repeating
| how the cleaner air is so good for tourists._
|
| it's not a weird framing, it's a clearly marked travel piece on
| "CNN Travel"
|
| the French don't read that, they read French newspapers etc.
| delichon wrote:
| In an American city I would bet on the mobility impaired people
| to win the cage match against the fewer cars people. They are
| tougher than they look.
|
| Edit: The responses reasonably talk about the officially mobility
| impaired people. I was thinking more about the unofficially
| mobility impaired people by obesity, like me. French obesity
| rates are ~16% compared to ~42% in the US. That contributes to a
| fierce US constituency for cars.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Huh? Fewer cars seems like a win to those who really rely on
| them. Could probably wind up with _more_ accessible spots if
| done right.
| kevinklaes wrote:
| Fewer cars overall should increase the availability for those
| who need it. Same for drivers overall but most can't see past
| the first step which is reducing lanes and parking.
| wiether wrote:
| A city with less cars is a net positive for mobility impaired
| people.
|
| It frees space for people (wider sidewalks...), reduce the
| risks of navigating the streets, and for the ones that have to
| use a car, there's less traffic and less people stealing
| dedicated parking spots.
|
| Less cars also means less mobility impaired people. Cars create
| them through crashes and a lifetime of sedentariness.
|
| Finally, it should be noted that most of the time when someone
| says "what about mobility impaired people?", when debating
| reallocating public space to people instead of cars, they are
| not mobility impaired themselves and don't actually care about
| them. They just try to guilt shame their opponents to win.
| dmix wrote:
| > and for the ones that have to use a car, there's less
| traffic and less people stealing dedicated parking spots.
|
| The article mentions there's now constant traffic jams for
| city buses in Paris. It seems best for people who can cycle,
| walk, or people who already live in the city and don't need
| to travel much.
| LaGrange wrote:
| That's just a weird way of saying that the reforms didn't
| go far enough.
| dmix wrote:
| Congestion pricing seems to be the simplest solution. Has
| nice clear incentives and less excessive top-down city
| planning.
| NoraCodes wrote:
| > constant traffic jams
|
| Well, no, the article says that
|
| > traffic jams in Paris have risen 4% [in 11 years]
| orwin wrote:
| The occurrence increased, but weirdly, the length (in
| time spent, not kilometers) was reduced by around the
| same number. So you enter a bit more traffic jams, but
| they last a bit less.
| delichon wrote:
| > they are not mobility impaired themselves and don't
| actually care about them.
|
| That's a baseless and false slur. My first thought was that
| visiting Paris would be difficult because of all of the
| walking. I fall in the large gap between disabled and fit. On
| the one hand I would benefit from more walking, on the other
| I would not get much enjoyment out of a city that way, and
| would tend to drive far to services where I could park
| nearby.
| wiether wrote:
| Maybe it's my European bias talking, but "visiting a city"
| with a car seems like the worst idea possible.
|
| Basically a city is either small enough to be crossed
| walking, or big enough to have public transportation.
|
| And after walking or cycling, public transportation is the
| best way to visit the city. In Paris, there's bus stops or
| metro (subway) stations everywhere. A bus or metro puts the
| passenger at a higher level than walkers/cyclists/car
| passengers and with huge windows, allowing to enjoy a
| unique view of the city.
|
| The view of the Eiffel Tower you get when crossing the
| Seine on the Bir-Hakeim bridge is an experience that can
| ONLY be enjoyed by riding the metro.
| https://www.youtube.com/shorts/cqIJVzkLD4c
| rsynnott wrote:
| I think you'd have a fairly miserable time navigating any
| major European city _by car_, even before these policies.
| They're largely not designed for it. For a start, where are
| you parking? It's not like parking was particularly
| plentiful or conveniently located before this change.
|
| These sorts of reforms are generally aimed at discouraging
| people from commuting in by car. People who _regularly
| drive around central Paris_ (except for delivery drivers
| etc) would be a fairly small constituency.
| Fricken wrote:
| My buddy with no arms or legs would beg to differ. He can't
| afford taxis because he can't work a real job. His
| friends/family can't drive him around because you need a custom
| vehicle for his chair. But he can use bike lanes and sidewalks
| independently without too muuch trouble.
|
| Car-dependent sprawl creates mobility impaired people where
| there were previously none. Many people are too old, too young,
| too intoxicated, too vision impaired or too poor to drive. Lack
| of viable transportation options is the greatest barrier to
| upward economic mobility for Americans today.
| tantivy wrote:
| Cars are enclosed sofas that move around. Could car dominance
| be contributing to obesity?
| alamortsubite wrote:
| I think you're selling cars short. For one thing, sofas don't
| have a plethora of cupholders that can accommodate any size
| sugary beverage within arm's reach.
| dpkirchner wrote:
| Plus if I hit someone with my sofa, I'm going to jail. If I
| hit them with my car, it was just an accident.
| rsynnott wrote:
| > I was thinking more about the unofficially mobility impaired
| people by obesity, like me
|
| The vast majority of obese people are not meaningfully mobility
| impaired.
| delichon wrote:
| As an obese person I disagree. Even 40 pounds is a meaningful
| mobility impairment, a difference between a joy and a trudge.
| I've experienced 200 pounds, and it is a kind of prison. Even
| a little bit of that prison is deeply meaningful. Have you
| not experienced it? I think I did more intensely as a yo-yo
| dieter. I knew what it was like to be fit from recent memory
| when I wasn't fit, and hated the difference.
| dahart wrote:
| > I would bet on the mobility impaired people to win the cage
| match
|
| Why frame it as a fight? There's no need to start there; you
| don't need to waste time fighting against people not in your
| group. You just need to establish group status. If the
| constituency of obese people is strong, why not seek to
| establish policy on behalf of obese people and not everyone? As
| the article and others here have said, reducing traffic
| congestion benefits everyone in multiple ways, including
| benefits for the people who still have to drive. Given a choice
| that doesn't affect your ability to drive, I assume you'd
| rather have less pollution, less noise, and fewer other drivers
| on the road?
|
| The other angle missing from your comment is e-bikes. Most of
| those ~42% of obese people in the U.S. are still capable of
| riding an e-bike, and for short trips in busy areas, e-bikes
| are more convenient and easier to park than cars.
| consumer451 wrote:
| Complete tangent, but I met my equally nerdy brother in Paris
| last month.
|
| It was my first time, and his fourth. We stayed South of the
| Republique metro station.
|
| After the literal 30th indie Manga [0] shop that we walked by, I
| asked him: "how are all these shops financially viable?" He said:
| "look inside."
|
| Holy crap, they all had customers inside! I had no idea that
| Japanese culture has such a strong presence in the heart of
| Paris, in the middle of Europe.
|
| [0] I should be clear, this was not just Manga. There were so
| many cool indie retro video game shops that it blew my little
| mind. I should probably get out of my Silesian village more
| often.
| goldenarm wrote:
| Pedestrianization of neighborhoods like Rivoli did decrease
| shopping at first, but ended up exploding again once people got
| used to it.
