Why is cycling so popular in the Netherlands?

beauf

A lot of people making reasons for not cycling simply haven't tried it.

Though I will say that road design, layout and junctions around Dublin in particular are very poorly designed. They seem to be designed by someone without any experience of cycling or driving. Its like someone drew them out on paper so they looked nice, or fit the space and left it at that.

monument

mossym wrote: »

nothing other than personal observation, always seemed to be much more cyclists on the roads in SF than I've seen in Dublin, but happy to stand corrected in the face of actual stats. my observation could be based on the quote below, greater concentration on some routes to avoid hills.

By the way, I was asking out of interest, not to correct you or anything.

Another factor could be that you don't see the following amounts of cyclists in all parts if Dublin... so perceptions can vary a lot from area to area...

http://m.flickr.com/lightbox?id=9216937811
http://m.flickr.com/photos/cianginty/9216941735/lightbox/

A lot of areas in Dublin may also have reasonally high (in Dublin terms) commuter numbers, but much lower levels of cyclists outside rush hour.

thebionicdude

Possibly veering off topic but just pasting in the complete stats prompted by Iwannahurl. They show the drop in kids pedaling to school over the years and the large increase in numbers being driven to class instead. I also paste in the breakdown of boys and girls pedaling.

It would be interesting to compare Irish census figures with Dutch ones if the same question is asked there but the numbers suggest less and less Irish parents are encouraging their children to commute by bike.

Unless the reasons for this are addressed it is hard to see cycle-commuting being seen as anything but a fringe activity in time. In addition, the joys of cycling will be something that people discover when they are adult.

Spook_ie

monument wrote: »

In 2006 almost 100,000 people in Dublin drove 4km or less to work!

We really have to get past the myth that the majority are now doing really long commutes.

Source for this being?

GT_TDI_150

Being a belgian myself I would say first and foremost that all dutch people are cheap skates and dont want to pay for fuel.

On a serious note, as the countries are side be side I'm going to look at this from the view point that the reasons me and my friends, family, etc cycled when I was living at home are:

1)infrastructure
my 'commute' to school used to be 10km from a town the size of say 'Bantry' to the outskirts of Antwerp city, the entire route has a cycling path!, my gran used to live 25-30km in the other direction - same storey cycle paths all the way, including along dual carriage ways, etc.

2)Habit
There was a bus on my route to school, with a bus stop 50m from my house that would stop outside the school ... very seldom did we take the bus. From a early age parents take their kids cycling along designated (car free) paths. To a kid in Belgium it is 100% normal to jump on the bike and go to school, training, friends, family in the local area. If a parent suggested to their child here that they head to gaa training on their bike I reckon in most cases the kid would have a heart attack.

3)Drivers attitude towards cyclists
Much more positive in Belgium, this might be down to my first point that every one has their space on the road, but I cant remember any close calls with cars/vans/buses I had whilst cycling(for 14-15 years) in Belgium

4) Weather being an issue in Ireland a ridiculous argument, Belgium's weather would be similar to Ireland, a tad hotter in summer, a tad colder in winter - plenty rain there too - and that didn't stop most of the kids in my school from cycling EVERYDAY, no matter what the weather was the bike shed was always full(a few 100 bikes) - Gave many a day trying to keep our bike upright on the way to and from school on icy winter days

Cookie_Monster

Spook_ie wrote: »

Source for this being?

2006 census and the DoT

Spook_ie

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

2006 census and the DoT

Just checking because the source I'm looking at for the 2006 census says 96665 traveled to work over a distance of 2-4 Km not drove

http://census.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=76562

So are we viewing the same stats? as I assume that the mode of transport would be this table

http://census.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=76542

dave_o_brien

beauf wrote: »

Though I will say that road design, layout and junctions around Dublin in particular are very poorly designed. They seem to be designed by someone without any experience of cycling or driving. Its like someone drew them out on paper so they looked nice, or fit the space and left it at that.

This is pretty much what has happened, with few exceptions. Dublin is a former medieval city, which has had much of it's medieval fabric demolished to make way for Georgian and Victorian buildings. Most of the Georgian new builds was replacing the same footprint as it's medieval predecessor. When the city began to expand, the wide roads commission made compulsory purchase orders to locations such as capel street, leeson street, etc, to provide for broad boulevards. But all of this design and planning was done in an era before the motor vehicle. At this point in time, the largest, fastest vehicle was the horse drawn carriage, and they weren't that common.

