Sitting facing the palace of Federigo da Montefeltro in the bright afternoon sun, sipping “water with gaz” and hooking into a rare WiFi spot after my latest two-hour hit of Madonna with Child paintings, not a car in sight on this elegant cobbled street and plaza.
It looks almost like La Citta Ideale, the painting I saw saw inside that depicts an elegant city square, completely empty.
That’s of course been the situation in every historic town and city we’ve visited: Volterra, Siena, Perugia, Gubbio, Deruta, and now Urbino. It’s almost enough to make you buy into the thesis behind this recent NY Times story that one of my faithful correspondents sent me, detailing the way European cities are making life difficult for drivers. (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/27/science/earth/27traffic.html?emc=eta1)
The problem with all of this, though, is that this kind of car obstructionism — here in Europe or even back home in the Americas — is that it’s limited to a very restricted area: the historic and tourist-oriented centers where it almost makes a kind of business sense to ban cars, as a way of enhancing the city as spectacle and resort.
But, as I’ve written before here, the amount of land consecrated to asphalt and the creation of ugly suburbs and sprawling industrial zones is something that Europeans excel at. I’ve driven through areas of Italy on this trip that make the lower part of King George Highway look like the Champs Elysees. Clusters of big-box stores and plastics factories next to a super-highway and a tangle of roads that serve the new suburbs sprouting up around any Italian city that’s not completely dead. The most recent vivid example for me were the valleys that intersect at Perugia, the north-south valley dominated by the E45 highway and the east-west highway that runs through the valley below Perugia.
Of course, Perugia itself bans cars in the centre and, like many Italian cities, even imposes fines on anyone who tries to drive in the zone pedonale (pedestrian zone). But there are any number of roads and car parks around it, to serve everyone who drives up to the walls and then gets out in order to have their pristine pedestrian experience.
What I’m looking to see is the precedent-setting city mayor who doesn’t just make life difficult for cars in the compact and tourist-oriented urban centres that are now the identity-makers for the city, but the mayor who tries to tackle the issues of suburban road-building. I haven’t seen anyone in Europe tackling this in a serious way, except possibly for French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s competition two years ago for urban planners to come up with a way of creating a transit system and urban plan for Paris’s outer suburbs.
In the meantime, I will stroll back through the car-free streets of Urbino, enjoying my pedestrian experience before I retrieve my car from the carpark just outside the city walls and head on out along the superhighway to Fano and the Adriatic, coping with the inevitable traffic around me.
86 responses so far ↓
1 Corey // Jul 3, 2011 at 9:01 am
What I would like to see is a leveling of the field between cars and other forms of transport. Would cars really be so dominant if their subsidy was taken away (or other forms of transport were subsidized at the same level, assuming we could afford that?)
2 Andrea Cordonier // Jul 3, 2011 at 9:49 am
Ha! I don’t think anyone anywhere at anytime on the planet has ever combined the words “King George Hwy” and “Champs Elysee” into a single sentence before. You’re a true master and I bow down.
3 mezzanine // Jul 3, 2011 at 10:53 am
IMO i think a lot of the highway-oriented places in tuscany is due to its agricultural industry. When we drove to San Gimignano from Sienna, we went thru a long stretch of warehouses and food processing plants.
4 Everyman // Jul 3, 2011 at 11:57 am
Ah Frances, you’ve discovered Europe’s dirty little secret. It reminds me of that line from the Wizard of Oz “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain”!
5 Glissando Remmy // Jul 3, 2011 at 4:14 pm
The The Thought of The Day
“Criticizing Italians for their transit arrangements and urban choices and their way of life… after flying half the world as a Return Vacationer to their cities … is hypocritically dumb. Your Carbon Footprint must be flushed with embarrassment by now, Frances.”
Historic Districts aka Touristic Districts in most European cities, are the only car free zone districts for exactly that. They are the open air spectacle put out by the city for the benefit of the hoards of visiting tourists like yourself. Period. And that’s damn smart for them to do that.
See, YOU are on vacation. THEY…are not.
Life goes on, people need to go to work, people move, goods move, gee, maybe it’s not that wise from the city’s economic well being point of view, if everyone starts walking around like they have nothing else to do and no one’s in a hurry. Maybe they cannot afford dream sequences like the ones out of the Charlie Chaplin movies. Whereas in Vancouver…
If I were you I would bring that to their attention. Pronto. Also, I would propose Trial Separated Bike lanes on Ponte Palatino and on Ponte Garibaldi in a loop with Lungotevere De Cenci, de Pierleoni and Degli Aguillara.
See how they take it.
COBBLED STREETS
Aren’t they good lookers?
Closer to home…Cobbled streets in Vancouver, gee, where to start, all of them gone. By some weird luck though one can still encounter a few of them in different form of humiliation, left behind by the City out of laziness I assume, and what’s left… some in Kits, some in East Vancouver, some in Gas Town… half covered in asphalt… the parked cars cover the rest.
HISTORIC / TOURISTIC CAR FREE ZONES
I have personally advocated for that in Gas Town (no car traffic other than small, preferably electric delivery trucks, and based on the numbers, small tour buses) pedestrian traffic only.
But hey, apparently that stand against progressive selective development and gentrification, not to say that the multi-level parking structure is already there, soooo…
HOME SWEET HOME
By the time you come back to Vancouver, that little ugly but growing shrine at the base of Hudson Bay, downtown, will become the place to be in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Hollyhock gurus are already showing interest in that, trying to bring in a healing angle to the story.
If they could only squeeze The Riot Healing aspect into it…
With lyrics by Allen Garr:
“Touch the board signed in by Christy,
Kiss the scratch left by Gregor’s Ring,
Play ‘Game Seven’ for me… misty,
All’s well, you’ve got healed of ‘Rioting’!”
With a mandolin background music and a Vision chorus, that’s a killer right there.
We’ll be fully booked till 2020!
People from all over the world would come visit us, to take in the blessed air and take home that Riot healing experience.
But here’s the kicker.
Come next year, you’ll be writing this blog not from Rome, and not from Paris, but from Stratchona, describing how unlike the Romans, the Strathconans are avid cyclists carrying live chicken in their front baskets, while on their way to selling free run eggs to the Kitsilanos lying in the nude on the Wrecked beach, and how unlike the Parisians they are all smoking weed, but not any weed, BC Bud quality.
We are talking 30 Miles Diet in here…till then though…
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
6 Morry // Jul 3, 2011 at 5:17 pm
I would stick to driving along the hill tops, the Adriatic coast is a joke. But if you are on the coast don’t miss: Ristorante Puntiron’s in Marotta. Head in after 8pm.
7 Lewis N. Villegas // Jul 3, 2011 at 8:36 pm
It’s probably a density thing, Frances. The historic centre is the point of origin. And it partakes of two advantages:
1. It is near to Everything.
2. Typically, there has been an ethos of pride & preservation.
In the suburbs, the problem is sprawl and density. And I am not entirely convinced this is a new problem. The campagna always sprawled. And sooner or later that low density urbanism is the basis for the next wave of urbanization.
Possibly the most interesting object lesson in urbanism is flying in or out of Frankfurt. The scene outside the small window as one approaches is one of very well designed villages (at quartier scale) surrounded by farms and fields, linked up by highways and railways.
You can see it on Google Earth.
After a fast industrialization in mid 19th-century, and some bad business in Berlin, Germany defeated the French circa 1871 and—almost as the spoils of war—soon found themselves as the leading edge of western European urbanism. The Haussmann era was over. Full stop.
Frankfurt still has a tower zone, and a historic zone, and like many British and German urban centres, engaged in rebuilding after severe aerial bombardment.
But the real story is the network of towns that webs out from the centre. There, the pedestrian priority zone is the central square, or the equivalent to the italian piazze. Yet, most of the side streets look like they are calm and drivers know to mind their neighbours.
City Ideale German style.
8 Bobbie Bees // Jul 3, 2011 at 9:19 pm
Don’t worry Frances, give it no more than 50 years, what with the Chinese and Indians upping their demand for oil. North American and European cities alike will be severely kicking themselves in the a$$ for wasting all that money and precious oil creating urban sprawl. I’m happy I won’t be around to see the outcome of the wars over the last few drops of oil.
But hey, it was a good party while it lasted, right?
Why conserve for the future when you can blow it all right now, eh?
Why even here in Sunny Vancouver, the city is doing it’s damnedest to make sure that pedestrians don’t stop the progress of the automobile.
We’re getting a brand new ‘pedestrian’ controlled (should be control) intersection at Bidwell and Davie.
