I'm appalled at the people here saying you need a car to lead a full life. A car-dependent life is an empty and sad one for many of us. I moved to the Netherlands with my family (two young daughters) and it has been _absolutely fantastic_ to be able to just bike.... everywhere. Or get a train. or bus. Or, sometimes, use a car-share vehicle. It's absolute freedom. And I'm a hell of a lot less worried about my kids being killed by drivers - the leading cause of dead kids in the US.
Even here there's too many Dodge Rams though. And large SUV's - especially electric ones - are increasingly popular.
On the flip side, being required to drive everywhere because there is no transit option is a negative impact on quality of life, especially in cities.
Ultimately it comes down to how good the transit infrastructure is. Some cities make transit feel effortless and get you anywhere you need to be; others make you battle your way through it and lose a lot of time.
Obviously not a solution for every situation, but if you only need a car occasionally then it would likely work out well.
The "Not Just Bikes" video on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OObwqreAJ48
Personally I only drive once a week at most, but there isn't a car share scheme locally. If one started up that was cost effective and convinient enough then I'd consider it.
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...
of course if you moved there from the USA (which I assume you did?) the car situation there is not that much better than other European countries.
And that way I don't have to screw around with taking my own car to the shop for (oil changes, tyres, brake jobs, whatever), or having it inspected annually, or shopping around for insurance, etc.
My original comment was about removing cars from the city centre, which is great for people who are _not_ in cars because, of course, drivers kill a lot of people and biking to school with your 6 year old is utterly TERRIFYING when someone decides to cut in front of them in a giant truck. Cars make the world worse for everyone around them (including those who are in _other_ cars!) and it's kinda rude to use one in a city.
The title says "Travel Distance per person day by main travel mode for urban mobility on all days". That is ambiguous, but suggests that the numbers are actually the share of the travel distance for peoples' main mode, meaning that people who need to travel further in a day tend to have cars, to an overwhelming extent.
That is still a coherent situation in a world where most people don't use cars because their daily travel needs only involve short distances (e.g. because they live in an area where all of their needs are met within a short range).
Now that I moved away to a place with better quality of life, and little to no traffic having a car is great.
I can go wherever I want whenever I want.
No doubt it's a symbol for freedom for many.
As someone who loves car-less living in big cities like NYC, I think the position above is an ideological belief rather than a practical one.
Every geography and lifestyle has an optimum mode of transportation. In dense urban environments, it would be a heterogeneous mix of public transit for longer distances, scooters or bikes for last mile/yard, and the occasional taxi for groceries or the like.
But for those of us who have active busy lives and need to meet friends, take classes, go to events, etc. across town, our time is maximized by the use of a car if the geography admits it. I used to live in Chicago where you absolutely did not need a car, but a car saves you time, lets you explore more parts of the city, and lets you pack more activities in 5 work nights than if you had to rely on public transit and transfers between different lines.
I love cycling and I love to bike within town and it's great that I can get to nearly all basic needs by bike. I wish there was safe bike parking everywhere though, since the lack of it means I often can't bike there if I can't be sure it won't be stolen.
Still, if you want to advocate for more bike friendly places, calling car use an empty and sad life isn't going to win any converts.
Cars are immensely useful for nearly everyone, so merely banning them and hoping for the best won't work. Policies need to make alternatives attractive, at which point people will pick what's most convenient by themselves, no need to ban anything.
"How Much Of The Netherlands Is Below Sea Level?"
https://netherlandsinsiders.com/how-much-of-the-netherlands-...
If I were less risk-averse I'd live there too. But flooding is "Nature's way of telling" me to move.
There is very little outdoor/nature activity accessible to me by public transit.
But if I extend my leash to a 2-3 hour car ride it opens up countless forests, beaches, mountains, ghost towns, lakes, caves, marshes, waterfalls, ...
Can't you be satisfied that you achieved what works for you and your family and not strive to implement your will onto the entire planet?
I used to live in the outback without electricity or running water, and no cars around. It was lovely and I'll probably do it again in my life. And that is an option each one of us has. If you're sick of the city and traffic, you can go live in the sticks, where you won't have to breathe the exhaust. You can go live in a tropical island where there are no cars and only walking roads. That's not a fantasy, that's an option that exists right now. I used to live on one as well.
But living away from civilization also requires self-sufficiency – something that everybody had before cars.
Of course we can just ignore that which is not at all crazy...
