War on cars

[fat and old]

Is it the publics fault for not understanding induced demand or the governments fault for not educating the public on induced demand?

Nah, it’s the government’s fault for not understanding induced demand.

Or worse: being in denial.

Every adult man and woman understands induced demand, they just don't apply it beyond their own experiences.

eg. What man doesn't understand that buying a bigger shed, or building a bigger garage doesn't solve his storage problems? More space, more crap. Same goes for women in the house. More cupboards, more crap. Build a butlers pantry/kitchen? Even more crap. Go the full on Marie Kondo? House full of new crap in three weeks. This is not rocket science here

[vbplease]

a congestion tax is the solution. get rid of tolls on all toll ways (in brisbane, as they all go around the city, not to the city), and replace with a $10 congestion tax. then make PT free

This is what I've been thinking for quite a while!
All of those things would be game changers.. but implemented together and the improved liveability of a city would be huge.
Jasonc for Lord Mayor??

[jasonc]

Jasonc for Lord Mayor??

that's definitely not a good idea

[Comedian]

Is it the publics fault for not understanding induced demand or the governments fault for not educating the public on induced demand?

Nah, it’s the government’s fault for not understanding induced demand.

Or worse: being in denial.

Every adult man and woman understands induced demand, they just don't apply it beyond their own experiences.

eg. What man doesn't understand that buying a bigger shed, or building a bigger garage doesn't solve his storage problems? More space, more crap. Same goes for women in the house. More cupboards, more crap. Build a butlers pantry/kitchen? Even more crap. Go the full on Marie Kondo? House full of new crap in three weeks. This is not rocket science here

Yeah but in a car/traffic sense.. if they do understand it they sure aren't cognisant about it.

Resurfacing roads is a total winner for council. You don't change anything so no one can really get annoyed, and now it's clean, smooth and new. At worst people are ambivalent.

New roads are very popular except for the people who live by them and are affected by them. Generally they are a tiny subset of the people who are pleased by them - but they can be a noisy painful minority. BCC doesn't like annoying anyone, so a tunnel it is then!

[fat and old]

Nah, it’s the government’s fault for not understanding induced demand.

Or worse: being in denial.

Every adult man and woman understands induced demand, they just don't apply it beyond their own experiences.

eg. What man doesn't understand that buying a bigger shed, or building a bigger garage doesn't solve his storage problems? More space, more crap. Same goes for women in the house. More cupboards, more crap. Build a butlers pantry/kitchen? Even more crap. Go the full on Marie Kondo? House full of new crap in three weeks. This is not rocket science here

Yeah but in a car/traffic sense.. if they do understand it they sure aren't cognisant about it.

Yeah, that was tongue in cheek there....

[trailgumby]

Jasonc for Lord Mayor??

that's definitely not a good idea

Ah. You think you have a choice in the matter.

[jasonc]

Jasonc for Lord Mayor??

that's definitely not a good idea

Ah. You think you have a choice in the matter.

Haha. "None of the above" kind of vote

[Thoglette]

10 images show just how attractive Australian shopping strips can be without cars

Published in The Conversation: August 18, 2022 6.05am AEST
Matthew Mclaughlin, The University of Western Australia, Hayley Christian, The University of Western Australia, Jasper Schipperijn, University of Southern Denmark, Trevor Shilton, Curtin University

Sort of interesting

[rokwiz]

Funny, they don't show car free, Hunter street mall in those pictures.
They ended up re-introducing a one way traffic lane to encourage people (in cars) back into Newcastle's CBD.
The place was a ghost town for many years.

[Thoglette]

Funny, they don't show car free, Hunter street mall in those pictures.
They ended up re-introducing a one way traffic lane to encourage people (in cars) back into Newcastle's CBD.
The place was a ghost town for many years.

There's an interesting dynamic there, and size isn't the only determinant. Darwin struggles with it's mall, Fremantle does not. Nor Cairns. Perth keeps (very slowly) expanding its car-free areas, Sydney fights them tooth and nail. York's works where as Melton not so much.

The recent presentation on Paris I attended highlighted that their success has been based on reducing traffic, particularly through traffice. And not access nor parking. That is, they'd rather a single (one way for cars/trucks) lane with parking than a ped-only area.

Perhaps it depends on whether the area is really urban or actually still mostly suburban. That is, are people already trying to walk there?

