WudiBritish children are 3 times more likely than Dutch children to be obese. A British journalist explains why
Works great if you have smaller spaces, able bodied people, and the infrastructure in place to support it.
For what it’s worth, dense infrastructure is possible everywhere, even in large spaces like the United States. It just doesn’t get built because the people tasked with making such decisions choose not to for various reasons.
The density in a specific location isn’t the issue, it’s the space BETWEEN all other locations. Too much sprawl to begin with requires extensive work of a long period of time to even be able to do something this.
Also helps that the cities this works for were built for walking a long time before cities in the US had even developed a unique urban footprint. East Coast cities established in the 1500-1700’s would be the closest in design to European cities.
LibertyLizardDo you need to visit every single location in your city state or county? Or do you need to reach certain amenities and would happily use a closer one of similar quality?
Density matters more than size. People aren’t shopping on the other side of the country. They go to the most convenient option.
Well, you’re either unaware of, or just ignoring a lot of things that do not fit into your tidy explanation.
Every been the Bay Area in the US? You know what it takes to ride a bike from one side of SF to the other and any direction? What about crossing a bridge to Oakland? What about crossing the GGB to get to literally any other city on the other side?
Also,.most major US cities were not built for walking, only East Coast earlier cities. Let me ramble off a bunch that discount your point: Los Angeles, Atlanta, Chicago, Seattle, San Diego, Denver, Philadelphia, and even Washington DC.
Your immediate response is going to be something like “Well they WERE originally…”, but that doesn’t matter. Maybe 100+ years ago, but that’s not where we live. We live in the reality of now, and that reality is that none of the cities are AS accessible by walking or bike as they are with cars. If not Topography, then the general logistics of where jobs vs living spaces are located.
People don’t have the luxury of choosing where they get to live in the US anymore in proximity and convenience of their commute to work. Just not the reality of things. No argument you might have will beat the consumer logic of finding the most ideal place to live first, and worrying about the commute second. Likely to be by car.
I have literally biked many of the routes you’re discussing here. I live in Sacramento and regularly visit the Bay Area without driving. Actually, that’s already the most convenient way to do so. But that’s a fun outing, not practical urban transit. Practical urban transit takes place within or to adjacent neighborhoods. That’s the whole point. Once you reach a certain density of amenities, car infrastructure and travel becomes totally impractical. This density is well below American suburbs, which is why our cities are all clogged with traffic and people are being flattened left and right.
For occasional longer distance trips you can rent a car or take a train. We’re not talking about inter-city travel here. The point is, like the above video, people, especially children should have the ability to safely navigate their neighborhoods. And this is totally achievable in the US.