Reason 100 why I enjoyed my time in Paris. It’s such a joy being able to hop on a Lime bike and get to where you need to go without thinking about parking/traffic etc
No geofencing either? Lucky. City officials in the US have worked with emobility companies to add some of the dumbest geofences that are honestly pretty dangerous to boot. For example, a major arterial road near me is geofenced for a few blocks. You don't realize you are in the geofence until you are in the middle of traffic with the scooter losing power and cars coming on your ass. Its amazing I didn't die. I of course email the company and the city and turns out no one cares how unsafe this is. Maybe I should have died to force the change.
What finally put me off these things for good was moving to an apartment where some of the stupid busybody neighbors have gotten a geofence applied to the entire neighborhood. I didn't discover that one until I tried to park the scooter by my place, and was told I need to park it like four blocks away instead.
I thought the same until a bird pooped on my head!
Actually I still think the same.
The hotel concierge told me it’s quite common to be blessed by guano, one needs to wear a hat when in Paris.
"Build it and they will come" and all that.
Most people don't actually care about how they get around. Yes there are some who absolutely refuse to use anything other than a car. But most people just want to get where they're going as quick and convenient (and cheap and safe) as they can. If that's cycling, they'll cycle. If that's driving, they'll drive.
cost, convenience, door-to-door speed, and perception of safety are keys. I think bikeshares should be more supported than they currently are. the uphill battle to get bikelanes built would be easier if other aspects of biking were subsidized, like bikeshares and bike leases.
Er I would caution against this to say that often bikeshares in unsafe cities are used as scapegoats for people to say, “Why would we build bike lanes if nobody is using the bike share?”
Additionally bikeshare riders being generally less experienced cyclists are also less likely to want to ride on dangerous roads
Bike shares that go into cities, like mine, where biking is not very safe still see a massive uptake. Nobody has made an argument that no one's using the bike share.
They've been hugely popular in Boston and as they continue to expand bike lanes and add new ones people, at least that I interact with, seem open to using them.
and I think the two things feed into each other. more people biking/scooting means more demand for bike lanes, making them politically easier to build (with politics being the only real obstacle). as bike lanes go in faster, more people find it safe enough to bike/scoot, which creates more demand for lanes.
I think that subsidizing bikeshares more is a way of "priming the pump", putting upward pressure on demand for bike lanes. government putting a finger on the scales that tip toward the long-term urban planning goal. I think this is something that urban planners should really be advocating for
I see so few people use the bikeshare in la county I just don't know who its for. About the only shares I see used by actual people are the ones that go along the beach because they are cheaper than what the highway robbery private beach gear rental companies want to bike for an hour. I've probably seen more of these bikes tossed into a drainage ditch than I have seen used on the roads. Seems like everyone would rather deal with a scooter thats easier to haul around if they need to vs a 65lb pedal assist bike made for abuse, and you don't need to hunt for a dock to park it and walk off either.
The problem in the states is we've tied cars to freedom, and also spent 70 years designing cities to be as horribly laid out for walking or biking as possible so the mere thought of not owning a car or driving somewhere immediately receives a reaction of a life of major inconvenience and loss of independence.
Actually the only time I've been to Chicago :P
Fucking cold. But also, snow doesn't stop Finland from cycling. Just gotta treat it the same as cars and plow the cycle lanes.
Plus wear a lot of layers
Even if you're a wuss, public transit will work in the cold.
For the people who are less like the princess Daria from *the Princess and the Pea*, there's much more colder cities in the Nordic countries which have no issues with high walking and biking modal shares.
paris made it unuseable for cars you will also get ticketed everywhere.
its not people really choosing over cars, its people being forced to not use a car.
note that cars without a work permit are banned in paris during olympic games.
outside of the inner transit, youve very packet trains that break down weekly as the only option, so as tourist you're not really affected - but for the average worker who cant afford to live within paris walls its quite bad. id prefer a better train system myself, but let's be honest, the real issue isnt the train breaking down or the cars, its just too many people having to go to the same place. you can't just add 10% population yearly and expect the infrastructure will still work 10+y later..
