To think we could make housing estates like Center Parcs re cars

[QuertyGirl]

The USP of Centre Parcs is for many, the fact that they are mostly car free. Kids can play out and ride their bikes like I did when I was kid.

Can't do that now due to the amount of cars, speed and size of cars and, attitude of some car drivers.

People (including myself) pay a small fortune to holiday at CP.

Why can't we make housing estates more like that?

Communal car parks in walking distance, deliveries by small electric vehicles from a hub (like old fashioned milk floats), exemptions for blue badge holders and funding for electric mobility scooters for those that need them.

Yet, if the council suggests a couple of cycle lane and all hell breaks loose.

Crosspusscrossstitcher, less traffic and pollution is good for everyone, sometimes the greater good trumps individual needs however much your driveway cost

I find it bonkers the attitude in the UK that you have to park next to your house. In my family's part of Europe, parking ten minutes walk from your front door is normal and it's actually good to walk, also makes you think twice about jumping in the car as if you're already walking half a mile you might as well walk the whole way to your destination. But that might be part of the lifestyle (generally healthier in my opinion) plus shopping little and often so no huge 'weekly' shop. Also purely designed for city's and suburbs, rural is different.
I would love for kids to roam freely. People just need to see the light!

No thanks. Who's going to pay for 24 hour security? How would you make sure guests have somewhere to park? What about households with multiple cars taking up too many spots? There will always be cf around to take advantage. We live on an estate and it already has speed bumps, each house has a decent sized garden front and back. There is no reason kids can't play in their gardens than out on the street. There is signs about telling people to reduce their speed. The cost of upkeep would fall to the residents and I already own a drive.

It might work in a city centre but then kids wouldn't be playing on the streets anyway. It might encourage residents to walk or use public transport which is decent in most city centres bit many people would push back as they pay a premium to live in the centre of town anyway.

If you want this sort of lifestyle then I think you need to look at the whole culture of a country. In the UK, we work long hours...it causes people to be stressed and rushed all the time. If we overall had a more relaxed lifestyle people would be more amenable to an occasional walk

@Propertysourcingguy

I do like what they have done in some areas although not the right roads, where they basically make them a no through road to stop the rat run traffic

Doesn't always work though. We live on a cul-de-sac, so no "rat run" traffic, but it's still not safe for the kids to play on the roads. The road is a dog-leg, and cars/vans come round the blind corner far too fast. They're not going anywhere and will have to turn at the end or go into drives, so speed is pointless as it does them no good - just a bad habit they've got into. One of our neighbours is an absolute maniac - he has one of those Audi sports cars (Quattro?) and must be doing 40/50 around the blind corner, every single time - when he sets off in a morning, it's wheel spin time! Once when he came home, he misjudged it and slammed straight into the garage door, but he didn't learn from that and continued driving like a lunatic. Same with delivery vans - I actually saw one coming around the corner so fast it looked like it's nearside wheels were almost off the ground - just why - it had nowhere to go!

As for "rat runs" through housing estates, they're often caused by traffic calming/one way systems/traffic lights etc on other roads - typical road planners not considering the consequences of their "improvements". I used to live on a "through" road in a more traditional housing estate with the criss-cross road pattern rather than cul-de-sacs and closes. I played out daily on the road, very few cars and there was good visibility as the road was straight. The road planning lunatics put a bus lane, traffic calming and traffic lights on what was then the "main" road by-passing our estate and virtually overnight we lived on a rat-run. What did the muppets think would happen when they purposely and deliberately reduced the usable width of the road and put in measures which would obviously cause delays and queues?

Sceptre86, you're wrong, there are car free areas in plenty of cities across the world where children can play, including the uk. Low traffic neighbourhoods and pedestrianisation are increasing, however much people stay entrenched in their carcentric bubbles

You do realise that no everyone is within easy walking distance of a bus stop with buses that go to where they want to go, don't you?

In our village (8000 inhabitants so not small), there are NO bus stops at all in the centre of it, no bus routes through the centre at all. The last few services were chopped around 2005. The only bus route is along the by-pass road at the edge of the village, so just about walkable for those living at that side, but not for those living on the opposite side of the centre. And it just goes between towns A & B, not the big town C where most people work and shop and where the hospital is, so you have to get the bus to town A and then change at the bus station for a bus to big town C. So what could have been a 15 minute drive to, say, the hospital, becomes a 2 hours slog, it's only one bus per hour which doesn't even synchronise with the A-C bus so you also have a 30 minute wait at the bus station changeover - none of the buses are direct, so you are sat wasting time as they dawdle around housing estates and a big detour around the out of town supermarket!

Fair enough in London and other bigger cities with frequent and integrated public transport systems, but forget it if you live in smaller towns and villages etc.

Yep, I've said the same about self-driving cars and also about taxis. They actually increase the number of journeys! The main benefit is reducing the need for parking, either at home, or town centres, hospitals, workplaces, etc as cars will either be parked up elsewhere presumably in huge out of town car parks, or in the case of taxis, being used for other journeys.