Why?
Any pedestrians get hit by a car recently, nope.
Any pedestrians have difficulty getting traffic to stop? Nope.
Nope, turns out that because pedestrians can cross at anytime, it f@#ks up the flow of car traffic and the poor widdle car drivers can’t speed through the west end like it was the Trans Canada.
Only in Vancouver, the city that claims it’s trying to become green, but still bends over backwards and kisses the rosy red a$$es of card drivers.
9 Glissando Remmy // Jul 4, 2011 at 12:23 am
The Thought of The Day
“While in Germany, the only three words you’ll ever need to master are: Bier, Bierwurst, and Danke!”
Out of pure luck, one of my best friends and an Architect working for my studio, moved his family to Schwangau a small municipality in Bavaria, two hours away from Munich. That was many years ago, BTW.
But that gave me the opportunity not only to establish a business office in the village but I took many trips to Bavaria ever since. To say that Munich is my favourite city in Germany is an understatement.
Munich is a pedestrian’s paradise with streets after streets of no car traffic, with small vendors, designer’s boutiques, mom and pop shops, cobbled streets, street width to building height ratios that are humanely designed, with festivals, street performers all year round.
For goodness sake, are they the same people that lost the war 70 years ago? Yes they are!
Believe it or not, like the majority of the German Cities, Munich was flattened out during the Allies bombings of the 1940′s.
Faced with the inevitable and horrendous choice of rebuilding their country from scratch, the German cities went their own different ways, Frankfurt (because Lewis pointed out this one) went the modern skyscraper, financial/ banking look (idiots)…the Manhattan look.
Berlin being divided for so long after the war, grew up with mixed approaches, old and new.
But Munich, didn’t want any of that. No Siree, Bob. Munich wanted back what they’ve lost. Their identity, their character, their old city. They wanted to recapture their old German ‘feel good’ feel.
That’s why now Munich is IMHO Germany’s most liveable city. And before I go any further I have to bring it out in the open, it’s not the great architects, the planners or the city officials that did it, though them being open to public discussion helped, it’s the people of Munich. They did it! They’ve been blessed with not having to put up with idiotic Messiah of Solomonic proportions as we do here in Vancouver, every three years or so.
Munich, it’s also considered Germany’s Silicon City meets Hollywood City, all in one.
Where here in Vancouver we have “I Scream’ View cones and View corridors they have Marienplatz (Mary’s Square) that marks the centre of the city and it was also the starting point for their city’s reconstruction, plus the tiny fact that any new building cannot exceed the height of the St. Peter’s church spires. Wicked, eh?
That’s what I call a City Hall administration with Public Balls instead of Developer’s Key Holders.
BTW, their City Hall dominates the plaza, and is a beautiful piece of Neo Gothic art.
Contrary to Vancouver’s down-town, Munich’s is a shopping magnet. People go there instead of going to the… malls.
Shopping in Vancouver, Thy name is Metrotwon!
Even when they go downtown, Vancouverites are shopping underground in the Pacific mall.
Geniuses! You think?
Back to the pedestrian adventure.
Munich’s main show off is their original great pedestrian areas.
Forty years ago the business district was on the verge of a local riot, when cars were first prohibited. Now? Not so much. With 120,000 + people passing by their stores every business day, they are ecstatic.
During holidays the $$$ take in is even better.
Anyhoo.
The philosophy was simple. Keep it local, have lots of green spaces, small human sized streets and buildings, no cars, walking made feasible, you didn’t hear me mention any biking now, did you, no, but one will have to provide an excellent public transportation system at their fingertips.
Vancouver? Still talking…
You can smell the small-town Munich aromas inside these boundaries, go ahead, smell the fresh produce and talk with the grocers. But here’s the kicker, are you ready for this? Contrary with what is happening in the Cowboy town of Vancouver, where if your horse dies, you are left behind too, to die, (only think of the small businesses that were ravaged in the riot and more recently remember the former maternity store “Hazel” on Cambie Street, in a david against Goliath fight with the Canada Line thugs and their lawyers – funny thing though, that happened under the ineffective trademark watch of one former MLA by the name of Gregor…who knew?) there you have the approach of neighbor helps neighbor, and then, the city helps both!
Get that? The city helps both!
How many times have you read about decrepit landlords, greedy landlords, development sharks waiting in the shadows for a business to fail, for the building to catch fire, so they could move in hike up the rents, or build 100 condos where before there was only a meat shop and a caffe.
A million times!
Well, while this (the pedestrian district) is the most expensive real estate in town (as per last appraisal) Munich keeps the rents low so these old-timers can carry on, and and on…
You go there every day for one week and I guarantee, you will go inside seven different eateries and end up asking for the same thing: Beer and Wurst. Even Vegetarians are having at it, incognito.
Now, I’ll have to look in the freezer, for some sausage, well why don’t I just ‘fogettabatit’ I’m out of beer too!
Dressed in a checkered shirt, traditional lederhosen with suspenders, off white slouched socks pulled down, Haferl shoes and served by a voluptuous blonde showing her… necklace, in a white trachtenblus’n, blue-white-blue drindl, with a red-white pinafore, carrying 1 litre Beer carafes around the garden… in my tonight dreams, for sure, godamnit!
I’ll blame Lewis!
Bier ist gut! Darf ich noch eine bitte? Vielen Dank!
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
10 Frances // Jul 4, 2011 at 2:35 am
Lewis and Glissy,
Interesting to hear about the German successes, especially if, as you say, they have found a way to extend that walkable experience beyond just the historic city centre. That was the point in my last post, wondering where the model is for developing walkable chunks of urbanism outside the downtown (in North America) or the historic city centre (in Europe).
And Glissy, your idea of having the city maintain control of some of the downtown buildings, in order to help keep small businesses in place — Surrey is considering acquiring property in the downtown it is trying to develop, as a way of encouraging those small, independent businesses. I’m waiting to see if they’ll actually do it and how it will work out.
11 Julia // Jul 4, 2011 at 4:20 am
If Surrey can hold property to protect amenity/neighbourhood businesses, they will have done something Vancouver does not have the courage to do.
Google Clone Town.
12 Chris Keam // Jul 4, 2011 at 7:37 am
“you didn’t hear me mention any biking now, did you, no, ”
Nope. But I’m happy to:
“Five Good Reasons to Ride a Bike in Munich”
http://www.muenchen.de/verticals/Traffic_Transport/Biking/228777/401fivegoodreasons.html
(1200 km of bike lanes in Munich and 22,000 parking spaces being one of those reasons)
13 Roger Kemble // Jul 4, 2011 at 10:30 am
Glissando Remmy @ # 09
Urban design expertise is rampant in Vancouver if you believe all the boasting of architect’s letterheads. Yet, according to our correspondents here there is quite a lack of it?
I fulfilled SCARP’s obligatory dance card of authenticity. I certainly learned what not to do!
And having a smattering of knowledge, and my experience with European cities so limited, I hesitate to become embroiled.
I spent my school years in Eboracum where Constantine the Great was declared Emperor of the Roman Empire in 306 AD and my school was founded some time later in 627 AD, by Saint Paulinus and still going strong.
Being at boarding school I cannot remember ever using the local TX. We did a lot of walking around the markets, on town leave Wednesdays and Saturdays: always we made a B-line for the pictures.
I spent a couple of professional years, teaching and carousing, in the largest city in the world. The tiers of its interlocking TX there are superb so long as you watch your wallet.
I also had the good fortune to enjoy a conducted tour of one of the world’s most livable cities by one of the worlds most famous planners where I learned that high rise tower amenity goes way beyond density or other bland nostrums and that city design is very complex: way beyond comparing home to your favourite tourist watering hole.
I hesitate, sin embargo, to pontificate on the whys and why nots of this or that conurbation even though there appears to be much dissatisfaction with home life here.
Do any of us urban gossipers have the jam to get out there and demand improvement? We will need more than bragging, lies and wet dreams.
Brown noses, evidently, don’t cut it!
We will need creative substance and guts to stand up against what’s going on now!
“We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy,” should read, judging by all this tourist gossip . . .
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us very dissatisfied.
(Subliminally of course ‘cos we don’t want to rock the boat).
14 Richard // Jul 4, 2011 at 4:32 pm
It is not just in the tourist areas. In Barcelona, many streets outside the core are also car-free. There is one I discovered in a working class area that was a mini La Ramblas except that instead of having lanes of traffic on either side of the median, it had bike lanes on either side.
