I'm aware the Montréal/Rigaud line has had new engines, faster locomotives
that will take you from Dorion to Windsor station in around 40 minutes
instead of 54 minutes like it actually takes. That's great!

But there's also a rotten peach in the basket. I've suggested many times
adding more trains, especially in evening and weekends, since there will be
more time saved, so room for more trains. I asked for the new timetable, and
the person at Comments/Complaints for commuter trains told me they're
planning to make 1 departure from Windsor in the evening: at 10PM, instead
of 8PM and 10:45PM. I was shocked! I told her it's unacceptable and we won't
lose a train. She said they're not making money with the 8PM and they
instead made the 16:40 continue to Dorion instead of stopping at
Beaconsfield. I told her we already have enough rush hour trains, and they
intend to replace the 8PM by one that already exists (partially) so we'd be
losing something.

I wrote a note to denounce the situation, printed out 600 copies, and dealt
them on the trains I took yesterday and today. Hope those train managers
will be overwhelmed by calls asking to quit the idea of abandoning the 8PM
(or another train).

What else shall we do to avoid another loss in transit (a serious one, since
I take the 8PM in average once a week since 1985). There's no other transit
going west of Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue. Help!


Louis-Luc

Oy vey. You're right, Ronald. There's a very heavy ideological axe to
grind inside these arguments. Sometimes I wonder whether it even makes
sense to waste breath on people like Cox. But it does, not because I think
they're amenable to counterarguments, but because we have to publicly
challenge the pernicious ideology they espouse, which has devastating,
globe-spanning consequences. Essentially, it's an argument for privatizing
all public services and running them on profit lines. You could easily
replace "public transit"  with "water," for example. Why should those who
can afford to install their own reverse osmosis filters help pay for clean
public drinking water, instead of leaving it to "those who want to or
need to use it"? It's clear what the proponents of this philosophy have
in mind: maximizing the benefits to the already privileged, those who
have expropriated most of the planet's wealth for themselves, while
making the rest buy their subsistence at the "company store."

If you want to read a cautionary tale of the kind of nightmarish
future inequities and social breakdown that this leads to, see
http://www.struggle.ws/africa/accounts/chekov/lagos.html
There's even some excellent commentary on the transit system!
(super-modern, elevated highspeed motorized tollways -- but only
for the super-rich car owners, the rest are stuck in the miasma
and gridlock of the city streets below).


On Tue, 31 Jul 2001 19:19:58 -0400, Ronald Dawson wrote:

>
> John O. Andersen wrote:
> >Karen,
> >Thanks for this analysis.  I think it's always a good idea to look at what
> >the opposing arguments are so we can be better informed.
>
> I agree with you, that it is very valuable to look at their arguments. In
> some rare times they are valid, but most of the time they seem to be based
> on fear and paranoia.
> Also let's not forget that there is very major social/ideological base to
> them as well.
>
> For example, here is some one else with a very similar mind set as that of
> Mr.Cox. 								 Dawson
>
> <<As long as the better alternative is available (cars), transit rarely does
> well.  On the other hand, a city with a lot of transit available will still
> usually yield lots of auto usage.  In other words, guess who wins in a free
> market.
>
> This is why transit advocates desperately depend on and advocate such
> things as congestion pricing, subsidies by employers for employees
> who take transit, and laws designed to make it miserable for people
> to drive.
>
> To me, the current system of how we administer transit in this
> country is like a house of cards with no foundation.  Sooner or later
> somebody is going to blow it down.  Until transit people understand
> the proper role of transit should be to serve those who want to or
> need to use it, instead of forcing other unwilling people to use it,
> they will continue advocating for the wasted consumption of resources
> that will not yield the desired results.  That is, it costs much more
> to build systems (i.e. rail) to encourage ridership by those who
> would normally prefer to drive rather than build/operate systems for
> those who really want to use it (jitneys, small bus service, and
> other targeted cost-efficient transit service).
>
> Somehow we have reached a point in this country in which the inferior
> solutions (conservation over production, transit over roads, social
> welfare over hard work and individual ingenuity).  All of the former
> in each pair have been demonstrated failures but like blind sheep we
> move closer to the cliff anyway.>>

Car Free Fremont
Sunday, September 16, 2001
9 a.m. to 9 p.m. - Fremont  (Seattle, WA)

  For Immediate Release

Contact
Sarah Kavage or Robert Zverina: 206-547-6433
rob@... or skavage@...
website: http://www.thinksmall.org

  Fremont Divorces the Automobile for a Day

  The honeymoon's over! The American romance with the automobile will be declared
officially dead in Fremont on Sunday, September 16, 2001. In an effort to
promote alternative transportation and celebrate the streets as public space,
35th Street and Canal Street between 1st Avenue and Phinney Avenue will be
closed in the neighborhood for the first ever Car Free Fremont. Cyclists and bus
riders, skaters and walkers, skateboarders and, yes, even reluctant car users
are encouraged to join Fremont residents in celebrating Car-freedom.

  Featured events include:
  · Free workshops on bike repair, safety and maintenance
  · Art bike and kinetic sculpture rally
  · Free inline skating workshops
  · A roller disco in the street
  · Construction of sculptural bike racks
  · A benefit for Bikeworks, a nonprofit bicycle repair shop and after-school
program in Columbia City

  A variety of other participatory neighborhood activities will also be taking
place in the space that is typically reserved for cars, illustrating how the
absence of cars can create alternative focal points for community gathering,
interaction and creativity. It's a block party with a message!

  The event is funded through a grant from the City of Seattle CarSmart
Communities Program which funds neighborhood-based projects that encourage
people to drive less, drive smarter, and explore alternatives to cars. For more
information about the City of Seattle CarSmart Communities program, see
http://www.cityofseattle.net/carsmart

  Some quick facts about auto use:
  · The average car in King County makes 12 vehicle trips a day - nearly half of
those are to destinations 3 miles or less from home.
  · If each household in Seattle made just one less car trip per day, that would
remove enough cars from the streets daily to fill the parking garage at the Bon
Marche about 500 times!  That's about 3 million less vehicles on our streets
every week.
  · Cars are the source of over half of our air pollution and the largest
contributor to global warming in the Northwest.  90% of carbon monoxide is from
vehicle exhaust.
  · At least a dozen bikes can be parked in the space it takes to store one
automobile. Most vehicles spend an average of 23 hours a day parked, taking up
space in our streets and neighborhoods that could be used for gardens,
playgrounds, parks, or public art.

                    ###



==
Mark Watson
Carfree Seattle
Website - http://carfree_seattle.tripod.com
Email list - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/carfree_seattle

_____________________________________________________________
Get a FREE e-mail account and save 5 square feet of rainforest with every e-mail
you send or receive! Visit http://www.planet-save.com to sign up now!

Dear Mark

This sounds great and I wish I could come over from England to enjoy the
day, though things are going to be a bit better in London this year. How
about getting a local theatre group to stage a divorce court process in
which a driver who has fallen out of love with, and is now trying to
divorce, their car goes for a huge settlement to help support their future
carfree life after many years of cruel treatment as a car-dependent "zombie"
(you know the sort of language the lawyers might use during settlement
negotiation.) You might have the car counter-claiming for custody of
children with a big court battle to follow on their future welfare. Dramatic
stuff. In Birmingham a few years ago Friends of the Earth had a court case
in which a car was tried founf guilty and condemned to death for serial
murder and "executed" but that might be in bad taste.

Best wishes

Simon

Simon Baddeley
34 Beaudesert Road
Handsworth
Birmingham B20 3TG
UK
00 44 121 554 9794
07775 655842

----- Original Message -----
From: "Mark Watson" <carfree_seattle@...>
To: <carfree_seattle@yahoogroups.com>; <bicyclism@yahoogroups.com>;
<CarFree@yahoogroups.com>; <carfree_cities@yahoogroups.com>;
<nomorecars@yahoogroups.com>; <seatransit@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, August 02, 2001 9:12 PM
Subject: [carfree_cities] Press release for Car Free Fremont. Please fwd far
& wide.


> Car Free Fremont
> Sunday, September 16, 2001
> 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. - Fremont  (Seattle, WA)
>
>  For Immediate Release
>
> Contact
> Sarah Kavage or Robert Zverina: 206-547-6433
> rob@... or skavage@...
> website: http://www.thinksmall.org
>
>  Fremont Divorces the Automobile for a Day
>
>  The honeymoon's over! The American romance with the automobile will be
declared officially dead in Fremont on Sunday, September 16, 2001. In an
effort to promote alternative transportation and celebrate the streets as
public space, 35th Street and Canal Street between 1st Avenue and Phinney
Avenue will be closed in the neighborhood for the first ever Car Free
Fremont. Cyclists and bus riders, skaters and walkers, skateboarders and,
yes, even reluctant car users are encouraged to join Fremont residents in
celebrating Car-freedom.
>
>  Featured events include:
>  · Free workshops on bike repair, safety and maintenance
>  · Art bike and kinetic sculpture rally
>  · Free inline skating workshops
>  · A roller disco in the street
>  · Construction of sculptural bike racks
>  · A benefit for Bikeworks, a nonprofit bicycle repair shop and
after-school program in Columbia City
>
>  A variety of other participatory neighborhood activities will also be
taking place in the space that is typically reserved for cars, illustrating
how the absence of cars can create alternative focal points for community
gathering, interaction and creativity. It's a block party with a message!
>
>

The violent confrontation last Monday  between bus owners and their
commuters on the one hand and government security forces on the other
was not planned.

Commuters aboard  the Tillett bus became upset after the police
stopped the bus (because its road permit had expired) and obliged the
passengers to walk the several miles to Orange Walk Town.

The commuters were furious at this  abuse of authority, and persuaded
the bus owner to make a protest by parking his bus at the approach to
the Toll Bridge. Castillo's Bus which also had a gripe with the
Transport Department, decided to join the protest and brought his bus
to the blockade.

Both Tillett and Castillo are small operators, each  owning two
buses. They provide a good and reliable service to village commuters
who have to find a way to get to work..

The people of the north reject completely the views put forward by the
Belize Transport Authority and the Ministry of Works in which they
blame the Tillett and Castillo bus lines for overcrowding their buses.

