Designing Urban Places that Don't Suck (a sense of place)
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- čas přidán 16. 05. 2024
- Have you ever walked through a great city and thought, wow I love this place? What is it that makes some places great and others ... not? One key factor is what urban planners call a “sense of place.”
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After watching this video, it is very easy to understand why everyone but especially North Americans love Disneyland and theme parks in general
' Main street USA ' is nothing like the average main street in the real USA
yes indeed!
@@marvintpandroid2213 how so? Asks the ignorant european
@@marvintpandroid2213 Except that it was designed to specifically emulate old style of all the Main Streets that the country was built around. Those mostly got bulldozed.
There is a very interesting chapter in a book called "The geography of nowhere" where it talks more about this idea of the Main Street of Disneyland.
Imagine how soul crushing it must be if your entire nation looks like an open air shopping mall for cars.
But our entire nation does not look like that. My city in the Pacific Northwest is designed so that you can get practically anywhere in the city on foot or by bicycle. If you prefer, we have a great bus system too. I invite you to see some of the movies I have uploaded where I go on walks through different neighborhoods with just the ambient sounds of the neighborhood. Some are quiet and peaceful, while others are bustling and festive. All of Eugene, Oregon's neighborhoods are mixed-use, with nearly 40 miles (64 km) of bike paths and a similar amount of hiking trails, both in the city and in the "greenway" just outside of the city. As for Oregon itself, our entire coastline is public land and there is a hiking trail that follows the entire coast, known as the Oregon Coast Trail. There are similar trails along old railroad lines from Portland to the coast, and another one from the college town of Corvallis to the coast. Cheers!
@@mushroomsteve lucky for the 1% of Americans that live in Oregon I guess...
@@Blackadder75 But our state didn't get that way in a vacuum. Oregon specifically enacted policies -- such as urban growth boundaries, public beaches, etc. in the early 1970's. It was a forward-looking policy choice that prevented us from going the way of most other parts of the US. I hope that other states can now look to what we have accomplished and use it as a model for their own urban development. Car-centric development was a choice in itself. With channels like Not Just BIkes and others spreading awareness, we can hopefully soon make better choices.
@@mushroomsteve When I look at Eugene on Google maps streetview I barely see any bus lines or cycling lanes at all.
@@mushroomsteve Okay 99% then :)
I've been walking for mental health recently. Have to cross a highway to get away from my home, and the pedestrian light turns green at the same time as the car turning lane at the intersection I walk. Some lady in one of those giant trucks yelled 'Nice one' at me for walking when my light turned green because she was turning. I often feel hated for being foot traffic, and clearly this is a sentiment shared by many.
NEVER believe a light can protect you. ALWAYS check. I have seen people killed crossing streets and many close calls.
Pedestrians always have right of way
I live in Canada but I am originally from Eastern Europe. It absolutely strikes me whenever I ask for directions in Eastern Europe and people tell me “okay, so walk up to 5th elementary school, head right until you see 3rd polyclinic and then as soon as you see the statue of X historical figure you’ll know you’re there”. Your mind space is occupied by places, not streets :)
You forget when people try unknown streets and then give up and use tram lines instead.
Interesting fact: Eisenhower actually hated how the Interstate Highway System turned out because it was nothing how he envisioned. He never intended for Highways to cut through cities or even for normal people to mass use them. He envisioned it mostly for military use and economic use, so things like truckers. He more or less wanted the Autobahn copy and pasted into the U.S.
This is really neat! Was this from a book or something, because I’d love to read it!
curious, I too would like to read more about this
So some people have comments that are auto-removed here -so how do we have a discussion about improving things while censorship and fascism rule the USA?
Wouldn't it have been so much cheaper to build those highways AROUND the cities?
That's what happens when you make GM secretary of War
I think another factor in the "Every place is the same" feeling is that in the US almost every shop is some sort of chain. With all the branding and box construction that comes with putting up a building the cheapest they can. Every big box store brand has the look that they want for their building to maintain their "brand", and that goes for all the chain restaurants. All the places feel the same because they are all built to look the same, because corporate America feels that the identity of their businesses is more important then the identity of the town or city that they are built in.
Funny enough it looks like I envision communism, everything tailored to be as cheap and functional as possible. No culture.
Yea, and the "brands" of chains have been so diluted that its not even a brand anymore, they just build the same building and put a different logo on it.
Except in a few cities, like Manhattan, parts of Boston, parts of Philadelphia, etc...
That's one tiny thing I do actually appreciate about Apple.
Have never and will never give them a red cent, but I appreciate how they often try to save the exterior and style of a building they use for their shops. For example the Apple store shown at 8:45, or the Apple Store on Leidseplein, Amsterdam. McDonalds weirdly enough does this too .. sometimes. For example, one in Haarlem is situated in a monumental corner building and still has all the old markings.
I think Apple Inc. has tried to maintain the buildings' identity when they move into older neighborhoods with their stores.