Freiburg, a suburb of Freiberg, is also car free.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/12/science/earth/12suburb.html
Point taken that there is much car focused development in Europe. The take away is though that this pretty much destroys the myth that Europe is some how “different” so while car free areas work over there, they won’t work in a city like Vancouver.
15 David Hadaway // Jul 4, 2011 at 4:44 pm
Munich was a royal capital and it has to be admitted that, whatever their other faults, most monarchs let loose on the exchequer can lay out a good city, and not a town planning diploma between them. Modern mayors and bureaucrats, no matter how visionary and qualified, not so much. Nor perhaps Munich’s own idiotic messiah, whose Braune Haus and Ehrentempel were not among the structures so carefully rebuilt after the war.
It maybe shouldn’t be mentioned in the context of Wills’ and Kate’s visit, but Bavaria’s still extant Wittelsbach dynasty has a better hereditary claim to the British throne than the Windsors, being legitimately descended from Charles I rather than James I.
16 michelle // Jul 4, 2011 at 8:40 pm
glissando remmy# 09
I really, really liked your op-ed on Munchen. Believe it or not your beer garden description made me think that we should have an Octoberfest here in Vancouver too. I am sure we could put together a dozen long tables in a place like Granville Island, and I trust there are enough Vancouverites with German heritage and guests eager to attend. Think about it! hello Hospitality people…
chris keam # 12
Glissando writes an approx 1000 words piece and you pick on one…bikes. How predictable Chris, how predictable.
roger kemble #13
I didn’t get what you want to say exactly. Nobody in here is criticizing you. You on the other hand… what’s your plan?
17 The Fourth Horseman // Jul 4, 2011 at 9:30 pm
What a fabulous discussion.
18 voony // Jul 4, 2011 at 10:34 pm
Thanks David Hadaway #15 to remind us, that all the European cities the choir is singing praise of are product of Despostism…and not of some kind of idealized “populist democracy” they are calling for.
Obviously Munich after war could not have proceeded with the Hermann Giesler urban plan, and was called for humility
“They did it! They’ve been blessed with not having to put up with idiotic Messiah of Solomonic proportions”
…Clearly, you need to be seriously lost in a fantasy world of revisionists, to write such inanity when come to Munich.
19 Chris Keam // Jul 4, 2011 at 10:43 pm
@Michelle
Predictable or not, I think the fact that Munich has 1200 km of bike lanes and 22,000 bicycle parking spots is an important piece of info that went unmentioned by Mr Remmy. For those of us who haven’t visited Munich, it helps gain a greater understanding of the city’s transportation priorities. It appears to me they place a slightly higher emphasis on cycling as an effective urban transportation choice than one might infer based upon GR’s reminisces of the city.
I also had somewhere to be and time was short this morning. Given time I would probably have added some comments akin to Richard’s, pointing out that Munich is a ‘new’ city in the same way as many North American ones… and puts paid to the idea that cycling for transportation is a mode that can’t be accommodated in a modern city.
cheers,
CK
20 Roger Kemble // Jul 5, 2011 at 4:57 am
Chris Keam @ #19 “It appears to me they place a slightly higher emphasis on cycling as an effective urban transportation choice . . . of course, because the auto is, and was, unaffordable to most.
Anyone who has lived in Europe and seen the morning and evening rush hour will know of what I speak: bikes are absolutely the means of TX. Wow, you should see the crush after a soccer game!
Michelle @ #16“roger kemble #13 I didn’t get what you want to say exactly”. That’s okay Michelle try a little harder.
“Nobody in here is criticizing you. You on the other hand… what’s your plan?”.
Well that’s right: everyone is so wrapped up in their own little tourist indulgences they don’t pay attention to little old me or, for that matter, what is swirling around them.
Tune into any media other than CBC and Fox et. al. and European discontent is raging: I cannot believe our café crowd miss it!
Surely the consequences have some impact on their specious observations.
Plan?
Why would I have a have a plan?
Evidently I am not alone . . .
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/robert-becker/37126/flop-as-progressive-force-the-internet-devolves-to-entertainment . . . a “Flop as Progressive Force”
. . . concluding that on line gossip is just another medium of entertainment, not to be taken seriously. I don’t have a plan. I just like to gossip the same as you: less the smarmy pretensions, though!
Accordingly . . .
I am told that although only a dozen or so regulars frequent this blog hundreds, thousands, follow.
Ummmmmmm, I hope so!
21 Max // Jul 5, 2011 at 9:58 am
Well worth watching:
64 million empty apartments in China…
http://www.sbs.com.au/dateline/story/watch/id/601007/n/China-s-Ghost-Cities
22 Max // Jul 5, 2011 at 10:03 am
@michelle #16:
I am pretty sure Vancouver hosts an Octoberfest. Check out the Alpen Club.
23 Lewis N. Villegas // Jul 5, 2011 at 10:09 am
Marienplatz partakes of the German idea of making a square by widening a street for a stretch. Good lesson.
The German language is still beyond me, so that gets in the way of being able to dig into German urbanism beyond the translated or the obvious. That’s too bad because Stüben’s Der Stadtbau from the 1890′s is a treasure trove of urban facts.
I am totally on side with GR’s assessment of the tower district in Frankfurt. I have had the luck to know just one person that lived in one of the satellite towns I described above and first saw outside window of the plane heading into Frankfurt. Her experience of place confirms what is visible on google. The towns work as a unit. Things are nearby. The neighbours are close but not too close. There is enough of them to create a village culture, and there is transit to the urban centre. Those are the pegs to hang the urbanist caps on–not the Manhattan-like quarter.
Going to Frances’s question about our suburban lands, the satellite villages of Frankfurt could be seen as model neighbourhoods building out on the Surrey-Langley leg of the BC Electric R.O.W. over the next two decades.
So could Urbino for that matter. These German and Italian places resemble each other in remarkable ways. Where they differ is that Urbino is a hill town, and the Frankfurt satellites lie on a plain. Urbino, birth place of Raphael, host to Alberti on many occasions, and ruled in its golden age by the famed Renaissance patriarch is a treasure trove of history. The satellites are just villages that were either born or intensified in the nineteenth century.
Going in the other direction, forward in time into our region, the satellites on the Interurban would resemble their Frankfurt counterparts, Urbino, and any number of other urban sites with human scale including places in Canada such as: Montreal, Cabbagetown, Charlottetown, the Hydrostone neighbourhood in Halifax, historic Dartmouth a Sea Bus ride away, Winnipegs Market Square district, and of course our own Historic Quartiers.
Common characteristics we might measure in their urbanism might include: footprint of the townsite; scale of build out; land title; relationship of doors and windows to the street; orientation of units; density; length & width of streets; street aspect ratio; number of cars per household; walking distance to fast and reliable transit; number and disposition of public open spaces or “urban rooms”; cost to own; rent for an attic suite; etc.
Of course there are going to be differences, especially with European models, and with European models from historical eras long removed. Yet, like the proverbial glass at 50% capacity, one will be able to point to either the differences or the similarities. The real challenge is to be conversant with both, and comfortable in the knowledge that to trade in one does not commit one to meddle in the other.
We can build sustainable urbanism without falling into European or historical styles. Yet, unless we build with the human experience of place at the top of the hierarchy of urban goals, the places we get will not be the places we want.
24 MB // Jul 5, 2011 at 11:22 am
One factor not fully iterated in the above posting and comments is that most of these wonderful pedestrian plazas containing historic monuments and lined with caffes exist in the public realm.
We in the younger Canadian cities have an enormous public land base. There’s probably more acreage per capita in our cities devoted to public land than even the average in European cities. A shortage of space isn’t the problem here. What IS the problem is how it is used and configured.
Most of our publicly owned urban land is asphalted, curbed, guttered, illuminated, signaled and undergrounded with utilities at a great cost to public coffers, human sanity and the environment to serve the private car. A minority of its use is for commerce.
Building a legacy of high quality public pedestrian spaces that is meaningful to our culture, psychological and economic well being, and human spirit is only a decision away.
Lack of resources, especially land, is not a viable excuse for not doing it.
25 Max // Jul 5, 2011 at 11:29 am
Downtown Granville Street used to have so much character.
But now, is nothing but dead sapling trees, concrete and metal poles for bike and car park markers smattered on the sidewalks.
It is truly a mess and an eyesore. I do hope at some point council will address this disaster of an area.