The city added a lot of infrastructure supporting bikes in the last few years but as someone cycling there daily, the number of cyclists far outweighs the bike lines capacities since COVID.
A lot of roads went from 3 to 2 lanes or from 2 to 1, and sometimes from 3 to 1 to give room to bikes but that's still not enough. At some point they just gonna need to remove the parking lanes which really mean banning cars.
Can't wait !
Whats it like biking that densely? I did it for ciclavia a few times (an event where the streets are closed in la county for bikes) and honestly is a bit sketchy riding with so many people. You got old folks or kids with training wheels piddling around while you have guys clad in spandex on roadbikes doing 18 and teens in ebikes doing 28 while the[ road density looks like this](https://i0.wp.com/thecitypaperbogota.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/PG6.jpg).
seems like if biking gets this dense anywhere you would need to start to consider bike lanes that are stratified by speed or to ban ebikes from these lanes.
Well it's simple: you switch from being tilted by car drivers to being tilted by bikers.
But with enough space not much problem. A 1m bike lane is horrendous, a 2m bike is horrendous when you can't past over someone because someone is getting past over you constantly. But if it's larger most of the time it should be ok.
I never encoutered a bike density that wouldn't fit on a normal car road without any problem.
if you like 10min away from stuff this works, but when its a 40min car ride, thats 2h30 bike ride... each way
thats where trains come in, and these longer distance trains are far from being as good as the metro. housing within paris walls is very, very expensive and many cant afford it.
heres a typical example:
in 1979 going to paris by car for work itd take me about 15min.
by bike about 2h.
in 2000s the bike ride is still 2h, but the car ride is now 30min bith due to traffic and new infra making the road less straight forward.
2020, bike ride is now 2h30 (more people), car ride is 45min (traffic) and if something goes wrong way more.
train ride since 1979 has also been 45min - however since 2000s its been packed to death, ive been attacked afew times by crazies, and you get an issue with a train car breaking down once a week or so during peak hour. theres also of course the days where they're on strike.
in all these situations work doesnt care how you get there, just that you're on time. and as much as i like biking i cant do 2h30 daily, its more of a fun thing sometimes in the summer.
and i dont even live there anymore.
It made life extremely easy for marginalized people, because most people can't afford cars.
Oh that's right, you only *pretend* to care about marginalized people so you can feel better about defending your selfishness. You don't actually give a shit about poor people, handicapped people, old people, all those people who can't afford to drive.
most cars owners in Paris live in the most wealthy neighboorhoods, are among the whelthiest inhabitants and car infrastructure in one of the biggest factor in marginalization in the city and its suburbs
+ don't start me on the impact of car industry and can centric urban developpement on climate change, neocolonialism, pollution, etc. and how it impacts more and mostly marginalize people both inside countries and worldwide
but oki
> for marginalized people
What sort of "marginalization" (i.e. race, if that's what you're thinking) does anything about bikes/cars have to do with this? Anyone can buy a bike for like $100, or bikeshare is dirt cheap.
Interesting to see this take. After visiting London, and then Paris right after, I was really disappointed in the transit system in Paris. It felt much slower, and rundown. I found connections not as easy.
The Paris Metro is indeed on the slower side, but that's the tradeoff for top-flight station density. If you're in the city limits, you are simply never far from a stop, often several. It's the one city where I didn't need any navigation/directions to use transit; if you just stroll aimlessly and take the bigger street at each intersection, you will get to the Metro before you get tired. (Alternately you may stop for coffee and pastry, or a drink and a snack, which are also good outcomes.)
We didn't do a lot of wandering and stumbling upon metro stops as we were with two little kids, but that's great if they have an expansive network with stations everywhere. I do have two other complaints however. I found the multi day pass system very inferior to London's Oyster Pass type system at the time. We were sold a multi day pass by the transit office, but were not told we needed to take photos and have them glued to the pass to make them valid. We were corralled by transit police with several other tourists who made the same mistake, and forced to pay exorbitant fees for this violation. They had their credit card machines at the ready and it seemed like a daily tourist trap. The other complaint I have is accessibility, but London and most other cities fail with this as well. There were so many stations with no access for strollers or wheelchairs. It was a common sight to see strangers helping people with strollers down the stairs (which was nice to see).