| consumer451 wrote:
| I have to say, I look forward to visiting Paris again as soon
| as I can find an excuse. I know there are things people could
| say negatively, as one could say about any large city, but
| the energy and diversity really drew me in.
|
| I also really like French food, especially when mixed with
| the crazy chefs in that area that we stayed.
|
| Edit: just so everyone knows, this is what an airport
| terminal could be, according to Air France:
| https://postimg.cc/ZCww5xFs - So cool that I had to take
| photo.
|
| This was the least customer-hostile area that I have ever
| seen at an airport. Oh, you have to wait for a flight? Just
| lay back and chill.
| rsynnott wrote:
| ... Huh, never heard of anyone actually _liking_ CDG
| before.
| consumer451 wrote:
| Haha, I get that. You may be aware, but this is Terminal
| 2G.
|
| It is almost like its own tiny airport for short hops by
| Air France in the EU.
|
| It feels like a completely different world from the main
| mixed-carrier international disaster situation. It really
| feels like a designer experimental terminal.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Does it still have the weird security procedures?
| (Security at CDG is IME very slow and just, well,
| strange; at least once they were asking people to _carry
| their passports through the scanners_, rather than
| leaving them in their bags like in all other airports in
| Europe).
|
| CDG wouldn't be my _least favourite airport (I think
| that's probably San Francisco, specifically the
| international terminal), but it definitely would be up
| there.
| consumer451 wrote:
| So, my brother was departing intercontinental 3 hours
| prior to my flight to Prague. I hung out with him at one
| the main terminals in the crazy long security line, until
| I could not. He showed up 2.5hrs early, and almost missed
| his flight. Computers were down or something. Once he got
| to his gate, he had to take a bus to his A350. Crazy shit
| show. Quote: "this is so ghetto."
|
| Meanwhile, I went to Terminal 2G, and there was
| absolutely zero security wait. It was like a 1 screener
| per 3 people type situation. It was like being at some
| rich people resort airport. Once I got through security,
| which took 5 minutes, I was presented with a high-end
| shopping center, a roving smiling robot garbage/recycling
| can straight out of Shenzhen asking people for
| deposits... excellent food, anyone could lay down on
| comfy couches. It blew my mind. It was France, and Air
| France, flexing.
| rsynnott wrote:
| ... Ah. So I just looked it up; no-one flies to Dublin
| from there (Aer Lingus is 2A, Air France is 2F). Possibly
| it's a Schengen-only terminal.
|
| (Living inside Europe but outside Schengen tends to get
| you the worst terminals/sections of terminals. Berlin
| Tegel used to have a tiny little terminal that, as far as
| I could see, only flew to Ireland and Turkey (not sure
| where the UK flights went from). Absolutely horrendous;
| there'd sometimes only be one passport control line, so
| if the person in front of you had an issue you might be
| waiting for an hour.)
| Palomides wrote:
| france has a really strong tradition of comics, it's not just
| manga
| alamortsubite wrote:
| I learned about la nouvelle manga recently:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_nouvelle_manga
| bombcar wrote:
| It's not just France; most of Europe. Barks and Don Rosa are
| better known there than in their home country.
| b0rtb0rt wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japonisme
| consumer451 wrote:
| Cool! Thank you for this information! Very interesting.
| Kankuro wrote:
| France is the 2nd largest market for manga after Japan (or it
| was a few years ago). That's surprising because there are
| almost 7 times more inhabitants in the US. Those who were a kid
| in the 80s and 90s in France saw a lot of Japanese anime on TV
| during this period, so that's part of the explanation.
| goldenarm wrote:
| I moved from LA to Paris, my mental and physical health improved
| dramatically.
|
| I don't even take the subway, walking and biking are enough where
| I live. Hopefully we can reach the comfort of dutch cities within
| a decade.
| vovavili wrote:
| I was more comfortable living in Paris than living in a Dutch
| city because I was able to live in a banlieue. Biking here is
| more developed, and that's a plus. But having my job, my living
| space, my friends and my favorite weekend activities spread
| across Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague does take a bit of a
| toll. I wish The Netherlands did have a much less restrictive
| housing policy.
| goldenarm wrote:
| Interesting ! My comparison was indeed limited, I only lived
| in center of Den Haag as a foreigner. Decentralization has
| its pros and cons, but Paris is way too centralized around
| Chatelet sometimes.
| black_puppydog wrote:
| France as a whole is way too centralized on Paris and it's
| actually hurting the country. If you do read French, there
| is a very interesting book from 2024 (IIRC) about this.
| It's called "Quand le parisianisme ecrase la France".
|
| Before reading this book I always thought Germany (where I
| grew up) was the exception for being more decentralized.
| But it looks like actually France is way more centralized
| even compared to other pretty centralized countries.
| mrtksn wrote:
| What do you think about all those videos on how dangerous Paris
| is? Having made the move, would you say that those stem from
| real experiences and are organic or would you say that it was
| an organized campaign for some political reason? Or maybe
| something else?
|
| Trump keeps saying that they want to prevent USA becoming a
| dangerous place like Europe, even said that recently and the
| Irish president disagreed with him. As an American, would you
| say that EU has fallen and it has become a shithole or maybe
| something in between? I'm just curious if its just about
| differences of expectations or something.
| rkomorn wrote:
| As a European who moved to the US for 20+ years then moved
| back to Europe, any idea that Europe is a shithole or has
| fallen is ludicrous.
|
| If anything, the US degraded far more over the time I spent
| there than Europe did while I was away.
| mrtksn wrote:
| I am EU too and I know Europe is doing quite fine on
| average with some good and bad places but I wonder if all
| this is propaganda for the Americans or if the Americans
| genuinely expect something else from life.
| mcv wrote:
| My impression is that it's propaganda to stop Americans
| from expecting the same from life.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| Trump and his base think that. The rest of us know we are 40
| years behind the rest of the modern world.
| goldenarm wrote:
| I don't have anecdata, but Paris homicide rate is 6x less
| than LA, 10x fewer car related deaths, but only 1.2x less
| crime.
|
| Comparing countries and policies is a great thing, we have to
| learn from each other. Just be careful of misinformation and
| out of context numbers. Sure France's GDP seems lower, but
| they don't need a larger car and a larger diet coke to be
| happier.
| pkulak wrote:
| I just paid about 2 grand for new tires on my car. That
| contributed to GDP, but it certainly didn't make me happier
| than I'd be if I didn't need a car in the first place. GDP
| is very misleading when it's measuring work that shouldn't
| need to be done in the first place. Hurricanes and
| earthquakes are also amazing for GDP, especially in places
| that never bothered to prepare for them.
| StyloBill wrote:
| The idea that Paris is more dangerous than any big city in
| the US is laughable, and any person that thinks otherwise or
| that believes anything that Trump spouts is either gravely
| uneducated at best, or an absolute moron at worst.
| UncleMeat wrote:
| Videos about how dangerous some city is, often to scare
| people about nonwhite residents, is a longstanding and
| utterly useless genre.