Unlike the Georgians, we in the 21st century are terrified of new things, so protect many unworthy aspects of our architectural heritage ferociously, in the misguided belief that if we allow the mediocre elements of our heritage go, the exceptional will be next. Same insane logic that applies to the abortion debate- known as the "slippery slope" argument. Which to me seems obviousle erroneous, and leaves us crippled by fear of replacing the mediocre old with the bad new. Simple solution: replace it with something better.

To clarify, I'm not condoning replacing all, or even most, of Georgian Dublin, just parts that are not of merit.

But why do I say all that? It has left us with a pattern of streets that were largely leftover space, not "designed" for cars. Not designed for traffic, of any meaningful description. Yet we insist on streets such as leeson street to put three lanes of traffic down it. Merrion square has four lanes, plus parking. O'Connell Street, which doesn't really go anywhere, has 4 lanes. Nassau Street is a terrifying 2 lane+massive bus lay by. Why?

All of this makes it very easy to drive. There won't be a modal shift in Ireland by choice. To make people choose, you need to actively make driving unattractive, and tell the public that this is what is happening. If you want to drive into town, there will be very, very few routes through town, with mass car parks along it, which will be very expensive. You will not be able to drive to where you want to go. You will drive to a car park, and walk the rest of the way. We should reduce rates for shops in the city centre, recovering that cost with a congestion charge.

There obviously isn't the political will for this, because there is no public desire for change. It's all well and good to ask what we can do to make cycling more attractive. The answer is very simple: make driving significantly less attractive.

galwaycyclist

^^^^^^ This + 1 same goes for all our larger towns

galwaycyclist

Spook_ie wrote: »

Just checking because the source I'm looking at for the 2006 census says 96665 traveled to work over a distance of 2-4 Km not drove

http://census.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=76562

So are we viewing the same stats? as I assume that the mode of transport would be this table

http://census.cso.ie/Census/TableViewer/tableView.aspx?ReportId=76542

Ok I don't know about Dublin but I did a quick pull from Table 57A

Table 57A Persons at work aged 15 years and over usually resident in the State and present in their usual residence on Census Night, classified by distance travelled and by means of travel to work, distinguishing the Aggregate Town and Aggregate Rural Areas

Motor car driver
Less than 1 km --- 1,637
1 to 2 km

---

43,264
2 to 4 km

---

158,434

Total

---

203,335

This does not include those who travelled to work as passengers

theUbiq

stetyrrell wrote: »

Town isn't hilly, but the suburbs are, the Netherlands are flat like a pancake. Less of a social pressure to drive as well.

SOCIAL PRESSURE TO DRIVE?

magicbastarder

Spook_ie wrote: »

Source for this being?

i remember reading that half of all journeys under a mile in dublin are made by car. i'll see if i can find a source which would confirm or disprove my memory.

i assume that 'under a mile' does not include journeys like 'walking to the loo'.

galwaycyclist

While I'm at it I did a quick pull from Table 59A which is secondary school students

Table 59A Students aged between 13 and 18 years usually resident in the State and present in their usual residence on Census Night, classified by distance travelled and by means of travel to school or college, distinguishing the Aggregate Town and Aggregate Rural Areas

Motor car passenger
Less than 1 km --- 75
1 to 2 km

---

7,800
2 to 4 km

---

35,206
Total

---

43,081

Motor car driver
Less than 1 km --- 3
1 to 2 km

---

238
2 to 4 km

---

979
Total

---

1220

In 2006 there 238 Irish schoolchildren driving themselves less than 2km to school. If we raised the driving age to 18 like the Dutch that might help solve that.

beauf

dave_o_brien wrote: »

...But why do I say all that? It has left us with a pattern of streets that were largely leftover space, not "designed" for cars. Not designed for traffic, of any meaningful description. Yet we insist on streets such as leeson street to put three lanes of traffic down it. Merrion square has four lanes, plus parking. O'Connell Street, which doesn't really go anywhere, has 4 lanes. Nassau Street is a terrifying 2 lane+massive bus lay by. Why?...

