Today is World Carfree Day!

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by RobertSmalls

Groar,

Are they really going to let public transit workers strike?

It's Socialist France. Ever since their (literally) bloody Revolution it's been in their cultural history. Going on strike is their national political pastime, and has been in recent decades, big time. Nothing new here. If you like national socialism, you'll love France.

[robchalmers]

You'll find quite a lot of europe is half-assed-socialist, by which I mean not totally socialist but they'll used the bit the people like! I mean the UK was tecnically socialist (labour) for the last 13years until May, which is odd as they where Bush's Biggest fans and now the Republicans seems to love talking about all forms of socialism in a bad way!
Don't get me wrong there are some VERY obvious bad cases around the 1930s-40s-50s-60s and it pretty much crippled any form of manufacturing industry here in the UK under the unions, but there are also some scandinavian countries which make it work - and work well!

while we're on a political theme anyone love the irony that we spend 40+ years of the cold war saying the Capitalism is better than Communism, then when the system falls over we have to get propped up by the red-brigade!

[groar]

Please concentrate on thread's subject : "Today is World Carfree Day!".

Thanks in advance,

Denis.

[robchalmers]

sorry (climbing down off the soap box)

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by groar

Please concentrate on thread's subject : "Today is World Carfree Day!".

Thanks in advance,

Denis.

We are concentrating on the subject, ostensibly that it is a politically Left-wing, utopian goal: that the world would be somehow be better if there were no cars.

Otherwise why would anyone or any political entity be sponsoring a carfree day?

[Tweety]

Originally Posted by Thymeclock

We are concentrating on the subject, ostensibly that it is a politically Left-wing, utopian goal: that the world would be somehow be better if there were no cars.

Otherwise why would anyone or any political entity be sponsoring a carfree day?

And you are either trying to profile yourself as right-wing, ultra conservative... Or are provokative and stupid...

The concept is pretty simple... Not to remove the cars, but to get people to discover the alternative... To have them actually try the bus/train routes to work before dismissing it as unpractical... And to in the end find a balance between using the car for where it's useful/practical, and leaving it at home when that's more practical...

And as such a concept it's actually a good idea, show your car's registration and use any puplic transportation for free for the day...

Also another thing you should take into account before engaging the mouth without the brain, is that most European cities are quite a lot older than the average american city... Ie we haven't torn down everything and re-built it around 4 lane roads in the city centre...

In many of these cities it actually makes more sense to use public transportation than a car, based solely on the reason that navigating it in a car takes enormous amounts of time, plus you need to spend large amounts of time to find parking... And if to many do it, the "congestion" you guys have over there becomes childs play in comparasion...

Also the positive side of that, the city is usually laid out in such a way that it's easy to navigate on foot or on a bike... Ie close to anything, then take the bus and you get to another small mini town in the town...

Take the time to think things through and look at things with the world as a reference, not just your hometown in the US as a reference and we can have lots of interesting discussions... And I haven't even discussed politics yet...

[robchalmers]

[euromodder]

Originally Posted by RobertSmalls

Are they really going to let public transit workers strike?

Happens frequently in France and Belgium.

It means public transport is not a viable nor reliable transport option as long as it remains completely union-controlled.

[euromodder]

Originally Posted by Tweety

The concept is pretty simple... Not to remove the cars, but to get people to discover the alternative...

It's just a day where a minority imposes its utopian views upon a majority.

To have them actually try the bus/train routes to work before dismissing it as unpractical...

I work fully continuous shifts in the Antwerp harbour.
It's Belgium's main economic centre, but you can't even get there with public transport - not at the odd hours that I work, not at the more regular hours.

I could use my employer's bus system, but I can't get to one of the bus stops using public transport either.

If I could use public transportation, my employer expects me to show up even when the public transport employees go on strike


It'd be a good thing if the hypocrisy of these so-called car-free days could end right here.
The traffic jams are just as bad if not worse than on a regular day !
What's the point after all when huge numbers of people take their cars and drive to the edge of a city centre to go biking or walking in the car-free centres ????

[euromodder]

Originally Posted by Piwoslaw

But is a dirty bus with 40-60 people in it worse than 30-50 cars, some of them SUV's, even if all of them are new and 'clean'?

All bus traffic going through the small city where I live, passes right before my home. <sarcasm>(The joy !)</sarcasm>
You'd be amazed how many of these busses are (near-)empty.

Many of these busses are city-lines, meaning people are using busses when they could walk or bike.