They also reject entirely  the view that the cheaper fares of
Castillo  and Tillett are disruptive of the orderly development of
the industry.

The case for cheaper fares is a simple matter  of private enterprise
competing for a larger slice of the cake. If Castillo and Tillett can
afford to  sell a bus ride from Orange Walk to Belize City for $3.00,
Novelo's Bus line, which is much bigger and much richer,  should be
able to reduce its  fare of $4.50 in order to compete.

This is how competition in private enterprise works.

The complaint about overcrowding  can be solved simply and easily by
allowing more buses on the line. Only in backward Belize can  a
transport authority  hope to cure overcrowding by restricting the
flow of traffic.

And if a bus owner violates the conditions of his road permit, what
can be the justification for penalizing the commuters, when it is so
much simpler to charge the owner with a traffic violation?

"A safe, reliable public bus transportation system" is the objective
of the Department of Transport, according to Minister Henry Canton.
He may be pleased to know that the commuters of Guinea Grass and
Progresso agree with him completely. That is why they have chosen the
smaller bus lines over their much bigger rival.

In the final analysis it is the  commuters whose comfort and safety
are of paramount importance. This being so, why does the Transport
Department not listen to what commuters have to say? Why doesn't the
Transport Department pay heed to their clearly stated  preference.

In the minds of many  commuters, the Belize Transport Department is
more interested in protecting the Novelo franchise than in looking
after the legitimate interests. of the pssengers.
***

AccountingWEB is a global community of over 140,000 accountancy
professionals. For details of how to reach this audience:
http://www.accountingweb.co.uk/help/advertise.html


Editor's Note
=============

AccountingWEB's tax month got off to a great start with the
launch of our company car tax zone as the central focus for all
this month's activities. The new page includes a free car tax
table explaining the new rules, an interactive car benefit
calculator and a virtual showroom for offers from those in the
car industry. It is already proving a popular resource.
http://www.accountingweb.co.uk/company_car

On the same theme, Ray Chidell of Mazars Neville Russell hosted a
lively workshop in which he explained the nuances of the new
company car regime and fielded some intense questioning. His is
the first of three sessions on company cars and there will also
be workshops on tax investigations and VAT and Property. Come
along on Wednesday lunchtimes and get free advice from some of
the country's leading tax experts. Next week Nick Parkes will be
there to answer your questions on investigations.
http://www.accountingweb.co.uk/workshop

Dear More Philosophic Policy Types,

If you turn to the latest edition of Yikes! (you'll see it in the top bar
menu of our @New Mobility Agenda site at http://newmobility.org), you will
find a trio of thinkpieces that attempt to set out some thinking on the
carsharing/sustainability/public policy nexus.

I put this particular number of our informal e-mag before you today because
at least some of those of us who worry over policy and practice in the
transport field have in recent years come to believe that carsharing, by
whatever name, may with appropriate policy support be used as an effective
sustainability and sustainable transportation transition tool.

So if any of you have the time and taste for this sort of thing, I would be
very interested to hear what you have to say.  In the interest of economy of
time for all the busy people who come here to work, may I suggest that you
mail your eventual remarks to me individually at
eric.britton@....  Then, if the responses look like they may
have a broader interest to the group, I can fashion them into a sort of
single update piece, which we can then share with the others in one shot.

With all good wishes,

Eric Britton

The @New Mobility Forum is permanently at http://newmobility.org
The Commons ___Sustainable Development and Social Justice___
Le Frene, 8/10 rue Joseph Bara, 75006 Paris, France
Eric.Britton@...    Tel: +331 4326 1323

Let's say that our carfree city (based on Mr. Crawford's design) is
going to have a streetcar system, due to a high water table, low
population, or just preference of the population.

(A note about that--when a group from my university was in Madrid, some
students told me they preferred buses over the metro--despite the bus's
obvious shortcomings--to allow them a view of the outdoors. I must
admit that the newer sections of the Madrid metro--ie, in the suburbs--
that ran outside were quite pleasant.)

In any case, a streetcar track can be crossed when there's no
streetcar, but, of course, the track has to be kept unobstructed.

A major 3-lane road cuts through the center of my university's campus,
much like the streetcar would cut through the center of each district
of Carfree. Notice, however, the following differences:

Road: every two minutes, you are given about 15 seconds of clearance to
cross the street on a "walk" light, during which time you are *still*
not guaranteed an unobstructed crossing, due to heavy traffic blocking
the zebra, or due to drivers who disregard the red light.

Streetcar: assuming that a streetcar comes every two minutes at the
minimum, you have two minutes during which you are *guaranteed* that
you can step into the track without being hit by a streetcar. Do y'all
think that 30 seconds of blinking-light warning is enough to tell
people to not cross the track? Safety-wise, considering how quickly the
streetcars pass through, and how frequently they come, there would be
less temptation to sprint across the track on a don't-walk light to
catch the approaching streetcar--just wait two minutes. Go to an
American city with a shoddy bus system, and you'll see what I mean:
people sprinting into 5 lanes of traffic to catch a bus that won't be
by for another hour.

There's no such thing as completely fool-proof, and people have before
been killed by streetcars (but not nearly as much as by cars). This is
a tragic happening, and I would like to see as little as possible
happen.

Someone who's been to Strasbourg and used EuroTram, please answer this:
looking at the picture of it at http://www.carfree.com/pax_trans.html,
there is a slight curb to the track, much like on regular roads. Are
there any wheelchair cuts along the way to allow wheelchairs,
strollers, bicycles, and the elderly to cross? And what kind of warning
do they have to an oncoming streetcar? (Of course, all this is null and
void if the track area is a no-no zone--but it doesn't look that way in
the picture.)

I was downtown today doing a job which took several hours.  During that time, I
watched several streetcars go by and they were all packed full, standing room
only.

Perhaps some of that was the summer tourist crowd???

In any case, it looks like the streetcar is a big hit here.

John Andersen
Unconventional Ideas at http://www.unconventionalideas.com


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Louis-Luc wrote:
>I'm aware the Montréal/Rigaud line has had new engines, faster locomotives
>that will take you from Dorion to Windsor station in around 40 minutes
>instead of 54 minutes like it actually takes. That's great!

The F59's are very nice and for those that don't know what they look like
here is a picture of one. http://www.emdx.org/rail/Blainville/RameAGogo2.jpg

>But there's also a rotten peach in the basket. I've suggested many times
>adding more trains, especially in evening and weekends, since there will be
>more time saved, so room for more trains.

Well yes and no, for starters there are various problems that will have to
be dealt with for the Lake Shore line (its real name is the Vaudreuil
Subdivision) so that operations improve.

One, is that west of Dorval there is no CTC (Centralized Traffic Control) at
least to Dorion, currently it's all ABS (Automatic Block Signal) which slows
down movement of both passenger and freight trains.

Two, the amount of freight traffic on the, but with CTC that problem would
mostly be solved.

Three, the amount of equipment available is already being stretched, that's
why you're seeing those leased locomotives from Amtrak. Plus with the new
train to Delson planed to start in September, I wouldn't be surprised if
they've plucked equipment from other lines.

Four, the kind of equipment that is really needed on the line would be some
kind of DMU (Diesel Multiple Unit) like Budd cars.
http://capecodrails.railfan.net/budd/rdc3.jpg

>I asked for the new timetable, and
>the person at Comments/Complaints for commuter trains told me they're
>planning to make 1 departure from Windsor in the evening: at 10PM, instead
>of 8PM and 10:45PM. I was shocked!

I'm shocked as well.

>I told her it's unacceptable and we won't
>lose a train. She said they're not making money with the 8PM and they
>instead made the 16:40 continue to Dorion instead of stopping at
>Beaconsfield. I told her we already have enough rush hour trains, and they
>intend to replace the 8PM by one that already exists (partially) so we'd be
>losing something.

That's for sure.

>I wrote a note to denounce the situation, printed out 600 copies, and dealt
>them on the trains I took yesterday and today. Hope those train managers
>will be overwhelmed by calls asking to quit the idea of abandoning the 8PM
>(or another train).

I would also sugest going to http://www.amt.qc.ca/ .

>What else shall we do to avoid another loss in transit (a serious one,
since
>I take the 8PM in average once a week since 1985). There's no other transit
>going west of Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue. Help!

I'm just as stumped as you are. 			 Dawson

Matt Hohmeister said:

>Streetcar: assuming that a streetcar comes every two minutes at the
>minimum, you have two minutes during which you are *guaranteed* that
>you can step into the track without being hit by a streetcar. Do y'all
>think that 30 seconds of blinking-light warning is enough to tell
>people to not cross the track? Safety-wise, considering how quickly the
>streetcars pass through, and how frequently they come, there would be
>less temptation to sprint across the track on a don't-walk light to
>catch the approaching streetcar--just wait two minutes. Go to an
>American city with a shoddy bus system, and you'll see what I mean:
>people sprinting into 5 lanes of traffic to catch a bus that won't be
>by for another hour.

It has to be said that here in Amsterdam, pedestrians are struck
by trams on occasion, especially tourists, who are not accustomed
to their routes. The reference design presented in the book calls
for the central boulevard to be split if trams are to be used,
so each half of the boulevard has a single track with trams
running in only one direction. This eliminates the risk of crossing
behind a passing tram only to blunder into a second, oncoming
tram on the other track.

>There's no such thing as completely fool-proof, and people have before
>been killed by streetcars (but not nearly as much as by cars). This is
>a tragic happening, and I would like to see as little as possible
>happen.

Generally, the risk is relatively low and considered acceptable.
I still prefer metros, as they eliminate both this risk and
the noise that even the quietest trams will make. (Alas, the
trams here in Amsterdam are incredibly noisy due to poor
maintenance.)

>Someone who's been to Strasbourg and used EuroTram, please answer this:
>looking at the picture of it at http://www.carfree.com/pax_trans.html,
>there is a slight curb to the track, much like on regular roads.

It's actually higher, about 14 inches (36 cm or so).

>Are
>there any wheelchair cuts along the way to allow wheelchairs,
>strollers, bicycles, and the elderly to cross?