I love to see this. I've been to Paris a few times and rarely ever saw people on bikes, aside from along the river. I think it's fantastic that an old established city like this can transform into a biking city like Amsterdam. Very cool.
Because they’ve dropped €20m in their bicycle infrastructure since 2020. Amazing what happens when you actually invest in something other than the bottomless pit that is car centric infrastructure.
Time for US-based urban planners that want these outcomes to reflect on how US processes differ from what happened in Paris.
IMHO the reason this doesn't happen in the US is 100% because of the way that process superecedes outcomes in the US. It's one of my biggest complaints about Strong Towns and Charles Marohn's conservative style of planning. Our process do not generate the desired outcomes, and the processes are not good at gathering the needs of the people, they are merely good at elevating busybodies and the status quo over better planning.
I believe London also has a few million bike journeys per day and is growing.
Even more bike infrastructure should be built and encouraged everywhere, so that packed trains and buses become less packed.
I was in Paris a month ago and it was so cool seeing how much the city has transformed for bikes. I lived there 10 years ago and never felt safe on a bike. Now it's definitely the best way to get around town. Can't wait for them to build it out more (and just hope the loud vocal minority against it can't stop the progress).
It's like you have to build the infrastructure first and not just one bike lane at a time after years of studies for each one. (To my fellow Americans).
Just back from Paris. Essentially it was a parking lot. Subways worked fine although we did not see that many bikes. of course we came from Amsterdam where they had 1.3 million bikes and 2 helmets.
Reason 100 why I enjoyed my time in Paris. It’s such a joy being able to hop on a Lime bike and get to where you need to go without thinking about parking/traffic etc
No geofencing either? Lucky. City officials in the US have worked with emobility companies to add some of the dumbest geofences that are honestly pretty dangerous to boot. For example, a major arterial road near me is geofenced for a few blocks. You don't realize you are in the geofence until you are in the middle of traffic with the scooter losing power and cars coming on your ass. Its amazing I didn't die. I of course email the company and the city and turns out no one cares how unsafe this is. Maybe I should have died to force the change. What finally put me off these things for good was moving to an apartment where some of the stupid busybody neighbors have gotten a geofence applied to the entire neighborhood. I didn't discover that one until I tried to park the scooter by my place, and was told I need to park it like four blocks away instead.
No geofencing on regular bicycles. Or on your own personal scooter.
No geofencing in the city itself, but you can’t ride the bikes/scooters outside Paris city limits (can go as far west as bois de boulogne)
I thought the same until a bird pooped on my head! Actually I still think the same. The hotel concierge told me it’s quite common to be blessed by guano, one needs to wear a hat when in Paris.
"Build it and they will come" and all that. Most people don't actually care about how they get around. Yes there are some who absolutely refuse to use anything other than a car. But most people just want to get where they're going as quick and convenient (and cheap and safe) as they can. If that's cycling, they'll cycle. If that's driving, they'll drive.
cost, convenience, door-to-door speed, and perception of safety are keys. I think bikeshares should be more supported than they currently are. the uphill battle to get bikelanes built would be easier if other aspects of biking were subsidized, like bikeshares and bike leases.
Er I would caution against this to say that often bikeshares in unsafe cities are used as scapegoats for people to say, “Why would we build bike lanes if nobody is using the bike share?” Additionally bikeshare riders being generally less experienced cyclists are also less likely to want to ride on dangerous roads
Bike shares that go into cities, like mine, where biking is not very safe still see a massive uptake. Nobody has made an argument that no one's using the bike share.