[rokwiz]

Funny, they don't show car free, Hunter street mall in those pictures.
They ended up re-introducing a one way traffic lane to encourage people (in cars) back into Newcastle's CBD.
The place was a ghost town for many years.

There's an interesting dynamic there, and size isn't the only determinant. Darwin struggles with it's mall, Fremantle does not. Nor Cairns. Perth keeps (very slowly) expanding its car-free areas, Sydney fights them tooth and nail. York's works where as Melton not so much.

The recent presentation on Paris I attended highlighted that their success has been based on reducing traffic, particularly through traffice. And not access nor parking. That is, they'd rather a single (one way for cars/trucks) lane with parking than a ped-only area.

Perhaps it depends on whether the area is really urban or actually still mostly suburban. That is, are people already trying to walk there?

Newcastle's Hunter Street pedestrian mall has always been an oddity. It has been car free for many years. Lets put it this way, I can remember watching the Commonwealth Cycling Classic stage there. (a very young Jan Ullrich first Aus. race) It's always been a good pedestrian route for both local and tourist to the beaches.
Commercially over the years it fell on hard times, cafes and small shop moved out, the major fall came when DJ's dept store closed.
It became a hang out for gangs until local gov decided they needed to reopen the roadway for one way traffic. Since then cafe's and business has been gradually re emerging.
But there's no reason why similar cafe strips like (shown) Darby and Beaumont precinct couldn't become one way traffic calmed routes. Both have major bus routes along them which need to be maintained.
Newcastle is a very car based city, maybe a lot to with the geography, being split in 2 by the range which separates Newcastle city and Lake Macquarie. Since Fernleigh cycleway tunnel was opened there has been a vast improvement for cyclist to cross that range.

[brumby33]

The Age of the "Car is King" is over, the sooner we accept that the better by John Vidal from the Guardian

Here is an article that talks about car ownership around the world, what has it done in the past 120 years, how have Humans benefitted and why now they are turning away from the all too expensive motor car.
Which I would ask, will people readily adopt the very expensive electric cars as their means of travel, I think many are now noticing that options like E-Bikes and scooters, public transport may soon take over.
With Global Governments on all levels are pushing for cleaner air, less congestion and better use of City facilities, the car is now being pushed out just as the horse and carriage and bicycles were 120 years ago, maybe a full circle is now occurring.

It talks about China being the Country of bicycles, now being jam packed in smoggy Cities now they are saying bicycles are dead but that's not what the entire world is saying, it's all happening at the local Government areas of Cities around the world.

You and I may not see it happen but your kids and grand kids might, could it be that one day, kids will find it safe to ride to school again, Uni and work in the future instead of taking up space with a car.

Another question (not in article but) if Australia and other Countries were forced to take sides in another war, with the fuels being controlled by other nations, would we all be forced or coersed into getting that bike out of the shed? Perhaps!!
It'd be a good thing in a way but not because we are at war but people can still get around by their own means and not have to rely on a motorcar.

Anyway, have a read, it's starting to become clear now, that owning motorcars are now too expensive, are causing hardship on people's budget and lives due to accidents etc, people are struggling financially especially at the moment with higher inflation, interest rates, rents and many having to have 2 cars because they were forced to buy too far away from their workplace......the tide is turning, it can be seen even here in our own society.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/th ... 3fe55c960a

Maybe we don't have to have a war with the motorcar, maybe it could meet it's own demise.

Cheers

brumby33

[baabaa]

Bike protest takes over German motorway

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-62710430

Around 8,500 cyclists prevented motorists from using a stretch of Germany's autobahn, during a protest calling for better public transport and cycle lanes.

The demonstration took place between Frankfurt and Wiesbaden - a distance of 40km (25 miles).

It was organised by Verkehrswende Hessen - a group seeking to make transport in the German state of Hesse climate-neutral by 2030.

[brumby33]

Bike protest takes over German motorway

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-62710430

Around 8,500 cyclists prevented motorists from using a stretch of Germany's autobahn, during a protest calling for better public transport and cycle lanes.

The demonstration took place between Frankfurt and Wiesbaden - a distance of 40km (25 miles).

It was organised by Verkehrswende Hessen - a group seeking to make transport in the German state of Hesse climate-neutral by 2030.

AWESOME

[g-boaf]

Next step against old trucks/cars in cities:

https://www.drive.com.au/news/calls-to- ... an-cities/

The **champagne-chardonnay-leftist-garden-smashed-avo socialist-soy-weak-extra-flat-latte-chattering-class-woke-thought-control-elites continuing its war on hard working real Australians, right?