Another example is the quays. They allowed new builds right up to the existing line rather than moving all new development back. Over time that would have given us another lane on the quays, rather then the bottlenecks we now have.

Iwannahurl

dave_o_brien wrote: »

Unlike the Georgians, we in the 21st century are terrified of new things, so protect many unworthy aspects of our architectural heritage ferociously, in the misguided belief that if we allow the mediocre elements of our heritage go, the exceptional will be next.

[...]

To clarify, I'm not condoning replacing all, or even most, of Georgian Dublin, just parts that are not of merit.

I'm not following your line of argument here.

Which parts of Georgian Dublin are unworthy, mediocre and lacking merit in the context of traffic and transportation policy?

magicbastarder

magicbastarder wrote: »

i remember reading that half of all journeys under a mile in dublin are made by car. i'll see if i can find a source which would confirm or disprove my memory.

i assume that 'under a mile' does not include journeys like 'walking to the loo'.

aha - i had it slightly wrong.
half of all *car* journeys are under one mile.

http://www.smartertravelworkplaces.ie/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Half-of-all-car-owners-drive-for-trips-of-less-than-1-mile.pdf

beauf

We used to have a traffic school in fairview to teach cycling and road rules to kids. Sorely lacking now.

slideshow bob

f1dan wrote: »

There is definitely a perception about the weather though cos it's the main reason why people I work with, who make shorter trips, all travel by car.

Same here - weather is the most cited reason for not cycling.

What I'm truly amazed about is that in my workplace substantially less than 10% of the people who bought wheels on the Bike To Work scheme EVER use their bikes to get to work (as in not once).

enas

dave_o_brien wrote: »

The answer is very simple: make driving significantly less attractive.

I largely subscribe to that, obviously.

However, I have a minor disagreement. I wouldn't say we should make driving unattractive, but make cycling more attractive. At the end of the day, the result is the same, comparatively, we're looking to make cycling more attractive than driving, for certain types of journeys. But how we present that to the public is very important. We don't want to punish people for using their cars, it's hardly a crime to do this. Quite the opposite, those people who are made to use their cars, for all the reasons we know, are the first victims of this: think about congestion, pollution, long journey times, prohibitive costs, it's unpleasant, stressful, unhealthy, etc. No one enjoys that. You can hardly suspect that people are readily making this choice, in full knowledge of the better alternatives.

Why this point is important, is that political will depends on this. Politicians are rarely happy to impose to the population something they feel reluctant about. And quite rightly so, they shouldn't. So I believe, from a campaigning point of view, we should first and foremost focus on convincing the general population of the benefits of shifting to cycling. There has to be a mainstream demand for cycling. Then, political will will follow mechanically.

And since the focus of this thread is the Netherlands, I honestly don't think that there is any particular anti-driving policy in the Netherlands. Outside the obvious extreme case of Amsterdam, driving is very easy in the Netherlands, car parks are abundant and reasonably priced, petrol price is average, and indeed, car ownership is amongst the highest in Europe. But it makes simply no sense to use your car for certain types of journey, because of the way roads and cities in general are engineered.

seamus

DirkVoodoo wrote: »

I think this is part of the problem: We were never allowed cycle to school

I think the Celtic Tiger played a relatively big part in this too. When I was in primary and secondary school there was never enough room to park bikes. I'd say about 25% of the students cycled every day, rain or shine. Lots were driven too, and lots walked, but tonnes of bikes.
I finished school in 2000, so right as the economy was about to insane and it started creeping in then. When my older brothers went before me, there were maybe one or two guys in 6th year who had cars in school. When I got to fifth year, the first guy with a car got it for Xmas (no, really). By sixth year there were about 30 students out of 100 who had full-time access to a car, either their own or their mother's "spare" car. And of course they all drove in, even though they mostly lived in the direct suburbs surrounding the school. By sixth year I was probably one of ten people who still cycled in every day.

I can only imagine in the six years that followed, it got even crazier. The school I went to, converted a basketball court into parking spaces to create more room. Whereas before the tiger, time and money would have been at a premium, during the boom parent would never want other people to see their little darling cycling or walking into school when they could turn up at the gates in a fuel-guzzling monstrosity, because nothing's too good for their little darlings.