I'm not sure, but I don't think so. The boarding platforms
are fairly short, so it's possible to go around one end or the
other.

>And what kind of warning
>do they have to an oncoming streetcar?

Don't recall, I'm afraid.



--                                ###                               --

J.H. Crawford                                           Carfree Cities
postmaster@...                                     Carfree.com

Guy Berliner wrote:
>Oy vey. You're right, Ronald. There's a very heavy ideological axe to
>grind inside these arguments. Sometimes I wonder whether it even makes
>sense to waste breath on people like Cox. But it does, not because I think
>they're amenable to counterarguments, but because we have to publicly
>challenge the pernicious ideology they espouse, which has devastating,
>globe-spanning consequences. Essentially, it's an argument for privatizing
>all public services and running them on profit lines. You could easily
>replace "public transit"  with "water," for example. Why should those who
>can afford to install their own reverse osmosis filters help pay for clean
>public drinking water, instead of leaving it to "those who want to or
>need to use it"? It's clear what the proponents of this philosophy have
>in mind: maximizing the benefits to the already privileged, those who
>have expropriated most of the planet's wealth for themselves, while
>making the rest buy their subsistence at the "company store."

Well, so much for the idea of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Also here is an other mind set example that I've seen.  Dawson

<Molestation, intimidation, vulgarity, obnoxious behavior are the
earmark of mass transit. Police can not protect women riding or
leaving the trains and being followed or accosted by hoodlums.
Give me road rage any time. At least the bastards had enough money to
own or steal a car and they do not know if I have a gun under my seat.>

--- In carfree_cities@y..., "Mike Lacey" <firefly956@h...> wrote:

> Cox's vision is very narrow, being concerned only with traffic
> reduction. Within that highly restrictive context his analysis is
> probaly correct. However Cox show no interest in people oriented
> analysis - personal mobility, quality of life, safety and freedom

I have to agree with you there.  After visiting demographia.com to
hear Mr. Cox's arguments I came away with the impression that his
motives are in line with the anti-society libertarian/property rights
crowd.  His statistics are very misleading and are presented in a way
that tries to make sprawl seem like some sort of utopian paradise.
To me the most ludicrous thing about his arguments is that they fail
to address what is so blatently obvious.  One only has to look at the
sprawling, soulless landscape of Wal-Marts, McDonalds, and McMansions
to see that something has gone terribly wrong with the American dream.

However, many people in this country just don't realize the magnitude
of the problem or they just choose to ignore it all together. At
lunch today I was arguing with a co-worker about why sprawl is such a
problem.  His response was that its what the American public wants
and that "freedom" comes before everything else.  Nevermind that
there is no real alternative to it in most U.S. cities.  He said that
people are basically greedy and that is why the prefer it.  If they
didn't want this they would vote against it.  I'm not so sure that is
the case.  I don't believe people are basically greedy, but rather
that people in the U.S. have been sold on the misleading idea that
somehow excessive consumption is good for everything.

In any case, I just discovered this discussion group a couple days
ago.  I'm originally from Atlanta and grew up there in the 70s in 80s
(back when it was still a somewhat nice place to live).  I moved away
ten years ago and now live about an hour north of Asheville, NC,
which is one of the nicest small cities in the U.S. if you ever get a
chance to visit there.  I've always been aware of the problems with
urban sprawl, but didn't become seriously interested in it until I
made a trip to France and Germany two years ago.  I was literally
blown away by how much nicer and more liveable their cities are.
Flying back to Atlanta from Europe was totally surreal, as it became
immediately obvious that Atlanta for the most part has all the charm
of a corporate office park.  Shortly after that I picked up a copy of
Andres Duany's Suburban Nation and I've been a New Urbanist convert
ever since.  Urban sprawl is the greatest threat to life in this
country and the thought of another 50 years of such planning is a
horrifying indeed.

Looking forward to continuing this discussion.

-Matt

Hi All,

Matt wrote in part in this thread:
> After visiting demographia.com to
> hear Mr. Cox's arguments I came away with the impression that his
> motives are in line with the anti-society libertarian/property rights
> crowd.

I'm very libertairian, pro propety rights and pro society too. Try not to
trip into a dark hole with a string-of-names and without grace nor universal
understanding. I see some shifting sand foundations brewing, so I'll jump in
here.

> His statistics are very misleading and are presented in a way
> that tries to make sprawl seem like some sort of utopian paradise.
Face it, to some, sprawl is a real utopian paradise. Not me, not you
perhaps. But, sprawl is "utopian paradise" for some folks and for good
reason.

I'd say aim for the roots, not the leaves.

> To me the most ludicrous thing about his arguments is that they fail
> to address what is so blatently obvious.  One only has to look at the
> sprawling, soulless landscape of Wal-Marts, McDonalds, and McMansions
> to see that something has gone terribly wrong with the American dream.

To play the devil's advocate again -- and that was the quest of this thread
if I'm not mistaken -- here is another blatently obvious wound: inter-city
America. Sadly, there are many neighborhoods in my city, Pittsburgh, PA,
USA, where things are blatently ugly. Hence, we can't overlook those
conditions as well.

> His response was that its what the American public wants
> and that "freedom" comes before everything else.
I too feel strongly that freedom does come before everything else as well. I
think you'd be better served not fighting that point on face-value.

I tell a story, (ask a question). What is your #1 wish for your kids',
kids', kids', kids (7th generation)? My wish if for them to be free. Many
will agree with me.

But, .... where I suggest you lead the conversation is to the realm of
"responsibility." Every freedom advocate understands as well that
"restraint" is a measure of freedom as well. There can be no freedom without
an equal amount of restraint. That is where you win the day -- or expose the
hope of your convictions.

> Nevermind that
> there is no real alternative to it in most U.S. cities.  He said that
> people are basically greedy and that is why the prefer it.  If they
> didn't want this they would vote against it.  I'm not so sure that is
> the case.  I don't believe people are basically greedy, but rather
> that people in the U.S. have been sold on the misleading idea that
> somehow excessive consumption is good for everything.

Now you've gone three steps beyond.... and I'm not sure I agree as well. My
remarks are more for the very root of the discussion.

> Urban sprawl is the greatest threat to life in this
> country and the thought of another 50 years of such planning is a
> horrifying indeed.

Woops. Can't agree. The loss of freedom is the greatest threat to live in
this country. Perhaps urban sprawl is a by-product of huge weakness in
self-government, democracy, freedoms and restraints. IMHO, the city-folks
have gotten out flanked by a few speculators and have had the rug of
responsible democratic freedoms pulled from under them by a few with serious
corporate interests.

Ta.

Mark Rauterkus
mark@...

http://Rauterkus.com

----- Original Message -----
>    Date: Sun, 5 Aug 2001 13:39:04 -0400
>    From: "Ronald Dawson" <rdadddmd@...>
> Subject: RE: neoliberalism (was Re: Digest Number 460)
>
> Well, so much for the idea of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
> Also here is an other mind set example that I've seen. Dawson
>
> <Molestation, intimidation, vulgarity, obnoxious behavior are the
> earmark of mass transit. Police can not protect women riding or
> leaving the trains and being followed or accosted by hoodlums.
> Give me road rage any time. At least the bastards had enough money to
> own or steal a car and they do not know if I have a gun under my seat.>

Gee, I always think to myself that if I'm going to get mugged, I'd like it
to be by someone with enough money to afford their own car!

--- In carfree_cities@y..., "Mark Rauterkus" <mark@R...> wrote:
> Hi All,

> I'm very libertairian, pro propety rights and pro society too. Try
not to
> trip into a dark hole with a string-of-names and without grace nor
universal
> understanding. I see some shifting sand foundations brewing, so
I'll jump in
> here.

Excellent. I wasn't expecting this sort of response, but I always
enjoy a healthy bit of rational discourse.

> Face it, to some, sprawl is a real utopian paradise. Not me, not you
> perhaps. But, sprawl is "utopian paradise" for some folks and for
good
> reason.

Well the problem is there little or no alternative to sprawl type
developments in a most parts of the U.S.  Due to the postwar era of
modern planning the traditional mixed use style of development is
illegal in many places as it violates modern zoning laws. The only
type of "new" development to choose from is of the suburban
subdivision/fast food strip/shopping mall variety, as the high demand
for traditional neighborhoods puts them out of reach of most middle
class incomes.

I'm not arguing against your freedom to drive a car or live out in
the suburbs.  I'm arguing for an equal dispersion of tax funds to
provide for multiple transportation alternatives and the type of
sustainable growth that I and many others are fond of.

I'm wondering if you, as a Libertarian, object to the Federal
government's massive subsidy of highway funds at the expense of other
transportation alternatives? Since sprawl type development is largely
dependent on access to cheap land, its not really a truly free market
when taxpayers are up picking up the tab for that access is it?

> To play the devil's advocate again -- and that was the quest of
this thread
> if I'm not mistaken -- here is another blatently obvious wound:
inter-city
> America. Sadly, there are many neighborhoods in my city,
Pittsburgh, PA,
> USA, where things are blatently ugly. Hence, we can't overlook those
> conditions as well.

Of course its expected that an area that has been abandoned and
neglected for decades will be ugly.  The relocation of the tax base
from the city to the suburbs pretty much guaranteed that would
happen.

   > I too feel strongly that freedom does come before everything else
as well. I
> think you'd be better served not fighting that point on face-value.

Well in this case the particular "freedom" I was referring to was the
notion of unhindered, unlimited consumer freedom.  An example of this
would be the "right" to own an SUV.  It may personally provide the
occupants a small margin of improved safety, but it doesn't do much
for the majority who don't drive one when they get hit by three tons
of steel.  In a multiple vehicle crash the occupants of the car are
four times more likely to be killed than the occupants of the SUV, in
a side-impact collision with an SUV, they are 27 times more likely to
die.

http://www.suv.org/safety.html

But this notion of unhindered consumer freedom says that is OK.  The
fact that your vehicle choice is collectively making driving much
more dangerous doesn't matter since as an individual you're
benefiting from it.

> I tell a story, (ask a question). What is your #1 wish for your
kids',
> kids', kids', kids (7th generation)? My wish if for them to be
free. Many
> will agree with me.