**I hope I got all the usual colourful terms used by the spam-gangs.

Sarcasm and cynicism aside, I feel that older trucks and cars are not the biggest problem, it's actually quite modern cars which have been tuned to be as loud as possible and are driven in a irresponsible way to make heaps of noise as well. Overseas this kind of "poser" behaviour is not allowed and those people can be fined. Also modifications to vehicles are strictly controlled so cars must be within original noise limits and the testing is done when the car is pulled over, not at some workshop afterwards, so people can't just "undo" exhaust mods.

Trucks just go past and continue on their way. They don't go back and forwards 20 times a night, nor do they sit at traffic lights revving their engines away non-stop. They also don't just drive around in low gear to make heaps of noise. It's passenger car drivers who do that.

[zebee]

[
Anyway, have a read, it's starting to become clear now, that owning motorcars are now too expensive, are causing hardship on people's budget and lives due to accidents etc, people are struggling financially especially at the moment with higher inflation, interest rates, rents and many having to have 2 cars because they were forced to buy too far away from their workplace......the tide is turning, it can be seen even here in our own society.


brumby33

We have spent 70 post war years creating cities that require cars. As you said yourself people with 2 cars because they live in a sprawling low density area and there's no PT and even ebikes aren't really viable.

Making car ownership expensive and difficult means poor people don't have cars. RIch people can buy houses in well located places with lots of transport options, very rich people can live in the hills and ostentatiously use expensive transport. Many many people can't afford to live anywhere but the places you need a car to get to. It used to be the poor people lived close to the polluting industries, now those are gone and the slums get a coat of paint and a multi million dollar price tag (yes I am looking at you Balmain)

It's a chicken and egg thing in a way. If you repurpose all the space used for the storage of private cars into public transport and bikeways and housing you can fit a lot more people into a given space. But you can't do that until you have got rid of cars and who will do that? I live in a place it is really easy to be car-free (and the motorcycle has gone out about 3 times this year) but my unit-neighbours all have one car each.

If you have kids then it's really hard not to need a car especially if one or more is into sport as the ovals for interschool (never mind interclub) matches tend to be well out of ebike distance.

The whole culture has been built around the car getting on for 3 generations. How the hell do you unwind that without seriously hurting a hell of a lot of people who live in places that only cars make viable? We can't work out what to do with a few hundred in Lismore never mind over half the people in each capital city.

[brumby33]

I guess Zeebee that things will take some time to change but after years of stagnant wages, inflation and Interest rates putting a lot of pressure of people's standard of living, I think there needs to be some changes.
I must admit, Internationally I'm not well travelled, never been to Europe or US or UK but many of those places with much bigger populations than ours, kind of makes you wonder why Australian Cities have had to go so far out.

I just spent 6 weeks in Japan in the Chiba Prefecture and there you have many cities joined together to basically make one mega-city to make up the biggest City region in Kanto (greater Tokyo) and yes they have a lot of sprawl but their laws are so much different even though the Kanto region covering The Tokyo and Chiba and a few smaller prefectures, first class Public transport is the key, a Cycling culture that have multi level cycling stations but lots of other cycle parking around rail stations and shopping centres.
Honestly even though there's still a lot of cars, they have been forced to take a back seat compared to those of Pedestrians and bicycle riders. In many City areas can either ride on the sidewalks as well as the roads.
The roads, on City Highways where bicycles arn't permitted, top speed is 80kph although traffic go a lot faster but there's doesn't seem the be the zealous persual of speedsters as there are in Australia with Cameras everywhere.

Suburban roads are 50kph, local roads are 40kph and streets are 30kph and even down as far as 20kph I noticed. I seen bicyclists bringing home their shopping from 24 hour supermarkets at 1am in the morning, 1 plain front lights, no flashing red lights, no reflective vests because most streets are very well lit and bicyclists and pedestrians can easily be seen.

Cars cannot be owned or parked unless they have a registered car park at the residence. There are paid car parking around the place but sparingly so. It's up to the local Government if you're allowed to own a car or not, there's no parking on the street as there is never enough room and the roads are very narrow.