|
| Better to get crime information from anything else.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| > What do you think about all those videos on how dangerous
| Paris is?
|
| The question to ask is why those videos are being made.
|
| Paris, as other people have pointed out, has a much lower
| homicide rate than big US cities.
|
| However for pickpocketing, paris is notorious. But getting
| actual stats that are comparable is difficult.
| orochimaaru wrote:
| Homicide in US cities is an inner city issue. It's not
| mainstream. There's bad areas - stay out of them.
|
| It depends if pick pocketing is ubiquitous or prevalent
| only in specific places.
| jancsika wrote:
| > As an American, would you say that EU has fallen and it has
| become a shithole or maybe something in between?
|
| Would love to know the social media you've been consuming
| that could make you believe that an American in Paris who is
| _praising_ French city planning for its positive health
| effects could possibly believe anything close to that epithet
| uttered by the current American president.
| watwut wrote:
| EU is overall safer then USA. Including Paris.
|
| And cops are significantly less likely to shoot you. You dont
| have to be afraid of them.
| anvuong wrote:
| I have visited Seattle, SF, LA, Phoenix, Miami, Shanghai,
| Tokyo, Paris, and Amsterdam in the past 2 years, and I can
| say with 100% confident that the cities in the US are shit
| compared to those in Asia and EU. They are not even close,
| they are just simply shit, there is no comparison at all. I
| have no idea what the statistics is, but I feel much less
| safe in US cities.
| pkulak wrote:
| How's your French? Sounds like a flippant question, but I hear
| Parisians are not that... tolerant of even bad French speakers,
| let alone non-speakers. That stereotype has kept me from
| visiting, let alone living there, despite it probably being my
| dream city in every other respect. I'm in my mid 40s, and
| learning a new (spoken) language has become extremely
| difficult. I spent 2 years trying to learn German a while back
| and it was a pretty big failure.
| yardie wrote:
| If you can you should go. Lived there for 12 years and my
| French was not amazing but no one gave me shit about it.
| English has been required in schools since 00s basically
| anyone under 40 should be able to communicate. But knowing
| some French goes a lot further.
| estimator7292 wrote:
| Paris has a population of 2 million people, a good chunk of
| whom are not native to France.
|
| It's safe to assume you'll encounter a very wide variety of
| people speaking many different languages.
| interstice wrote:
| I've had a few experiences in France, as recently as a month
| ago. Not speaking French (I do not) is not generally a
| problem, no one seems to mind. What some parts of Europe do
| mind is being too... How do I put this politely... Obviously
| from certain places with very little sensitivity for where in
| the the world they happen to be at the time. Often loudly.
| ungovernableCat wrote:
| Prevented from visiting? Paris is one of the most visited
| cities in the world, and the Parisians are pragmatic people.
| If you're kind and respectful they'll give you that in
| return.
|
| I can only say the most basic phrases in French and have
| experienced zero problems.
| watwut wrote:
| They acted like normal people when we have been there.
| Frost1x wrote:
| It's probably more similar to Japan in terms of cultural
| tolerance. I heard the same story years ago and only recently
| visited (just after the Paris Olympics). I usually try to
| learn some of the basics of the language before visiting but
| was incredibly busy and didn't this trip. I had no issues and
| I was all over Paris. People were very reasonable, and
| translation apps/services helped me plenty, but for the most
| part they spoke English or could understand some basic level
| of it. If you _live_ there and try to assimilate but speak
| poorly or little, there may be less tolerance? As a tourist I
| had not a single incident.
|
| I don't like to be the ugly American who just assumes the
| world should speak my language, so I was ready for language
| barriers, but I had no real issues at all.
| satvikpendem wrote:
| Agreed. It seems the Olympics really bolstered both Japan
| and France from before, where even in remote regions of
| Japan I had no issue speaking basic English for things I
| needed.
| shakow wrote:
| As a Frenchman living in Paris - we have such a huge expat
| community already (and many english-speakers, I worked with
| Brits, Aussies, Kiwis, Americans, Canadians) than one more or
| less will be a non-event.
|
| Now it's true that Americans tend to love to frighten each
| other with firecamp stories about the Big Bad Frenchman, but
| IME it's mostly a mix of latent francophobia and a grapevine
| of bad experience between what is locally perceived as wholly
| uneducated Americans and local Frenchmen that the Americans
| tend to see as arrogant.
|
| The latest if most often due to (i) tourists forgetting that
| what is a great week you spent years saving for is another
| Tuesday for the other guys in the street, (ii) many
| fundamental French etiquette rules (don't shout, say "hello"
| first when talking to someone, the absence of a hierarchical
| relationship between hospitality personnel and customers,
| distant behaviour is not arrogance but a mark of respect,
| etc.) are completely accessory in the US customs, leading to
| very strong misunderstandings.
|
| So book a trip for a week and come say hello, we don't bite!
| (and avoid like the plague any cafe/restaurant in the
| touristy areas)
| orochimaaru wrote:
| >>> say "hello" first when talking to someone, the absence
| of a hierarchical relationship between hospitality
| personnel and customers
|
| These two are generally adhered to in the US as well. May
| be the hierarchy part is there if you're staying at really
| exclusive resorts. But by and large, most folks are polite.
|
| There is obviously the random asshole. But those exist
| everywhere.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| I went to Paris last year and it was not a big deal, as long
| as you know the basics like excuse me/please/thank you.
|
| A few times someone would correct us (eg "after 6pm we say
| bonsoir instead of bonjour"), but it never felt like it was
| done in a dickish way and people were generally pretty
| accommodating. Perhaps it helps that I went to Paris with low
| expectations, not thinking it'd live up to the hype, but I
| had a great time. Definitely don't let the language thing
| keep you from going!
| teekert wrote:
| As a Dutch person having spend many summers in France, I can
| say that the latest generations are much more tolerant and
| friendly. When I was young (90's) I saw camping owners with
| war grudges screaming "Campsite Full!! (Complet!! In French)"
| To any German. I also had to walk out of a boulangerie
| without croissants because they couldn't understand the way I
| pronounced croissant... but nowadays you can just speak
| English anywhere.
| anvuong wrote:
| Maybe it's time to stop caring about these stereotypes over-
| amplified by social media? I'm from Asia and I speak English
| with a heavy accent, the only French I know is "merci
| beaucoup", "toilet?", and "au revoir". I've visited Paris
| twice (1 week each time) and language barrier or the so-
| called "Parisian elitism" had never prevented me to enjoy my
| stay there.
|
| That being said, there is still a lot to hate about Paris:
| dirty and overcrowded subway, shady people everywhere,
| especially around tourists' places of interest, etc. Not that
| much different from big cities like NYC, SF, Seattle, etc.
| ta9000 wrote:
| I've traveled all over the world and the French were by far
| the biggest assholes I've encountered, especially in
| hospitality.
| rayiner wrote:
| How many kids do you have? How comfortable is the downtown core
| for families with 2-3 kids?
| Nevermark wrote:
| Several years ago, I moved to twin university towns, where I
| can walk everywhere including between towns.
