<story><title>London saw a surprising benefit to ultra-low emissions zone: More active kids</title><url>https://grist.org/cities/london-fining-polluting-cars-more-active-kids/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>danieldk</author><text>This. Though it doesn’t stop at road design. You also have to change the regulations so that car drivers are (partially) legally responsible for accidents, even when a cyclist or pedestrian made the error. Pedestrians and cyclists are orders of magnitude more vulnerable. Putting much more of the legal burden on car drivers makes them more careful.&lt;p&gt;The hard part is that you also need to build a cycling culture. Most car drivers in NL are more mindful of cyclists, because they are cyclists themselves as well.&lt;p&gt;Circling back to road design. In our mid-sized Dutch city, it’s often faster to go from A to B than by bike than by car because of the excellent biking infrastructure and car-free city center. Everything is designed around cycling, some traffic lights will even give bikes a green light more often when it’s raining.</text></item><item><author>w3news</author><text>Emission zone shouldnt be the issue, it is about the amount of cars and road safety for every user. 
Check e.g. the Dutch road design, where many kids ride bikes.
This is already for decades, and has nothing to do with emission zones. 
But another road design can also help reducing emissions. 
It is about how many people can travel safe, and with big cities, you have to reduce cars to increase the amount of people that can travel safe, like bikes, walking, and public transport.
Road and city design is very important for a livable city.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>magicalhippo</author><text>&amp;gt; car drivers are (partially) legally responsible for accidents, even when a cyclist or pedestrian made the error&lt;p&gt;Here in Norway the traffic law states[1] that everyone should be considerate, heedful and careful to avoid harm, and this stands above everything else.&lt;p&gt;So you can indeed get (partial) blame even if the rest of the rules and regulations say you did nothing wrong.&lt;p&gt;For example you can&amp;#x27;t just ram a cyclist or a pedestrian if you have the right of way, but you saw them, or should have seen them, in time to  take avoiding action.&lt;p&gt;Having a quick look at the NYS traffic rules[2] as a semi-random point of comparison, I&amp;#x27;m assuming most states have something similar, it does say at the start that &amp;quot;no person shall operate a vehicle in a manner that will endanger any person or property&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;This seems to be similar in spirit but not quite the same. I guess I could see the NY courts could find in favor of the driver where the Norwegian courts would not, depending on how they draw the line of endangering.&lt;p&gt;[1]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;lovdata.no&amp;#x2F;lov&amp;#x2F;1965-06-18-4&amp;#x2F;§3&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;lovdata.no&amp;#x2F;lov&amp;#x2F;1965-06-18-4&amp;#x2F;§3&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;[2]: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nyc.gov&amp;#x2F;html&amp;#x2F;dot&amp;#x2F;downloads&amp;#x2F;pdf&amp;#x2F;trafrule.pdf&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.nyc.gov&amp;#x2F;html&amp;#x2F;dot&amp;#x2F;downloads&amp;#x2F;pdf&amp;#x2F;trafrule.pdf&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>London saw a surprising benefit to ultra-low emissions zone: More active kids</title><url>https://grist.org/cities/london-fining-polluting-cars-more-active-kids/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>danieldk</author><text>This. Though it doesn’t stop at road design. You also have to change the regulations so that car drivers are (partially) legally responsible for accidents, even when a cyclist or pedestrian made the error. Pedestrians and cyclists are orders of magnitude more vulnerable. Putting much more of the legal burden on car drivers makes them more careful.&lt;p&gt;The hard part is that you also need to build a cycling culture. Most car drivers in NL are more mindful of cyclists, because they are cyclists themselves as well.&lt;p&gt;Circling back to road design. In our mid-sized Dutch city, it’s often faster to go from A to B than by bike than by car because of the excellent biking infrastructure and car-free city center. Everything is designed around cycling, some traffic lights will even give bikes a green light more often when it’s raining.</text></item><item><author>w3news</author><text>Emission zone shouldnt be the issue, it is about the amount of cars and road safety for every user. 
Check e.g. the Dutch road design, where many kids ride bikes.
This is already for decades, and has nothing to do with emission zones. 
But another road design can also help reducing emissions. 
It is about how many people can travel safe, and with big cities, you have to reduce cars to increase the amount of people that can travel safe, like bikes, walking, and public transport.
Road and city design is very important for a livable city.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>richardw</author><text>I wonder if the flatness of the country plays a part? I live on a hill and am surrounded by hills. A 3km ride in any direction and back is hard work. Lots of e-bikes here, and lots of mountain biking. But when I suggested getting a bike to my SO for her to get to the closest bus stop faster, the hills were the reason why she’d rather walk.</text></comment>