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#12
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Car Free Fantasy
Frank F. Matthews wrote:
I have looked at your web site and find it completely unconvincing. Your car free cities are pretty much isolated shopping streets, isolated islands with no area or population, or very old construction that is supported by a car using periphery. The closest thing to a real car-free city I've seen is Saigon. Millions of people and in many parts of town you'll only see one car for every 500 mopeds. Cars are so slow there that they're only used by people for whom the prestige value is worth the wait. Which points to the eventual reason why many cities will probably have to do without cars: In places with truly high population density, the cars just won't fit. Saigon's streets are completely saturated already with vehicles that are nimbler and 1/8 the size of cars. Replace them and you'll have permanent and total gridlock. Anyone who's interested, I have a quick video of Saigon traffic taken with my digital camera that I can email you if you can handle large attachments (About 4M, as I recall). You'll see why cars won't work there. miguel -- Hit The Road! Photos and tales from around the world: http://travel.u.nu |
#13
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Groningen, Holland Is Automobile-Free
Still funny.
"Steve Austin" wrote in message ... Groningen, Holland is automobile-free. It's a bicycle and pedestrian-only city. |
#14
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Groningen, Holland Is Automobile-Free
"Chris Elam" wrote in message news:Tr8oc.27492$xw3.1871080@attbi_s04...
Still funny. But, Chris, Steve Austin is a man barely alive! (And I've always wondered how he escaped massive TBI if he needed to have an eye replaced.) "Steve Austin" tried his best to come across as the Don Saklad of transportation... Nancy |
#15
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Car Free Fantasy
Miguel Cruz wrote in message ...
The closest thing to a real car-free city I've seen is Saigon. Millions of people and in many parts of town you'll only see one car for every 500 mopeds. Cars are so slow there that they're only used by people for whom the prestige value is worth the wait. Which points to the eventual reason why many cities will probably have to do without cars: In places with truly high population density, the cars just won't fit. Saigon's streets are completely saturated already with vehicles that are nimbler and 1/8 the size of cars. Replace them and you'll have permanent and total gridlock. Anyone who's interested, I have a quick video of Saigon traffic taken with my digital camera that I can email you if you can handle large attachments (About 4M, as I recall). You'll see why cars won't work there. miguel I go to Saigon once or twice a year and each time I can't fail notice the seemingly huge increase in the number of private four-wheeled vehicles in the city. Cars will come to Saigon just as they did everywhere else -- eventually. The only limiting factor is cost. After all, Vietnamese are only in their first generation of mass motorcycle ownership. What remains to be seen is how the planners react. Will they sweep away the town for highways -- as they did in Jakarta, to its detriment -- or try to construct something less radical. George W. Russell Hanoi |
#16
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Car Free Fantasy
George W. Russell extrapolated from data available...
I go to Saigon once or twice a year and each time I can't fail notice the seemingly huge increase in the number of private four-wheeled vehicles in the city. I suspect that the return of cars and trucks to Saigon has more to do with money than with current congestion. A look at old photos of NYC actually shows many streets, pre-auto, as more congested than they are today, jammed by every sort of horse-drawn conveyance (and think of the knee deep manure). Not that long ago, HongKong had few private autos in evidence. I don't think Castro will live long enough to make Havana car free and care free. After all, there is a limit to how long even the most skilled virtuoso mechanic in the city can keep a '54 DeSoto used daily for half a century on the road. Cars will come to Saigon just as they did everywhere else -- eventually. The only limiting factor is cost. After all, Vietnamese are only in their first generation of mass motorcycle ownership. "Return", not "come". There were a number of them around for a decade or so....(especially the black Cadillacs of Cholon). What remains to be seen is how the planners react. Will they sweep away the town for highways -- as they did in Jakarta, to its detriment -- or try to construct something less radical. No, like planners everywhere, they'll spend gadzillions building a freeway/grand boulevard to the airport. TMO |
#17
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Car Free Fantasy
"Olivers" schreef in bericht ... .. I don't think Castro will live long enough to make Havana car free and care free. After all, there is a limit to how long even the most skilled virtuoso mechanic in the city can keep a '54 DeSoto used daily for half a century on the road. I drove a brand new Hyundai that I rented in Cuba last year in Havana. Less than 50% of the cars in Cuba are "old Americans". Sjoerd |
#18
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Car Free Fantasy
Sjoerd extrapolated from data available...
"Olivers" schreef in bericht ... . I don't think Castro will live long enough to make Havana car free and care free. After all, there is a limit to how long even the most skilled virtuoso mechanic in the city can keep a '54 DeSoto used daily for half a century on the road. I drove a brand new Hyundai that I rented in Cuba last year in Havana. Less than 50% of the cars in Cuba are "old Americans". Can you compare that with anywhere else in the world? While less than 50% of the cars in havana are "Old American", the other side of that same coin is, unlike any other city outside of Cuba, almost half of the cars are at least 44 years old and from the US. I'm sure that car rental agencies can afford new Hyundais. How many Cubans can afford new Hyundais? While we might argue constantly over the state of Cuban economy and the financial outlook for Cubans, the bottom line is that as long as Fidel Castro or a government drawn from successors who emulate his policies remains in place, Cuba's economy and Cubans will lag behind the country's economic potential (punished as it were for the sins of its masters, an undeserved fate for most Cubans, and one not easily avoided). One posting here claimed recently Cuba and Cubans were doing quite well (well, under the circumstances). Can you imagine how well the economy and the lives of Cubans would be, especially given the natural advantages of geography and skills, had they had been able to lose Castro y amigos, even keeping a nice classic form of socialism without wholesale expropriation. After all, state-owned sugar cane plantations don't seem to be any more efficient than oligarch-owned sugar cane plantations, and half a dozen countries could have provided examples of both successes and failures in reforming agriculture and landownership. Even if one applies the old motto, "So far from God, so close to the US," used for another NAmerican nation, Cuba's economy would have certainly moved farther than it has, robber barons in retrospect turning out to be not much more expensive than bureaucrats and fewer in number. One might claim that Cuba would have profiterd greatly as an Eastern gamblers' haven, removingg all need for Atlantic City or Bahamas casinos. But then we'd be comparing the moral staure of Meyer Lansky as compared to Donald Trump. TMO |
#19
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Car Free Fantasy
"Olivers" schreef in bericht ... While we might argue constantly over the state of Cuban economy and the financial outlook for Cubans, the bottom line is that as long as Fidel Castro or a government drawn from successors who emulate his policies remains in place, Cuba's economy and Cubans will lag behind the country's economic potential (punished as it were for the sins of its masters, an undeserved fate for most Cubans, and one not easily avoided). Agreed. One posting here claimed recently Cuba and Cubans were doing quite well (well, under the circumstances). One should not forget that the Cubans enjoy the best healthcare in Latin America, live longer on average than almost all other people in the Western Hemisphere, and are well educated. Not everything is bad in Cuba. Can you imagine how well the economy and the lives of Cubans would be, especially given the natural advantages of geography and skills, had they had been able to lose Castro y amigos, About as good as Haiti or the Dominican Republic perhaps? Sjoerd |
#20
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Car Free Fantasy
Following up to Frank F. Matthews
You are constructing it right now in your back yard from Leggos. Isn't that in Greece? -- Mike Reid "Art is the lie that reveals the truth" P.Picasso Wasdale-Lake district-Thames path-London "http://www.fellwalk.co.uk" -- you can email us@ this site Eat-walk-Spain "http://www.fell-walker.co.uk" -- dontuse@ all, it's a spamtrap |
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