|
| Funny thing about distances in small towns. It doesn't take
| long to start perceiving a ten or fifteen minute drive as a
| "long" drive. But a two hour walk while I turn over a difficult
| design problem goes by in an instant.
|
| The difference between time that saps or renews our energy.
|
| And I am off for a walk...
| tom-blk wrote:
| Only rich people get to drive now
| throwawaytea wrote:
| I go to Berkeley Ca often on weekends. As a kid we'd go to SF
| too because why not. But now it's another $8+ for the bridge,
| and even if you find street parking it's another $2 an hour
| anywhere you might want to jump out for a few minutes.
| Basically it's an extra $20 to get the opportunity to spend
| your money in SF. So now I haven't been to my favorite coffee
| shop or pizza place in years. Oh well.
| NoraCodes wrote:
| Why not take the train...?
| throwawaytea wrote:
| Loud, dirty, and stuck in a confined space with people
| doing acrobatics, or panhandling, or angry. I wouldn't take
| BART if you paid ME $20 to go into SF.
| dpark wrote:
| This is a tired and unhelpful refrain. Only rich people fill
| their cars with gasoline without wincing at the price. Only
| rich people get to own 7 houses. Only rich people get to fill
| their pools in the middle of a drought.
|
| There are a lot of things that "only rich people get to do".
| Reducing the number of people who engage in destructive
| activities is a good thing, even if it means only rich people
| can still do it.
| Y-bar wrote:
| > An advanced city is not one where even the poor use cars, but
| rather one where even the rich use public transport.
|
| - Enrique Penalosa Londono
| rossant wrote:
| I've lived in Paris for 20 years without even having the
| driver's license.
| bombcar wrote:
| But are you le riche?
| saltysalt wrote:
| Correct. Rich people can easily afford the congestion charges
| and higher parking fees. These policies impact working class
| people more.
| tonyedgecombe wrote:
| Were the working class driving SUV's into Paris before the
| changes?
| saltysalt wrote:
| What has got to do with it? Some of them are driving
| vehicles even larger than SUVs, e.g. tradesmen driving
| vans, builders with pickups etc.
|
| The obsession with SUVs is classist.
| dopidopHN2 wrote:
| No. Rich people zoom in to work and take a stroll to the market
| on Saturday morning, and they enjoy tapas a the quaint Bistro
| on the bank of the seine.
|
| Driving is for plebes
| dpark wrote:
| I don't know how you're defining "rich" but the wealthiest
| folks I know all go to work physically. They get in their
| cars, or in one case on their bike, and commute to work like
| everyone else.
| dopidopHN2 wrote:
| The wealthiest people I know are philanthropist that spend
| their day on zoon meetings to decide who get the grant. A
| couple of time a week someone arrange a visit for them to
| check on "things are going" on the trenches.
|
| They also spend a lot of time on the phone strategizing
| with other folks like them. --
|
| But that's not a contest!I'm sure your rich people are
| richer than my rich people. --
|
| If we were looking at a formal definition, my naive
| approach would be to use the median income, add the revenue
| of assets, and add a 20% to that ?
|
| I'm sure the field of sociology could help be more formal
| here. --
|
| Here I was talking specifically about French folks, where
| access to remote work and living in the inner city are
| strongly correlated with higher income.
| alephnerd wrote:
| There's a reason _gilets jaunes_ tended to be what are
| derisively called "plebs".
|
| I honestly find it extremely interesting how both France
| and the US have similar fault lines due to the
| intersection of economic, social, and political culture
| wars, and an extremely similar manner of consolidated
| media ownership.
|
| What Paris does politically speaking matters less than
| what Marseille, Nice, and Toulon does - everyone
| overindexes on the 20% at the expense of the other 80%.
| This is what brought Trump to office in 2016, and I see
| similar mistakes being made across Western Europe as
| well.
|
| > where access to remote work and living in the inner
| city are strongly correlated with higher income
|
| People also underestimate the number of mega-commuters in
| France, and how depending on the distance commuting via
| Intercites+TGV and a car becomes a wash.
|
| Some people will derisively say "let's make owning a car
| more expensive to make them change", but that's similar
| to Marie Antoinette's retort "S'ils n'ont pas de pain?
| Qu'ils mangent de la brioche!", especially given how
| severe spatial inequality is in France.
| dpark wrote:
| I wasn't really looking to argue about who knows the
| wealthiest people. I'm just curious who you are looking
| at.
|
| If you're looking at billionaire philanthropists, I don't
| know what they do but at that level of wealth it's
| probably whatever they want.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Concentrating on the very wealthiest is perhaps unhelpful,
| as there are very few of them, so they're kinda irrelevant
| for planning purposes. Most well-off people I know commute
| to work on the train or bus; the city center offices where
| well-off people tend to work in Dublin are not generally
| exactly well-provided with parking, if they have it at all,
| and the traffic is pretty horrible. The office of the tech
| multinational I work in has 700 people, and capacity for
| more, and, I think, about 30 parking spaces.
|
| Being on the DART (a not-quite-metro; trains carrying a
| thousand people every ten minutes per direction) or Luas (a
| high-capacity tram system) lines tends to lead to homes
| being considerably more expensive than those which only
| have bus access.
|
| Dublin used to have a synthetic 'posh' accent that was
| often referred to as DART-speak, because it was common in
| the upper-middle-class suburbs along the southern section
| of the DART line. Public transport can be posh, or at least
| seen as such.
| LaGrange wrote:
| FYI this article and thread is about Paris, France, not
| Paris, Texas.
| tantivy wrote:
| How many working class people would be happier and less
| stressed if they had high-quality transit to replace their car
| bills?
| whatever1 wrote:
| Of course you can reduce highways and infrastructure and reduce
| traffic. But you also choked access to the city.
|
| And no public transportation does not fix the problem. It helps a
| bit, but at the end of the day biggest part of far commuters are
| gradually cut off.
|
| If decentralization is the target, then just state it.
| goda90 wrote:
| Many cities in the world have many thousands of far commuters
| arriving by train every day. And many of those people even live
| in single family homes and own cars.
| Zigurd wrote:
| > _choked access to the city_
|
| Citation needed.
|
| Pedestrian and cyclist friendly cities have more vibrant street
| life, and are more attractive places to live. I've never heard
| of car restrictions leading to more suburbanization.
| rsynnott wrote:
| I would assume that if you're commuting to Paris from far away,
| the train is generally _quicker_, tbh. AIUI the RER is mostly
| 140km/h quality lines.
| LaGrange wrote:
| "There was a rise in hospitalizations of pedestrians and
| cyclists"
|
| _looks at the reason_
|
| CARS.
| saltysalt wrote:
| Cyclists hitting pedestrians.
| consumer451 wrote:
| I used to cosplay as a bike messenger in Seattle. I did not
| follow the rules at all on my ride to work. There were few
| bike lanes, and a lot of morons rode on the sidewalks.
|
| I have only been to Paris once, but the cyclists were much
| more sane in my experience. The bike lanes were clear, and
| for the most part they stopped at a red light.