I'd say we'll see a jump in the numbers of kids cycling to school over the next decade. It's comical how quickly someone's "It's too dangerous" opinion changes when you show them the monetary cost of driving them to school.

magicbastarder

when i was in secodary school (finished in 94), despite the fact that the school was in a well-off area, students were forbidden from bringing cars into school.

beauf

Around my area the schools with a decent cycling infrastructure and a decent safe route have always got lots of kids cycling. Regardless of the boom. The schools that don't, don't get the cyclists.

So I agree with the idea of making cycling more attractive is the way to go.

Anyone who cycles get out earlier. School and work. Bet that would have an impact.

dave_o_brien

beauf wrote: »

Another example is the quays. They allowed new builds right up to the existing line rather than moving all new development back. Over time that would have given us another lane on the quays, rather then the bottlenecks we now have.

It would be terrible for the streetline to introduce too many buildings with setbacks. The main reason behind a setback would be to create a public space (such as in front of Central Bank, or the former Bank of Ireland on Baggott Street), not to allow for more traffic. Why would an extra lane of traffic be desirable? Studies have shown that an increased capacity in terms of traffic leads to an increased load, not a decrease in congestion.

Iwannahurl wrote: »

I'm not following your line of argument here.

Which parts of Georgian Dublin are unworthy, mediocre and lacking merit in the context of traffic and transportation policy?

Well, all of Georgian Dublin predated the motorcar, so in terms of what parts of Georgian Dublin are unworthy, mediocre and lacking merit in the context of traffic and transportation policy, the answer would be all of it. But we don't want to get rid of it, because a lot of it is great.

I was on a tangential point: we have an aggressively conservationist planning policy that romanticises anything Georgian, to the extent that there are many examples of mediocre Georgian architecture that are protected. We also then have some fine examples that are protected to such an extent that to do anything becomes prohibitively difficult, leading to their ultimate decline, such as Henrietta Street.

Related to that, in terms of this conversation, we have an inherited system of roads that are not designed for heavy traffic, and this won't change unless we demolish large portions of Georgian Dublin (which we shouldn't, even if we should stop romanticising ALL of it), or, as happened elsewhere, it gets removed for us.

enas wrote: »

I largely subscribe to that, obviously.

However, I have a minor disagreement. I wouldn't say we should make driving unattractive, but make cycling more attractive. At the end of the day, the result is the same, comparatively, we're looking to make cycling more attractive than driving, for certain types of journeys. But how we present that to the public is very important. We don't want to punish people for using their cars, it's hardly a crime to do this. Quite the opposite, those people who are made to use their cars, for all the reasons we know, are the first victims of this: think about congestion, pollution, long journey times, prohibitive costs, it's unpleasant, stressful, unhealthy, etc. No one enjoys that. You can hardly suspect that people are readily making this choice, in full knowledge of the better alternatives.

Why this point is important, is that political will depends on this. Politicians are rarely happy to impose to the population something they feel reluctant about. And quite rightly so, they shouldn't. So I believe, from a campaigning point of view, we should first and foremost focus on convincing the general population of the benefits of shifting to cycling. There has to be a mainstream demand for cycling. Then, political will will follow mechanically.

And since the focus of this thread is the Netherlands, I honestly don't think that there is any particular anti-driving policy in the Netherlands. Outside the obvious extreme case of Amsterdam, driving is very easy in the Netherlands, car parks are abundant and reasonably priced, petrol price is average, and indeed, car ownership is amongst the highest in Europe. But it makes simply no sense to use your car for certain types of journey, because of the way roads and cities in general are engineered.

I totally disagree that the way to effectively enact a modal shift is to make the unpopular thing more attractive. It didn't work for smoking, drinking, fast food, and countless other vices. Unless you make the popular choice less attractive, you won't find the levels of migration significant, as people will continue with their still-convenient choice.

Unfortunately, this can't happen without the support of the population, which is why I highlighted the bit I did. You are completely right here. The government are populists, they have to be, as their election depends on it.