THIS! The first time I went to north america, I had such an overwhelming feeling that I had no words for. A friend explained the concept of places to me, and that the US is mostly made up of non-places. The only places for the most part are peoples homes and the insides of buildings. But moving between these feels like putting on a space suit and moving in a rover through the inhospitable landscape of another planet. It's not made for people.
And of course, as Global Heating intensifies, this impression of using a rover to traverse inhospitable wasteland between sealed environments will become more _literal._
My husband and I are closing on a house soon. This channel made a HUGE difference in where we chose to look for houses. We live in the USA and work from home, so we hunted for a town that prioritizes human-scale design, has a thriving downtown, and has lots of small business. Once we found that, we looked for a home within cycling distance of the town since homes near downtown were really expensive. I'm stupidly excited that we found exactly that. We'll be able to bike to Aldi and other box stores along low speed frontage streets, as well as to the downtown of the town on cycling trails - all of it under 10 miles distance. It was even within our budget, which was capped at 300k. I'm so glad I was orange pilled before looking for a house. Our experience proves that with some research and time you can still find places to live in the US that values humans over cars.
Great! Check out the channel City Nerd for some good recommendations on where to live in the US.
@@NotJustBikes Oh heck yeah, we watch City Nerd and Strong Towns :)
Where did you end up?
@@NotJustBikes - haha-this-sucks-man.jpg
what city?? name please! if I have to move back to the US, looking for somewhere that has a real city vibe and not a car city vibe..
I once decided to take a two hour walk to get to the nearest provincial park. On the way, I found little to no shade, a sidewalk that ended, and then found myself walking on the side of the road where I got flipped off multiple times. The park was beautiful but the journey there was not something I’d ever do again.
Oh the irony of having to drive miles somewhere to... walk.
What.. what the... why did you even get flipped off for?
@@kentreed2011 Because they were "in the way".
I once decided I was going to walk to the nearest book store. Took me over two hours, each way. Luckily there were abandoned train tracks I could follow for about half of it. Way more pleasurable to walk there than anywhere else
@@kentreed2011 people in the US sometimes just do that if you're on the side of the road and walking when there's no sidewalk, basically "Fuck you, get a car asshole!" as if you couldn't possibly have anywhere to be without using a car to get there.
(Edit: fixing grammar)
Cookie cutter suburbs/houses have the same issue. A lot of times they can be really beautiful and functional homes, but their sense of place is overpowered by a sense of normalcy as they are copy and pasted around a sea of asphalt.
I would go insane living in a place like that honestly. I understand why Americans are so weird
There’s no history, and it feels fake
@@mnm5165 weird is an understatement
I know people see apartments, condos, and “missing middle” homes as copy/paste design. The difference, of course, is all the asphalt
Prewar uk (and presumably european) suburbs are nice because changing architectural styles give them a sense of place. A victorian gothic-revival street looks different to a street of regency townhouses.
The whole point of Northern American urban design strategies is to put people in one of three places, their house, their car, and their job. That's it. You're in one of these three places over 95% of your life. You're rarely outside. Rarely around other people in a social setting. You're rarely around beauty which is purposeful to communicating to people that beauty has to be purchased in the form of a car or a house.
The more I think about this, the more this idea disturbs me. Growing up in central Europe, I never even considered how much public places contributed and continue to contribute to my life.
This starts out with the enormous frequency of public playgrounds and parks with BBQ--areas. Only a very small portion of people in cities here have gardens or patios, so public BBQ-areas are your chance to have a family BBQ in summer and then stay at the park, play outside with kids etc.
Then there are random hang-out areas that are not fit as play areas or for any dedicated activity except strolling and hanging out. You often have benches there that just require open space around them to be comfy. I wouldn't call these places parks, they are too small for that, but basically wide, tree-lined street centers that are meant to walk at leisure, sit down on the sides and exist outside without staring right into traffic.
Of course there are parks. Small parks, big parks, any kind. As kids or teens you meet there to hang out with friends without being helicoptered by parents. Where I live this is likely to be the space where you drink your first beer (it's legal at 16 here), meet with your boy-/girlfriend before you are ready to introduce them to your parents and of course just every day hangout.
As adults, this is basically what we use when we'd otherwise need a patio. Sure it's not as private as having your own backyard, but for many things that doesn't matter. You just want to hang out with some people outside, maybe play some Boule or Kubb or sit in the sun together. It's also space to work out in for many people (think running, yoga, cycling, bodyweight exercise etc.).
And this isn't even touching on aspects like shopping streets. People just need outside areas to exist.
It's meant to make you live as a machine, not a human.
I moved out from Houston to Virginia. Although not perfect, it is miles better. There's actual town centers, places to bike, stores are close by, and a park with an entire lake that has farmers markets open up every week. My partner and I can actually walk and bike to these places. I have relied less on my cars and opted to try and walk more. It has been a game changer.
thats great! ive been car free for over 5 years now, and im absolutely loving it. i walk to the store, bike to work, and bus to visit my friends
Shame Virginia is so muggy
When you say Virginia I assume you mean northern Virginia. I live there too and can relate when you say that there is some pedestrian infrastructure. While not perfect, it is far better than other places I’ve visited in America. Along with the recent push toward expanding the metro lines (although the cost of parking makes it hard to justify financially if you want to ride the metro daily), I’m hopeful for the future of public transport in the D.C. metropolitan area.
