Northern Italian Cities Ban Cars from Center

[donsu]

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=12285


Many cities in northern Italy banned traffic for several hours Sunday in a one-day bid to fight pollution.

The length of the bans varied from region to region, but most ranged from six to 12 hours. Lombardy, which includes Milan, banned traffic except for low-level polluting cars from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (0700 GMT-1900 GMT). Turin, an automotive capital at the foot of the Alps, was among the metropolitan areas joining the ban.

Last week, Rome had a similar one-day ban.

Environment Minister Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio, a Greens leader, called Sunday's initiative "a beginning. Useful but not enough," according to an interview with Milan daily Corriere della Sera.

Scanio said that in nearly all Italian cities, there is an average of 500 cars for every 1,000 inhabitants, and that in Rome, there are 732 cars for every 1,000 inhabitants, the report said.
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at least they are taking a first step. what is the US doing?

[Ravenseye]

1. How usefull was it though?

Banning for a day as a symbolic message is one thing, but actually doing something about it is another.

On top of that though, this could never fly in the U.S.. The policies over the past half century in this country have effectively destroyed the chances of an easy change. Where Europe kept it's populations tightly together and put public money into public transportation infrastructure, the U.S. encouraged people to live 50 miles from the city center and drive every day back and forth, with no public transporation option. Some denser U.S. cities have alternatives, but without MASSIVE infrastructure improvements there is little that can be done. In most parts of the United States there is minimal to no public transporation alternatives that are feasible (a once a day bus is not a feasible alternative for instance)

The U.S. needs to radically increase fuel efficiency standards immediately, and at the same time pour billions of dollars into our infrastructure.

[donsu]

2. well, it at least did two things:

kept all that pollution from going into the air and onto the ground, for some hours.

and it stressed the dire straights the world is in and the need for speed in finding remedies.

[Ravenseye]

3. Negligble

This is somethign that has almost no impact, for almost no cost....of course it happened.

The amount of pollution stopped that one day, in that one region, in those few cities, is a drop in the bucket compared to the whole world, or the coal plants coming online in China.

As far as stressing the dire straights the world is in, it just preached to the choir, at best.

[donsu]

6. so what do you suggest we do - remain seated on the couch?

every time a vehicle isn't driven is to the good

every time solar or wind takes the place of a coal plant is to the good (has that even happened yet?)

are the companies around the world that build buses doing more business?

all the home building contractors around the world should have a concave learning session on bldg. to accomodate climate change. (how interesting that would be to see house builders from all over the world at a meeting discussing how to keep humans alive and sheltered during the coming years)

[PLF]

9. Sitting around bitching and moaning, apparently.

[Ravenseye]

15. Or you could read

and actually see what I suggested in my intial post.

We need our governments to actually take a hard position, and shutting down a small part of a city on a sunday for a few hours amounts to jack shit.

[Ravenseye]

11. I already made my suggestion

"The U.S. needs to radically increase fuel efficiency standards immediately, and at the same time pour billions of dollars into our infrastructure."

I'd add plenty of other things. Clean and renewable energy technology. Close down all coal fired power plants and replace them as soon as possible with greener energy.

[PLF]

8. It sets a precedent for doing this more often and for longer periods

and perhaps for a permanent ban.

[Ravenseye]

12. No it doesn't

banning traffic from essentially the downtown area of a city for 6 hours on a Sunday as a nod to the environment is nothing. Talk about something that's easy and painless to pass. The same people who put that through would never make it permanent. It's a show. A game. It sets no precedent.

It's like a non-binding resolution saying that you support a healthy environment. Everyone will sign it.

"So you support a healthy environment?* - yes or no *this is a non-binding question."

Granted we're talking about it, but at the same time traffic is flowing freeling again through Milan and Torino and it's provided absolutely nothing towards helping us actually doing anything.

[PLF]

14. yeah, whatever

[Ravenseye]

16. stunning retort

[PLF]

18. You just seem to be wanting to find somebody to argue with.

I'm not interested and this will be my last post in this thread.

[Ravenseye]

19. K

Don't know what I'll do without your weighty thoughtful responses...I'll manage.

[MADem]

4. In tLondon, you have to pay a 'fine' to even drive in the city

It's something like five quid. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/02/14/1044927804777.html

[Ravenseye]

5. That's a good start

...but it'll only work in a few places like London. I've lived in London, and I've lived north of the city. I never owned a car. Public Transportation might be complained about in England, but at least it exists. Granted I wouldn't want to live on one side of the city and work on the other, but the same can be said of pretty much anywhere. Plus this only affects the core of central London which is just a smidge of the huge vastness that is Greater London. Something like only 13 square km. Nothing.

Like I said before though...something that wouldn't really be applicable to most American cities.

[Selatius]

7. The US has a decayed, decrepit mass transit system in comparison to Europe and Japan

We simply get our asses whipped when we compare our mass transit system to countries like Germany and France and Japan.

The car, oil, and road lobbies ensured America's mass transit system would be stunted. Then again, this is a function of a campaign system run on private cash, not taxpayer dollars. Both parties have failed to transition to a public financing system.

[SoCalDem]

17. "...Germany and France and Japan...."

Those countries had their transportation mostly blown to bits in WWII, and US money built them new, state of the art systems when there were no pesky "zoning laws" or private property issues to deal with.

"Improving, adding-to or upgrading" existing systems in the US is next to impossible to do, and will never be done..

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

10. Anyone who has lived in Europe, especially southern Europe

knows that the downtown parts of cities have much lighter traffic on Sundays anyway. And even if they could ban traffic downtown on week-days when it's really heavy, I doubt it would work in the U.S. In the U.S. there is far more suburban sprawl, with malls and mini-malls taking the place of the downtown areas of yesteryear. The U.S. is just too spread out, especially in California. I am continually amazed at how long and how far it takes to drive anywhere to do virtually anything in California.

[Ravenseye]

13. I missed that initially

That it was on Sunday. For a few hours. Yeah they really took the hurt on that one.

You're absolutely right. This sort of thing could never work in the United States. Probably even WITH massive infrastructure expenditure. We need, as a nation, to rethink HOW we live in our space. We need to say bye bye to the exurbs and the suburbs.