Being more than a little bit idealistic here, my wish would be for
them to live in a free world with clean air, water, and liveable
cities that doesn't come at of excessive detriment to the natural
world.  One with an efficient transportation system that doesn't
consume two or three hours of their waking day getting to and from
work.  One where quality of life is a more imporatant concern than
quantity of life.  Not one where our environment is so poisoned by
excessive self interest that people travel around isolated in little
steel boxes and live in gated communities because they are afraid of
the people around them.

> But, .... where I suggest you lead the conversation is to the realm
of
> "responsibility." Every freedom advocate understands as well that
> "restraint" is a measure of freedom as well. There can be no
freedom without
> an equal amount of restraint. That is where you win the day -- or
expose the
> hope of your convictions.

> Woops. Can't agree. The loss of freedom is the greatest threat to
live in
> this country. Perhaps urban sprawl is a by-product of huge weakness
in
> self-government, democracy, freedoms and restraints. IMHO, the city-
folks
> have gotten out flanked by a few speculators and have had the rug of
> responsible democratic freedoms pulled from under them by a few
with serious
> corporate interests.

The problem is that the particular "freedom" you're defending is
somewhat exclusive since it requires the ownership of an automobile
to partake in.  Additionally in most cities there is very little
choice associated with that freedom i.e. I can have any method of
transport I want as long as it is by automobile.  If I'm too young,
too old, too poor, or otherwise physically prohibited from driving
then my "freedom" in a city based around sprawl type development is
very limited.

You're right that urban sprawl is a of huge weakness in the system of
self-government, democracy, freedoms and restraints.  However I'm a
little confused here, as in general Libertarians are against any such
restraints instead favoring the individual responsibility that your
advocated above. However, it is arguably that very lack
of "responsibility" that that drives sprawl type development in the
first place.  The perpetrators or sprawl type planning - corporate
franchises, absentee landowners, and real estate speculators have
little or no stake in the future of a community.  Their only concern
is to extract wealth from the natural resources and inhabitants of
the area. As a result such intangible concepts as quality of life
don't really factor into their concept of responsibilty.

This however leads into the much bigger issue of corporatization and
the subjugation of the democratic process which I won't go into
today.  Urban sprawl, however, is in my opinion the most visible
expression of the corporate "Consume and you will be Free" philosophy
that more often than not we use to connotate freedom in this day and
age.

-Matt

A study published today says that we should pay more to travel on both road
and rail if we are to cover the true costs of travel.  I can't find the study
itself but here are a couple of news articles about it.

http://globalarchive.ft.com/globalarchive/article.html?id=010807001108
http://globalarchive.ft.com/globalarchive/article.html?id=010807001689

And an interview with Professor Chris Nash on BBC Radio 4

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listen/listen.shtml (today's choice clips,
seventh down)
--
          __o
        _`\<,                "If you brake, you don't win." -Mario Cipollini
       (*)/(*)
  Alex Farran, Lewes, East Sussex, UK       www.alexfarran.com

> ... Due to the postwar era of
> modern planning the traditional mixed use style of development is
> illegal in many places as it violates modern zoning laws.

Bingo! Very good point.

Case in point: In Pittsburgh, should a "row house" be torn down (due to
total need -- say bad roof for 5 years), it can't be "re-built." The new
laws say you need say 5-feet on each side of the property line (? exact) for
new building. Well, many of these row houses are on lots 15-foot wide.

So, the zoning laws (very un-Libertarian) get in the way for in-fill
developments in places that used to hold such buildings.

That is wrong. I'd be in favor of zapping most zoning laws. Too much
government.

So, in this case -- the anti-sprawl friends are the pro-society
Libertarians.

> I'm wondering if you, as a Libertarian, object to the Federal
> government's massive subsidy of highway funds at the expense of other
> transportation alternatives?

Mostly. But, there are some other transportation alternatives that I'm not
fond of as well. Maglev (magnetic levitation trains -- high speed) is
something that I don't think we should purchase for a number of reasons.
But, I'm in big favor of plain old heavy rail.

> Since sprawl type development is largely
> dependent on access to cheap land, its not really a truly free market
> when taxpayers are up picking up the tab for that access is it?
Agree. But, I might stress, sprawl development is largely dependent upon the
flight of urban areas too. The attraction to the new houses out there is
less than the avoidance to the conditions that have gone bad.

> Of course its expected that an area that has been abandoned and
> neglected for decades will be ugly.  The relocation of the tax base
> from the city to the suburbs pretty much guaranteed that would
> happen.

I see it a bit in another way. Has the tax base of the city shrunk? If there
was a "land value tax" -- it is hard to shrink the tax base unless the land
is annexed to another municipal entity -- or the neighborhood gets flooded
for some high-dam project. :)

And, as sprawl happens, the people move in far in advance of the tax base.
Right. So, the shifting of the taxes (most of all in a TIF setting - tax
incentive finance deal) comes at a much later date than the original
building.

Q: Isn't there a cash-flow problem with sprawl too? The relocation of the
tax base is more of an artifact to the sprawl, less the cause of it.

But, the real prime mover (string pullers) is the corporate interests and
speculators. These folks can control politicians and set the course for
self-government in their favor. The speculators have out-foxed the citizens
in the application of the process of democracy.

>
>   > I too feel strongly that freedom does come before everything else
> as well. I
>> think you'd be better served not fighting that point on face-value.
>
> Well in this case the particular "freedom" I was referring to was the
> notion of unhindered, unlimited consumer freedom.  An example of this
> would be the "right" to own an SUV.  It may personally provide the
> occupants a small margin of improved safety, but it doesn't do much
> for the majority who don't drive one when they get hit by three tons
> of steel.  In a multiple vehicle crash the occupants of the car are
> four times more likely to be killed than the occupants of the SUV, in
> a side-impact collision with an SUV, they are 27 times more likely to
> die.
>
> http://www.suv.org/safety.html
>
> But this notion of unhindered consumer freedom says that is OK.  The
> fact that your vehicle choice is collectively making driving much
> more dangerous doesn't matter since as an individual you're
> benefiting from it.

You make good points. But, I'd still stand by the original concept that
there are never any unhindered consumer freedoms. Stress the fact that
FREEDOMs always come with restraints.

> Being more than a little bit idealistic here, my wish would be for
> them to live in a free world with clean air, water, and liveable
> cities that doesn't come at of excessive detriment to the natural
> world.  One with an efficient transportation system that doesn't
> consume two or three hours of their waking day getting to and from
> work.  One where quality of life is a more imporatant concern than
> quantity of life.  Not one where our environment is so poisoned by
> excessive self interest that people travel around isolated in little
> steel boxes and live in gated communities because they are afraid of
> the people around them.

You get just one wish. The genie is going back into the bottle. :)



>>The loss of freedom is the greatest threat to live in
>> this country. Perhaps urban sprawl is a by-product of huge weakness
> in
>> self-government, democracy, freedoms and restraints. IMHO, the city-
> folks
>> have gotten out flanked by a few speculators and have had the rug of
>> responsible democratic freedoms pulled from under them by a few
>> with serious corporate interests.
>
> The problem is that the particular "freedom" you're defending is
> somewhat exclusive since it requires the ownership of an automobile
> to partake in.

Nope. I'm talking general terms. And, I'm sure that our freedom (in the USA)
is a vehicle with four flat tires. It isn't healthy today. So, I agree with
what you say that follows. But, my freedom vision isn't exclusive nor
particular.

> Additionally in most cities there is very little
> choice associated with that freedom i.e. I can have any method of
> transport I want as long as it is by automobile.  If I'm too young,
> too old, too poor, or otherwise physically prohibited from driving
> then my "freedom" in a city based around sprawl type development is
> very limited.


> You're right that urban sprawl is a of huge weakness in the system of
> self-government, democracy, freedoms and restraints.  However I'm a
> little confused here, as in general Libertarians are against any such
> restraints instead favoring the individual responsibility that your
> advocated above.

Okay.

> However, it is arguably that very lack
> of "responsibility" that that drives sprawl type development in the
> first place.  The perpetrators or sprawl type planning - corporate
> franchises, absentee landowners, and real estate speculators have
> little or no stake in the future of a community.  Their only concern
> is to extract wealth from the natural resources and inhabitants of
> the area. As a result such intangible concepts as quality of life
> don't really factor into their concept of responsibilty.

Okay.

> This however leads into the much bigger issue of corporatization and
> the subjugation of the democratic process which I won't go into
> today.

Fine. FWIW, you've done a good job of not getting into it today anyway. :)

> Urban sprawl, however, is in my opinion the most visible
> expression of the corporate "Consume and you will be Free" philosophy
> that more often than not we use to connotate freedom in this day and
> age.

Nods -- so -- we have to have them flip over the coin of freedom that is in
their own hands/pockets. Don't shame them into it -- or don't steal it back
from them. Rather, smart them into it for their own good and we have a
win/win for society.

The advertised facade of freedom from corporate America is false. The
heartbeat of America -- whatever -- isn't about turning the ignition key and
driving down some winding road. We all agree. Let's not run from freedom
because of some false facade from Madison Avenue. Let's show the other side.
That is the way to stop them in their tracks once in for all. Cut them at
their roots.

Do you know what is really free? Me walking down the steps to work each
morning. I am free as I take care of my own children. I'm free as I don't
need to move my car for a week.

Mark Rauterkus
mark@...

I thought this might be of interest to gardeners and those interested in
urban regeneration and the links between the two.

http://www.geog.leeds.ac.uk/research/projects/h.shaw.html

is the URL for  "The Ecology of Food Deserts" a thesis being developed by
Hillary Shaw
School of Geography, University of Leeds (1st October 1998 - 30th September
2004)

Summary
Since the 1960s a new form of grocery retailing, the out - of - town
supermarket, has arrived in Britain. At the same time, the number of small
local grocery stores has declined by over 50%, and allowing for urban
expansion since 1960, the average distance between a house and a local
grocery store has risen by 75% since 1960. Local grocery stores have
declined for a number of reasons, not all connected with the rise of the
out - of - town superstores; but the resultant dearth of shopping facilities
available to those without access to a private motor vehicle has given rise
to the term "Food Deserts". Food Deserts have been defined as "areas of
cities where cheap nutritious food is virtually unobtainable (to those
without cars)".


