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The Chicago Suburb That's Trying To Kill the Car (politico.com)
HughPickens.com writes: T. R. Goldman writes at Politico that downtown Evanston, Illinois—a sturdy, tree-lined Victorian city wedged neatly between Lake Michigan and Chicago's northern border, is missing one thing — cars. Or, more accurately, it's missing a lot of cars. Thanks to concerted planning, new developments are rising within a 10-minute walk of two rail lines and half-a-dozen bus routes and the local automobile ownership rate is nearly half that of the surrounding area. According to Goldman, the whole point of the suburbs, reinforced by decades of local zoning laws and developers' plans for a car-centric lifestyle, was that you weren't supposed to live on top of your neighbor, that there was supposed to be plenty of parking everywhere you went and that you weren't supposed to walk anywhere.
"But Evanston had a different idea: What if a suburban downtown became a place where pedestrians ruled and cars were actively discouraged?" writes Goldman. "Beginning in 1986, a new plan for Evanston embraced the idea of a '24/7' downtown, pouring resources into increasing the density of its downtown—a density that also meant decreasing residents' reliance on automobiles. As a compact city, Evanston couldn't compete with the vast sprawling parking spots of the Old Orchard Mall. It had to build a different sort of appeal."
Evanston has gained recognition and reputation for efforts related to sustainability, including those by government, citizens, and institutions and one thing that Evanston does to reduce the number of cars is let individual car owners rent their idle cars to other drivers through an online service. The service is being provided by a San Francisco-based startup called Getaround, and it's facilitated by a two-year, $475,000 federal research grant to the Center for Neighborhood Technology that's being implemented by the Shared-Use Mobility Center. Getaround claims that a car owner can make as much as $10,000 a year by renting out a vehicle and that renters can get a car to use when they need one for as little as $5 an hour.
Sharon Feigon says the new program is designed to test different models for car sharing in communities with different economic characteristics — ranging from low to moderate income communities in the city to more suburban areas like Evanston. "We'll also be surveying people about their use to better understand how it works and whether it actually leads to some people selling their cars, whether it reduces carbon dioxide emissions and vehicle miles traveled," says Feigon. "Car owners can make a little money and feel good that their car is in service to others. We expect 10,000 people will use the service over the two-year test period.''
"But Evanston had a different idea: What if a suburban downtown became a place where pedestrians ruled and cars were actively discouraged?" writes Goldman. "Beginning in 1986, a new plan for Evanston embraced the idea of a '24/7' downtown, pouring resources into increasing the density of its downtown—a density that also meant decreasing residents' reliance on automobiles. As a compact city, Evanston couldn't compete with the vast sprawling parking spots of the Old Orchard Mall. It had to build a different sort of appeal."
Evanston has gained recognition and reputation for efforts related to sustainability, including those by government, citizens, and institutions and one thing that Evanston does to reduce the number of cars is let individual car owners rent their idle cars to other drivers through an online service. The service is being provided by a San Francisco-based startup called Getaround, and it's facilitated by a two-year, $475,000 federal research grant to the Center for Neighborhood Technology that's being implemented by the Shared-Use Mobility Center. Getaround claims that a car owner can make as much as $10,000 a year by renting out a vehicle and that renters can get a car to use when they need one for as little as $5 an hour.
Sharon Feigon says the new program is designed to test different models for car sharing in communities with different economic characteristics — ranging from low to moderate income communities in the city to more suburban areas like Evanston. "We'll also be surveying people about their use to better understand how it works and whether it actually leads to some people selling their cars, whether it reduces carbon dioxide emissions and vehicle miles traveled," says Feigon. "Car owners can make a little money and feel good that their car is in service to others. We expect 10,000 people will use the service over the two-year test period.''
Actually, the air in Paris is worse:
http://www.numbeo.com/pollutio...
That number is meaningless. You want the number of accidents per person per unit of distance travelled. And here, because Americans ride in their cars much more than Europeans, we do not look so bad.
(Too lazy to struggle with WolframAlpha to give you a link here myself.)
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.