26 MB // Jul 5, 2011 at 11:47 am
“In countries such as Australia, the US, Canada, Spain and Italy, weak planning has ensured that the distinction between town and countryside is blurred. Here you can find the worst of both worlds: a wildly unsustainable, disaggregated urban nightmare, in which infrastructure is stretched across sprawling suburbs, people have no choice but to drive, and anonymous dormitory estates seem perfectly designed to generate alienation and anomie.
“Sydney is not as bad in this respect as Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide, whose sprawl and low urban densities beggar belief, but the problems it now faces are the result of catastrophic planning failures. Without policies to keep cities compact and urban densities high, they will begin to fail all over the world: logistically, socially and economically. Remember that, whenever anyone argues that we should weaken the planning laws to stimulate the economy.”
George Monbiot, June 30th, 2011
http://www.monbiot.com/2011/06/30/atro-city/
27 Glissando Remmy // Jul 5, 2011 at 12:02 pm
The Thought of The Day
“You, of all people…”
Geez, Roger, if you think I am some kind of a moth still inside my cocoon waiting to get out and experience life, well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but you are mistaken.
I am paying attention of what is swirling around us, and surprise, surprise, I don’t follow CBC or FOX because I don’t watch TV.
But I read a great deal of foreign press, daily.
Anyhoo.
I am in reality totally immersed in the European “summer” of discontent that rages on throughout Europe and that IMO will be followed by the “winter” of discontent in the next few months.
“Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this son of York;
And all the clouds that low’r'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.”
(Richard The Third Act 1, scene 1, 1–4)
Will The Bard
Not only that Europe is the place where I mostly conduct my business, but parents are there and the rest of my family is there as I am writing this.
So.
As a matter of fact please take the time and read my arguments on the Greek crisis in here (BTW an interesting discussion went on in there):
http://www.citycaucus.com/2011/06/youtube-creation-captures-essence-of-robertsons-riot
And you already know my opinion on the fractional reserve banking, usury and on the Chinese North American land grabbing and other stuff.
That trip of mine throughout the memory lanes of Munich was just me venting out, and BTW, it was on topic, err, pedestrian zones in European cities, so…
My political commentary often comes down to satire; and by doing that I am hoping that people, after recognizing themselves in these pieces, will at least make the effort to think about what I said, and then act on it, change or not change… for the betterment of everyone.
Do they do that? Not a chance in Hell. They are after all, punks at heart, dressed in ‘respectable people’ clothes.
Based on my findings, if everything would have gone accordingly to the common sense, we would have a new Mayor by now after a short and brutal resignation, the new Police Chief would be… not Chu, Aufochs and Ballem would be the morning team serving burgers at the Mac, still on probation for the rest of their working lives, Gordon Campbell would be allowed monthly conjugal visits while Christy Clark would be his parole officer…you see where I am going with this?
Yeah, it’s entertainment… for some.
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
28 Roger Kemble // Jul 5, 2011 at 1:02 pm
B>THE FALL OF ROME
The piers are pummeled by the waves;
In a lonely field the rain
Lashes an abandoned train;
Outlaws fill the mountain caves.
Fantastic grow the evening gowns;
Agents of the Fisc pursue
Absconding tax-defaulters through
The sewers of provincial towns.
Private rites of magic send
The temple prostitutes to sleep;
All the literati keep
An imaginary friend.
Cerebrotonic Cato may
Extol the Ancient Disciplines,
But the muscle-bound Marines
Mutiny for food and pay.
Caesar’s double-bed is warm
As an unimportant clerk
Writes I DO NOT LIKE MY WORK
On a pink official form.
Unendowed with wealth or pity,
Little birds with scarlet legs,
Sitting on their speckled eggs,
Eye each flu-infected city.
Altogether elsewhere, vast
Herds of reindeer move across
Miles and miles of golden moss,
Silently and very fast.
W. H. Auden
Cerebrotonic Glissy.
29 Glissando Remmy // Jul 5, 2011 at 5:33 pm
The Thought of The Day
“Bruce Wayne. Clark Kent. Peter Parker… all Cerobrotones, so yeah, you may say I am in good company.”
You ask my wife, she’ll say she already cheated on me with at least three of my split personalities.
The one she despises the most though, is Edward Scissorhands.
…
That was a hell of a poem you posted on Bula’s Literati and Friends.
Very , very good. Hard to write and decipher.
All stanzas are image packed, very powerful imagery. Goddammit!
I loved it!
Covering a timeline starting with the Fall of Rome, visiting the 1918 avian flu horrific epidemic, ending in American Decadence and Decline… what’s not to like. Thinking that it was written in 1947 at the beginning of the Cold War, wow, still as refreshing today as a junior mint.
Good find, Roger.
And if you liked the Fall, I am sure you’d love the Shield… I’m talking Greeks here.
Ancient Greece and the Modern Times.
THE SHIELD OF ACHILLES
She looked over his shoulder
For vines and olive trees,
Marble well-governed cities
And ships upon untamed seas,
But there on the shining metal
His hands had put instead
An artificial wilderness
And a sky like lead.
A plain without a feature, bare and brown,
No blade of grass, no sign of neighborhood,
Nothing to eat and nowhere to sit down,
Yet, congregated on its blankness, stood
An unintelligible multitude,
A million eyes, a million boots in line,
Without expression, waiting for a sign.
Out of the air a voice without a face
Proved by statistics that some cause was just
In tones as dry and level as the place:
No one was cheered and nothing was discussed;
Column by column in a cloud of dust
They marched away enduring a belief
Whose logic brought them, somewhere else, to grief.
She looked over his shoulder
For ritual pieties,
White flower-garlanded heifers,
Libation and sacrifice,
But there on the shining metal
Where the altar should have been,
She saw by his flickering forge-light
Quite another scene.
Barbed wire enclosed an arbitrary spot
Where bored officials lounged (one cracked a joke)
And sentries sweated for the day was hot:
A crowd of ordinary decent folk
Watched from without and neither moved nor spoke
As three pale figures were led forth and bound
To three posts driven upright in the ground.
The mass and majesty of this world, all
That carries weight and always weighs the same
Lay in the hands of others; they were small
And could not hope for help and no help came:
What their foes like to do was done, their shame
Was all the worst could wish; they lost their pride
And died as men before their bodies died.
She looked over his shoulder
For athletes at their games,
Men and women in a dance
Moving their sweet limbs
Quick, quick, to music,
But there on the shining shield
His hands had set no dancing-floor
But a weed-choked field.
A ragged urchin, aimless and alone,
Loitered about that vacancy; a bird
Flew up to safety from his well-aimed stone:
That girls are raped, that two boys knife a third,
Were axioms to him, who’d never heard
Of any world where promises were kept,
Or one could weep because another wept.
The thin-lipped armorer,
Hephaestos, hobbled away,
Thetis of the shining breasts
Cried out in dismay
At what the god had wrought
To please her son, the strong
Iron-hearted man-slaying Achilles
Who would not live long.
W. H. Auden, 1952
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
PS.
And, yes, I hope to give to some of the ‘strategic communication’ people from the Spin & Disinformation Office at the City Hall, a bit of a headache.
Maybe we’ve stumbled upon something here, Roger!
30 Michael Geller // Jul 5, 2011 at 10:11 pm
A wonderful discussion…..
After spending a few days in the predominantly pedestrian oriented historic centre of Seville, and riding their modern new tram line, (apparently the first of more to come)….and then yesterday wandering around Marble Arch in London, seeing a surprisingly large number of cyclists…. I could not help but think that these two cities really are addressing, in a significant way, how best to get around while reducing congestion and carbon footprint.
Not only does one see an increased number of cyclists, one reads a lot of about cycling in the London newspapers handed out to you as you get on the tube….
One thing that I did note in both cities, which have extensive bike lanes along sidewalks as well as roads and bike share programs, is that most cyclists are not wearing helmets.
I would love to know just how much our requirement for helmets affects bicycle usage in our city.
In Seville and London it is feasible for a pedestrian leaving a pedestrian zone to get onto a bike and take it for a short trip….that will be more difficult to do in Vancouver…when we get our bike share program…. if you are law abiding, and don’t carry a helmet around with you.
One other thing…although I did not come across many ‘scramble’ intersections that give pedestrians the right of way in all directions at the same time…I did notice in Seville that the traffic lights take much longer to change than what we are used to.
I can’t help but think someone has done some research and determined that given how long it takes for many motorists to stop checking their email at red lights and get moving once the lights change, it makes sense to change the lights less frequently.
This is something Vancouver’s transportation engineers might want to investigate in our effort to improve the safety and efficiency of our roads for pedestrians, cyclists and motorists.