Sydney has a long way to go but it's improving greatly over the decades, especially during Covid19 restrictions, and I've recently seen many regional towns really getting into the active lifestyle and transport solutions, lowering local town speed limits and even change the way that cars park in the CBDs. I'm soon to move down south to the township of Albury on the NSW side of the Murray River and have been really impressed in the way they've promoted Cycling facilities, bikeways etc and there's even a bikeway that you can ride all the way to Bright in Victoria...I couldn't believe what I was seeing....can't wait to get the Vivente down there

brumby33

[zebee]

The point with UK and Europe and Japan (but much less the US) is that they were high density before cars.

If you look only at the bits of Oz built before the car you see plenty of walkability and ease of movement. Choked by storage of cars of course but it is there.

We had a lot of spare land and when the car got cheap enough we could use it. Europe and the UK and Japan did not have that spare space. The US did and has the same kind of problem we do, but even worse as they had enough water and space to really spread out. Look at US "suburbs", we aren't talking quarter acre blocks we are talking 2 acre ones. With no footpaths and no PT and nothing within walking distance.

All those people on the city fringe need sports ovals and sewerage and a way to get to work. If you moved them to the centrish suburbs they would still need those.

[Thoglette]

We have spent 70 post war years creating cities that require cars. As you said yourself people with 2 cars because they live in a sprawling low density area and there's no PT and even ebikes aren't really viable.
…,
It's a chicken and egg thing in a way. If you repurpose all the space used for the storage of private cars into public transport and bikeways and housing you can fit a lot more people into a given space. But you can't do that until you have got rid of cars and who will do that?

You take through traffic & lanes away & let congestion build to a “normal” level. This is what Paris has done in the last decade.

As you point out, our biggest problem (outside Melb and lucky suburbs in other cities) is a lack of 24/7 alternatives (even Uber had its limits)

If you have kids then it's really hard not to need a car especially if one or more is into sport as the ovals for interschool (never mind interclub) matches tend to be well out of ebike distance.

It’s called the club/school bus.

The whole culture has been built around the car getting on for 3 generations. How the hell do you unwind that without seriously hurting a hell of a lot of people who live in places that only cars make viable?

You do it the way the Dutch did (and the British & Germanys are following, in my experience). First, stop cars traversing the core people focused areas (e.g. CBDs and suburbs). Then, while keeping every location accessible, reduce vehicle infrastructure, speeds and access.

Second, build and maintain general purpose public transport. You know, so people can take the dog to the vet or Granny to IKEA or the kids to the holiday town. Don’t expect to “make it pay its way”

Finally, fix your planning and financial systems around housing so that people have stable housing in liveable areas. That’s the big problem as it means unwinding 50 years of neocon policies & associated neglect of key govt responsibilities.

At least the conversation has started.

[fat and old]

Here's a group that's taking the literal meaning of the thread to heart!

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... -one-night

Courageous citizens all over the world last night … deflated tyres on at least 600 SUVs, exactly two months before the opening of the United Nations Cop27 climate summit in Egypt,” the Tyre Extinguishers said. The group said the total was likely to rise, with more reports of actions expected.

Damn straight courageous. If I caught someone doing that to me car, I wouldn't be impressed!

[Chris249]

If you have kids then it's really hard not to need a car especially if one or more is into sport as the ovals for interschool (never mind interclub) matches tend to be well out of ebike distance.

It’s called the club/school bus.
[/quote]

That depends on the sport. How does a surfer with a Malibu get to the beach from the western (or middle) suburbs? What about a rock climber, or someone who sails small boats? And what about other leisure pursuits, like dog training or playing a cello (to name two in my family)?

I've run small amateur sporting clubs, and still do, and there's no practical way of running a bus.

My wife and I have commuted to work by bike for years, but things like getting to many sports or Ikea are often extremely difficult without a car. I'm very pro-bike but many of the issues of switching off cars are going to be harder than just getting a bus to Ikea or to sport.

[DavidS]

Here's a group that's taking the literal meaning of the thread to heart!

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... -one-night

Courageous citizens all over the world last night … deflated tyres on at least 600 SUVs, exactly two months before the opening of the United Nations Cop27 climate summit in Egypt,” the Tyre Extinguishers said. The group said the total was likely to rise, with more reports of actions expected.

Damn straight courageous. If I caught someone doing that to me car, I wouldn't be impressed!

I saw the article about them in July, hmm, damned tempting.

I agree we often do need cars but bloody great SUVs to drive around town? Yeah, no actually. No problem with people owning a capable 4WD if they go bush, but you don't need them around town.

DS

[Thoglette]

It’s called the club/school bus.

That depends on the sport.