Best wishes

Simon Baddeley
34 Beaudesert Road
Handsworth
Birmingham B20 3TG
0121 554 9794
07775 655842

The root problem of libertarianism is precisely the root problem of
Marxism: it's a religion, in this case, the religion of the great and
all-consuming god Market Forces, and like Marxism, it assumes that if we
just follow all the commandments of this god, utopia will be the result.

Unfortunately for both extremes of the economic and political spectrum,
reality has a way of tossing monkey wrenches into right-wing and
left-wing religions.

Libertarianism underestimates the negative power of selfishness. It
assumes that everyone's "enlightened self-interest" will somehow work
together to produce a desired outcome. But like Marxism, Libertarianism
neglects to take the human capacity for evil into account. In other
words, it has no defense against the economic predator, the
environmental rapist, the largest employer in town who depresses wages
and benefits for everyone, the deliberately deceptive advertiser, the
union buster, the price-fixing cartel, or the seller of dangerous
products.

The libertarian economic ideal looks a lot like the nineteenth century
or the contemporary Third World. It's a fantastic ideology for rich
people or for the tiny percentage of the population that has the
combination of talent and personality traits to become fabulously
successful entrepreneurs. For everyone else, --well, the Progressive
Movement, the labor movement, the trust-busting movement, and the growth
of consumer protection and securities fraud regulations in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries occurred for a reason.

So what does this have to do with suburbia? Well, in most suburbs,
land-use regulations can be boiled down to the following rules: 1) Put
the houses here. 2) Put the commercial businesses there. 3) Provide lots
of off-street parking. 4) (Optional:) Pay some of the costs of extending
utilities and streets to your development. 5) Go for it.

Combined with massive federal subsidies for freeways and the
availability of cheap land, this situation has been an irresistible
temptation for businesses that profit from sprawl. Don't bother to
invest in fixing up the inner city. Just grab some new land along the
interstate and throw up some McMansions and a shopping center full of
nationwide chain businesses. You don't have to put much thought into it.
Just put up what everyone else is building and mass--produce it,
offering three or four "distinctive" plans. Then advertise your new
"community" as offering a pastoral slice of country life, in order to
attract buyers frustrated with the way their former "pastoral slice of
country life" has turned into a hell-hole of smog and gridlock.

In many cities, the only choices left for the would-be urbanite are
slums and $500,000 condos. Most of the slums used to be perfectly nice
neighborhoods (ask an old-timer), but decades of disinvestment have done
their work.

Suburbia appears to be a "choice," but it's not a "choice" if the only
reasonable alternatives are too expensive for the average buyer. What if
someone built new $150,000 houses in an urban area?

Now for the greatest and most universally hated by-product of sprawl:
traffic. Everyone hates being stuck in traffic jams, but few people are
stepping back and seeing how suburbia makes traffic jams inevitable.

In a city, most people get by with one car or no cars. In the suburbs,
two cars are the norm, since there is little or no mass transit and the
landscape is not laid out for walking or cycling, it is not uncommon for
families to buy an additional car for each teenager. While this may make
life "easier" for the individual, in that parents no longer have to
chauffeur their kids here and there, it inevitably puts more cars on the
road. The farther out a family lives, the more it needs cars. Two or
three cars per family, instead of zero or one. It doesn't take a degree
in math to figure out why new highways fill up in a couple of years.

Ideologies are fun to talk about, but they pay insufficient attention to
reality.

In transit,
Karen Sandness

Scenario:

A small market town in England has, at last, closed the High Street to
traffic for one day to hold a Monday market. It is hugely successful.

Normally, every one-and-a-half minutes throughout the day, a mainly empty
double decked bus thunders through the High Street belching fumes, only to
turn around and make its way back to its point of origin in the large town
10 miles away. (700 buses per day)

The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and who claim,
on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
(half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.

Question:

Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
appearing to be non-caring?

Roy P(leased to hear any suggestions?)

Get "shopmobility" involved - meeting people as they alight or giving notice
of their services near the point where bus passengers alight and board at
the point where pedestrianisation starts. In Inverness the shopmobility
service is right  by a carpark exit, taxi/car drop-off pick up point and bus
stop.

With the passenger numbers you mention, I imagine the bus company is feeling
pretty threatened already. Surely management could be persuaded to
negotiate. If they have been receiving complaints from their passengers they
have to be able to offer something back.

Just an idea. I hope the council etc don't cave in - but transport issues
are characteristically full of stake holders frequently in win-lose
situations. How can this situation become win-win?

Simon


----- Original Message -----
From: Roy Preston <preston@...>
To: <carfree_cities@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2001 9:48 PM
Subject: [carfree_cities] Monday Market


> Scenario:
>
> A small market town in England has, at last, closed the High Street to
> traffic for one day to hold a Monday market. It is hugely successful.
>
> Normally, every one-and-a-half minutes throughout the day, a mainly empty
> double decked bus thunders through the High Street belching fumes, only to
> turn around and make its way back to its point of origin in the large town
> 10 miles away. (700 buses per day)
>
> The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
> the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and who
claim,
> on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
> extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
> (half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
>
> Question:
>
> Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
> under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
> appearing to be non-caring?
>

Letter prompted by a local MEP's letter to the Birmingham Post decrying
congestion charging.

S


----- Original Message -----
From: Simon Baddeley <s.j.baddeley@...>
To: <thepost@...>
Sent: Monday, August 06, 2001 5:32 PM
Subject: Congestion charging


> 6 August 2001
>
> The Editor
> BIRMINGHAM POST & MAIL
> Colmore Circus
> Birmingham B4 6AX
> Fax 625 1105 thepost@...
>
>
> Sir
>
> I am surprised at the fears expressed in your columns that congestion
> charging will turn central Birmingham into a "ghost town" (Post 6/08/01).
> What concerned many people 15 years ago was the way our city centre was
> being abandoned because it was perceived by the public as a hazardous
> concrete desert.
>
> Things have got a lot better but Birmingham still lacks the superlative
> public transport system it needs to maintain prominence in competition
with
> other cities. A system that would give mobility on a level equivalent to
> that offered by the private car would have stops no more than 9 minutes
walk
> from anyone's home; trains, trams or buses every 4 minutes throughout the
> day (8 minutes late night and early morning); and no journey from any
point
> in the city lasting more than 30 minutes with most a lot swifter.
>
> If effective mobility is to be achieved other than by reliance on cars,
> money is needed for alternatives on the same scale as the capital raised
to
> bring clean water to Birmingham in the 19th century - until now the
greatest
> public health project ever initiated. Whatever is decided is bound to be a
> gamble with the future, but Mr.Prescott, while he bore the brunt of the
> unpopularity that attached to trying to address this complex problem,
> rightly said "Doing nothing is not an option."
>
> If congestion charging can lever in the investment needed to realise
> solutions, all of us, including committed motorists, will come to regard
> this tax as value for money. There are, after all, going to be more short
> term car-parking spaces in the city after the present rebuilding than
> before.
>
> We must continue the trend towards the "compact" city with more and more
of
> professionals who abandoned the city centre in the late 19th century
wanting
> to live and work in the central square mile. At the same time we must not
so
> gentrify the centre that anyone who isn't rich is excluded from living
> there. We must also raise money to ensure that those whose employment has
> revolved around the motor-trade do not suffer more than they have already.
> Our local economy has been especially over-reliant on car making, but a
> century of undoubted success in achieving access by mobility has led to
> problems that afflict cities across the world. We need to move far further
> towards employment based on e-commerce as well as local trading, local
> manufacture and food retailing. Over the next 20 years we need to place
> greater reliance on access by proximity - to homes, schools, shops,
> entertainment as well as to safer streets and to beautiful public parks,
> walkways and squares.
>
> Churchill said the sublime is so close to the ridiculous. A vision of this
> kind is likely, at its inception, to run counter to popular opinion - even
> among those suffering in grid-lock. Congestion charging is a measure that
> requires great political courage. It is a measure designed to help achieve
a
> long term vision. One of these is linked to a quote in the manifesto of
the
> Road Traffic Reduction Campaign, supported by many MPs across the House.
It
> comes from Zechariah (8:4 & 5) "There shall yet old men and old women
dwell
> in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for
> very age. and the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls
> playing in the streets thereof." I doubt I shall live to see this dream of
a
> city recovered, but I shall strive to help others achieve it.
>
> Yours etc.
>
>
> Simon Baddeley
> 34 Beaudesert Road
> Handsworth
> Birmingham B20 3TG
> 0121 554 9794
> 07775 655842
>
>
>

>The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
>the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and who claim,
>on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
>extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
>(half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
>
>Question:
>
>Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
>under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
>appearing to be non-caring?

How about suggesting that the market vendors all chip in a few bucks to
hire a thick-calved college student to run a pedicab back and forth during
the "closure".

How about a voluntary (or hired by transit company) pedicab driver, or buggy
puller person, that will take one of the (half dozen) elderly, or disable
people through the carfree zone to the new bus stop location. If such
passenger are rare, the voluntary/hired person could be a shop tenant
concurrently. One would need a doctor note to be granted a pass for this
service (so it is not overused).

Once this is popular, it becomes easier to repulse motor traffic (even
buses) farther away from the activity zones.

Louis-Luc

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Roy Preston [mailto:preston@...]
> Sent: 7 août, 2001 16:48
> To: carfree_cities@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [carfree_cities] Monday Market
>
>
> Scenario:
>
> A small market town in England has, at last, closed the High Street to
> traffic for one day to hold a Monday market. It is hugely successful.
>
> Normally, every one-and-a-half minutes throughout the day, a mainly empty
> double decked bus thunders through the High Street belching fumes, only to
> turn around and make its way back to its point of origin in the large town
> 10 miles away. (700 buses per day)
>
> The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
> the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and
> who claim,
> on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
> extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
> (half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
>
> Question:
>
> Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
> under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
> appearing to be non-caring?
>
> Roy P(leased to hear any suggestions?)
>
>
>
> To Post a message, send it to:   carfree_cities@eGroups.com
> To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to:
> carfree_cities-unsubscribe@eGroups.com
> Group address: http://www.egroups.com/group/carfree_cities/
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>

We had the same idea!
(I wrote my followup before reading yours).