Edit: I would like to add that the description of the town you moved to is frighteningly similar to mine. I too have a farmers market that is open every Sunday all year round just beside a park with parallel rows of townhouses facing into the park on either side. At the further end of the park there is a large pond that is cupped by larger single family homes.
It was wild when you mentionned Old Québec and then described street/road vs place when describing a trip through a city. It made me realize that when I give direction to my place, I offer highways and roads and bridges as reference, and when I describe Old Québec, a place made for pedestrians, the directions are places. The old church, the public square, the huge park... In the came city and yet everything is changed as soon as directions are given!
Incredible video, you always give me hope with every new one.
Designing Urban Places that Don't Suck
@@LavaCreeperPeople Yes, that's the title of the video, correct.
I live in Quebec city and seriously outside of the downtown's and Limoilou's districts, the city is a suburbs and car nightmare in so many places. But the situation is starting to change, with the project to build a streetcar like in Europe's cities and more bike lanes who take lanes from cars,
Ding ding ding, we've got a winner. Exactly my opinion when I describe a location here in Hamburg, Germany. Not streets, at least not predominantly, but places.
This explains the memorability of places to a great extent.
The center / shopping street of my 30k people town in Germany fulfils the criteria of width to height, which makes it memorable to some degree. But because the street going through it has car traffic at 50 km/h, as a pedestrian, you're more focused on finding the next crossing and not getting hit by a car. Sitting in the cafés and bars is a noisy and polluted endeavour.
So our town is remembered more easily, but not really in a good way.
The neighbouring town of the same size has a street that also has lots of shops with a street. The key difference for me is that cars here go much slower, maybe 30 km/h and you can cross the street anywhere, though you still have to pay attention. The place is significantly more pleasant, even if there is cars.
So reducing speed can be a quick measure to make a place better for people not inside a car.
And the capacity of the street isn't any worse when it's 30km/h instead of 50km/h. I think it's even better to have slower speeds, you can experience that in traffic jams
@askuri_ I feel the same way with my city center
Jasper Alberta’s main street through town has a speed of 30 km/h. Its nice to walk along it and its not too loud even during the day when its busy.
Now entitled drivers coming from the city dont always adhere to that limit (the lanes are too wide imo), but baby steps
Of which cities are you speaking? It stands out to me that t50 streets are always dead in Frankfurt where I live
@@silassheriff7868was sind t50 Straßen, bitte?
This is such a well worded video for me. I am from Paraguay, a small country in South America, currently studying Architecture and Urbanism. But it breaks my heart to see us as a developing country people taking "inspiration" from the most famous country a.k.a. the U.S. and steadily going into a car-dependent society with no sense of place. Not only because of the many reasons you already know but also because in this country THE HEAT is such that in a normal winter day we can have +35ºC of heat (in summer you can only imagine and pray). Yet we keep cutting trees to add a new lane. I do not know if studying Urbanism is going to be in ANY way useful because I feel so hopeless, how can I change my city alone... I will try. But hurts.
I'm so glad you included examples form Croatia. We have so much great walkable places in Croatia but at the same time Croatia has become a car destination for tourists from all over Europe which really makes it tough to preserve those beautiful places.
Would love to see European train infrastructure build up to make it convenient, and cheap, to travel across nations. It is definitely doable with the right set of priorities.
As soon as they get a high speed rail line between Beč and Agram running, I'll visit Croatia.
Replacing the local shops with national chains is exactly what is happening in NYC. The rents have become so high that only big national chains can afford it and the local Mom & Pops are priced out and you lose so much of the cities character when you allow that to happen. In NYC they would prefer a place stay empty (and gain tax benefit from that) than to lower the price to allow locals to open unique places. US greed at its finest.
Indeed. We often hear about landlords rent gouging and abusing their residential tenants (which is something that should be heard about), but rarely how landlord gouging also negatively affects small businesses.
Great point. While Its great to get a Krispy Kreme, we need are losing the unique Donuts Plant/Shoppe and local places.
Vacancy taxes! Punish lack of use! And then remove building restrictions to decrease market rate rent.
it's happening all over the world. half my major citys cbd shops are empty
even some chain shops closed there during covid
Thanks for mentioning my hometown Zagreb, in my opinion a pretty underrated city by both Croatians and foreigners in comparison to our costal cities
I visited Croatia for the first time last year and Zagreb was my first stop. I really enjoyed it, especially going up in the hills and seeing the views down on the city.