Frances, I do look forward to our forthcoming CKNW Civic Affairs Panel discussions when we attempt to distill the lessons for Vancouver from our respective travels…as well as the lessons for other cities from Vancouver…since yes, there is much we can offer too.
BTW…I’m staying in a hotel in London across from the new Olympic Athletes’ Village. Yesterday I walked over to the construction site which like ours, is fenced off with considerable security.
From a distance, there is a remarkable similarity in building form (although I must say, from a distance, ours looks much better than the London project that is being developed by the same company that did the Sydney Australia Olympic Athletes’ Village).
It will be interesting to see how their housing works out post Olympics…but that’s another story!
31 Ron // Jul 6, 2011 at 2:06 pm
32 Morry // Jul 7, 2011 at 7:42 am
@Michael:
” One thing that I did note in both cities, which have extensive bike lanes along sidewalks as well as roads and bike share programs, is that most cyclists are not wearing helmets.”
If one were cycling around the downtown peninsula of Vancouver one could make the case of having to wear helmets optional. Women and men cycling about in business attires on their city bikes is a common site in many european cities. In vancouver if i was riding into the downtown area it makes sense to wear an helmet. once in the city tooling around unfettered at a slow pace it would be nice to be helmetless, just like the good citizens of London, Seville et al.
33 Everyman // Jul 7, 2011 at 11:02 am
@Morry 32
Makes sense, as long as they waive their right to universal healthcare treating head injuries if they crash.
34 Chris Keam // Jul 7, 2011 at 11:21 am
I don’t see anyone asking drivers to waive their right to healthcare when they speed and cause an accident, nor do smokers or other individuals have to forgo medical treatment due to their choices.
If we could only get everyone to slavishly obey every traffic law there is, we’d have enough money to gold plate the streets and bubble wrap every sharp object in the country.
In terms of public health benefits, a law requiring a helmet while using a ladder would probably have a greater positive impact on overall health outcomes.
35 Roger Kemble // Jul 7, 2011 at 11:32 am
Yup, it’s only a matter of time before our “Saddle Sniffers” insinuate themselves into, and take over, the conversation.
Perhaps this little diversion. . .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_acwahNKjNU&NR=1
. . . may help to relieve the boredom!
36 Bill // Jul 7, 2011 at 1:28 pm
@Chris #34
Fuzzy logic as usual when it comes to cycling. The discussion point is whether helmets should be optional or the law – like seat belts or helmets for motorcycles. And the rationale for infringing on individual rights to decide whether to use a seat belt or wear a helmet is that society picks up the tab if someone is injured by not doing so.
So the question really is – “does wearing a helmet reduce injuries”? If yes, then it is reasonable to require cyclists to wear a helmet just like with seat belts or helmets for motorcycles.
37 Chris Keam // Jul 7, 2011 at 6:00 pm
Lots of debate over whether helmets make cyclists safer, but many suspect the opposite, unintended result is just as likely. There are lots of things we could do to make roads safer for cyclists. Helmet laws don’t appear to be in that category. See link below for more info.
———–
No clear evidence from countries that have enforced the wearing of helmets
Summary points
Case-control studies suggest cyclists who choose to wear helmets generally have fewer head injuries than non-wearers
Before and after data show enforced helmet laws discourage cycling but produce no obvious response in percentage of head injuries.
This contradiction may be due to risk compensation, incorrect helmet wearing, reduced safety in numbers, or incorrect adjustment for confounders in case-control studies.
Governments should focus on factors such as speeding, drink-driving, failure to obey road rules, poor road design, and cycling without lights at night.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1410838/
38 Chris Keam // Jul 7, 2011 at 6:02 pm
“:And the rationale for infringing on individual rights to decide whether to use a seat belt or wear a helmet is that society picks up the tab if someone is injured by not doing so.”
By this rationale anyone in a traveling in a motor vehicle should be wearing a styrofoam hat.
39 ThinkOutsideABox // Jul 7, 2011 at 7:04 pm
By that rationale, the car manufacturer builds in seat belts which are mandatory to wear when driving, crumple zones and air bags, all of which the driver picks up the tab for in the cost of the car, making the “styrofoam hat” redundant.
I note that a motorcyclist participating in a helmet law protest in NY state died after he hit the brakes and flew over his handle bars. Evidence at the scene and information from the attending physician indicate Contos would have survived if he had been wearing a DOT approved helmet.
But I do agree that governments should focus on poor road design.
New figures from ICBC show an increase in the number of accidents on the Burrard Street bridge after the installation of bike lanes.
Anyone turning right from Pacific onto the Burrard bridge would know what a precarious intersection that is. I mentioned it here last summer. Why was it a mystery to our city’s engineers and Jerry Dubrovolny?
I avoid that turn when driving, and avoid the southbound bike lane along Burrard towards the bridge head when cycling.
40 ThinkOutsideABox // Jul 7, 2011 at 7:12 pm
@Roger 35, totally agree. It’s like a Godwin’s law spawned in the micro-climate of this blog.
41 Chris Keam // Jul 7, 2011 at 7:19 pm
Seat belts, air bags and crumple zones aren’t necessarily going to prevent a head injury. We can never be too careful
42 Morry // Jul 7, 2011 at 9:42 pm
no one has discussed the urban vs non urban cyclist. and what are the levels of head injuries suffered by cyclists in London. Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Paris etc.
betcha it’s very low.
43 Gerry McGuire // Jul 8, 2011 at 6:04 am
It’s been exactly a year. Happy f***ing anniversary, Gregor. It’s been a riot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZDVGipZwdQ
44 David Hadaway // Jul 8, 2011 at 9:16 am
@TOaB
That junction is appallingly designed but it’s far from alone. For a while I’ve thought that road layout, marking, surface and signage standards here are very poor compared to other parts of the world. My own pet hate is the crappy road paint that vanishes in the dark and wet.
As for urban traffic management, it seems to be stuck in the 50s, if there’s a problem add a set of lights. We actually have a lot of blacktop compared to the European cities we’re talking about but by failing to use it efficiently are unable to create room for the public spaces everyone claims to want.
On another note, and hesitatingly, it does seem that vehicle manufacturers should be required to provide as much safety consideration to people outside the vehicle as to those cocooned within. I gave up driving a convertible after after thinking an SUV equipped with some kind of chrome ram was about to decapitate me and certainly would never dream of riding a bike here.
45 jesse // Jul 8, 2011 at 11:53 am
Western Europe is littered with mid-scale cities, a few hundred thousand residents, with pedestrian-only zones but all of them have ample parking around the perimeter. Larger cities cannot do this and rely on transit and higher parking fees to feed people into the core.
Vancouver as a city doesn’t have a major parking problem, for those who venture outside of a few popular neighbourhoods. Fraser and Hastings offer parking in the back alleys precisely because its what its consumers want. It’s to the point where I will avoid going to certain parts of Vancouver now because parking is so bad or expensive, and will accept shopping in another area instead. Call it creative substitution. Maybe sprawl isn’t such a bad thing. (duck)
46 Bill McCreery // Jul 8, 2011 at 3:29 pm
An interesting insight Frances. It reminds me also somewhat of Quebec City. Although cars get inside the walls there, there is clearly a distinction between the old and new cities, among other things, with respect to car accessibility and dominance.
The relevance of restricting cars access in downtown Vancouver as a quality of life improvement is a worthwhile objective. But, as others have pointed out monarchs have a better track record than planners.
Banning cars downtown in Vancouver at this point is not a wise idea, although that is precisely what Mayor Greg and Vision appear to be doing by stealth. They are deliberately creating bottlenecks at major chock points (Burrard Gateway ++ projects at north end of Bridge, Marine Gateway at Marine and Cambie, and about to do the same at north foot of Granville Bridge — it’s interesting isn’t it, a “gateway” is supposed to allow you access isn’t it?), and installing “trial” bike lanes on inappropriate streets.
A better solution is to use smart integration design techniques to permit cars, car parking, pedestrians and bikes to coexist peacefully. Vision’s war on cars is creating the opposite result. Granville Island, and for that matter Quebec City, are examples of such more balanced solutions.
There are a variety of ways to create a ‘people friendly’ urban environment. Vancouver has been slowly working towards that for the past 40 years with considerable success. There’s ways to continue moving to our nirvana, but it’s not the way Vision is trying to do it.
47 Michelle // Jul 8, 2011 at 3:31 pm
gerry #43
Now that really was redundant of you Gerry. Why would anyone want to lower themselves to the level of his Lowership Robertson?