| saltysalt wrote:
| If car usage is going down but pedestrian injuries are
| going up? The pedestrians are not crashing into one another
| with greater frequency...
| consumer451 wrote:
| Yeah, my experience was anecdotal. Also, cyclists can be
| assholes. However, they have less inertia.
|
| What I would like to see is mortality rates of
| pedestrians in Paris in general. That might be the
| actually interesting trend.
| saltysalt wrote:
| I would wager it's the usage of payments and ignoring of
| pedestrian lights by cyclists is a big factor.
|
| As a pedestrian, I've had FAR more encounters with
| aggressive cyclists than aggressive drivers (also
| anecdotal). Makes walking downtown more stressful.
| Mawr wrote:
| The difference in severity of a crash between a car and a
| bicycle is on the order of 20x. Are you seeing 20x more
| agressive cyclists than motorists?
|
| Anyhow, talking about the _hospitalization_ rate without
| the _mortality_ rate is very odd and smells of
| manipulation one way or the other.
| saltysalt wrote:
| So the argument of "well it would have hurt more if it
| was a car!" is cold comfort, and cars aren't mounting
| pavements to get me...
| reactormonk wrote:
| I have bad news for you: https://old.reddit.com/r/Rentner
| fahreninDinge/comments/1qtsg...
| saltysalt wrote:
| Sorry but I don't speak German, what's the context for
| that video?
| chiefalchemist wrote:
| Slightly off-topic but NYC went through a similar process when
| congestion pricing met legal battle after legal battle. Long to
| short, there was a calculated effort to make midtown less and
| less vehicle-friendly. The "hack" was to take streets / aves and
| repurpose those for pedestrians. Special walking lanes, more
| "park cafes", bike lanes, etc. None were stated as being anti-
| vehicle - as that would open up legal challenges - but that was
| obviously the intention.
| cguess wrote:
| And it worked, there's multiple studies showing that retail
| business in the neighborhoods that limited car accessibility is
| _up_ while pollution and noise is down and for those who choose
| to drive into the city, parking is easier.
| Shitty-kitty wrote:
| Its been great for those that can afford to live in
| Manhattan. For us living in the other borrows its been
| horrible. The honking is now non-stop.
| cguess wrote:
| I'm in Brooklyn, I'm not sure what you mean? How would it
| affect the outer boroughs?
| Shitty-kitty wrote:
| Here across the 59th, traffic is definitely worst. With
| the BQE the daily shit-show that is is (never ceases to
| amaze me, how people get in accidents on a highway that
| rarely get over 35mph.) The best way was actually thru
| the FDR. Now everyone just uses Vernon Blvd which is only
| accessible thru local streets.
| pastel8739 wrote:
| But in fact the end goal wasn't to remove vehicles, it was to
| reduce congestion, emissions, etc. Those things are caused by
| vehicles, so policies to remove them will affect vehicles, but
| it's disingenuous to suggest that their motivation is anti-
| vehicle.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| It is also anti vehicle. Moving people in nyc at densities of
| 10ft by 20ft apart from the next human at the best
| theoretical case is astoundingly stupid.
| tzs wrote:
| > Moving people in nyc at densities of 10ft by 20ft apart
| from the next human at the best theoretical case is
| astoundingly stupid
|
| Are you sure? I would expect that it is average density of
| people over the length of the route that is important when
| it comes from moving people from some point A to some point
| B on a road.
|
| With for example buses you have high density where the
| buses are actually at, but 0 density where they are not.
| The average over the entire route can easily be lower than
| the density for cars where you can have that 1 person per
| 20 feet over the whole route.
|
| If an observer at a fixed point on the route sees more than
| about 50 cars pass between buses passing the cars will have
| higher throughput.
| saltysalt wrote:
| I think Paris has bigger problems to worry about.
| rwmj wrote:
| _> I think Paris has bigger problems to worry about._
|
| Say what you mean to say.
| dest wrote:
| The housing market is a bit broken: either expensive private
| housing or affordable publicly managed one, but very hard to
| get. People often cannot relocate. Big debt. Security, with
| addicted errands in some districts.
| saltysalt wrote:
| Well put. Lots of people in the comments have a nostalgic
| vision of Paris it seems.
| saltysalt wrote:
| Just did, it's the worse city in France. A few cycle lanes
| won't fix it.
| orwin wrote:
| Have you been to St Etienne or Limoges ? If we talk >80k
| sized French cities, Paris is in the middle of the pack.
| Maybe on the tail end (if you don't have a lake or fast
| access to a sea I can windsurf on, you loose a lot of
| points by default), but clearly not the worse.
| youknownothing wrote:
| There is some clear bias and green agenda in the way this has
| been written, which to be fair it's very common in Europe. As the
| EU continues its course to ban the sale of ICE cars by 2035, the
| argument of "fewer cars make for cleaner air" is gradually losing
| weight. As more and more EVs hit the streets, the argument
| against cars is more ideological, about lifestyle. It's about
| collectivism, about giving up individual transport in favour of
| public alternatives. It's happened in London, where a clear anti-
| car agenda is being disguised as a pro-clean air agenda. Almost
| the entire city now has a 20 mph speed limit "to reduce
| emissions" but, if that was the truly the objective, then I
| should be able to drive faster with an EV.
|
| Or maybe the angle they're trying to go for is another very
| European problem: cities are no longer designed for the people
| who live there, but for the people who visit them. Barcelona in
| particular has become a theme park, Venice has been one for
| decades. Entire neighbourhoods looks their soul so we can have
| more Airbnbs and drunk tourists. Sad times.
| Lionga wrote:
| The amount of brain farting someone can do the associated less
| cars, more bikes to cities being full of drunk tourists is
| truly something
| otherme123 wrote:
| > It's happened in London, where a clear anti-car agenda is
| being disguised as a pro-clean air agenda.
|
| I don't know about London, but in Spain there is no disguise:
| you can find pro-clean air _and_ pro-human strategies. Pro-
| clean limits, or straight ban, the access of ICE vehicles to
| some zones. Pro-human /anti-car limit or ban circulation or
| park _for any car_ in certain zones.
| tpm wrote:
| Well a big reason for speed limits in cities is safety, that
| doesn't change with EVs. Another thing you mention is
| collectivism but cars are a very inefficient private use of
| public space, both roads and parking, so when such space is
| scarce it makes sense to restrict them.
| rimbo789 wrote:
| Yes it is ideological: cars kill cities, kill communities and
| are bad for everyone involved. They are dangerous to drivers
| and non drivers alike and are deeply anti social. We need less
| cars everywhere period.
|
| Putting cars in cities was also deeply ideological. It was
| about segregation and as a way to extract as much resources
| from people as possible. The imposition of cars was about
| turning people into consumers who only point was to purchase
| goods and services.
|
| We didn't choose cars- they were pushed on societies through a
| decades long propaganda campaign.
| nonethewiser wrote:
| >Yes it is ideological: cars kill cities, kill communities
| and are bad for everyone involved. They are dangerous to
| drivers and non drivers alike and are deeply anti social. We
| need less cars everywhere period.