Indeed. Pretty hard to tow a Top Fueler with a Brompton. Or safely transport a three-man Bonsai, for that matter. But both of those are once-a-month events

The vast majority of weekend sport, on the other hand, is team based and perfectly amenable to busses. Indeed, that’s what the $$$ private schools already do. Including sailing & rowing.

[Chris249]

You're right that we need to change things, and while I haven't read the whole thread it's apparent that you've looked into this a lot. I just find weekend sport an interesting case study into the huge amount of re-shaping that we may need to go car free (or close to it). For example, the six most popular sports in Australia are individual sports on ABS data; out of the top 10 only two are team sports (ABS data). Some of them could easily be done by bus, train and/or bike (tennis, gym, etc) but some (golf, swimming, bushwalking) involve significant travel or moderately bulky kit. Not every person or club has the backing of a $$$$$$ public school. Does that mean they just get told they cannot do their favourite sport or activity?

It's interesting to read old accounts of sport, and the way the world was shaped around the lack of cars. There were special trains for sports, and many more general stores where you could buy the stuff you wanted when you were at your destination, rather than carrying it with you. In England, lots of bike racing clubs still have a clubhouse out of the city to give a base for road racing from. It would seem that it's going to need that sort of infrastructure, many times over, to achieve a car free life.

One thing that I would love to see is hire/share cars with towbars, and the tiny trailers some Europeans have. You could store the trailer easily on or in most blocks but be able to carry lots of stuff when you need to.

One thing we noticed when we lived in cities was that bikes were THE best thing to use for shopping most of the time, although we did live in inner city suburbs. None of this trying to find a park/schlogging through traffic stuff; just zip, zip, zip. It doesn't work that well now that we live 15km outside a country town, but the electric car (Nissan Leaf) is fantastic. It's funny when you hear people claim that electric cars don't work in the country; I think that they can, in a strange way, work better out there than in the city in some respects.

[brumby33]

Going back in the 60's, 70's right up to the 2,000's pre SUV were the humble station wagon, I've owned only 1 which was a Sigma wagon back in the early to mid 80's and it was fantastic, went everywhere and could do most stuff except AWD territory, but even those where catered for with Landcruiser and Nissan Patrol and Pajero, all good wagons but it was the car style wagon I wish to talk about, in the 60's and 70's, many people that had anymore than 2 kids drove wagons, they came from the main staple at the time Falcon, Holden, Chrysler Valiant then you had the Japanese variants which were many and Australia's wagon and roomy family hacks were catered for......
Subaru were I believe the first SUV having 4wd capability, and one that catered for those who loved biking & skiing, but didn't need a full blown 4WD.
It wasn't until people required bigger Caravans and rule changes that came that required a car had to be restricted in van weight that we seen the rise of huge 4WD numbers and the car got over shadowed.
I think we all remember back when the normal caravans were towed by a Holden Kingswood or a Ford Falcon and they handled the job well due to their powerful 6 cylinder in line motors.

The car industry has changed, people wanted more, they wanted to go camping, they wanted to tow bigger vans coz the Mrs wanted a shower and toilet, so sedans lost sales and more buying 4WD's even if they never intended to go offroad and the huge 4WD became a status Symbol hence the term Toorak Tractors, it's become the bigger is better theme, car makers around the world recognise this as it's not just Australia but everywhere on the planet who are buying this SUV concept and many of the smaller ones like Mazdas CX models, Hyundai' & Kia are built on chassis that have come off their sedan counterparts, the normal wagon is gone now and so are sedans, it's these glorified hatchbacks that are now called SUV (Sports Utility Vehicles) and that covers such a size variant from the Humble CX Mazda, Subaru and Hyundai/Kia up to the huge Euro machines from Audi/BMW & Mercs.
I just spent 6 weeks in Japan near Tokyo ad whilst the majority of people run around with the little boxy Kei cars, there were some SUV's but anyone who had big families to lug around, had the people carrying vans like Nissan Elgrand variants, lots of Toyota vans around and I must say very niice, but too big for the normal folk. You'd be surprised what you can fit in a Kei car with only 660cc turbo hybrid motors, with back seats down, the have the cubic space to fit a decent Costco shopping spree.
Probably the only wagon-ish vehicle today would be the Volvo & Skoda but many of the smaller SUV's don't have that much room if any than the humble Toyota Corolla Hatch. I'd welcome the return of a sensible car sized station wagon that were still popular back in the 80's. Makes more sense.

Appologies for long winded posts

brumby33