This vision acrobats would pick up on anything you foolish candidate! And wouldn’t that be a dozy?
48 Max // Jul 8, 2011 at 4:18 pm
@Gerry #43:
shhhh….Mayor Robertson (current poster child for cyclists ) is busy out breaking other rules:
Why is the Mayor riding where bikes are banned
http://www.theprovince.com/travel/mayor+riding+where+bikes+banned/5070862/story.html
49 Bill Lee // Jul 8, 2011 at 6:54 pm
Re: # 12 Jul 4, 2011 at 7:37 am and others.
Munich is not a paradise for bikes.
In the Munich SZ newspaper (one of the better feuilleton sections), they reported last month that surveys showed that bike accidents had gone up 35 percent in the winter months of January through March. Of 42 major cities in Germany, accidents have gone down in most cities over 5 years, except in 22-ranked Munich. The city liked to boast it is the cycling capital, but it is “Im roten Bereich” — the red zone.
The Munich police had a blitz in June on cyclists and over 3 weeks, warned 7359 cyclists, with more than 5000 paying a fine between 45 and 180 Euro. 2300 were charged, and 2100 drove through a red light.
The deputy police chief Robert Kopp called for a new culture by cyclists.
Compare this to the few hundred fines by the police here.
And the bike paths! In Ebersberg a path from Siegertsbrunn to Egmating is lead through a track in a forest because that is the boundary of the district. Other paths are rough pave stones, hard on bikes and their riders.
From the centre, MarianPlatz, to Aubing in the west for example is 12 km. It is not a big city for the routes.
The best city for cycling was Oldenburg in Lower Saxony. I thought nearby Bremen was good, despite all the cars mostly parked, in that compact city with a small inner city where cars are forbidden and light rail rules.
As for the takeover of the lists, Richard Campbell, (posting on this blog as “Richard”) is a paid flack for the various BCCC, VACC, BEST etc. groups and puts out several notices each week on issues and media addresses and phone numbers and web lines. Chris Keam also writes for the Reed publication Bike Europe sometimes. Eh, so what.
There are astroturf campaigns for all topics all the time and even “naive friends” who will join in anyway.
50 Gerry McGuire // Jul 8, 2011 at 7:04 pm
@ Michelle 47 Slightly (only slightly) more refined, today’s offering.
PS We have nothing to fear but fear itself!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSCqcRfCPQ4
51 Lewis N. Villegas // Jul 8, 2011 at 8:12 pm
I’m with Alan Jacobs. Asked about the bike helmet issue at his recent lecture in Vancouver he didn’t relent, “Wear the helmet” was his advice. Buckle the seat belt. Wear sunglasses or shields on motorcycles (’cause of the bumble bees), etc.
Jessy #45, Bill #46
There is an answer that might work for us. Implementing BRT and/or LRT takes away road space from cars (2.5 lanes or so) but returns many times more trip capacity. Implementation of transit can be accompanied by redesign of the new transit street. Congestion, at say 8,000 or 12,000 vehicles per day, might be used as a gentle encouragement to use transit for the commuter trips. Off peak, curb side parking might give merchants added business.
But really, what we have to educate about is that this kind of implementation should be done hand-in-hand with residential intensification (high-density, human-scale of course). That means that merchants need to be shown that as many as 15,000 people will be living within easy walking distance of their cash register. That requires a new paradigm in retail, where you neighbours are your best customers, and your shop keepers often more reliable than your best friends.
If we step outside the downtown peninsula to consider Broadway, Mt. Pleasant and the Historic Quartiers, that kind of density is not there right now. However, as we intensify there is no reason why the feel of Broadway, Main Street, and Hastings Street (to draw an alternative horse shoe shape) might well resemble that of Robson, Denman and Davie.
That would happen after transit implantation, street revitalization, and some amount of residential intensification. Once more some of the best examples to draw from are already around us.
Bill is correct to point to Quebec Citadel and Granville Island as Canadian examples that work where we mix cars and pedestrians safely because the places are designed to function like pedestrian priority zones.
52 Chris Keam // Jul 8, 2011 at 9:59 pm
My experience on Granville Island is mostly cars traveling too fast for a place full of tourists and children and also failing to yield to pedestrians waiting to cross the road, esp at the entrance to the Island where the Seawall crosses the road. If that’s pedestrian priority, the design isn’t working.
53 Everyman // Jul 8, 2011 at 10:28 pm
@Chris Keam 34
Ah yes, that old argument. Take a look at the automobile of 100 years ago compared to that of today, and then do the same for bikes. Today’s car is nearly unrecognizable compared to its forebear: antilock brakes, stability control, airbags, navi systems, rear cameras etc.
And yet the bike remains virtually unchanged in terms of safety equipment.
And when one piece of safety equipment is suggested, cyclists complain like it is the end of the world. Why is that? Auto owners have had to bear the ownership costs of all that equipment as much of it is government mandated. Why won’t cyclists do the same?
I’m anxiously awaiting your defense of that other majority of cyclists, those who don’t carry any type of lighting.
54 Chris Keam // Jul 8, 2011 at 11:05 pm
Interesting that only one of the safety improvements noted is exclusively for the protection of occupants (airbags). The others are there to protect other road users, spurred in no small part by the continuing unacceptable death toll exacted by excessively powered vehicles driving by individuals with insufficient training.
Interesting also that seatbelts are mandatory in many places around the world, yet helmet laws are the exception, esp. in those countries with lots of cyclists.
At some point one has to take a look at the facts and accept that laws can and should be changed if they aren’t achieving their intended goal(s).
Mandatory helmets while cycling, but no mandatory wearing of lifejackets while boating? It’s a double standard IMO and I question why we allow one group freedom of choice while the other must conform to a law that isn’t working.
55 Chris Keam // Jul 8, 2011 at 11:10 pm
“I’m anxiously awaiting your defense of that other majority of cyclists, those who don’t carry any type of lighting.”
Don’t presume that I would do so.
Darkwads
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Darkwad
Too bad all these safety conscious folks don’t take a cue from the playa people and heckle the drivers who ignore cel phone laws and endanger others, instead of complaining about cyclists making a choice regarding their own wellbeing (helmets, not lights).
56 Chris Keam // Jul 8, 2011 at 11:11 pm
“excessively powered vehicles driving by individuals with insufficient training.”
driven by. Sorry for the typo.
57 Glissando Remmy // Jul 8, 2011 at 11:35 pm
The Thought of The Night
” QED – Quod Erat Demonstrandum or… ‘what was to be demonstrated’ ”
Gerry #50,
I have never came across this Riotson scripted recital before, the first part, I mean.
This is the past.
Here is my syntax for a theorem in the Riotson/ Solomon/ Vision/ City Hall scheme:
Theorem
) their portfolio of “green” businesses (Enerpro & comp) in BC, and cash in on the new Green Racket, starting with Vancouver… their Pied a Terre. A puppet is needed, thick skin, and lots of Bull.”
“A group of American ex-pat leeches from up North on the Cortes Island, want to diversify ( Renew All
Proof 1
One self appointed guru, seer of the future, approve of his own 500 years plan, in the applause of his followers. All they need is a puppet.
Proof 2
Lookout for puppet ends in Vancouver Fairview. Puppet found. Approve funding for campaign. Campaign successful. Start collecting.
Proof 3
Starting @ 0.30 min in the video…re. Mayor’s Vision for Vancouver:
” extremely competitive tax regime here…we within a few years will be the lowest corporate tax rate combined in the G8… we like to be the green capital of finance in the world as well… the Switzerland of green finance if you want…”
If P1 is true and if P2 is true and if P3 is true, then as each step applies an inference rule, the truth of our theorem is established…QED.
However.
I would like to end with the present time:
To date, out of the 20,000 green jobs proposed… at the present we have … N/A.
NET BUSINESS GAIN for the City of Vancouver:
Chicken Coops and Sanctuary CHECK
“Trial’” Bike Lanes CHECK
Bee Hives… almost CHECK
Wheat lawns CHECK
Community Gardens CHECK
Incompetent Senior Management CHECK
…
NET BUSINESS LOSS for the City of Vancouver:
Competent Senior Management CHECK
Destruction of the Downtown Vancouver due to Mayor’s Foolishness CHECK
Businesses relocation outside Vancouver CHECK
Olympic Village White Mastodon CHECK
…
Soooooo…
We live in Vancouver QEF – Quod Erat Faciendum or… “what was to have been done”… and this keeps us busy.