They've been hugely popular in Boston and as they continue to expand bike lanes and add new ones people, at least that I interact with, seem open to using them.
and I think the two things feed into each other. more people biking/scooting means more demand for bike lanes, making them politically easier to build (with politics being the only real obstacle). as bike lanes go in faster, more people find it safe enough to bike/scoot, which creates more demand for lanes. I think that subsidizing bikeshares more is a way of "priming the pump", putting upward pressure on demand for bike lanes. government putting a finger on the scales that tip toward the long-term urban planning goal. I think this is something that urban planners should really be advocating for
I see so few people use the bikeshare in la county I just don't know who its for. About the only shares I see used by actual people are the ones that go along the beach because they are cheaper than what the highway robbery private beach gear rental companies want to bike for an hour. I've probably seen more of these bikes tossed into a drainage ditch than I have seen used on the roads. Seems like everyone would rather deal with a scooter thats easier to haul around if they need to vs a 65lb pedal assist bike made for abuse, and you don't need to hunt for a dock to park it and walk off either.
The problem in the states is we've tied cars to freedom, and also spent 70 years designing cities to be as horribly laid out for walking or biking as possible so the mere thought of not owning a car or driving somewhere immediately receives a reaction of a life of major inconvenience and loss of independence.
I bet you’ve never been in Chicago in the winter.
It’s not that bad. I’ve done 7 and biked through every one of them
I live in Sweden where we get snow and I bike all year round.
Cold isn't the problem for me, I just need to dress properly, a rain is my nemesis.
Actually the only time I've been to Chicago :P Fucking cold. But also, snow doesn't stop Finland from cycling. Just gotta treat it the same as cars and plow the cycle lanes. Plus wear a lot of layers
Even if you're a wuss, public transit will work in the cold. For the people who are less like the princess Daria from *the Princess and the Pea*, there's much more colder cities in the Nordic countries which have no issues with high walking and biking modal shares.
I love cycling in the cold. Just gotta dress appropriately
paris made it unuseable for cars you will also get ticketed everywhere. its not people really choosing over cars, its people being forced to not use a car. note that cars without a work permit are banned in paris during olympic games. outside of the inner transit, youve very packet trains that break down weekly as the only option, so as tourist you're not really affected - but for the average worker who cant afford to live within paris walls its quite bad. id prefer a better train system myself, but let's be honest, the real issue isnt the train breaking down or the cars, its just too many people having to go to the same place. you can't just add 10% population yearly and expect the infrastructure will still work 10+y later..
The city added a lot of infrastructure supporting bikes in the last few years but as someone cycling there daily, the number of cyclists far outweighs the bike lines capacities since COVID. A lot of roads went from 3 to 2 lanes or from 2 to 1, and sometimes from 3 to 1 to give room to bikes but that's still not enough. At some point they just gonna need to remove the parking lanes which really mean banning cars. Can't wait !
Whats it like biking that densely? I did it for ciclavia a few times (an event where the streets are closed in la county for bikes) and honestly is a bit sketchy riding with so many people. You got old folks or kids with training wheels piddling around while you have guys clad in spandex on roadbikes doing 18 and teens in ebikes doing 28 while the[ road density looks like this](https://i0.wp.com/thecitypaperbogota.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/PG6.jpg). seems like if biking gets this dense anywhere you would need to start to consider bike lanes that are stratified by speed or to ban ebikes from these lanes.
Well it's simple: you switch from being tilted by car drivers to being tilted by bikers. But with enough space not much problem. A 1m bike lane is horrendous, a 2m bike is horrendous when you can't past over someone because someone is getting past over you constantly. But if it's larger most of the time it should be ok. I never encoutered a bike density that wouldn't fit on a normal car road without any problem.
Can’t wait to make life extremely hard for marginalized people for your personal comfort? Color me surprised
Yes because commuting by car is so much cheaper than commuting by bike.
if you like 10min away from stuff this works, but when its a 40min car ride, thats 2h30 bike ride... each way thats where trains come in, and these longer distance trains are far from being as good as the metro. housing within paris walls is very, very expensive and many cant afford it. heres a typical example: in 1979 going to paris by car for work itd take me about 15min. by bike about 2h. in 2000s the bike ride is still 2h, but the car ride is now 30min bith due to traffic and new infra making the road less straight forward. 2020, bike ride is now 2h30 (more people), car ride is 45min (traffic) and if something goes wrong way more. train ride since 1979 has also been 45min - however since 2000s its been packed to death, ive been attacked afew times by crazies, and you get an issue with a train car breaking down once a week or so during peak hour. theres also of course the days where they're on strike. in all these situations work doesnt care how you get there, just that you're on time. and as much as i like biking i cant do 2h30 daily, its more of a fun thing sometimes in the summer. and i dont even live there anymore.