|
| You lost me at"We need less cars everywhere period." Not
| everywhere is a dense city.
| rimbo789 wrote:
| Why should rural areas be punished with having to use cars?
| mitthrowaway2 wrote:
| You're getting down voted but it's actually a reasonable
| question. Car infrastructure is much more expensive than
| bicycle or walking infrastructure, and population
| densities in rural areas are lower and less able to pay
| for it, while meanwhile rights-of-way and land for things
| like bicycle paths are much cheaper to afford. Obviously
| rural areas still need roads for work vehicles like
| farming, logging, mining, and so on, but there's no
| reason personal transportation should be car dependent.
| nxm wrote:
| No - we chose car as we were offered a way to not have to
| live in shoeboxes and having freedom to drive and explore not
| on anyone schedule.
| rimbo789 wrote:
| Look up the history of the interstate system - cars were
| very much imposed.
| dopidopHN2 wrote:
| As a resident of this city. The clean air is one thing. EV
| could give us that and offset the pollution where the batteries
| are made and recycle.
|
| But the main gain, as someone paying taxes there: is the
| reclaim of public space for human to enjoy.
|
| Its a cliche to say that Paris is pretty and its so much more
| enjoyable on a stroll along the bank of the seine that on a
| freeway at 20 miles/h. ( that freeway was permajamed )
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| Electric cars tend to be heavier than ICE cars. This means
| their tyres wear out faster, which is plastic dust being thrown
| up in the air. (We're still not sure of the health impacts of
| microplastics, but we do know they accumulate in various
| organs, including the brain.) They also throw up road dust, and
| we _know_ that rock dust is really bad to breathe in. Air
| pollution is still present. Compared to ICE cars fitted with
| catalytic converters, electric cars are probably better, but
| just because you can 't smell their emissions doesn't mean they
| aren't still reducing the air quality.
|
| They're also still tonnes of metal hurtling along the streets
| of a city shared by pedestrians, which is inherently dangerous.
| (Less so than a bus, but there are also more cars than buses:
| you'd have to check the statistics to see how that evens out.)
| As for actually damaging the road (producing road dust,
| potholes, etc, requiring a resurface that off-gases for weeks
| afterwards): cars damage the road more than bikes, though
| that's not significant compared to lorries, since the wear is
| something ludicrous like the fourth power of the weight-per-
| axle.
| LaGrange wrote:
| We don't really know if eating microplastics is particularly
| bad, but we do know breathing any pm2.5 and below dust is.
| kjkjadksj wrote:
| Wait till you find out you breath those microplastics as
| pm2.5 dust too
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| I believe that was LaGrange's point.
| LaGrange wrote:
| It was. I was differentiating between eating them
| (evidence unclear) and breathing them (pretty clear).
| nxm wrote:
| Common sense says yes it is bad
| alamortsubite wrote:
| The noise pollution is also comparable. Over 30 kph it's
| mostly wind and rolling resistance.
| andersonpico wrote:
| Why reclaiming city space is biased but covering the thing in
| parking lots is not?
| phoronixrly wrote:
| Yeah, if there is any agenda, that's the pro-car agenda...
| It's absurd to call people wanting to get rid of cars taking
| space, polluting with noise, dust and emissions, and killing
| their children part of a 'green agenda'... What? Big
| Pedestrian is pushing for banning cars?
| Macha wrote:
| > the argument of "fewer cars make for cleaner air" is
| gradually losing weight.
|
| Particles from tyre wear are a big contributor to local air
| pollution from cars - while they don't travel as far as CO2 to
| cause the larger scale problems, it's still going to be a local
| problem from electric cars, and since electric cars are
| generally heavier than equivalent petrol cars, that does mean
| they give off more tyre dust.
|
| Large car thoroughfares also didn't do much for the soul of
| cities and neighbourhoods.
| LaGrange wrote:
| Yep, CO2 is a problem but pm2.5 pollution made many cities
| hell to live in - and much (not all, of course) of that comes
| from rubber tyres and asphalt roads.
| alguerythme wrote:
| Your point about banning cars being ideological makes somewhat
| sense, but must be contrasted in regards to actual numbers.
|
| - EV share in greater Paris area is only 3%, far from being
| high enough to impact air quality. Overall, the effect of
| removing cars on air quality has been noticed and celebrated.
|
| - parisians are overwhelmingly in favor of banning cars. Unlike
| big american cities, car has never been a dominant
| transportation tool. Paris subway was already built when the
| first massed produced cars made their way in the capital. Cars
| have never been part of the soul of any neighbourhood people
| wanted to live in.
|
| - paris has one of the highest population density in the world:
| 20k hab/km^2, ranking 31th in the workd. As consequence,
| parking space has always been crazy expensive, on top of high
| rents. Similarly for travel time between two locations: I can't
| imagine a car being faster (except late at night, for night
| club and bars), and I try to avoid Uber/taxis intra-muros.
| Furthermore, a single noisy vehicle is estimated to be able to
| wake-up up to 150k (!!) people at night.
|
| - a large part of vehicles are actually... taxis and uber for
| wealthy tourists than don't want to bother with public
| transportation. In that regard, pushing away cars frees space
| for housing, parcs, shops, making the city easier to live in.
| OtherShrezzing wrote:
| The speed limit in London is at 20mph primarily due to safety,
| not emissions concerns. It takes approx 2x the distance to come
| to a complete stop from 30mph than it does from 20mph.
|
| For the majority of journeys in London, you're sitting at a red
| light, or transitioning to the next red light. Not a lot of
| opportunity for sustained 30mph travel. Accelerating up to
| 30mph so that you can travel the 300 meters, and then stop for
| 3 minutes serves no benefit to you (because your journey is
| still predominantly waiting at traffic lights), but reduces
| safety for you & everyone around you.
| Mawr wrote:
| Pedestrian mortality at 20mph vs 30mph is also vastly
| different: ~10% vs ~25% [1]. Also, see the graphs at [2].
|
| [1]: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22935347/
|
| [2]: https://data.bikeleague.org/new-nhtsa-data-speed-data-
| shows-...
| zahlman wrote:
| > It's about collectivism
|
| It's about the many other objective problems caused by cars
| besides the fuel use. Most obviously: they cause terribly
| inefficient land use (demand for parking + the roads themselves
| being congested), and are a physical threat to pedestrians and
| cyclists.
|
| > but, if that was the truly the objective, then I should be
| able to drive faster with an EV.
|
| That would be fundamentally incompatible with how traffic works
| and a nightmare to enforce.
| pastel8739 wrote:
| Looking at TfL's infographic about the speed limits [1], it is
| all about safety. In fact, it mentions "no net increase" to
| emissions. I think there is no such thing as an anti-car
| agenda, but perhaps there is an anti-death one.
|
| 1. https://content.tfl.gov.uk/the-impact-20mph-limits-and-
| zones...
| p_j_w wrote:
| >As more and more EVs hit the streets, the argument against
| cars is more ideological, about lifestyle. It's about
| collectivism, about giving up individual transport in favour of
| public alternatives.
