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September 01, 2003
Sprawl In Europe, people make 33 percent of their trips by foot or bicycle, compared with just 9.4 percent of Americans' trips. Pucher said the extra activity had to be healthy, as life expectancy in the Netherlands and Germany was about two years longer than in the United States, and obesity rates were lower. Why can these Europeans walk and bike more, and more safely, than Americans? It's not just travel distance - 41 percent of U.S. trips are shorter than 2 miles, yet most are by car. Instead, Pucher cited Dutch and German policies that encourage more sidewalks and bike paths, traffic calming, auto-free zones in cities, extensive road-sharing education for drivers and cyclists, and pedestrian-friendly urban design.I'd certainly be more inclined to bike eleven miles to work---a 30-minite ride at a normal riding pace, which is remarkably similar to the amount of time it takes to drive to work in freeway traffic, and that's after the great improvement due to the new fifteen billion dollar highway they built me---if only it were possible to do so without getting flattened by said freeway traffic. There simply aren't any routes from here to Cambridge that can be safely travelled by bike. Bummer. [permalink | reply | tb ] |
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