Cheers.
Louis-Luc
> How about suggesting that the market vendors all chip in a few bucks to
> hire a thick-calved college student to run a pedicab back and
> forth during
> the "closure".
>
>
> To Post a message, send it to:   carfree_cities@eGroups.com
> To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to:
> carfree_cities-unsubscribe@eGroups.com
> Group address: http://www.egroups.com/group/carfree_cities/
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>

[Warning: There follows a big digression here, from the real subject
of carfree_cities, occasioned in answer to some remarks by Karen
Sandness. I think this digression is ultimately highly relevant,
because it relates eventually to the crucial subject of "subsidies"
to transport, and their desirability or undesirability, and also to
the effects of zoning laws. My apologies  to those who consider it
otherwise.]

I actually think the intellectual history of Marxism is a lot
more honorable than what goes by the name "libertarianism" today.
People confuse "Marxism," which I would define as what Marx wrote,
with "Marxism-Leninism," which is one very particular ideology of
revolution which has had the most lamentable effects in the world.

Marx was an analyst and critic of what he called the "contradictions"
of capitalism. He was NOT a strident hater of capitalism. He was a
student of its historical underpinnings, inner dynamics, and its
social effects, both positive and negative. Most of his analysis is
still quite valuable and remarkably prescient to this day. But, in
contrast with his voluminous analysis of extant capitalism, he
provided but the sketchiest outlines of what was, in his philosophy,
to supplant it, i.e., "socialism."

The fatal mistake of the early followers of Marx was in believing that,
if one could make a systematic study of a social phenomenon like
capitalism, then one could just as well systematically devise and
implement a replacement for it. But, while enthusiasm for "scientific"
thinking in the social sciences, if leavened with humility, might be
enlightening, to take such an attitude towards the enterprise of
working practically for a more just society is anything but
"enlightening." Instead, it quickly leads to political totalitarianism.
And these considerations are as urgent and applicable to rightwing as
leftwing ideologies.

A "market" is nothing but a set of relations between pairs of people,
one, a buyer, the other, a seller, in which that pair may consummate
an exchange, without needing to consult anyone else. It happens to
be the simplest possible way in which to organize the
distribution of the wealth of society. But aside from simplicity,
there's nothing especially magical about it. Sometimes, the simplest
way to arrange something is also the best, sometimes not. Furthermore,
"the market" is not the same as "capitalism." A market economy, under
specific sociohistorical conditions LEADS TO capitalism. But there is
nothing "natural" about it. To quote Marx, referring to one especially
unique characteristic of capitalism, wage labor, which we might
generalize to capitalism as a whole:

    "This relation has no natural basis, neither is its social
     basis one that is common to all historical periods. It is
     clearly the result of a past historical development, the
     product of many economic revolutions, of the extinction of
     a whole series of older forms of social production."

     --__Capital__, part II, ch.6

Now, the best classical liberals, like Adam Smith or John Locke,
viewed the economic organization of society as being an equally fit
subject for democratic scrutiny as its political organization. Whereas,
by contrast, "libertarians," (aka, "neoliberals") -- who falsely claim
to follow in the footsteps of the classical liberals -- are instead little
different than the fuzzy headed, nakedly self-interested bourgeois
apologists for capitalism that Marx so thoroughly skewered in his works.
They make the most absurd, ahistorical arguments, trying to equate
"capitalism," a very specific historical set of social relations,
played out on a particular historical stage of times and places, to the
outcome of some kind of timeless, cosmic moral philosophy. Consider this
excerpt from "capitalism.com":

    Capitalism is founded on a proper understanding of Man's
    nature: The existence of inalienable individual rights.
    The validity of individual rights rests on the recognition
    that man is a rational being and has the capacity to
    discover truth on his own - without the need for a king or
    mystical revelation to guide him.

They go on to give as an example of a capitalist a little girl running
a lemonade stand.

The naivete of these people is painful to behold -- they are either
the most shamelessly disingenuous hucksters, or hopelessly adolescent
ideological enthusiasts.

Now, finally, to tie this back together, and make it relevant for
carfree_cities, we need to see how this ideology is used to argue
against subsidies for public transit. Because the "laissez-faire"
market is presented as the "natural order" of the universe, to
subsidize is somehow to "distort." It is to greatly burden the
"natural rights of Man," in the extreme form. In the more neutral
language of neoliberal economists, it is to introduce
"inefficiencies," viewing, as they do, the unregulated exchange
of commodities as always the "most efficient" form of economic
organization.

When, informed by an acute historical analysis, we deflate the moral
mystifications of the extreme forms of pro-capitalist ideology, we
are left with the economistic ones. Here, we venture into endless
complexities. But it should suffice to point out but a few of the
countless examples of "inefficiencies" arising directly from
capitalism, to debunk the notion that this system automatically
produces the most "efficient" outcomes, if by efficient we mean
optimal in utilizing human and natural resources. Consider the
unending miseries of the masses of humanity who are coldly ground
down in sweatshop labor. Clearly, countless people with enormous,
untapped creativity and potential are turned into labor commodities
to produce unearned profits for capitalists, ground into an early
grave by punishing toil. Leaving aside moral questions, is this the
most "efficient" use of resources we can come up with?

Moving on to an example more immediately relevant to transit:  When we "do
the numbers," as our friends at the Surface Transportation Policy Project
have, we find that the percentage of household budgets consumed by
transportation costs are MUCH HIGHER in cities that are more
autodependent, even factoring in the costs of taxes to pay for public
transit. But in the Libertarian ideology, of course, this is a no-no. Each
rider should always pay his own freight upfront, never mind the
transaction costs. The car automatically comes out ahead in this calculus,
because public transit requires longterm planning that private capital is
reluctant to risk. Better to leave every man and woman to fend for him or
herself, and each buy his or her own little automobile.

Consider another problem that ties into livable cities: zoning
and private land ownership. Under typical capitalist land tenure,
the land is alienable at will for whatever purpose the owner sees
fit. This is regulated by zoning laws, but the latter is anathema
to the Libertarian, according to whom no such thing should exist,
in pure, unalloyed "laissez faire" economics. But in no part of
our economy does the reality of complex historical underpinnings
present itself as clearly as land tenure. In the first instance,
all the land was stolen from the Indians in the USA anyway, so
much for stuffy moral claims as to the absolute sanctity of
private property ownership. But, more immediately, we see that
no one lives forever, whereas the land does, and we are but
stewards of this resource that we hand down to future generations.

Also, we know that land is a unique resource among those deemed
fit for private ownership. Unlike, say, toothbrushes, it does
not behave according to ordinary rules of supply and demand. The
supply is fixed. The demand is not. In this state of affairs, the
land speculator, the first one to lay claim to the supply with the
intent of earning profits by bidding up its price, has all the
advantages. The land speculator earns windfall profits, not from any
productive economic activity sponsored by himself, but by the
productive economic activity of others in the area surrounding him,
which make his property valuable -- attracting others to an area,
whether by employment or other attractions.

Properly viewed, property taxes are the least that society can
demand from those who earn such windfall profits. They should be
viewed as a mechanism and an opportunity to redress the problems
created by private land ownership, for example, lack of affordable
housing. And zoning, rather than an imposition, should be viewed
as the proper mechanism for social accountability, which takes
into account the stewardship aspect of land ownership referred
to before.

When we understand these things, we can not only analyze the
blights caused by autocentric urban sprawl development, but
unapologetically recommend public policies to fix them.

I'm sorry for the length of this discussion. Obviously, the
subject matter is complex enough to take up many volumes. I hope
I've at least provided some directions for further discussion of
these subjects.

Karen Sandness <ksand@...> wrote:

>
> The root problem of libertarianism is precisely the root problem of
> Marxism: it's a religion, in this case, the religion of the great and
> all-consuming god Market Forces, and like Marxism, it assumes that if we
> just follow all the commandments of this god, utopia will be the result.
>
> Unfortunately for both extremes of the economic and political spectrum,
> reality has a way of tossing monkey wrenches into right-wing and
> left-wing religions.
>
> Libertarianism underestimates the negative power of selfishness. It
> assumes that everyone's "enlightened self-interest" will somehow work
> together to produce a desired outcome. But like Marxism, Libertarianism
> neglects to take the human capacity for evil into account. In other
> words, it has no defense against the economic predator, the
> environmental rapist, the largest employer in town who depresses wages
> and benefits for everyone, the deliberately deceptive advertiser, the
> union buster, the price-fixing cartel, or the seller of dangerous
> products.
>
> The libertarian economic ideal looks a lot like the nineteenth century
> or the contemporary Third World. It's a fantastic ideology for rich
> people or for the tiny percentage of the population that has the
> combination of talent and personality traits to become fabulously
> successful entrepreneurs. For everyone else, --well, the Progressive
> Movement, the labor movement, the trust-busting movement, and the growth
> of consumer protection and securities fraud regulations in the late
> nineteenth and early twentieth centuries occurred for a reason.
>
> So what does this have to do with suburbia? Well, in most suburbs,
> land-use regulations can be boiled down to the following rules: 1) Put
> the houses here. 2) Put the commercial businesses there. 3) Provide lots
> of off-street parking. 4) (Optional:) Pay some of the costs of extending
> utilities and streets to your development. 5) Go for it.
>
> Combined with massive federal subsidies for freeways and the
> availability of cheap land, this situation has been an irresistible
> temptation for businesses that profit from sprawl. Don't bother to
> invest in fixing up the inner city. Just grab some new land along the
> interstate and throw up some McMansions and a shopping center full of
> nationwide chain businesses. You don't have to put much thought into it.
> Just put up what everyone else is building and mass--produce it,
> offering three or four "distinctive" plans. Then advertise your new
> "community" as offering a pastoral slice of country life, in order to
> attract buyers frustrated with the way their former "pastoral slice of
> country life" has turned into a hell-hole of smog and gridlock.
>
> In many cities, the only choices left for the would-be urbanite are
> slums and $500,000 condos. Most of the slums used to be perfectly nice
> neighborhoods (ask an old-timer), but decades of disinvestment have done
> their work.
>
> Suburbia appears to be a "choice," but it's not a "choice" if the only
> reasonable alternatives are too expensive for the average buyer. What if
> someone built new $150,000 houses in an urban area?
>
> Now for the greatest and most universally hated by-product of sprawl:
> traffic. Everyone hates being stuck in traffic jams, but few people are
> stepping back and seeing how suburbia makes traffic jams inevitable.
>
> In a city, most people get by with one car or no cars. In the suburbs,
> two cars are the norm, since there is little or no mass transit and the
> landscape is not laid out for walking or cycling, it is not uncommon for
> families to buy an additional car for each teenager. While this may make
> life "easier" for the individual, in that parents no longer have to
> chauffeur their kids here and there, it inevitably puts more cars on the
> road. The farther out a family lives, the more it needs cars. Two or
> three cars per family, instead of zero or one. It doesn't take a degree
> in math to figure out why new highways fill up in a couple of years.
>
> Ideologies are fun to talk about, but they pay insufficient attention to
reality.
>
> In transit,
> Karen Sandness
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 4
>    Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2001 21:48:24 +0100
>    From: Roy Preston <preston@...>
> Subject: Monday Market
>
> Scenario:
>
> A small market town in England has, at last, closed the High Street to
> traffic for one day to hold a Monday market. It is hugely successful.
>
> Normally, every one-and-a-half minutes throughout the day, a mainly empty
> double decked bus thunders through the High Street belching fumes, only to
> turn around and make its way back to its point of origin in the large town
> 10 miles away. (700 buses per day)
>
> The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
> the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and who claim,
> on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
> extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
> (half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
>
> Question:
>
> Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
> under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
> appearing to be non-caring?
>
> Roy P(leased to hear any suggestions?)
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 5
>    Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2001 22:12:50 +0100
>    From: "Simon Baddeley" <s.j.baddeley@...>
> Subject: Re: Monday Market
>
> Get "shopmobility" involved - meeting people as they alight or giving notice
> of their services near the point where bus passengers alight and board at
> the point where pedestrianisation starts. In Inverness the shopmobility
> service is right  by a carpark exit, taxi/car drop-off pick up point and bus
> stop.
>
> With the passenger numbers you mention, I imagine the bus company is feeling
> pretty threatened already. Surely management could be persuaded to
> negotiate. If they have been receiving complaints from their passengers they
> have to be able to offer something back.
>
> Just an idea. I hope the council etc don't cave in - but transport issues
> are characteristically full of stake holders frequently in win-lose
> situations. How can this situation become win-win?
>
> Simon
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Roy Preston <preston@...>
> To: <carfree_cities@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 07, 2001 9:48 PM
> Subject: [carfree_cities] Monday Market
>
>
> > Scenario:
> >
> > A small market town in England has, at last, closed the High Street to
> > traffic for one day to hold a Monday market. It is hugely successful.
> >
> > Normally, every one-and-a-half minutes throughout the day, a mainly empty
> > double decked bus thunders through the High Street belching fumes, only to
> > turn around and make its way back to its point of origin in the large town
> > 10 miles away. (700 buses per day)
> >
> > The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
> > the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and who
> claim,
> > on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
> > extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
> > (half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
> >
> > Question:
> >
> > Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
> > under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
> > appearing to be non-caring?
> >
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 6
>    Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2001 22:36:39 +0100
>    From: "Simon Baddeley" <s.j.baddeley@...>
> Subject: Letter re "Congestion charging"
>
> Letter prompted by a local MEP's letter to the Birmingham Post decrying
> congestion charging.
>
> S
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Simon Baddeley <s.j.baddeley@...>
> To: <thepost@...>
> Sent: Monday, August 06, 2001 5:32 PM
> Subject: Congestion charging
>
>
> > 6 August 2001
> >
> > The Editor
> > BIRMINGHAM POST & MAIL
> > Colmore Circus
> > Birmingham B4 6AX
> > Fax 625 1105 thepost@...
> >
> >
> > Sir
> >
> > I am surprised at the fears expressed in your columns that congestion
> > charging will turn central Birmingham into a "ghost town" (Post 6/08/01).
> > What concerned many people 15 years ago was the way our city centre was
> > being abandoned because it was perceived by the public as a hazardous
> > concrete desert.
> >
> > Things have got a lot better but Birmingham still lacks the superlative
> > public transport system it needs to maintain prominence in competition
> with
> > other cities. A system that would give mobility on a level equivalent to
> > that offered by the private car would have stops no more than 9 minutes
> walk
> > from anyone's home; trains, trams or buses every 4 minutes throughout the
> > day (8 minutes late night and early morning); and no journey from any
> point
> > in the city lasting more than 30 minutes with most a lot swifter.
> >
> > If effective mobility is to be achieved other than by reliance on cars,
> > money is needed for alternatives on the same scale as the capital raised
> to
> > bring clean water to Birmingham in the 19th century - until now the
> greatest
> > public health project ever initiated. Whatever is decided is bound to be a
> > gamble with the future, but Mr.Prescott, while he bore the brunt of the
> > unpopularity that attached to trying to address this complex problem,
> > rightly said "Doing nothing is not an option."
> >
> > If congestion charging can lever in the investment needed to realise
> > solutions, all of us, including committed motorists, will come to regard
> > this tax as value for money. There are, after all, going to be more short
> > term car-parking spaces in the city after the present rebuilding than
> > before.
> >
> > We must continue the trend towards the "compact" city with more and more
> of
> > professionals who abandoned the city centre in the late 19th century
> wanting
> > to live and work in the central square mile. At the same time we must not
> so
> > gentrify the centre that anyone who isn't rich is excluded from living
> > there. We must also raise money to ensure that those whose employment has
> > revolved around the motor-trade do not suffer more than they have already.
> > Our local economy has been especially over-reliant on car making, but a
> > century of undoubted success in achieving access by mobility has led to
> > problems that afflict cities across the world. We need to move far further
> > towards employment based on e-commerce as well as local trading, local
> > manufacture and food retailing. Over the next 20 years we need to place
> > greater reliance on access by proximity - to homes, schools, shops,
> > entertainment as well as to safer streets and to beautiful public parks,
> > walkways and squares.
> >
> > Churchill said the sublime is so close to the ridiculous. A vision of this
> > kind is likely, at its inception, to run counter to popular opinion - even
> > among those suffering in grid-lock. Congestion charging is a measure that
> > requires great political courage. It is a measure designed to help achieve
> a
> > long term vision. One of these is linked to a quote in the manifesto of
> the
> > Road Traffic Reduction Campaign, supported by many MPs across the House.
> It
> > comes from Zechariah (8:4 & 5) "There shall yet old men and old women
> dwell
> > in the streets of Jerusalem, and every man with his staff in his hand for
> > very age. and the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls
> > playing in the streets thereof." I doubt I shall live to see this dream of
> a
> > city recovered, but I shall strive to help others achieve it.
> >
> > Yours etc.
> >
> >
> > Simon Baddeley
> > 34 Beaudesert Road
> > Handsworth
> > Birmingham B20 3TG
> > 0121 554 9794
> > 07775 655842
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 7
>    Date: Tue, 07 Aug 2001 15:16:30 -0700
>    From: "T. J. Binkley" <tjbink@...>
> Subject: Re: Monday Market
>
>
> >The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
> >the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and who claim,
> >on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
> >extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
> >(half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
> >
> >Question:
> >
> >Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
> >under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
> >appearing to be non-caring?
>
> How about suggesting that the market vendors all chip in a few bucks to
> hire a thick-calved college student to run a pedicab back and forth during
> the "closure".
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 8
>    Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2001 23:20:45 -0400
>    From: "Louis-Luc" <exqmtl@...>
> Subject: RE: Monday Market
>
> How about a voluntary (or hired by transit company) pedicab driver, or buggy
> puller person, that will take one of the (half dozen) elderly, or disable
> people through the carfree zone to the new bus stop location. If such
> passenger are rare, the voluntary/hired person could be a shop tenant
> concurrently. One would need a doctor note to be granted a pass for this
> service (so it is not overused).
>
> Once this is popular, it becomes easier to repulse motor traffic (even
> buses) farther away from the activity zones.
>
> Louis-Luc
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Roy Preston [mailto:preston@...]
> > Sent: 7 août, 2001 16:48
> > To: carfree_cities@yahoogroups.com
> > Subject: [carfree_cities] Monday Market
> >
> >
> > Scenario:
> >
> > A small market town in England has, at last, closed the High Street to
> > traffic for one day to hold a Monday market. It is hugely successful.
> >
> > Normally, every one-and-a-half minutes throughout the day, a mainly empty
> > double decked bus thunders through the High Street belching fumes, only to
> > turn around and make its way back to its point of origin in the large town
> > 10 miles away. (700 buses per day)
> >
> > The Council and instigators of the market are now coming under fire from
> > the bus company which has been inconvenienced by the closure and
> > who claim,
> > on emotive grounds, that their elderly passengers are unable to walk the
> > extra 200-yards to the end of the High Street on the day of road closure
> > (half-a-dozen passengers at the most!), and are threatening legal action.
> >
> > Question:
> >
> > Apart from abandoning the Monday road closure, which seems very likely
> > under the circumstances, how would one defend the road closure without
> > appearing to be non-caring?
> >
> > Roy P(leased to hear any suggestions?)
> >
> >
> >
> > To Post a message, send it to:   carfree_cities@eGroups.com
> > To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to:
> > carfree_cities-unsubscribe@eGroups.com
> > Group address: http://www.egroups.com/group/carfree_cities/
> >
> > Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
> >
> >
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> Message: 9
>    Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2001 23:26:56 -0400
>    From: "Louis-Luc" <exqmtl@...>
> Subject: RE: Monday Market
>
> We had the same idea!
> (I wrote my followup before reading yours).
>
> Cheers.
> Louis-Luc
> > How about suggesting that the market vendors all chip in a few bucks to
> > hire a thick-calved college student to run a pedicab back and
> > forth during
> > the "closure".
> >
> >
> > To Post a message, send it to:   carfree_cities@eGroups.com
> > To Unsubscribe, send a blank message to:
> > carfree_cities-unsubscribe@eGroups.com
> > Group address: http://www.egroups.com/group/carfree_cities/
> >
> > Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
> >
> >
>
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________________
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
>

Litige voies sur berges
I wrote this as a digression the other evening:



Pierre-Yves Ligen died this May. It was while he was Paris's director of city
planning between 1978-1984 that there occurred what one of his obituarists
called "a Damascene conversion" from "megalomaniac projects for city motorways
and skyscrapers" of which President Pompidou's creation of the right bank
motorway that cut off the Seine to pedestrians was a typical example, to
progressive thinking about urban fabric which encouraged modernity on a human
scale, factoring pedestrians into cityscapes ahead of those relying on the
internal combustion engine.