Edit: I'm certainly not using this as argument to not ban ICE vehicles in city centers. However switching to EVs is not a good longterm solution. e.g. there won't be any incentives for massively increasing investment into public transport because everyone can just drive a "clean" EV.
*I'm not saying that brake and tire wear is that much higher for EVs, rather that if we only look at ICE vehicles tires/breaks are as big a source of PM 2.5 as the engine itself.
There are a lot of people who are driving an EV with several hundred miles of range to work less than 20 miles away. That extra order of magnitude of battery capacity is a lot of extra weight. Imagine I’d you could instead rent a battery trailer for those occasional long trips?
I think e-bikes are the way to go, tho perhaps we can define a new and smaller class of vehicles with cabins and/or inherent stability for those unable to ride.
You might want to cross that off your list of things to complain about when talking about EVs.
Of course, cars are generally too big, too heavy, and too fast. Addressing those issues would benefit everyone, regardless of fuel source.
Another (expensive) solution would be carbon ceramic brakes. These used to be for "race cars" but people found that they are too expensive to replace if you track the car, so people use iron brakes on the track, and carbon ceramics on the street. Carbon ceramics will last 100k+ miles under normal street use and they keep the wheels free of brake dust.
As for the tire emissions, you are likely quoting the worst case scenario that was devised by emissionsanalytics. The reality is, that was a worst case scenario, if you actually saw tire wear that was significantly more polluting than traditional cars you would have tires that go bald in a very short period of time.
For example, the Micheline Pilot Sport all seasons that come on the Tesla Model 3 are rated for 45k miles, but typically get around 35-40k miles depending on driving habits. That is only 13-26% more tread loss depending on driving style. So how is it possible the tires are losing significantly more tread (and as a consequence, polluting more) but also lasting a long time?
EVs use primarily regen for braking, so they contribute almost no brake wear. And that isn't even a problem.
It matters what is emitted. Tire wear particles are relatively large, and don't stay in the air.
Anti-EV disinformation uses the trick of counting pollution by weight, which completely discounts gaseous emissions, which is the real pollution that people breathe in.
Maps here: <https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/stockholm/bensin-och-diese...> and here: <https://www.dn.se/sverige/bensin-och-dieselbilar-forbjuds-i-...>. Note that the area is comparatively tiny; 180 000m² according to some articles, closer to 200 000m² according to my measurements – but in any case smaller than 50 acres.
OpenStreetMap link to the same area as the map, so you can zoom out and see the scales involved: <https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=16/59.33461/18.06944>
> The study found that children who grow up on roads in the capital with particularly high emissions have worse-than-average lung capacity when compared to other children, from as early as six months old.
This will only accelerate the move to the suburbs of the families having children themselves and who can't yet afford an EV, leaving the cities themselves (as I suspect similar moves will be applied elsewhere here in Europe) to young people without kids, to immigrant people with kids but not-interested in having a full Western-life experience (which necessitates having a car) and to the "pied-a-terres" of the few upper-middle class people who will afford to have EVs (who will also own property in the suburbs, for that matter).
American life experience, you mean? It's totally OK to live in Stockholm, as well as in many other cities in Europe, without a car. Besides, you make it sound like EVs are more expensive than ICE cars. They surely are, but the difference is not that much and subsidies cover a part of it.
This is just not accurate.
Wait, what's this "Western-life experience" I'm missing out on by not having a car? Having lived in Western Europe all my life, I seem to have missed the memo about this.
You're right of course that not having a car self-evidently limits the things you can do (yes even in your country that has flawless transit that is free and goes "everywhere"), and is even worse if you have children. Want to go to the country to relax? You're limited to the places you can get by transit. Kid wants to do something that isn't near a transit stop? Too bad. Visiting relatives outside the city? Better hope you can get a ride from the nearest transit stop. The list goes on and on.
Being able to walk places is desirable, but it's best when you can walk/bike and drive a car if you need to.
Meanwhile in NY some people are all up in arms about the congestion toll.
In Boston a certain subset of people are losing their minds at one of our streets going pedestrian only on Saturdays during the summer.
the US really has a crazy relationship with cars
They're obviously going to want cars. Walking & cycling are not options (see sedentary).
This way makes it safe to feel the waters, tweak public transports, get people's reaction, without killing it in the cradle.
Easier to start with one big zone over the whole city, and keep making the requirements stricter automatically. Eg. Take the cars age, add the current year, subtract the cars rated mpg, add 10 if it's a diesel. If the result is 2050 or more, there is a fine of $20/day if you drive it.
