
Secrets of the world's happiest cities - wr1472
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/nov/01/secrets-worlds-happiest-cities-commute-property-prices
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oftenwrong
Extra space, cleaner air, healthier and happier people, safer streets... Is
there really any downside to banning personal cars from the city? Leave the
roads for cyclists, public transportation, emergency vehicles and delivery
vehicles. Suburbanites can park outside of the city can go the rest of the way
via bus/train/bicycle.

[http://ecooptimism.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/bike-
bus-c...](http://ecooptimism.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/bike-bus-car.jpg)

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maratd
> Is there really any downside to banning personal cars from the city?

The fact that you're stomping all over a person's right to own property and
use it as they wish?

Oh sure, the city will prosper as a result, but when you start making rules
solely for the sake of the majority, throwing basic principles into the
garbage bin, you set a precedent.

A precedent where anything that's for the greater good passes muster,
regardless of anything else.

Which seems fine at first. The majority, is the majority of people right? Why
not act solely in their interest?

But the truth is that we're all part of some minority or other. In some way,
everyone's interests contradict the majority in some way.

If my grandma lives in the suburbs and it takes 4 hours to see her using
public transportation and 30 minutes using a car ... well, you just fucked me
over, didn't you? And that's just a mild example.

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epo
Any rational planning system would enhance public transport to mitigate the
effects of curtailing widespread use of privately owned cars. However, you
seem to be American so perhaps the notion of rational planning is alien to
you. Certainly the use of verbiage like "stomping all over a person's right to
own property and use it as they wish" would indicate that rational thought is
alien to you.

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Daniel_Newby
In most towns, bus economics only allows for one hour routes and a transfer
for most trips. That means two hours in motion average for a round trip, and
up to two more hours waiting if your business does not line up with scheduled
stops. The grandparent comment is exactly right.

Shorter, more frequent routes are possible, but making the economics work does
require a ban on cars to convert drivers to paying transit riders. But most of
the drivers still need cars to get to outlying areas, so they have to pay bus
operations and car capital outlay. People woth modest incomes cannot afford
both, so they would have to give up the car and be trapped in the denser part
of the city, indeed having their personal liberties stomped on.

Autonomous taxis will rewrite the economic rules. Since they won't crash, the
massive crumple zones and crush cage can be eliminated, dramatically reducing
capital and operating costs. An autonomous taxi ride will likely cost less
than driving your own beater.

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maratd
Yours is the sole intelligent response, so I'll comment here.

> Autonomous taxis will rewrite the economic rules.

You're absolutely right.

However, that technology isn't here yet and there is no guarantee that it will
arrive. Mind you, most of the barriers to adoption aren't even technical,
although those exist too. I prefer not to count my chickens until they hatch.

Right now, public transportation means one thing: unions. And unions, in turn,
mean: strikes, price hikes, inconsistent schedules and performance, etc.

On top of that, subway and other rail systems reach relatively few places.
That means buses. And buses exacerbate the above issues to an even greater
extent.

~~~
Daniel_Newby
Self-driving vehicles work today and are legal in several states. Elementary
pieces of self-driving tech are selling in production cars. I take it as a
foregone conclusion that everything will be self-driving in 50 years—probably
_much_ sooner.

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alpeb
Bogotanian here. This is one of the most unlivable cities there is. As soon as
you step out the door you're aggravated in a thousands ways through your day.
Bogotá and Colombia usually score high in the "happiness" rankings because of
a servitude mentality that dates back to the colony. Inequality is very high
even for Latin American standards and people are taught to accept and embrace
it. You'll rarely see protests in this country despite the rampant corruption
and nepotistic governments. People don't have the notion that democracy is
supposed to empower them, and don't know things can and should be better. And
of course blind catholic fanaticism only helps to keep them contained. So they
think they're "happy".

~~~
merraksh
I don't think the article has any intention to depict Bogotá as a happy city
in absolute terms (although yeah, the author calls Peñalosa the "Mayor of
Happiness"), but rather that the changes brought by its mayor in recent years
have made it happiER.

I would be curious about your opinion in this sense: despite the rampant
corruption and all other problems, has the city's quality of life actually
improved over the past years?

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alpeb
Indeed, Peñalosa was an extraordinary mayor ans his transportation system
improved the standard of living. But as the article hints at the end, the
follow up has been terrible (e.g. one mayor indicted) and the city has gotten
out of hands.