I visited Zagreb twice this month and was disappointed in how few people use public transport (despite it being very cheap) and ride bikes (despite sidewalks being pretty wide). Also, the streets/roads are unnecessarily wide, with too many lanes dedicated to car traffic. Rijeka, where I'm from, is much more enjoyable with its narrower streets/roads, though it is also car-infested.
@@BcroG11the public transport use lower is probably because its summer break (no school) aswell as lots of people having a vacation
The bike lanes are unfortunately pretty scarce :/ It also depends from which side of the city youre from - all of the eastern side is terrible for the bikers. Western side is much better, though it also seems to have some chanllenges.
I think the type of tourist that goes to Croatia doesn't really care about culture and only cares about the ocean. Especially because citys probably don't cater to foreign monolinguals.
Have spent two months in Zagreb last autumn, loved the city, I found it very walkable with good public transport and lots to do.
If anything the coast is totally overrated.
I really like the point about navigation. When I was in Japan, they don't even have names for lots of streets, so you kind of go by neighborhoods instead of by street names. Like, first you are in Asakusa, and if you head west, you will end up in Ueno, and south from Ueno, you will reach Akihabara. And so on. Each place is centered around a massive interchange of subway and rail lines, and each one has countless shops and restaurants and to explore.
It's basically true, but it's a bit funny you chose that in particular since Ueno to Akihabara follows the route of Tokyo's "Main Street" which then connects straight into the old Nihombashi bridge which serves as the 0 km marker for the whole rest of the road system of the country. It's one of the few street names people actually know and use. =P
well... we also gotta remember the town and cities of the "old world" were what people could travel on foot or horses... not cars, not trains... those were just villages and towns in modern terms...
then again Japanese just does certain thing better than the American (Western) minds... tho outside of Tokyo Metro Area it's basically just Japanese-nised Americanism (watch Abroad in Japan's Journey across Japan's 3 Series/ Season)
It’s a tragedy that America is built for driving a car to a mall, consuming some product, and driving the car home. Places that are only built for transactions, not life. I lived in Seattle and the city had great places. But every time we needed to drive to one of those shopping planets I felt dead inside.
This should be required watching for anyone in city government/city planning.
Edit: for everyone
It probably is, problem is the elected officials that'd be signing off on it are scared of the entitled car drivers.
Until they get billions in lobby money from big motor company
Good news: these concepts are being taught in planning school (source: I am in planning school). If you want to learn more about placemaking, enclosure, etc. try reading Cities for People by Jan Gehl and The Image of the City by Kevin Lynch.
I think that many planners are already aware of this stuff and are trying their best to reform cities for the better, it's often the politics that are holding things back.
@@reillycurran8508 My city removed parking minimums. For those that don't know, parking minimums are where the big government tells small businesses how big their parking lot needs to be without knowing anything about the business. A lot of car drivers came out and said that would mean there'd be no place for them to park! Thankfully, the council members had facts and logic to shut them down.
Even if they learned this, I don't think anything would change. An elected's main interest doesn't lie in improving living conditions for people, it's in being re-elected. As long as the average voter thinks that adding more roads is the best course of action, that is what the elected will do, even if they know it's bs.
It actually hurts seeing such nice places. I've spent my whole life in an utterly bland world of 4-lane stroads, chain restaurants, power centers and interstates. The comfy, historic small town USA downtowns in my state are pretty much dead, a few local shops hang on but not enough to give many people a reason or even an excuse to spend time there. Even the college town nearby is just a giant stroad.
I am from Argentina, grew up in a wealthier suburb with some car dependency but also a robust bus system with some trains- moved to Germany where I met my bf who is American. We recently were visiting his hometown and I was shocked that we needed a car for everything but I also understood how you get into this bubble of comfort where you don’t pay attention to the parking lots or general ugliness because you’re driving not walking. You go to your copy-paste box store than looks the same in every corner of the country and then you go back to the lush green suburban home (if you are lucky) and use your central AC and watch tv. It was so surreal. I get why so many Americans don’t understand this, why they are so afraid and isolated and why they feel they need their guns, they blame minorities and they consume so much: they are disconnected from their communities in systemic ways. The physical spaces we create actually mould societies. I wish more architects, urbanists and developers would understand this and the responsibility they hold.
This is not a coincidence. Single family zoning became really popular in the early 20th century as a way to get around the court rulings against racial covenants. It has always been about isolation from the rest of the world.
You nailed it:) this was all intentionally done from top down government policies not architects!
Exactly, after moving to Canada I realized why mass shootings are common.
I live in a city that is carbon copy of an average American city. Even with half million population it feels like a ghost town. If you work from home and have a car, you can live without every seeing a human.
Thank you. You explained the very real dilemma of Americans in just a few sentences. As a commenter below stated, this was the intent of the city planners and the government when creating these communities. They wanted to preserve physical and mental segregation through environmental planning.
This is an extremely cogent observation. Our suburbs are utterly alienating. No wonder we have so many mass shootings.
