Traffic and Pedestrian Woes

or

How to Create a Great City?How to Create a Great City?

Parisar presentation at the

National Conference on Urban Planning and Policy

Symbiosis School of Economics

Pune

17 February 2011

Does creating icons

make a city “livable”?

Human Scale - Chaotic Human Scale - Planned

How a city ought not to be!

• Our purpose in founding the city was not to

make any one class in it surpassingly happy,

but to make the city as a whole as happy as

possible. -- Socrates

Thoughts on a City

• Oh, a day in the city-square, there is no such

pleasure in life! -- Robert Browning

• In a quality city, a person should be able to

live their entire life without a car, and not feel

deprived. -- Paul Bedford

Thoughts on a City

• Planning of the automobile city focuses on

saving time. Planning for the accessible city,

on the other hand, focuses on time well

spent. -- Robert Cervero

• The point of cities is multiplicity of choice. -- Jane Jacobs

• For all its flexibility, the

car is not the best

possible way to get to

or move around in very

Thoughts on a City

or move around in very

busy places.” --Henry

Ford

• Our national flower is

the concrete cloverleaf.

-- Lewis Mumford

• Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race. --H.G. Wells

• God made us walking animals—pedestrians. animals—pedestrians. As a fish needs to swim, a bird to fly, a deer to run, we need to walk, not in order to survive, but to be happy. --Enrique Penalosa

New York

City

Bold Steps

Creating

Public

SpacesSpaces

New York City

Car Oriented - - - > People Oriented

We have street life.

Do we want to

preserve it or get rid

of it?

National Urban Transport Policy

Equitable allocation of road space - focus on

people rather than vehicles

Non-Motorized Transport is

environmentally friendly and must be given their due

shareshare

Have to address safety concerns of pedestrians and

cyclists

Features such as safe bicycle

parking, shade, landscaping,

drinking & resting stations needed

We don’t need wider roads. We need to use the right mode!

NUTP – Challenges

Lack of safe crossing at busy

intersections

Badly designed pedestrian paths and cycle tracks

Encroachments

NUTP – Prescriptions

Designs based on open

debate with experts and

users

Strict enforcement with public

participationusers

Explore Public Bicycle

Systems

Area Plans in congested areas with exclusive

zones for NMT

Comprehensive Mobility Plan (draft)Goals for Pune - 2030

Non-Motorized

Other Motorized

10% Target Trips by Mode

Non-Motorized

50%Public Transport

40%

Walkability is much more than just footpaths

Results of a Walkability Survey conducted by Parisar.

“World Class” city vs. Pune

• High quality bus stops –

Pedestrians have plenty of

space

• Poor quality bus stops –

block pedestrian path

• Hoarding block pedestrians• Hoardings do not block

pedestrians

• Signages – out of pedestrian

pathway

• Signages – pedestrians

forced to duck

• Electric boxes – block entire

footpath

• Electric boxes (and other

utilities) in green space

• Garbage bins on the side • Dumper on the footpath

• Trees – providing shade • Trees – block footpath –

footpath too narrow!

• Greenery - trimmed • Greenery – out of control

• Pedestrian crossings –

difficult, no pedestrian

signals, no refuge

• Pedestrian crossing – easy,

simple, no conflict with

traffic

• Pedestrians have plenty of

space

• Pedestrian squeezed

• Pedestrians on the road –

accidents likely• No pedestrians on the

motor carriageway

• Pleasant walking

environment – patterned

walkways

• Footpaths in disrepair

Our standards are

different from “their”

standards

Street Design Guidelines – Worldwide

Why?

• Lack of Understanding

• Vested Interests

• Inequity in Society

• Our own attitude?

• http://bit.ly/pmcgrs

Recommended

Jan Gehl on Liveable Cities

• http://www.economistconferences.co.uk/vide

o/creating-tomorrows-liveable-cities/4832

Cycling Cities

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rwwxrW

HBB8

THANKS

www.parisar.org

ranjit@parisar.org