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zacinbusiness
I spent two days in Copenhagen over the summer for some training and I loved
it. The people seemed so much more relaxed than in London or here in the US.
And the bikes! They were everywhere! It was so nice :)

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mabbo
Meanwhile my mayor declared "the war on cars is over" when he was elected.
Toronto, ugh.

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zacinbusiness
Is that the crack-smoking mayor? Or is that elsewhere in Canada?

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allannienhuis
yup, Mayor McCrack in Toronto. Seems like he got confused between the war on
Drugs and the war on Cars...

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eliot_sykes
The article mentions something along the lines of people who walk to work are
happier than if they drove to work.

I wonder how remote working from home compares in happiness to walking to a
separate but nearby place of work?

When I've worked from home for sustained periods, I've felt happier when
taking regular walks than if I stay indoors all day. I've found walking before
the work day starts to be the most beneficial (just around the block for 5-15
mins). I tried this after a remote working friend recommended it (and his
remote working neighbour had recommended it to him IIRC).

I wonder if any of you who home work have found the same or otherwise?

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zacinbusiness
I work from home 100% of the time (I live in the US and have a client here and
a client in Norway). I absolutely love it and I don't think I could ever go
back to working in an office.

I have time to spend with my dogs, take them out and keep them exercised. I
have time to spend with my wife and we only have to keep up one car.

I work just as efficiently, if not more so, than when I worked in an office
setting through tech like Skype, Screenhero, email, and just basic phone
calls. And we use task management apps like Zendesk to help coordinate between
our team and other teams. It's really very smooth and efficient.

I do get a little cabin-feverish sometimes, but then I just spend an hour
outside with my dogs, or my wife and I go on a day trip to and catch some
theater or something, and I'm ready to get back to it.

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junto
Downtown Bogota at night was one of the scariest places I've ever been.

On the flip-side, Bogota itself is awesome, made more awesome by Colombians,
who are also double awesome!

~~~
witek
I love Colombia and the Colombians but Bogota is one of my least favourite
places in the world. Most Colombians would agree, I think. Traffic is
horrible.

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yetanotherphd
This was a very interesting article but the evidence presented was especially
weak.

I was particularly unimpressed by "Bogotá's fortunes have since declined. The
TransMilenio system is plagued by desperate crowding as its private operators
fail to add more capacity – yet more proof that robust public transport needs
sustained public investment." It seems like any outcome is evidence for the
authors views.

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seanmcdirmid
Oddly enough, I opened this up expecting an article on Thimphu.

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michaelochurch
The car is a textbook case of catastrophically bad scaling. For sporadic use
(errands, long trips, leisure) it's amazing. For daily commuting (60 miles per
day, plus parking) it's horrible. Space-consuming, polluting, expensive
(except cheap relative to, e.g., Amtrak because no one uses the latter) and
unsafe when abused to the point that cars are (operated while drunk, while
seriously ill, or at unreasonable speeds given congestion).

The problem is that people, individually, don't want to give up the freedom.
It's "other drivers" that are the problem. Add to this the fact that so few
people _can_ use other means of transportation-- those have fallen into ruin.

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jaibot
Don't forget the perverse incentives of mandated "free" parking, resulting in
every pedestrian, cyclist, and transit user subsidizing everyone who parks
somewhere (in addition to the horrible sprawl effects).

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svantana
Exactly. Even in places that are generally enamoured with free markets, you
never see this. It would be fun to see market-priced parking in places like
Manhattan - what would happen?

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ams6110
Parking is not market-priced in Manhattan? Are there any major cities where it
is free?

When I lived in Chicago it certainly wasn't. Parking in the Loop was
$10-$20/day (this was 15 years ago) if you just did it ad-hoc, you could buy
monthly passes and save a bit, but it certainly wasn't free and as far as I
know it wasn't subsidized.

All the extra taxes, costs, and inconvenience of owning a car in an major
urban area is one of the big reasons why I will never live in such a place
again.

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wink
Here in Munich, Germany you pay something like 6-10 EUR to park in the city
centre for the time you're working, that is 8-10h. There are still some free
spots, the more you leave the center, the more easily you find them. Less than
10 years ago it was much easier to find a free one in the center as well.

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contextual
I wrote a related article about a year ago that discusses a major threat to
Canada's identity: A Big Reason Canadians are so Happy (and Why it's at Risk):
[http://allsprawldown.com/activism/a-big-reason-canadians-
are...](http://allsprawldown.com/activism/a-big-reason-canadians-are-so-happy-
and-why-its-at-risk/)