I feel like an alternative title for this video could be "Why we stopped knowing where we are". I feel like older generations always give directions by saying "Go past the place, then turn at the place. Then you'll be at the place." and I've literally never been able to understand how people can comfortably follow directions like that because everything looks exactly the same so it's hard to spot one bland building over another.
I feel like Japan has great walking neighborhoods. Tokyo is so massive and sprawling, you would think it wouldn't have heart. But there are so many small neighborhoods within the area. Each one has it's own unique feel. I lived there for three years. I would go out every weekend by train to random new places and explore. It was great. Now that I've been back in America, ive lived in multiple cities in multiple states. I rarely feel motivated to leave my house. The sprawl of Delaware feels no different than the sprawl of Missouri. It just has no allure. Japanese cities have so much to offer. Speaking of covered markets, that is also very common in Japan. The Nakano Sun Mall comes to mind, but there are so many examples all over Japan. All these neighborhoods are very small and are only open to foot traffic for the most part.
I think there is a key distinction between big, and sprawling.
Tokyo is definitely big (or perhaps gargantuan would be a better word) but pretty much no matter where you go it’s dense with homes and businesses.
Sprawl is what happens if there’s a lot of space taken up by inefficient land use. Think like parking lots, single family homes, and zoning that forces the places where people live to be faraway from places people want to be.
Also having an incredible public transit system definitely helps bring everything closer together.
Japanese cities are great for streetview tourism. Definitely makes sense that they would be good for walking about.
That's because Tokyo never evolved as a planned/managed city, but "naturally" evolving over the centuries in a mostly hermetic culture. In such case, size doesn't really matter to the sense of place. Ancient city of Rome shares similar characteristics with its chaotic and dense layout, in a sharp contrast to the colonial settlements across the empire with their prescriptive rational organizations. Organic evolution and cultural preservation is what grows the charm of a place -- big or small.
@@code96roblox One of the worst cities in the world for sprawl and lacking places and nice flow is Auckland New Zealand
Regarding enclosed streets: I’ve noticed this as I’ve been biking around town more this summer and I’ve naturally started to gravitate towards less direct bike routes.
All of the direct routes are just a lane on a busy wide street which has no coverage. That makes it hot, loud, and the sun is in my eyes.
But all of the indirect routes are tree lined which solves all those issues! Suddenly I don’t care about getting to my destination as quickly anymore when the journey is so much more pleasant!
I visited Amsterdam a year ago and cycled through that street with the grassy tram track in the middle and bike lanes on the side, I instantly recognised it in this video, just a random street and I can remember it a year after, that's the mark of a great street
Living in the Eastern Kentucky all my life, this video really helped me to understand why I have such an attachment to this area. I've been enclosed by mountains all my life giving me profound since of place. When I travel around here in the mountains, I am still enclosed yet in different and distinct places. I feel like this exactly mirrors the urbanist since of place, just on a much larger scale. Thanks for helping me to put this feeling into words!
One tiny detail I really appreciate in these videos is the use of a country's name in its native language in the little location markers in the bottom left. It really shows a deeper level of respect and inclusivity that I don't often see nowadays. As a Scotsman, 'Alba' and 'Glaschu' was so lovely to see. Thanks Jason!
I had to do that one. My grandmother was Scottish. 😉
I dunno, I'm kind of torn about it. If you're not familiar with the place a place that uses a foreign script (like Greek or Chinese characters) then it's a bit confusing. Maybe include the English names for clarity?
@@debesys6306 Glasgow is "Glaschu" in Gaelic and Scotland is "Alba". Gaelic isn't spoken much outside the highlands and western isles, though. The people of the central belt speak Scots instead (and English), which evolved from the same precursor language that English did. The Scots word for Glasgow is Glesga.
except for Paris apparently...
@@ShivamSPatel-is-on-fire Please tell me you're kidding.
It's interesting to see Glasgow for the first time on the channel. There is a fascinating case study of a city that tried to become a car-dependent hellhole build straight from the Los Angeles playbook (literally!) but is now undoing the damage as best it can.
And damn do some people resent the efforts to undo it, but I’m thankful that they’re trying. I grew up in North America, and moved over here over a decade ago now. When I was younger I said things like ‘I could never live in a city’ because my experience was with same-y looking cities, or dying Main St. I live in a walkable neighbourhood on the edge of City Zone 1 here, and I love it in part because it’s got more of a sense of place and being lived in, like an old small town. I hope they manage to bring that back to the parts of the city that have lost that feel.
They have a messy-as-hell public transportation system however.
How is the urban planning in the rest of Scotland? I don't see Scottish cities or towns featured much on urban planning channels and haven't had the opportunity to visit, but I've been curious
Do you have details of this case study please?
@@ddogg14 I was in Edinburgh recently and it is easy to get around by public transport but it’s a very small city, so it should be! The cycle lanes are poor so I biked on the roads. There’s a strong sense of place in the centre but start moving to adjoining areas, Livingstone etc, and you soon realise that good transport and public infra is not equally distributed. Which is a great shame as the centre of Edinburgh is a theme park while Livingstone is a liveable place.
