[sustran] Re: Indian roads - planes, cows, elephants, mosques

[martincassini at blueyonder.co.uk]

Some common ground then but not much, so we'll agree to differ.

Martin

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>
>
> The mistake hidden in this rationalization is that it erroneously assumes
> that traffic volume will remain constant after the intervention (in this
> case, after traffic lights abolition). But actually any facilitation of
> car use will increase car use and traffic. This kind of fallacy is
> constantly used, not only as a justification, but also for greenwashing of
> various motorized traffic projects, like parkings (they deter drivers to
> burn fuel for searching park space), motorways (less congestion hence less
> fuel use and pollution) even parks and pedestrian spaces destruction (they
> are more efficiently used).
>
> In the case of traffic lights removal there is in addition the danger to
> discourage walking and biking and thus to encourage even further car and
> motorcycle use. I am very sceptical about the general friendliness of the
> "naked streets" concept. It may indeed work in small Dutch or German
> towns, but in the case of Indian (and lot of other places) cities, it
> clearly creates an inhuman environment.
>
> However I think we can draw some very useful conclusions from these
> experiments and the undoubtedly fact that less accidents happen there. For
> instance when very often the corrupt and car use favouring administrations
> (using the above described perverted way of justification) set up barriers
> along the sidewalks, as a measure supposedly to protect pedestrians from
> car "accidents". But it turns out from these "naked street" cases, that
> this intervention creates a more dangerous environment (not only for
> pedestrians, but also for car and motorcycle users), because it gives to
> the drivers a false sense of security and encourages speeding.
>
> I am inclined to conclude that the best environment is created when
> regulations are completeley stripped out for pedestrians, are minimal for
> bikers and are strictly enforced to motorized traffic.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
>
> In the interests of long-term survival, people need to find other ways
> of getting about, work more from home, develop new energy sources. But
> something can be done NOW to make an impact on climate change: scrap
> traffic lights, the biggest gas-guzzlers of them all. From a Canadian
> website: “If every driver in Canada avoided idling for 5 minutes a day,
> 1.6 million tonnes of CO2 would not enter the atmosphere. It is
> estimated that idling and stop-go traffic costs motorists 753 million
> gallons of gas a year, or $1,194 per driver in wasted fuel and time.”
> But how do we avoid idling when traffic lights block progress in every
> sense? (In haste again, sorry)
>
>
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