|
| Making the city safer and more pleasant to be in is now
| communist?
|
| >Or maybe the angle they're trying to go for is another very
| European problem: cities are no longer designed for the people
| who live there, but for the people who visit them.
|
| It seems a reasonable conclusion that the people who elect the
| people putting these policies in place live in these cities.
| hashmal wrote:
| I get why you'd bring these points up. I mean, really, they
| could make sense. but both "green" and "tourist" points don't
| line up at all.
|
| to cut short lengthy arguments, just compare urbanism rules in
| the US and in the EU. the 4, 5, or idk 8 lanes roads you can
| find in some parts of the US with the at mot 3 lane (paid)
| highways.
|
| it all comes down to "if you make more room for cars, there
| will be more cars". if you refuse to cave in for this and you
| actually provide alternative ways of transportation (bus,
| bikes, subway if realistic, etc etc), then the overall traffic
| becomes much smoother. only complaints never cease, but that
| isn't specific to "moving people around".
| backtoyoujim wrote:
| "green agenda" means what exactly ?
| nxm wrote:
| Private jets and cars for those that can afford it, and
| bicycles for the rest. "Progress"
| saltysalt wrote:
| Exactly correct, ULEZ and LTNs have created a mess in London.
| These policies are driven by socialism not environmentalism.
| Climate is the excuse, reduced personal freedom is the intent.
| Thankfully many citizens in the EU and UK are waking up to it,
| so I hope a lot of these authoritarian policies get reversed in
| the future.
| Mawr wrote:
| The "mess" being a massive reduction in harmful particulates?
| saltysalt wrote:
| Yes that is literally the only impacts, no unexpected
| consequences whatsoever...
| rsynnott wrote:
| ... It's about collectivism? If you're such a rugged
| individualist that it reads this way, large cities are probably
| not for you. Like "we are trying to make the transport work
| mildly better" is the tip of the iceberg.
| Mawr wrote:
| > As the EU continues its course to ban the sale of ICE cars by
| 2035, the argument of "fewer cars make for cleaner air" is
| gradually losing weight.
|
| Complete nonsense I'm afraid. An EV is about 50% cleaner and
| way quieter. That's literally it. There's no other real
| benefits of it.
|
| An EV is still a car:
|
| - Still pollutes: it's a 2 ton vehicle with rubber tires -
| manufacturing that is very damaging to the environment and the
| tires constantly wear down
|
| - Takes up a lot of space
|
| - Incredibly dangerous to anyone not in a similar metal cage
| (hence 20mph limits)
|
| - Super expensive
| alamortsubite wrote:
| EVs are only quieter at very low speeds. If they're going 20
| mph or less, they're great, but any faster and air and
| rolling resistance is most of what you hear.
|
| It's also just as easy for a sociopath in an EV to roll down
| the windows and blast the neighborhood with noise from the
| stereo.
|
| EVs are better in the sense that the mufflers of ICE vehicles
| can be deliberately defeated by twits.
| papa-whisky wrote:
| Well it's very possible to blast music from a bike too http
| s://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLANhJNOIis5SrYZkIbN4MDJia...
| alamortsubite wrote:
| Now that looks like a good time.
| mjmsmith wrote:
| Come to New York, we still have freedom-loving individuals who
| reject collectivist ideology.
|
| https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2026/03/21/drunk-driver-arrested...
| rapht wrote:
| This article omits so many negatives from the "cyclist's
| paradise" vision of Hidalgo's 2 terms that I don't know where to
| start. Families are the first casualties: the Paris metro is
| nowhere near accessible to strollers except if you are willing to
| go to the chiropractor after each week end, and using your car -
| hell, even parking your family car - is a no go as soon as there
| is some kind of hipster sports event or just as soon as you are
| after 10am on week end mornings. Local parks and generally
| streets are so dirty that you have to wash your children from
| head to toe as soon as they have set foot outside. And I'm not
| even talking about used seringes and broken glass in certain
| parts of the city. I'm actually so ashamed of my city at this
| point.
| dadoum wrote:
| About the accessibility issue in the Paris metro: this can be
| mitigated by using the buses (that's not the best experience
| but it works fine), and in some parts of Paris (in my
| experience, east and suburbs) people usually quickly help you
| in the stairs with your stroller (it's not convenient or
| comfortable to rely on others but in practice it seems to
| work). Anyway this is not like Paris mayor has any power on
| that, the transport authority though announced a few years ago
| that the main priority after the Grand Paris Express will be
| making the historical Paris network accessible. And fortunately
| after two years hopefully your kid can walk and you can carry
| it without a stroller.
|
| > Local parks and generally streets are so dirty that you have
| to wash your children from head to toe as soon as they have set
| foot outside.
|
| Maybe if it is a newborn, and if you don't bring the stroller
| nor any clothes, on rainy days it can be that bad. Don't get me
| wrong, Paris is not a clean city, there are empty nitrogen
| tanks, puffs and cigarettes lying on the ground pretty much in
| every arrondissement, but syringes, even on the colline du
| crack I can hardly remember having seen even one (but it is
| very dirty there! with packaging, paper, cardboard, bottles).
|
| I still think there should be a higher priority on sanitation
| but I also think you are exaggerating a bit.
| bombcar wrote:
| Stroller access makes the USA look like a paradise compared to
| an old metro Europe.
|
| A week with a double stroller in Paris will make you appreciate
| ADA wheelchair ramps, kerb cuts, and elevators.
| hamdingers wrote:
| People took their children places for centuries without
| strollers and cars. The dependance on wheeled conveyances for
| children is baffling to me, I feel like some parents have an
| aversion to holding their kids. Especially the ones who clip a
| carseat into a stroller and never take them out.
|
| We were gifted a big heavy modern stroller and almost never
| used it, when the kids were babies we wore them and now they
| can walk a little we just do that and take breaks. If it's
| going to be an all-day thing (like a theme park) we'll bring a
| lightweight umbrella style stroller and those are trivial to
| fold up and carry.
|
| The accessibility argument makes sense for folks with
| disabilities but not so with children.
| mcv wrote:
| Accessibility is always important, regardless of what other
| options exist.
|
| I loved carrying my kids as babies, and rode them everywhere
| on my bike, but there will always be people for whom bikes,
| walking or cars aren't an option, which is why accessible
| public transport is always important.
| thrance wrote:
| Only 30% of Parisians drive in the city. There are real
| accessibility issues, but cars are probably the worst solution.
| We could add elevators to more metro stations, or improve bus
| service, etc. But having a car in the city and parking it is a
| costly provilege that not many can enjoy. Also cars are super
| bad for public health, noise pollution and the environment.
|
| > Local parks and generally streets are so dirty that you have
| to wash your children from head to toe as soon as they have set
| foot outside.
|
| That's an insane hyperbole.
|
| > And I'm not even talking about used seringes and broken glass
| in certain parts of the city.
|
| Not my experience, at all.
| oftenwrong wrote:
| Surely the school streets are a great benefit for families,
| yes? That seems as pro-child as public space allocation could
| be.