With your own car, once you're home, the car stays at home. With self driving or taxis or whatever, there's another "journey" when it goes back to base or car park. Highly unlikely that the taxi will get another job from somewhere near where it dropped you to where it "parks", so the return journey is an extra, unnecessary, journey.

Why will he never be able to play out?

The problem is it would be shouted down by a horde of people on here who are not disabled, so don’t need the car right outside the front door, and yet they see cars as a psychological extension of their psyche.
They see a car, parked as close as possible to the house, up on a kerb etc, as a human right. It gives “freedom” and “independence”, and having to walk three to four minutes to get into the car negates the whole experience.

You can say that about any modern invention that makes life much easier, though. What about all these lazy, non-disabled people who use washing machines - harming the planet with electricity use - when they could just shut up and grab their eco-friendly dolly tub and mangle? Everybody on this thread clearly happily makes use of a phone or computer - they don't run on moonbeams either.

Some people seem to want to be a martyr by rebelling against modern life - but only the bits that they are happy to do without. They're like Mrs Doyle - 'maybe they like the misery'.

At CP I believe blue badge holders can still drive around so if this were the case in these housing estates then that would help those with disabilities.

As has been clearly outlined on this thread, that helps some disabled people, but a whole load of other disabled people and those with mobility problems are just flung under the bus.

Something else that occurs to me is that people are advocating these places largely on the grounds of how wonderful and safe they are for children to play; but when anybody mentions disabled and elderly folk, they're just told that they can choose to live elsewhere instead - or presumably be forced out of their homes if they later become disabled or frailer as they age.

Where does that leave disabled people with children or kids who live with their grandparents? All these hard and fast draconian rules banning cars anywhere near to people's homes (as opposed to, say, strictly enforced 5mph limits) would also seem to be discriminating against the children of parents who aren't young and able-bodied, and who thus don't qualify for living in this magical utopia. Maybe those kids just don't matter....

Yup, I'd love to lug several £000 electronic equipment through the tipping rain, hoping not to get mugged, to get to my car to go to work.

The estates that were built that way round here aren't even safe places for children to play. They're so isolated the crime rate is v high.

The main benefit is reducing the need for parking, either at home, or town centres, hospitals, workplaces,

cars dominate local streets and pavements

thats why children can't play out, as its wall to wall cars & they've got bigger and bigger

disabled people only rely on cars in car-dependent places because they have to. Mobility aids become more useful, and neighborhoods become more
accessible, when they are not centered around cars. Car-centric towns are more structurally ableist than accessible walkable towns.

In Cambridge (UK) 26% of disabled workers commute by bicycle

2/3 of disabled cyclists say cycling is easier than walking for them

In London 78% of disabled people say they can cycle but only 15% actually do cycle 'sometimes' or more, probably scared of those fucking cars.

For the majority of disabled people cycling is a tool for freedom just like it is for an able bodied person.

All stats from here: www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/jan/02/cambridge-disabled-people-cycling-rolling-walking-stick

"Why will he never be able to play out?"

He is severely learning disabled and autistic and can't cope with and has nothing in common with other children/ young people (he is now a teenager) apart from those he mixes closely with at special school.

this is so true but often overlooked at the detriment of many people with physical disabilities

Quite apart from the problems for people with mobility or other health issues who don't qualify for a Blue Badge, depending on the area, this could be a nightmare for women coming home alone late at night. I live in a very safe area, but I can think of far too many places where I wouldn't want to be walking alone at night. I know 'not all men' etc, but a small percentage are predators, and they would take advantage. Also family shopping. Garden stuff. Bags of potting compost anyone? Impractical. Pretty invidious pointing out what our mothers and grandmothers did. It was a different world.

I lived on an estate, probably built in the 60's, where all houses had access to the rear (roads between back gardens) but between houses in front it was pedestrian only - was really nice to sit out front and chat to neighbours / children could play out front etc, but could still get right to back gate / garages by car for unloading shopping etc. Houses were in rows of about 8, I think, so if you wanted to go round to the garden without going through it wasn't too far, but long enough out front for little ones to learn to ride a bike / bod about. I always thought it was a great layout, but many people clearly don't!

Women who can't drive? Women who can't afford a car?

Those living in a car-dependent area:

What would you do if you lost the car? It happens to a lot of people through age or declining health.

They do what most people who don’t drive have to do -pay for taxis or get help from friends and relatives.

So if you can't afford a taxi (cost a fortune round here) you rely on lifts?

That's a bit crap.

That's the case for all people who cannot drive and cannot walk, cycle or use public transport.

I totally understand people with certain disabilities needing to park next to their house but people who are completely able-bodied but terrified of a bit of rain 🙄

Oblivious of what the weather is like in Scotland. We often have high winds, horizontal rain and sometimes it's dark by 15:30 in winter.