58 Roger Kemble // Jul 9, 2011 at 7:51 am
Bill Mc @ # 46
“Although cars get inside the walls there, there is clearly a distinction between the old and new cities, among other things, with respect to car accessibility and dominance.”
Yes, a clear distinction. La Vieux-Quebec is surrounded by walls and escarpments making access restricted. Essentially, the only vehicular entrance is Place d’Youville and that, in the tourist season, is a veritable over crowded parking lot.
It’s still subject to the shallow abuse of the tourists who really are just looking for a place to eat and come home with brownie points!
One of the great attractions in Vieux Ville, though, is the panoramic model of the Battle of the Heights of Abraham after which the Quebecois won a decisive victory at the Battle of Saint Foi (our history books keep that under wraps). The oncoming winter allowed the red coats to escape and the rest is history . . .
Once outside the perimeter it’s the same old same old. ”Basse Ville”, the erstwhile docks, is a veritable parking lot with the usual ersatz tourist distractions.
North of Riviere Saint-Charles could be Burquitlam with a Joual accent!
So, all our tourists will return, their 10% discounted peregrinations, after the summer: Frances full of “La Dolce Vita” never really being able to square the discrepancies between her brief masquerade as Pompeia and picking up the groceries.
We will never realize that ”Quartiers” are essentially a legislative issue not pretty pictures.
Urbanism will come into focus when the community controls the community (and, above all, have the respectful self-image to respect itself). We can do the JJ jig, with our notebook and measuring tape, all we like to no avail.
JJ subsequently wrote about that but, unfortunately, her later tomes seem to have been put on the back shelf.
59 The Fourth Horseman // Jul 9, 2011 at 12:19 pm
Common sense, stated elegantly.
We can’t talk you into running for a position at City Hall, can we, Glissy?
If not for elected position, I would gladly and without hesitation, nominate you for ‘People Laureate’. Duties: Hold up a mirror to our electeds. Make mischief. Stir the rabble.
As Shakespeare might have put it, were he into political sloganeering:
“Vote for Glissy! He gives a Puck!”
60 Jean // Jul 9, 2011 at 1:17 pm
M. Geller: “One other thing…although I did not come across many ‘scramble’ intersections that give pedestrians the right of way in all directions at the same time…I did notice in Seville that the traffic lights take much longer to change than what we are used to.
I can’t help but think someone has done some research and determined that given how long it takes for many motorists to stop checking their email at red lights and get moving once the lights change, it makes sense to change the lights less frequently.”
I totally disagree with this -am living in Calgary at this time. Downtown. Their traffic light change wait times are way too long. It’s just laughable when the roads aren’t heavily occupied 80% of the time anyway, and one is waiting for light to change. Believe me as a pedestrian and cyclist, it’s highly noticeable. And in -20 to -30 degreee C winters, it is just absurd.
This city also does not have hardly any pedestrian/cyclist traffic light push buttons.
Yes, we experience some great European downtown historic and pedestrianized cores/plazas in: southern Germany, Strasbourg (France), Prague, Copenhagen and Malmo.
While in North America, we could never replicate the centuries of architectural richness and variety that provide an additonal magnet for both locals and tourists, it might be useful to think what we do have now in certain areas for various Canadian cities.
I don’t totally agree that underground shopping malls are a bad thing if they are constructed carefully in areas in relation to public/green civic spaces that encourage pedestrian, cycling traffic and public meeting spots/social activities.
Example: In downtown Toronto on Queen St. East by Bay Street to University Avenue, that is probably a better example where there is convergence of shopping (underground shopping mall, the Bay above, etc.), subway entrances/exits, a historic courthouse (Upper Canada vintage) with little parkette and cobblestones (tourst attraction. I know I used to work there), Nathan Phillips Square with space for public activity and free flowing human traffic plus across the street another historic building –old city hall now another courthouse. Streetcar runs through there and there are bike routes along there.
Yes cars too. Crowded with tourists and locals….but it is our North American version of perhaps history and contemporary life converging there.
There are times we have to relook at some of our cities in new eyes.
61 Bill McCreery // Jul 10, 2011 at 4:47 pm
Good thoughts Lewis 51, and Roger 58, although Roger, while I see the essence of what you’re saying has validity, I do not share all your cynicism. As an eternal optimist, I prefer to build on and improve what we have. And, some of what we have in Vancouver is not to bad, a good place to start making it better.
What concerns me now is that the planning and development occurring in Vancouver is going backward, not forward.
62 Lewis N. Villegas // Jul 10, 2011 at 9:59 pm
“…. the planning and development occurring in Vancouver is going backward, not forward.”
Bill 61
So often they dance to the same tune. One of the key steps in the charrettes is to meet with a representative group of the development industry and have an open and honest session where real issues are on the table. We ask about the sticky wickets and the things (like parking) that are getting in the way of building better projects.
Few people realize that one of the most important aspects of the Form Based Code, the urban design component of the community plan, is that is ‘shows’ the outcome, or what the place will look like at full build out.
If, as was the case in the 3-year Mt. Pleasant planning process—where this brand of urbanism was not engaged—a 22-storey tower shows up at the final public meeting, then all the locals have to do is point to the drawings and say:
“It doesn’t look like one of these.”
They can do it at any point in time after that as well. The problem with doing urban design one site at the time is that we cannot plan the outcome. We cannot make a whole that is greater than the sum of the parts because we don’t know what the parts will be.
If properly executed the Urban Code will have the pro-forma for the build out, so the developers will have been already alerted that they can still do good trade within the purview of the Urban Code.
The most difficult thing to understand about ‘good’ urbanism is just how bland and simple it is… and how much delight and livability can be forged from just a few simple parts set out to achieve well defined results. Things that can be established well ahead of time in consensus driven, public consultation process.
63 Michelle // Jul 11, 2011 at 1:05 pm
lewis #62
You left out the most important part in your commentary. The MONEY. The developers are in it for that…THE MONEY. They don’t care about the ‘vibrant community’ they are building. Pish talk. Open houses are more like a dog and pony shows. Then it goes to the planning, UDPanel, DPBoard, Council, bla, bla, hoards of people awaiting to speak against the said projects, and then it gets approved cause the Vision/COPE/ NPA needs the developer’s campaign contribution. Yeah the charrettes are good in theory, you can show that to a bunch of students out for coffee and cookies. Look son this is what we could have build!
Vision needs to go (Robertson included) – the little mountain coop was demolished under their watch, during one of the biggest hole in Vancopuver’s housing affordability. There is a hole in the ground right now. That is simply criminal.
Toderian the Director of Planning, LOL needs to go as well he is useless.
64 Higgins // Jul 11, 2011 at 5:35 pm
Oh, Glissy #57 I never understood the QED… now I do! An act of beauty that was…what you wrote. Teachers might want to introduce this in the 4th Grade curriculum. Our kids will have to start learning about the creeps we have in politics from a young age so they would now how to avoid them in the future. Bravo, GR! I totally support The Fourth Horseman’s #59 motion… Glissando Remmy for People’s Laureate. Sounds good to me!
65 Lewis N. Villegas // Jul 12, 2011 at 12:16 am
“Yeah the charrettes are good in theory, you can show that to a bunch of students out for coffee and cookies. Look son this is what we could have build!”
Michelle 63
It is about the money for the developers because they are in a competitive economy. A dog eat dog world where you are quite right, it’s the money that matters.
The current political system is not much removed. In order to win a seat at Council, candidates have to choose: do they or do they not accept developer contributions? Most do and the results are more or less what you speak about.
However, the charrette process does work in other jurisdictions, and has never been used in our city as a municipal initiative. Not yet, anyway.
In South Fraser Lands, for example, it was the developer that brought in the King of the New Urbanism, Andrés Duany, to do the charrette, the urban code, and the whole-kit-and-kaboudle.
We are agitating to bring that to the neighbourhood planning level. We think that in the right context the developers will join in. I’ve seen it happen in the U.S.
No reason to think we can’t do it here.
66 Roger Kemble // Jul 12, 2011 at 5:40 am
What was that you said, Lewis @ #65?
“ . . . it was the developer that brought in the King of the New Urbanism, Andrés Duany, to do the charrette . . .”
King of the New Urbanism. WHAT!
Trevor Boddy exposed the Duany cult for what it is at southlands: the debate has been raging for many years – the viability of farming, the formerly called the Spetifore lands, were more than 8200 acres.
Much reduced these desparately needed farm lands are still under threat . . .
http://www.thecanadian.org/k2/item/608-southlands-video-debacle-raises-questions-damien-gillis
. . . and childlike you spew your stuff. It is 2010 Lewis: farmland is disappearing.