| mcv wrote:
| No elevators to the metro? That's a problem independent from
| the cyclist's paradise. A city like Paris should have an
| accessible metro. Amsterdam has elevators at I think every
| single metro station (though our metro system is far less
| extensive than Paris' of course).
| Tade0 wrote:
| > "She is constantly criticized, but still reelected: I've never
| understood it," says Lionel Pradal, a bistro owner on the
| bustling Rue des Martyrs. "Parisians never go out and vote, and
| then after they complain. This is the problem with French people,
| it's always the same."
|
| This is somewhat of a public secret, but few people ever stay in
| Paris for longer than say 10 years and thus aren't that attached
| to the city. It's noticeable in how few people voted in Hidalgo's
| referendums.
|
| The city has been losing citizens in favour of its suburbs for
| close to two decades now (if not much longer really) and this is
| a trend which shows no clear signs of reversing.
| bombcar wrote:
| The US has had cities like that, where it's a perpetually
| cycling (in both senses of the term heh) mostly-young group of
| renters who move out to the suburbs when they get older and
| start families.
|
| If "done well" neighborhoods preserve their character somewhat
| because the replacement people are basically the same, but in
| other cases the neighborhoods change drastically every ten
| years.
| gus_massa wrote:
| > _Parisians never go out and vote, and then after they
| complain._
|
| Wikipedia says that 70% of the people voted. Is it mandatory
| there?
|
| Here in Argentina it's mandatory, but weakly enforced. We get
| also a 70% of people voting. Anyway, the big problem are
| bubbles, probably all the friends of the guy don't like the
| current mayor and complain.
| thrance wrote:
| It's not mandatory. Hidalgo got reelected because people like
| her, the media is giving too much voice to the pro-cars when
| 70% of Parisians never drive in the city.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| > Is it mandatory there?
|
| No, its the french being _very_ french. Politics is still a
| sport there, with a plethora of teams playing.
| mrb wrote:
| I live in Paris and bike nearly every day, with my electric bike,
| or sometimes the city's velib rental bikes, sometimes private
| rental bikes (Uber, Dott, Voi). I _love_ the drastic push to add
| more bike lanes, and reduce car lanes. I don 't own a car in this
| city. Don't need one.
| black_puppydog wrote:
| People keep saying Hidalgo's policies made people angry, but then
| voter turnout when she actually _asks_ for confirmation of her
| policies is low. For example, 2024 's vote on whether to triple
| the parking fees for big SUVs. [1] Turnout was tiny, but the
| measure passed.
|
| Well what does that mean? It certainly doesn't mean that there is
| a huge wave of enthusiasm for the measure.
|
| But conversely it also means there's not a huge wave of anger
| about it. It's not like the automotive lobby didn't try hard to
| create one; the media coverage was actually kind of crazy at the
| time. And with the low turnout, even a small mobilization would
| have been sufficient to reject this measure. But it didn't
| materialise. So when I read articles like this one from CNN, I
| just have to ask myself what the agenda is behind jazzing this up
| as much.
|
| [1]: https://www.lerevenu.com/reduire-impots/conseils-
| impots/pari...
| bombcar wrote:
| I cannot read the fiery letters, but it's quite possible,
| depending on how the affected metro vs the voting block
| overlaps, that those who vote aren't those complaining.
|
| Also complaining is easy, I could do it right now here on HN
| from any bathroom in the world; voting is comparatively much
| harder.
| alamortsubite wrote:
| I've noticed in my city that a lot of the complaining about
| impinging upon the car-centric status quo comes from people
| who live outside the city.
| dwedge wrote:
| Measures like this always seem unfair to me if they aren't
| announced a few years in advance. A car is a large investment
| and people may have made different choices knowing that the
| rules will change. Same with the tax per mile for Electric cars
| in the UK.
|
| Instead of encouraging motorists to make better choices, they
| just end up feeling part of a money grab
| DominikPeters wrote:
| Large cars impose heavy many negative externalities on people
| (take up more space, make it difficult to get through a
| narrow street when they park there, higher mortality when
| they drive into pedestrians or cyclists, reduce visibility
| for others, aesthetically offensive). Policy is slow to shift
| those costs onto the people causing the externalities but it
| is predictable that it will happen eventually.
| black_puppydog wrote:
| Very sorry for drivers' inconvenience, but if they hadn't
| realized how bad SUVs are for health, climate, and basically
| anything that's going on in the city, then announcing it
| early wouldn't have registered either, I think, since they
| clearly haven't been following any news.
| thrance wrote:
| Hidalgo has been very clear about her plans for Paris for
| many years now, and people are still in favor of them. People
| shouldn't feel entitled to driving their oversized trucks in
| and out of our city, when we have such a dense and efficient
| network of public transit that doesn't make everyone else's
| lives worse through noise and pollution.
| b3orn wrote:
| I would take low voter turnout more as indifference than as
| lack of enthusiam. To take the parking fee for SUVs example, I
| would assume a lot of people affected by it and complaining
| about it aren't even living in Paris, so they can't vote
| against it.
| the_real_cher wrote:
| Biker supremacy engaged.
| paganel wrote:
| Yes, she's the poster-child for gentrification, that's why France
| is about to have a far-right government in the near term. But I
| guess she has made some Parisian bobos really happy, good for
| her.
| StyloBill wrote:
| Big cities in France never vote far-right, and the PS (left)
| candidate is leading the polls in Paris' next election, so I'm
| really not sure what you're talking about. Gentrification is
| hardly a cause for far-right coming to power.
| transcriptase wrote:
| Vancouver did the same thing. Now remaining parking is just
| filled with luxury vehicles with MSRPs that indicate you could
| charge $100 an hour and they wouldn't care.
|
| Nice of the wealthy politicians to get the riffraff off the road
| so the guy driving a Brabus G-Wagon, Rolls, or 911 Turbo can
| commute and park in peace. The poors can sit on packed busses
| with methheads.
| frugalmail wrote:
| Hmmm... "Mayor of Paris drastically reduces productivity of city
| by removing parking spaces"
| StyloBill wrote:
| Yes because wasting 2 to 3 hours in traffic every day surely
| makes people more productive.
| kgwxd wrote:
| Not The Onion?
| wao0uuno wrote:
| She can do the same to my city. Fuck cars. I'd rather have air to
| breathe and space to live.
| mono442 wrote:
| What's good about turning a city into a tourist attraction? I
| don't understand the way European communists think.
| p0w3n3d wrote:
| I live in Krakow and use car everyday*. There is virtually no
| possibility I will get my kids to school in the morning using
| public communication, mainly because the school is 4 kilometres
| away. City is so pro-clean-air and eliminate-parking-spaces and
| remove-cheap ekhm I mean polluting,-cars but meanwhile does
| nothing except for selling more and more ground for building
| flats. Not schools not hospitals not child daycare centres, but
| flats...
|
| ____
|
| * Always going to work by bicycle if possible, but if I have
| violin lesson or doctor's appointment I am not able to because
| the distances would be too long
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