Amsterdam, as we are using it as an example, had their population DEMAND of their politicians to make drivers in urban areas respect any and all others, that driving in urban centres be less attractive and less convenient than other modes of transport, on the back of many child deaths as a result of collisions with cars. It worked. Here, people simply don't want to not be able to drive to town. Until the populist opinion here is that the city should be for pedestrians, and cars should not have the right to navigate at the speeds they do in the locations they do, then politicians will not enact change.

magicbastarder

dave_o_brien wrote: »

I totally disagree that the way to effectively enact a modal shift is to make the unpopular thing more attractive. It didn't work for smoking, drinking, fast food, and countless other vices

but your examples are popular things which we want to make less attractive. which was the counterpoint you were making.

wexandproud

i have driven in holland regulary over the years and on one of my first trips almost hit a cyclist. my passenger, a local guy said i should be carefull because no matter who is wrong or right the motorist is almost allways deemed at fault if you hit cyclist in holland.

dave_o_brien

magicbastarder wrote: »

but your examples are popular things which we want to make less attractive. which was the counterpoint you were making.

I don't understand what you mean here.

Smoking is popular, we want to make it less so. Emphasising why it's didn't work as a deterrent all that well. Putting people out of the pub has been more successful.

Fast food is popular. Emphasising it's negative effects on health has not been a deterrent.

Driving is popular. Showing how nice it is to cycle won't make it less so. What will is making it less attractive. The upside is increased bike use.

I don't want increased bicycle use as the goal. I want better cities. Which means less cars. The inevitable upshot will be increased use of alternative means of transport, including cycling.

More bicycle use should be a consequence of better cities, not the goal for them.

beauf

dave_o_brien wrote: »

It would be terrible for the streetline to introduce too many buildings with setbacks. The main reason behind a setback would be to create a public space (such as in front of Central Bank, or the former Bank of Ireland on Baggott Street), not to allow for more traffic. Why would an extra lane of traffic be desirable? Studies have shown that an increased capacity in terms of traffic leads to an increased load, not a decrease in congestion....

I'm not thinking of using it for cars.

The extra lane could be used for a dedicated cycle lane, and continuous bus lanes. A cycle express lane through the park, and then up and down the quays would attract a lot of people to cycling.

At the moment the bus lane isn't continuous it disappears at points. These pinch points and the merging and un-merging of lanes (especially at speed) are not ideal for cyclists.

dave_o_brien

beauf wrote: »

I'm not thinking of using it for cars.

The extra lane could be used for a dedicated cycle lane, and continuous bus lanes. A cycle express lane through the park, and then up and down the quays would attract a lot of people to cycling.

At the moment the bus lane isn't continuous it disappears at points. These pinch points and the merging and un-merging of lanes (especially at speed) are not ideal for cyclists.

Right, I agree to an extent. North quays should be pedestrianised with a bike lane, while the south quays should be two way traffic, in my opinion. No need to start messing with the street line!

enas

dave_o_brien wrote: »

I don't want increased bicycle use as the goal. I want better cities. Which means less cars. The inevitable upshot will be increased use of alternative means of transport, including cycling.

More bicycle use should be a consequence of better cities, not the goal for them.

Every one wants better cities indeed. So we have to convince people that in a better city, there'll be fewer cars, and more alternative modes of transports, such bicycles for short journeys. Just as pubs and restaurants have become much more pleasant since the smoking ban, something that even the most diehard smoker agrees with. Similarly, cities with a more reasonable use of car (and a more reasonable use of space for cars) will become more pleasant to everyone, including for those who choose or have to drive a car.

beauf

dave_o_brien wrote: »

Right, I agree to an extent. North quays should be pedestrianised with a bike lane, while the south quays should be two way traffic, in my opinion. No need to start messing with the street line!

That one option. Mainly because there isn't enough space. it used to be two way both sides. They changed that because of congestion and the limited space. But then did nothing to improve that space over the following decades.

The street line goes in and out like a cartoon stairs, its not like your messing with vision of perfection here. its a mess. My point is much of that mess is recent, which could have been avoided if they'd actually planned it. There really only a handful of significant buildings that would be problematic.

Its too late now anyway, they've people to throw up any kinda monstrosity over recent years.