I and my family cycled in Paris last September on an official day of "car
restraint" and especially enjoyed cycling and walking during the "Journée du
piéton et du cycliste, dimanche de 9 heures à 15 heures" on the Voie Georges
Pompidou as well as on a Champs Elysées, still open to cars, which Ligens at the
request in the 1990s of Jacques Chirac, worried at its car-blighted seediness,
had once again made more pedestrian-friendly. Ligens' conversion was 30 years
ago, but the political risks for pedestrian friendly policies though they may be
taken more readily are still high. A cartoon in "le Parisien" (21 Sept 2000) has
M'sieur Ordinary Voter wagging a finger at two politicians "Demain journée sans
voiture" (pause) "Dimanche, journée sans electeurs!"



This year the new Mayor of Paris, Bertrand Delanoe, has ordered the infamous
Voie Georges Pompidou closed to traffic (or what general opinion refers to as
"traffic" on the basis that walkers and cyclists aren't) not just on Sunday but
between 6 a.m. and 11 p.m. for a whole month from July 15. Immediate result: the
police estimate that 100K motorists, deprived of access to the Seine motorway,
have been trapped in grid lock from St.Germain to the périphérique, pollution is
up, radio phone-ins are jammed with fuming drivers and "the great Paris traffic
snarl-up" is headlined daily. "It is a brave politician indeed who comes between
a Frenchman and his automobile." (The Guardian, 28 July 2001).



Then I saw this:



----- Original Message -----
From: Erick.Marchandise
To: mdbidf@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, August 08, 2001 1:52 PM
Subject: [mdbidf] Litige voies sur berges


J'ai piqué ça sur fr.misc.transport.urbain déposé par Carlos Klimann.


Litige autour des voies  sur berge à Paris
mercredi 08 août - 14h08

PARIS (AFP) - Le juge des référés du Tribunal de grande instance de Paris se
prononcera jeudi à 14H00
sur la demande de Me Michel Fleury, un avocat qui conteste la légalité de la
décision de réserver la voie sur berge de Paris aux piétons durant un mois.

Me Fleury estime qu'il s'agit d'une "voie de fait" car cette mesure prise au nom
d'un pouvoir de police par le préfet de police et le maire de Paris ont eu pour
objet de "créer le désordre", dit-il, afin de dégoûter les automobilistes
d'utiliser leur voiture.

Le substitut Pierre Dillange a indiqué qu'il n'avait "jamais entendu développer
une conception aussi fantaisiste de la voie de fait", et il a parlé de
"plaisanterie", demandant au juge, Jean-Pierre Marcus, de se déclarer
incompétent. Il soutient, comme les avocats du préfet de
police Jean-Paul Proust et du maire PS Bertrand Delanoë, que seul le juge
administratif est compétent pour juger de la légalité ou de l'opportunité d'un
arrêté préfectoral ou municipal.

La voie Georges Pompidou a été réservée aux piétons et cyclistes du 15 juillet
au 15 août, par un arrêté préfectoral du 13 juillet dernier fondé sur une
délibération municipale.

Me Fleury qui plaide aussi pour la Fédération française des automobile Clubs de
France, a expliqué au juge que selon les déclarations d'Yves Contassot, adjoint
Vert du maire Bertrand Delanoë, reprises dans un magazine et non contestées par
l'intéressé, le but était de provoquer des bouchons pour dégoûter les
automobilistes de prendre leur voiture. M. Contassot aurait déclaré qu'il
fallait "faire vivre l'enfer" aux automobilistes. Me Fleury en déduit que le
maire, avec le préfet de police, ont détourné le pouvoir de police qu'ils
détiennent pour maintenir l'ordre dans la capitale.

Me Alexandre Martin-Comnène, avocat du préfet, et Stéphane Desforges, avocat du
maire, ont expliqué que Me Fleury, auquel ils reprochent de plaider pour
lui-même contrairement aux règles déontologiques, réclamait 10 MF (1,524 M
d'EUR).

Ils lui ont reproché d'invoquer la liberté fondamentale d'aller et de venir, qui
permet à chacun d'aller où bon lui semble, a dit Me Martin-Comnène, mais qui ne
permet pas d'exiger, par commodité,
de pouvoir prendre en voiture une rue en sens interdit, a ajouté Me Desforges.

Me Desforges a estimé que Me Fleury avait "délibérément saisi un juge
incompétent pour enfler une campagne de presse" et il a souhaité, comme Me
Martin-Comnène et comme le substitut Dillange, que le juge condamne Me Fleury
pour "procédure
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Heavy rain, snow and particularly hail stones are all going to cause
problems in a carfree city.  It's not too bad if the weather is bad
before you leave your house as you have the opportunity to put on
your coat, pick up your umbrella etc.  It can be much worse if the
weather changes on your way home.

At my old university (York) the main walkways are all covered, with
each small roof supported by metal posts.  Although they're not
pretty, they are a welcome relief if it's raining heavy.  With a
little more effort, surrounding them with trees for example, I'm sure
they could be made much more attractive.

Re: [mdbidf] Litige voies sur bergesThis is fascinating. We observe our fellow
walkers and cyclists in Paris and wish them well as this great campaign goes on
to recover the beautiful city from the curse of motorised traffic. We applaud
the lawyers and politicians fighting this case to maintain the Voie sur Berges
free of cars.

Many regards

Simon

Simon Baddeley
34 Beaudesert Road
Handsworth
Birmingham B20 3TG
United Kingdom
England
00 44 121 554 9794
mobile 07775 655842
   ----- Original Message -----
   From: Mathias Heizmann
   To: mdbidf@yahoogroups.com
   Sent: Wednesday, August 08, 2001 5:12 PM
   Subject: Re: [mdbidf] Litige voies sur berges


   le 8/08/01 14:52, Erick.Marchandise à e.marchandise@... a écrit :


     J'ai piqué ça sur fr.misc.transport.urbain déposé par Carlos Klimann.


     Litige autour des voies  sur berge à Paris
     mercredi 08 août - 14h08

     PARIS (AFP) - Le juge des référés du Tribunal de grande instance de Paris se
prononcera jeudi à 14H00
     sur la demande de Me Michel Fleury, un avocat qui conteste la légalité de la
décision de réserver la voie sur berge de Paris aux piétons durant un mois.

     Me Fleury estime qu'il s'agit d'une "voie de fait" car cette mesure prise au
nom d'un pouvoir de police par le préfet de police et le maire de Paris ont eu
pour objet de "créer le désordre", dit-il, afin de dégoûter les automobilistes
d'utiliser leur voiture.

     Le substitut Pierre Dillange a indiqué qu'il n'avait "jamais entendu
développer une conception aussi fantaisiste de la voie de fait", et il a parlé
de "plaisanterie", demandant au juge, Jean-Pierre Marcus, de se déclarer
incompétent. Il soutient, comme les avocats du préfet de
     police Jean-Paul Proust et du maire PS Bertrand Delanoë, que seul le juge
administratif est compétent pour juger de la légalité ou de l'opportunité d'un
arrêté préfectoral ou municipal.

     La voie Georges Pompidou a été réservée aux piétons et cyclistes du 15
juillet au 15 août, par un arrêté préfectoral du 13 juillet dernier fondé sur
une délibération municipale.

     Me Fleury qui plaide aussi pour la Fédération française des automobile Clubs
de France, a expliqué au juge que selon les déclarations d'Yves Contassot,
adjoint Vert du maire Bertrand Delanoë, reprises dans un magazine et non
contestées par l'intéressé, le but était de provoquer des bouchons pour dégoûter
les automobilistes de prendre leur voiture. M. Contassot aurait déclaré qu'il
fallait "faire vivre l'enfer" aux automobilistes. Me Fleury en déduit que le
maire, avec le préfet de police, ont détourné le pouvoir de police qu'ils
détiennent pour maintenir l'ordre dans la capitale.

     Me Alexandre Martin-Comnène, avocat du préfet, et Stéphane Desforges, avocat
du maire, ont expliqué que Me Fleury, auquel ils reprochent de plaider pour
lui-même contrairement aux règles déontologiques, réclamait 10 MF (1,524 M
d'EUR).

     Ils lui ont reproché d'invoquer la liberté fondamentale d'aller et de venir,
qui permet à chacun d'aller où bon lui semble, a dit Me Martin-Comnène, mais qui
ne permet pas d'exiger, par commodité,
     de pouvoir prendre en voiture une rue en sens interdit, a ajouté Me
Desforges.

     Me Desforges a estimé que Me Fleury avait "délibérément saisi un juge
incompétent pour enfler une campagne de presse" et il a souhaité, comme Me
Martin-Comnène et comme le substitut Dillange, que le juge condamne Me Fleury
pour "procédure
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Charte sur la vie privée <http://fr.docs.yahoo.com/info/privacy.html> .


   out cela tient du délire. Cela dit, une mesure serait pas mal : ouvrir en
soirée les quais toute l'année, à partir de 21h par exemple. Je ne voix pas
d'ailleurs pourquoi on les réouvre en soirée en ce moment. Mais le fait de se
balader le soir le long de la seine, ca pourrait donner des idées aux piétons.
Et le soir, le problème des bouchons est moins cruciale.

   Mathias
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Conditions d'utilisation et de la Charte sur la vie privée.



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]