You made a fool of yourself in Nanaimo. You made a fool of yourself at SUNN. A charrette is not an opportunity for Lewis to strut and pout like a three year old: you just do not get it!
You are an absolute hero-worshipping oleaginous bloody fool. You insist upon sticking your nose into areas you have no expertise and no knowledge.
Why don’t you just cool it for a while and grow up?
67 Michael Geller // Jul 12, 2011 at 7:07 am
Roger, I think you have crossed the line with your mean spirited criticism of Lewis as written in post 66. It is not necessary. I am sure I am not alone in being disturbed by its tone and content.
You are also incorrect with respect to the Spetifore lands. They were never ‘more than 8200 acres’. They were once approximately 753 acres until a portion was sold to Metro Vancouver for parkland.
The plan that was developed through the Duany Charrette for this property may well lead to an innovative mix of agriculture and urbanism.
68 Roger Kemble // Jul 12, 2011 at 7:24 am
Michael @ #67
You were not at the Nanaimo debacle.
Read this . . .
http://www.thecanadian.org/k2/item/608-southlands-video-debacle-raises-questions-damien-gillis
. . . carefully again and watch the video.
I have lost patience with self-seeking developers such as yourself who have nothing to contribute but nice words hiding bad policy.
69 Roger Kemble // Jul 12, 2011 at 7:32 am
Michael @ #67
PS there are some pretty scary things going on . . .
http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/
and you seem to be in your own selfish little heaven, totally oblivious . . .
MYOB!
70 Roger Kemble // Jul 12, 2011 at 8:29 am
Michael @ #67
. . . mean spirited . . .
So you go the Spain on a house swap: lucky you . . .
And you frolic around the bazaars and parades. Lucky, lucky you . . .
In the meantime all hell is breaking out around you. Good Canadians are trying, risking their lives, to help the beleaguered people of Gaza. People are loosing their livelihoods.
And what do you do?
You complain about the graffiti!
And you don’t even have the good grace to learn the language to understand what it has to say.
And you have the impertinence to call me mean spirited!
71 MB // Jul 12, 2011 at 8:58 am
May I pop in for a sec, boys?
I’d just like to say that I value the comments by each of the three tenors, Roger, Lewis and Michael. I may not agree with the riff and tenor of the tenors, and they can be rather disharmonious together, but that doesn’t mean one or the other should step off the stage.
Their contribution to the idea of urbanism, though wrought and tempered with angst, formulaic pretentions and singular experience, have helped me (and I’m sure other readers) to refine my own ideas of this worthy idea, not because I swallow what any one of them says hook, line and stinker, but because juxtaposed they bounce off each other and orbit the truth like free radicals.
Roger, the green grey Strait and a stiff breeze becons right about now, eh?
72 Roger Kemble // Jul 12, 2011 at 9:09 am
MB @ #71
Yes, I’m planning to cruise through Dodds, down Trincomoli channel to Porlier, across the Straits to Point Roberts, were my daughter has a place, and chill out for a while . . . then a night in False Creek watching the city go to bed . . .
beginning of August weather permitting . . .
73 Bill // Jul 12, 2011 at 12:27 pm
@ Roger 70
“Good Canadians are trying, risking their lives, to help the beleaguered people of Gaza.”
While not on topic, your comment is very revealing as it reflects an individual who, at best, would be described as “gullible”. These “good” Canadians are worthy successors to those who Stalin called “useful idiots”
74 spartikus // Jul 12, 2011 at 3:53 pm
9 out of 10 dentists agree: There is no faster way to derail a non-Israel/Palestine internet discussion than to bring up Israel/Palestine.
Remember kids, be like Gold Five and “Stay on target!“
75 Higgins // Jul 12, 2011 at 8:40 pm
Bill #73
“Good Canadians are trying, risking their lives, to help the beleaguered people of Gaza.”…said Roger. (yeah not on topic but in all honesty the posts and comments on Fabula as of lately are forceps-ed out, not healthy IMHO)
And he is right on, Sir!
The bullshit perpetrated by the Israelis has gone for long enough. I for one am too tired of their disinformation.
spartikus,
when the topic starts to smell change the subject. Typical …
76 Bill // Jul 13, 2011 at 9:14 am
Higgins #75
Obviously not all of the useful idiots are on the ships.
77 Mira // Jul 13, 2011 at 12:51 pm
To Bill re. #73 #76
Roger and Higgins are some of the commentators that sometimes make sense sometimes they don’t. This time they do. You have your head to deep up yours, Bill. Nobody buys your kind of crap anymore, where I come from, they don’t. And BTW how did that Noah Ark work out for you?
78 spartikus // Jul 13, 2011 at 1:29 pm
And Gold Five goes down in flames.
Just like the movie.
79 a layman // Jul 13, 2011 at 4:04 pm
I must admit, as a concerned citizen, I read Mr. Villegas’ posts and thought he made some very good suggestions regarding improving the current planning process. Of course there is an issue of developers beholden to profits rather than good design, and politicians who need to encourage the developers to make big profits so they can donate to their campaigns.
But if the current planning process is so skewed and causing community groups to form and sign petitions 11,000 strong, why not at least try something different (like a charrette) that might be more transparent and accountable? If I were a civic politician who got elected on 50,000 votes, a petition of 11,000 against my re-zoning policy from just one neighbourhood would have me quaking in my boots… Surely, no amount of developer donations are going to counter that level of public outrage? There are many more than just one neighbourhood that appear to be completely fed up with what’s been going on in the development/planning community over the past few years.
That’s where, Mr. Kemble, you are really confusing me. Admittedly, I know nothing of Duany or Spetifore or Nanaimo. Clearly, you don’t like Mr. Villegas (and I agree with M. Geller that you have crossed way over the line — please argue against facts and debating points, and not resort to infantile personal attacks). But, you are clearly some sort of expert, so, can you tell us exactly what you don’t like about the actual planning process Mr. Villegas is suggesting be implemented? Again, it sounds quite sensible to me (a layman), or at least, I don’t see the harm in trying this different planning method?
I’d really like to understand this better because it appears that the current planning process has become horribly corrupted, and many people believe the results are doing real harm to Vancouver’s neighbourhoods. MB, Geller, McCreery and other commentators on this blog also appear to be experts in this field, and so your comments/critiques on this would also be very welcome. Thanks very much!
80 Bill // Jul 14, 2011 at 10:29 am
Mira, you might have a different take on the subject if you expanded your reading list beyond the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion”.
81 Ned // Jul 14, 2011 at 4:54 pm
I agree with spartikus. We need a change of topic.
But then I have to say this to Bill#79… because I went and googled his recommended reading for Mira #77, hmmm, in all honesty buddy you are a ‘useful’ one! Maybe you should do some reading yourself. But instead of taking your pound of manure from propaganda sites catering to both sides, read some real time reporting from some independent, respectable papers or news agencies on what happens there in Gaza. As it turns out the ever professional victims are doing on to others what others have done to them. Nice try Bill.
82 Bill // Jul 14, 2011 at 5:09 pm
Actually, Ned, I didn’t recommend any specific reading for Mira so I do not know what you googled or what you are referring to.
83 Joe Just Joe // Jul 15, 2011 at 8:40 am
Frances, come back and save us.
84 Michael Geller // Jul 15, 2011 at 8:53 am
JJJ…I’m entirely with you…
I am also delighted to report that Frances IS coming back since she’s scheduled to be on the CKNW Civic Affairs Panel which resumes next Tuesday at 9 am.
85 Bill McCreery // Jul 16, 2011 at 1:25 am
Roger 72, if you’re in Van please get in touch. It would be good to reconnect face to face Roger.
And, I concur with the comments of MB 71. There are indeed interesting ideas exchanged here. And, one thing I’ve learned, I trust, is that no-one is always right, but by gosh, there’s a stimulating exchange. And by and large we have to thank Frances for that. Her style of laying out her thoughts of the day are sometimes perplexing as to her motivation, but she has the unique ability to attract persons with divergent ideas and perspectives who, by and large, communicate at relatively civilized levels and certainly provoke further thought for us all. Thank you all.
86 Roger Kemble // Jul 16, 2011 at 7:11 am
Bill @ #84
Yes, God bless Frances . . .
In the meantime I’ll be in touch.
I’ll be visiting Julie at The Point after she’s done her Harmony gig. Then I’ll be in town.
Everyone, please check out Giulietta Designs, Harmony WV, mid August.
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