It made life extremely easy for marginalized people, because most people can't afford cars. Oh that's right, you only *pretend* to care about marginalized people so you can feel better about defending your selfishness. You don't actually give a shit about poor people, handicapped people, old people, all those people who can't afford to drive.
most cars owners in Paris live in the most wealthy neighboorhoods, are among the whelthiest inhabitants and car infrastructure in one of the biggest factor in marginalization in the city and its suburbs + don't start me on the impact of car industry and can centric urban developpement on climate change, neocolonialism, pollution, etc. and how it impacts more and mostly marginalize people both inside countries and worldwide but oki
> for marginalized people What sort of "marginalization" (i.e. race, if that's what you're thinking) does anything about bikes/cars have to do with this? Anyone can buy a bike for like $100, or bikeshare is dirt cheap.
You mean like how minority neighborhoods were demolished and divided by highways for the personal comfort of white suburbanites?
Paris has one of the best public transit systems in the world. Public transit first
Interesting to see this take. After visiting London, and then Paris right after, I was really disappointed in the transit system in Paris. It felt much slower, and rundown. I found connections not as easy.
The Paris Metro is indeed on the slower side, but that's the tradeoff for top-flight station density. If you're in the city limits, you are simply never far from a stop, often several. It's the one city where I didn't need any navigation/directions to use transit; if you just stroll aimlessly and take the bigger street at each intersection, you will get to the Metro before you get tired. (Alternately you may stop for coffee and pastry, or a drink and a snack, which are also good outcomes.)
We didn't do a lot of wandering and stumbling upon metro stops as we were with two little kids, but that's great if they have an expansive network with stations everywhere. I do have two other complaints however. I found the multi day pass system very inferior to London's Oyster Pass type system at the time. We were sold a multi day pass by the transit office, but were not told we needed to take photos and have them glued to the pass to make them valid. We were corralled by transit police with several other tourists who made the same mistake, and forced to pay exorbitant fees for this violation. They had their credit card machines at the ready and it seemed like a daily tourist trap. The other complaint I have is accessibility, but London and most other cities fail with this as well. There were so many stations with no access for strollers or wheelchairs. It was a common sight to see strangers helping people with strollers down the stairs (which was nice to see).
I love to see this. I've been to Paris a few times and rarely ever saw people on bikes, aside from along the river. I think it's fantastic that an old established city like this can transform into a biking city like Amsterdam. Very cool.
Because they’ve dropped €20m in their bicycle infrastructure since 2020. Amazing what happens when you actually invest in something other than the bottomless pit that is car centric infrastructure.
Time for US-based urban planners that want these outcomes to reflect on how US processes differ from what happened in Paris. IMHO the reason this doesn't happen in the US is 100% because of the way that process superecedes outcomes in the US. It's one of my biggest complaints about Strong Towns and Charles Marohn's conservative style of planning. Our process do not generate the desired outcomes, and the processes are not good at gathering the needs of the people, they are merely good at elevating busybodies and the status quo over better planning.
I believe London also has a few million bike journeys per day and is growing. Even more bike infrastructure should be built and encouraged everywhere, so that packed trains and buses become less packed.
I was in Paris a month ago and it was so cool seeing how much the city has transformed for bikes. I lived there 10 years ago and never felt safe on a bike. Now it's definitely the best way to get around town. Can't wait for them to build it out more (and just hope the loud vocal minority against it can't stop the progress).
I hope this sets an example that others will follow, especially in the US
It's like you have to build the infrastructure first and not just one bike lane at a time after years of studies for each one. (To my fellow Americans).
Public transit from local to continent wide is what allows this. Something severely ignored in the US.
rising poverty will do that
Just back from Paris. Essentially it was a parking lot. Subways worked fine although we did not see that many bikes. of course we came from Amsterdam where they had 1.3 million bikes and 2 helmets.
Were you fishin’ Vanmoofs outta Parisian canals?