But still better than England where we’re governed by US-influenced subhumans who possess the US’ default twitch towards retrograde transport and urban planning policy.
I just got back from Da Nang, Vietnam. I fell in love with the city in just a few days. From where I was staying, I was able to find one of the most unique features of the city, the Dragon Bridge. I found it almost by accident, as I was looking for a nearby night market. So much of what you said in the video resonated with me while I was thinking about Da Nang and what I loved about it. There were a few chains, but they were balanced by local businesses. The city had character and the bars near the river had open air seating, both because of the hot weather and because people wanted a view of the river and the bridges. It was distinctive and the area around my accommodations was easily navigable on foot, especially after becoming a little familiar with the surroundings.
I have lived my whole life in America, and I always get confused when people tell me that they are going to visit a giant city like Houston, Atlanta, or LA. Aside from a small downtown area these cities, and a ton more, are almost entirely just suburban sprawl filled with strip malls and cookie cutter neighborhoods. I have always preferred state/national parks for vacation to escape the cityscape and see something that is actually pretty. If more cities in America were like the ones shown in your videos I would be more open to going to them.
Yeah, this always happens when I visit places. You realize not much interesting except for specific tourist spots.
Your videos should be mandatory for city planners in the US and Canada!
Hell no
@@QiZFziG4 Bruh I would like to see a better infrastructure, besides it can greatly improve the environment, mental/physical health, make outside more pleasant, and walking, biking, and even taking a train is much better for your health both physical and mental.
I would rather that than having to drive 24/7 shouting many curse words possible in a deserted isolated asphalt.
One of my professors actually played his video about streetcar suburbs in my urbanization class!
The planners know... really this video should be mandatory for voters!
@@timmattle4730”hell no” is not the opening to an “open and vibrant conversation”. Keep it moving bozo
One of the major differences is also densification. If the city is built around cars, it fosters urban sprawl and further encourages car usage. We need to rethink our cities around people's lifestyles, redesigning short and medium-range transportation networks. This will likely make cities more appealing, as people will be able to walk and spend more time there and Of course, it will create more memories!
I agree that population density is a big difference between most European large cities and North American ones but if I look at the evolution of the density in Paris across time I am not convinced that it is applicable on a finer scale. The population in the center of Paris has been decreasing since the mid 50's which could be attributed to the increase access to cars but it is still decreasing now despite more than 10 years of increased pressure to reduce car traffic in the center. I have seen the same trend in other large cities. (I think that these number of inhabitants are even overestimated in many countries due to the difference in taxation between the main and the secondary residence. At least true for France and the Netherlands.) It would be interesting to study the cause and effects of these changes.
I was standing in line to get on a flight from LA to Atlanta last week, and struck up conversation with the guy behind me. I said "what did you like about LA?" and he said "oh, the highways. they have so many of them. we don't have enough in Atlanta." then he turned to his son and said "wouldn't it be great if they added more back home? like maybe 5 or 6 more?" I stood there in disbelief and laughed it off. I've never had a more baffling or terrifying exchange in my life.
Back in Europe, I also thought of the city as places, not directions. That is such a nice observation.
Finally, urban planning channels are starting to talk about HOW to make a great city. I've been waiting for the discourse to transition from WHY the current design of many cities (mostly western) are a problem, to HOW we can design our cities better. Now that a lot of the discourse on urban planning reaches mainstream media and the public, it can now shift into videos wherein the main focus are the solutions to the problems of our modern cities.
Additionally, I am hoping for more coverage of Middle Eastern, African, East and Southeast Asian countries, so that the discourse on urban planning could reach the mainstream media of these areas of the globe. I, from the Philippines are starting to see content on TikTok and Facebook about Philippine urban planning and it would help a lot if these big channels could cover countries like mine that deserve good urban places :D
I agree, I can personally attest to the Philippines as a car dependent hell. Spoiler alert, traffic is still ridiculous which is amplified by the density, and most don't even have their own cars, especially in poorer areas. 🙃
@@patricke825 We have the same problem with other countries where most people don't even own cars yet all of our infrastructure is for the few who can afford to own them. The public transportation potential would've been great, with our tricycles and jeepneys, we can connect everyone to any location if only our cities were designed with walkability, and bikability in mind, plus tricycle (for really short), jeepney (intra-city to inter-city, same with bus) metros, subways, and inter-city high speed rail as public transportation options.
@@asahiorbit4565 Jeepneys are a horrible public transportation device.
I love to use public transportation, but can't get myself use these crowded, hot, uncomfortable vehicles that are still the most common way to move around in Metro Manila.
The Philippine government announced they will modernize them back in 2017/18, yet five years later almost nothing was done.
Philippine urbanism:
No culture
No architecture
Intense traffic
Slums for the impoverish
Speculation towers for the middle class
Booming american suburbs in the countryside
Chaotic and irritating public transportation system
Extreme density with the narrowest roads and alleyways
LOVE THE PHILIPPINES 👍☺️ [this is a command, not a request]
Are things getting better for the poor there?
