Suburbanites Surrender Their Cars, Win Transportation War
- Posted by: Siobhan O'Connor
- on May 12, 2009 at 12:04 pm
Is suburbia the new utopia? Probably not, because they’re still the suburbs (I kid!), but there is momentum to this trend of building or retrofitting suburbs to become more energy-efficient and—most impressively—car-free.
There’s a good piece in The New York Times about the well-heeled German community of Freiberg, where people have given up their cars altogether. It’s an experiment that flies in the face of the gas-guzzling reputation we’ve assigned to modern suburbs, and it has promise.
The key, of course, is retooling the town so that it’s actually car-free-friendly. For starters, the town shops serve multiple purposes at once, so you don’t have to schlep around too much to run your errands, and everything is within walking distance from the energy-efficient rowhouses. If residents really want to, they can have their own car, but they have to park it on the outskirts of town in municipal lot spaces that cost $40,000 apiece. (Further proof that “taxing” potentially irresponsible behavior is a really good idea.)
Sounds like great ideas all around—and leaps and bounds better than some other admittedly creative (but in my opinion misguided) efforts to rethink the way we live. But can it work here? The other day we looked at Mackinac Island, where as many as 500 residents have also forgone cars for other ways to get around. An anomaly, but also an interesting model.
Well done, Germany! In addition to your strong Environmental Performance Index rating (number 13), You can now add this to the ever-growing list of pioneering efforts for a more sustainable way to live.
Photo by Martin Specht for The New York Times
DISCUSSION: 10 Comments
American suburbs aren’t quite like European suburbs. For one, American suburbs are much more possessivist, based around the ownership and underuse of large goods (e.g. cars and houses). For another, they are more conservative, and much more resistant to implementation of progressive development. Suburbs have been the Epitome of the American Dream ever since “the American Dream” became a household word (i.e.: marketing slogan) since the start of the Cold War. I think that we will need to see the death of the nationalist Cold War mentality before we see real progress in America’s suburbs.
Love the “pioneering efforts”. Especially after reading the Mackinac Island story. It actually inspired me to think about how often we write off ideation and implementation in the name of something not being “realistic.”I wrote a short blog here.
I don’t think the 40k is all that crazy. That’s property you gotta buy. Adding a garage to a house can cost that much.
I think that a great source of stress in a suburban environment is the neighborhood car traffic. Without that nuisance, children can finally go play in and explore their neighborhoods and the parents won’t have to worry about their safety. Excellent idea.
This would be so cool! but everything in America’s so spread out, I imagine way more spread out than Germany. Our roads are mini highways. It’d be fun to hand those 3-lane roads over to the bikers. would buses be allowed?
I love this idea. Doing anything at the community level is going to get more people involved in the process. Would I ever see anything like this around LA? No. In many other parts of the country? Yes.
A question – what % of America does ‘Suburbia’ constitute?
About half the country did, in 2006. Fifty percent!
ok lets give up more of our freedom
My office 7 miles, Wife’s office 3.5 miles, two cars because there is no other safe way of getting there. No bicycle paths, no bus service, no light rail service, no walk paths, or short cuts through residential areas.We’d park our cars in a heartbeat if we could only get to work safely using an alternate method of transportation.