Iwannahurl

dave_o_brien wrote: »

Well, all of Georgian Dublin predated the motorcar, so in terms of what parts of Georgian Dublin are unworthy, mediocre and lacking merit in the context of traffic and transportation policy, the answer would be all of it. But we don't want to get rid of it, because a lot of it is great.

I was on a tangential point: we have an aggressively conservationist planning policy that romanticises anything Georgian, to the extent that there are many examples of mediocre Georgian architecture that are protected. We also then have some fine examples that are protected to such an extent that to do anything becomes prohibitively difficult, leading to their ultimate decline, such as Henrietta Street.

Related to that, in terms of this conversation, we have an inherited system of roads that are not designed for heavy traffic, and this won't change unless we demolish large portions of Georgian Dublin (which we shouldn't, even if we should stop romanticising ALL of it), or, as happened elsewhere, it gets removed for us.

I still don't understand your point.

Georgian Dublin was not designed for motorised traffic, so is it not therefore eminently suited to other modes of transport, such as walking and cycling?

Why would any of it need to be demolished to make way for more bikes?

dave_o_brien

Iwannahurl wrote: »

I still don't understand your point.

Georgian Dublin was not designed for motorised traffic, so is it not therefore eminently suited to other modes of transport, such as walking and cycling?

Why would any of it need to be demolished to make way for more bikes?

Right, I think I see what you mean now. I was kind of voicing an opinion that may not have been totally related.

Let me rephrase:all of Georgian Dublin predated the motorcar, so in terms of what parts of Georgian Dublin are unworthy, mediocre and lacking merit in the context of traffic and transportation policy predicated on mass use of private motorised transport, the answer would be all of it.

This is the scenario we live in. The approach to how we use the streets we have is based upon how can we transport cars around these streets. Not how can we transport people.

Georgian urbanism did create great spaces for people: just look at Merrion Sq (which I'm looking at now, as I'm still at work), Stephens Green, Henrietta Street. But allowing cars to circumnavigate Stephens Green, for example, made it very unpleasant. The current ease with which people can walk between Grafton Street and the Green is a great success.

None of Georgian Dublin would need to be demolished to make space for bikes, I was never trying to make that point. But trying to service the huge volume of cars is resulting in a pretty unpleasant place in terms of infrastructure, for pedestrians and cyclists alike. Where other cities had an advantage was where massive reconstruction projects had to occur, they could accommodate for a high volume of cars without interfering with many pedestrianised parts of their cities.

By making Dublin a less convenient place to drive around, we'd make it a nicer place to be. People would still need to navigate quickly, so bicycle use would increase. I don't believe that providing better "facilities" for cycling without providing worse ones for cars would result in a significant modal shift.

My whole point about protectionist planning strategy was tangential, and probably as much me stating a very loosely connected opinion as anything else.

dave_o_brien

beauf wrote: »

That one option. Mainly because there isn't enough space. it used to be two way both sides. They changed that because of congestion and the limited space. But then did nothing to improve that space over the following decades.

The street line goes in and out like a cartoon stairs, its not like your messing with vision of perfection here. its a mess. My point is much of that mess is recent, which could have been avoided if they'd actually planned it. There really only a handful of significant buildings that would be problematic.

Its too late now anyway, they've people to throw up any kinda monstrosity over recent years.

There isn't enough space for how it's currently being used. I would prefer it to be used in a different way. Then there would be loads of space!

You're right, in parts it is a bit, er, erratic! Most of the recent buildings were held to strict building lines based on what existed before: there hasn't been a significant change to the building line since Ormonde turned Dublin to face the Liffey. Obviously, this is excepting the Docklands.

They've also thrown up some very good stuff too. Doing nothing because somebody did something you don't like gets us nowhere.

enas

dave_o_brien wrote: »

I totally disagree that the way to effectively enact a modal shift is to make the unpopular thing more attractive.

Just read this post, which couldn't be a better illustration of the point I was trying to make.

Have a read, I believe it's worth it.

Which do you think will convince more people to shift away from cars in this city? Penalising people for choosing to drive a car? There's already not only parking charges, but even a congestion charge. Both could be increased. Or making cycling conditions ever so slightly more attractive?