The more I live in Small-ish but Old-ish Ville USA, the more I realize just how, even in the places that have detail, that are walkable, most Americans are so attuned to ignoring every detail that when I point out a cool bust or brick design in a 120 year old building, nobody, NOBODY I am ever with has ever even stopped to notice such things before.
Its like every American is trained to treat everywhere like the strip malls.... and yet, and yet... and yet... they still always seem to agree (but never understand) when I say something like "This downtown (which is 1 1/2 main streets) used to have an xtensive streetcar network, wouldnt that be so nice enstead of these car cars?"
But nomatter how much any of these Americans I call friends agree with me, I still cant seem to convince any of them "why" and certainly not to try and figure out "Why" for themselves
Americans are just too fucking stupid.
you are sort of leading the horse to water. you've noticed PART of how thier mindsets work.
Maladapted survival skill. Works well when dealing with sidewalks and driving because of how stressful it is, so you have to tune it out. Doesn’t work in pedestrian-oriented areas, but it takes a while to unlearn survival skills like that
Americans spend thousands of dollars to go vacation in Europe or even just to Disney World. It's not like we don't have the instinctual like for good urban places. But too many of us ignore what could be better right in front of us because we've deluded ourselves that the American Dream is car dependent suburbia. It would take a lot for that cultural image to break and for the country to change.
@@machtmann2881
I wonder what happens when one day ALL the oil on the planet is gone.
No more "gas" to fuel their cars. ^^
I'm Dutch, and haven't been outside Europe for my entire life (20 years)... except the past week. I've always enjoyed your video's, but never truly understood it until I was standing here, on the roads of the USA. So many of the stereotypes we have of America are just day-to-day business here, it's insane. The mountains and nature are insanely pretty here, and I hope one day the cities will be as well
America is great for a holiday - had a fantastic time touring the tourist hotspots and visiting their beautiful nature. However, I'd never want to live there.
@@AnEnormousNerd I've been nearly exactly been 1 week in the states, and have 3 more planned. I'm staying with some friends, so I'm really getting the native experience (though my hosts do have a couple e-bikes, and do really prefer to not use their cars)
@@AnEnormousNerdI live in a suburb east of San Francisco and I’m inclined to agree with you 😅 The nature around me is indeed beautiful, but the area I actually have to conduct my daily life in leaves much to be desired. May I ask where you live?
Fantastic video, especially in light of the very recent passing of the French anthropologist Marc Augé, who was the person who first coined the term "non-place" in his 1995 book "Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity". Super interesting how these non-places impacts our sense of identity, culture and social glue, and how striking the difference is between a non-place (highways, supermarkets, airports, hotels and other car-infested, sterile, copy-paste places) and a "sense of place", like this NJB video show.
This video needs to be broadcasted on billboards in every North American city
BuT hOw WiLl I dRiVe My CaR tHrOuGh ThErE?! It'S nOt LiKe ThErE aRe OtHeR rOaDs I cAn UsE!
Your channel has sparked an interest in me. I’m seriously considering pursuing a career in urban planning simply because of this channel. I love seeing the things you talk about in your videos in my everyday life, and actually being able to put things into words to explain why I feel so empty in modern cities in North America.
If you interest is more in change than in design maybe also consider a political career. (Local) Law is a very big factor in why urban planners are not even allowed to make great places in many US cities.
Our daughter just returned to vienna from a trip to minesota. If we didn't know where she went, the pictures she sent wouldn't have helped us guess what state she was visiting. Without having friends there, she said she wouldn't think of going back anytime soon.
Exciting first week, dull three more weeks of the same good damn sight all day and night.
The "no places" you showed look exactly like where I have always lived. No wonder I go to more interesting places on my vacations.
I'd love a video or two on how to convert lousy places, like Houston, to something a little better.
I just looked up the process to getting traffic calmed on my street with a speed bump-emailing the planning commissioner, who sends out paper mail notifications to homeowners on my street, inviting them to a residential planning commission meeting in 2-6 weeks, whereupon 65% or more of the homeowners need to agree to the speed bump in order to authorize the speed bump. In the meantime, the streets on either side have speed bumps already and this is the only road without speed bumps, so everybody speeds like a demon along our street rather than going down another one. If not enough members show up physically/virtually and vote yea, they won’t do the speed bump. So at every step of the way, planning just this one calming speed bump on one street has to be almost entirely the responsibility of the residents all getting together, even though we all work and we all have different schedules and some of the residents on this street are renters and I don’t know who owns their properties. Maximum effort required of the citizenry, minimum responsibility for the city.
Watch Strong Towns then, not my channel. I've given up on Houston, they haven't.
@@calidawg510 What's bad in cherry picking your topics when you're a youtuber? You only have so much time to produce a video. At least if you're doing this next to your normal job.
I like trains a lot. So if i'd start doing videos about train stations, i'd cherry-pick an interesting station over a very generic one somewhere in the suburbs.