Whereas the reality is that these actions are preplanned internationally and designed (by opaque agencies such the club of Rome and the UN) in order for individuals to have less control over their lives - shifting that control to the governance structure. Did anyone discuss the transfer of control, agree to it, vote on it?
It's quite amazing to me that people are going to lose freedom of movement, will pay more etc and be happy to do so. Turkeys voting for Christmas.
Not everyone is happy with this change, if that makes you feel better.
Also, this is implemented by the city, by real people (yes, politicians are people) that Stockholmers voted for.
Political class as a concept doesn't make much sense in Sweden, just FYI.
It's probably a self-fulfilling expectation: the government can't be effective without trust. Without support, it can't pass strong regulations that make a difference. So you get an ineffective government, and watered-down lobbied laws that easily fall to regulatory capture, and you can say "told you so!"
This isn't what "freedom of movement" means.
It also masks the effects of inefficient decisionmaking.
Of course they are not, and trusting the government to do the right thing isn't too bad a position neither. After, we vote for them.
Personally I don't really care since I don't live in Stockholm anymore but that city is very hostile against car traffic in general (which is stupid in my opinion). Finding a parking space in the outskirts of the city is very hard and I have searched for a spot in like an hour when visiting my family. They build a lot of housing but no parking spaces for residents. Sometimes if you're lucky they'll build like 1 parking space per 20 residents when in reality 19 of these residents have a car. I know personally some areas close to my mother where they have taken areas for parking and built housing there making the actual parking spaces go negative.
Fine if you want to get rid of petrol/diesel but there are alternatives and you don't have to make things shitty for people with electric cars as well.
I think people will start moving from Stockholm because who wants to live in a city where housing is 3-4 times the national avg, people being shot all the time and even blown up when in bed in your own home. Then the politicians responsible cares more about making it more expensive for you to go to work which all seems more meaningless since you pay so much in taxes that goes to immigration and people not contributing to society.
Productive will move to the country side where they can safely drive to work and work less because working hard is just not worth it in Sweden.
> While it is primarily intended to allow for only fully electric cars, bigger vans with plug-in hybrid engines will also be allowed, and exceptions will be made for ambulances and police cars, as well as cars in which the driver or passenger has a documented disability
I guess time will tell, but if you look at statistics many country side smaller cities are growing when in the past they were shrinking for a really long time. The wind is vänding.
It is an emotional decision. Politics is all about emotionalism. Now everybody that like or work there will need to have buy a te$la or pole$tar.
Most people I know at work own a car, but no one drives to work. Why would they?
Seems like people driving in downtown Stockholm are the kind of people that can afford EVs anyway. (Of course, disabled people etc. But they are also covered by the new rules.)
It's like these people live in a parallel reality where nobody needs to get in our out of the inner city.
I love how cars are entitled to every inch of the city.
Maybe it looks brilliant if you're used to some US shithole. But even at its best it can't hold a candle to somewhere like the Copenhagen metro. And even that pales when compared to the trusty car that will take you from anywhere, to anywhere, whenever you want.
Source: lived in Stockholm for 8 years so far, half of which were carless.
I went there a few weeks ago for the first time in 6 years or so and could easily identify positive changes that make living there more pleasant.
Also while driving was a little slow (as usual), I had no problem finding (paid) parking close to the old town.
To add more context: "The first phase of the Krakow LEZ will restrict vehicles with EU exhaust emission standards Euro 1 petrol and Euro 2 diesel vehicles, before tightening restrictions further in 2026. After then, only cars with a minimum norm Euro 3 for petrol and Euro 5 for diesel will be allowed in the city (20% of the current fleet will be affected). "
The latter seem to have been designed and sold mainly to skirt some regulations and take advantage of subsidies; along with a sometimes-hefty price increase.
We also own a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV and while it's a fine SUV and family mover, it uses the ICE constantly, while I drive my Volt for months without ever using the combustion engine (to the point where it has to run a "maintenance cycle" to stop the gas from going bad).
Meanwhile the Volt was killed off by GM. It's a shame because I feel like consumers would have responded more positively to electrification if more cars like this had been rolled out and the engineering (and marketing and sales) had been taken more seriously on them.
[0] https://www.designboom.com/technology/device-captures-harmfu...
I guess they will either shutdown or get an exemption somehow.
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