At present, as the article shows, cycling has been essentially designed out as a mode of transport. You could punish people as much as you want for choosing to drive a car, as long as a more attractive alternative is not present, people will only feel resentment, and you would lose any mainstream support for cycling.

As an aside, I'm rather against congestion charges, as a consequence of this reasoning. I can see how it can be a necessary extreme measure to deal with an extreme situation, but I totally disagree with its consistent use as a normal way to deal with congestion.

Iwannahurl

dave_o_brien wrote: »

Let me rephrase:all of Georgian Dublin predated the motorcar, so in terms of what parts of Georgian Dublin are unworthy, mediocre and lacking merit in the context of traffic and transportation policy predicated on mass use of private motorised transport, the answer would be all of it.

None of Georgian Dublin would need to be demolished to make space for bikes, I was never trying to make that point. But trying to service the huge volume of cars is resulting in a pretty unpleasant place in terms of infrastructure, for pedestrians and cyclists alike. Where other cities had an advantage was where massive reconstruction projects had to occur, they could accommodate for a high volume of cars without interfering with many pedestrianised parts of their cities.

By making Dublin a less convenient place to drive around, we'd make it a nicer place to be. People would still need to navigate quickly, so bicycle use would increase. I don't believe that providing better "facilities" for cycling without providing worse ones for cars would result in a significant modal shift.

Perhaps words such as "worse" are a bit loaded. There may be more neutral terms such as Level of Service.

http://www.humantransit.org/2010/09/avoiding-car-centered-language-a-directive.html
http://dc.streetsblog.org/2013/06/03/attacking-the-language-bias-in-transportation-engineering/
http://www.vtpi.org/reinvent.pdf

Of course my view is that accommodating large volumes of cars, whether or not pedestrian areas are affected, is inherently unsustainable. Values are therefore an inevitable part of transportation policy and so should be made explicit. For decades it was implicit that "planning" (itself a loaded term in this country) was based on car use first and foremost. In my opinion it is not only necessary to be more open about what you're planning (don't say "traffic" when you really mean "cars" and don't say "people" when you really mean "motorists") but it is essential to explicitly prioritise a higher Level of Service for publoic transport, walking and cycling.

A huge cultural shift is required to achieve this to any meaningful extent, and that is a massive task in this country. With regard to Dublin, I recall Pat Kenny a few years ago interviewing Andrew Montague, mayor at the time and champion of the shared bike scheme and the 30 km/h zone in the city. More of a mugging than an interview, perhaps.

Pat ranted on about how O'Connell Street was "the widest thoroughfare in Europe", as if it was designed for multiple lanes of cars. When Andrew Montague countered that the pedestrian space had been greatly expanded, Pat demanded to know "whose fault is that?"

There's a video somewhere on YouTube (posted recently in the Cycling forum, iirc) which clearly shows how Dutch cities systematically go about providing a much higher level of service for cycling than for cars. This is achieved by providing direct, continuous, traffic-calmed and traffic-reduced routes for cycling, while cars are excluded or diverted by means of one-way systems, car-free zones and parking restrictions. We're decades behind on such developments, but there can be no doubt that if cycling is to be effectively promoted the more sustainable choice must be made the easier one.

Iwannahurl

enas wrote: »

As an aside, I'm rather against congestion charges, as a consequence of this reasoning. I can see how it can be a necessary extreme measure to deal with an extreme situation, but I totally disagree with its consistent use as a normal way to deal with congestion.

Why should we as a society not place an economic value on a finite resource, in this case road space?

Perhaps a congestion charge is not always the only or best way to go, but other means could be found to put a price on road space, such as parking-related charges.

Typically what "planners" do in Ireland, and in other countries that have willy-nilly embraced car dependence, is not to deal with the problem of limited space by charging appropriately for use of it but by requiring that more space is provided for the most inefficient users of it.

http://shoup.bol.ucla.edu/Chapter1.pdf

dave_o_brien

enas wrote: »

Just read this post, which couldn't be a better illustration of the point I was trying to make.

Have a read, I believe it's worth it.

Which do you think will convince more people to shift away from cars in this city? Penalising people for choosing to drive a car? There's already not only parking charges, but even a congestion charge. Both could be increased. Or making cycling conditions ever so slightly more attractive?

At present, as the article shows, cycling has been essentially designed out as a mode of transport. You could punish people as much as you want for choosing to drive a car, as long as a more attractive alternative is not present, people will only feel resentment, and you would lose any mainstream support for cycling.

As an aside, I'm rather against congestion charges, as a consequence of this reasoning. I can see how it can be a necessary extreme measure to deal with an extreme situation, but I totally disagree with its consistent use as a normal way to deal with congestion.

That's an interesting piece. But talk about specific!

While I can see how it reinforces your opinion, it also reinforces mine. Here is a city with a street pattern that was designed to be accommodating to pedestrians in the pre-motor car era. Look at the picture of the pedestrainised street (with a loading zone, horror of horrors- what a ridiculous bone to pick by the author of that piece); it looks lovely.

On the majority of that lovely little town, they have decided that cars simply MUST be catered for. The result is that it's a hole. I don't care that there aren't any provisions for cycling, nobody wants provisions as long as the car culture is the way it is. It's awful. Make driving not just costly (as per the congestion charge), make it awkward, and inefficient, so that you only engage in it when you absolutely need to. Remove lanes, give them back to pedestrians. Remove parking, give them back to pedestrians. Remove shortcuts, give them back to pedestrians. You'll be left with a nice town, where to get around, people will look at alternative, which will happen to include our bikes.

My points of action outlined above are obviously far more complex in implementation than my tone suggests. It requires strategically providing car parking in location convenient to shopping areas, but removed from major ped zones. It involves introducing a lot of traffic calming measures, reducing lane widths, creating ways of navigating conveniently around rather than through the town, enormous man hours of consultation, design, engineering, etc. But making cycling more attractive wouldn't be a solution. Making driving less attractive might is more likely to make cycling a considered alternative.

To clarify, not for a second do I think that this is what will happen in Ireland or the UK any time soon. It needs support from the public, and the public really likes driving.

dave_o_brien

Iwannahurl wrote: »

Perhaps words such as "worse" are a bit loaded. There may be more neutral terms such as Level of Service.

http://www.humantransit.org/2010/09/avoiding-car-centered-language-a-directive.html
http://dc.streetsblog.org/2013/06/03/attacking-the-language-bias-in-transportation-engineering/
http://www.vtpi.org/reinvent.pdf

Of course my view is that accommodating large volumes of cars, whether or not pedestrian areas are affected, is inherently unsustainable. Values are therefore an inevitable part of transportation policy and so should be made explicit. For decades it was implicit that "planning" (itself a loaded term in this country) was based on car use first and foremost. In my opinion it is not only necessary to be more open about what you're planning (don't say "traffic" when you really mean "cars" and don't say "people" when you really mean "motorists") but it is essential to explicitly prioritise a higher Level of Service for publoic transport, walking and cycling.

A huge cultural shift is required to achieve this to any meaningful extent, and that is a massive task in this country. With regard to Dublin, I recall Pat Kenny a few years ago interviewing Andrew Montague, mayor at the time and champion of the shared bike scheme and the 30 km/h zone in the city. More of a mugging than an interview, perhaps.

Pat ranted on about how O'Connell Street was "the widest thoroughfare in Europe", as if it was designed for multiple lanes of cars. When Andrew Montague countered that the pedestrian space had been greatly expanded, Pat demanded to know "whose fault is that?"

There's a video somewhere on YouTube (posted recently in the Cycling forum, iirc) which clearly shows how Dutch cities systematically go about providing a much higher level of service for cycling than for cars. This is achieved by providing direct, continuous, traffic-calmed and traffic-reduced routes for cycling, while cars are excluded or diverted by means of one-way systems, car-free zones and parking restrictions. We're decades behind on such developments, but there can be no doubt that if cycling is to be effectively promoted the more sustainable choice must be made the easier one.

Yes, "more neutral level of service" would be the way to sell this. But I'm not trying to sell it. I'm just stating my opinions, based on observation, study and practice.

As I've said, if one were to try to implement any of this, it would require either:

A) A huge swing in public opinion with regards to the right of motorised access to urban centres.

or

One hell of a political spin doctor.

On this forum, I am attempting to enact neither.