Bulldose it and start over.
But seriously, i think that would be very difficult. Both because it would mean bringing everything closer together creating huge abandoned areas inside cities.
And because of the increased dencity the entire infrastructure that was build to deal with low density needs to be replaced. Like sewers, electricity and water and gas and stuff. And it would create havoc in property prices. Making most basicly worthless and some places to valuable. It requires loads of planning and regulation to build a replacement instead of growing something more densly organicly.
Doing it at once would be wildly expensive, but doing it slowly would create half century long construction pits and makes it hard to plan ahead as everything is depending on eachother.
There was this guy called Oppenheimer, he invented the solution for Houston some time ago. A fairly good movie was made about him recently. You should watch.
Your videos give me such a sense of gratitude for living in a liveable European city (consistently ranked at the top, to boast a little, though I'm not sure how much that is attributable to excellent urban planning). Also, I get lots of ideas on how to make it even better. Great content!
lol you don't know how lucky you are to live there and not be trapped and secluded as a child/ teenager because you can't drive.
Likewise for me, living in such a place in the Pacific Northwest USA. Greetings.
How do you think I feel living in the Netherlands? 😄 This channel really opened my eyes about my own country and everything I take for granted. It honestly changed my life ^^
The worst part of living in a south-italian city is that it's exactly like the U.S. but whitout parking lots. I wanna emigrate to the Netherlands since i was 12, now I'm 13 and realized how much time I still have to wait in this hellscape.
People wonder why I barely leave NYC and PHL. As soon as I get to another US City I want to turnaround to go back home to NYC and hope NYC tries to become more like Barcelona and Old Amsterdam.
This video really helped me understand what it is about traveling abroad that I enjoyed so much. Growing up in suburban America, I had never been exposed to streets or public areas with the sense of space you describe. As a result, going to another country and experiencing that feeling was kind of mind blowing.
as a Scottish person living in Scotland, kind of surprised you went for "Glaschu, Alba" instead of "Glasgow, Scotland". I can't think of the last time I actually saw/heard the city's Gaelic name used.
Notice that he did that for all of the place names.
I wanted to mix it up a bit. My grandmother was Scottish.
Oh wow, I wondered where „Glaschu, Alba“ was, thanks for commenting on it! I‘ve actually been to Glasgow before! Now I am looking to find it again in the video.
7:02
@@NotJustBikes huh, whereabouts in Scotland were they from?
I moved from the US to Freiburg recently and it was life changing. First time I had access to actual transit and walkability
I was very excited to see that you visited. I hope you enjoyed the city
Greetings from the south Radolfzell am Bodensee🙋♂️
Just a FYI...The city of Vancouver is about to vote on getting rid of a bike lane that was put in place during the pandemic. This was about ten blocks long. They had changed to street to a one-way for cars with a two way bike lane. Now they are voting to get rid of bike lane...So ashamed of the cities in Canada doing this!!! Have visited Amsterdam and loved it there for the bikes!! Keep up the great work and hope that some day the idiots in Canada will come to their senses!!!
Sadly you need build quite a lot of bike lines (or roads comfy enough to bike) before people start using them
You can't bike-lane your way into a livable city.
@@hardopinions True. It's not the bike lanes per se. It's the removal of car lanes that does it. Cars don't mix with bikes or pedestrians. When cars are around NOBODY will walk or bike.
Vancouver is 'ALL IN' on cars. For them it is about money and profit over livability.
@@wytrzeszczwytrzeszcz7739 This is true. Victoria did this and now a lot of people use the lanes on the main trails and the city is very cycleable
As a Canadian who recently moved to Amsterdam, I am loving these pro euro anti -North -America-44-Lane-Highway city design videos
1:41 This street in Berlin actually used to be a very car-intense street not too long ago. They simply decided to close them and make it a public space.
But the CDU will bring cars back again? I thought I read that
Yup the pedestrian/bike zone is gone, it’s open for car traffic again 💩
@@rickb3078 Sadly the cars will come back, since the previous city government (not CDU) did not provide proper reasoning for closing off the road to cars. Closure of streets towards cars is only allowed for safety reasons and controlling traffic, not for improving the city planning 😞
Konservatives love cars. Especially politicians who get money from car companies.
I just rewatched the video and saw that Not just Bikes had a note in the right bottom corner saying "RIP car-free Friedrichstraße :-(" nice attention to detail by him
Taiwan in general has a lot to work on to be more pedestrian friendly because we embraced laissez faire urban expansion in the 70s when cars are becoming popular and economy booming. There was no real planning and people just build whereever they want. Although the cities and roads in the country is still a big mess, it shows that the communities are still human-centric. Because we have a sense of community, and we just naturally build enclosed spaces like that: with shops and residential places all together. Human have been building places like this for thousands of years. Within my 5min biking distance I always feel like I'm in a different place.
Taiwan is already so much better than USA in general. (With the caveat that some specific towns/cities in North America is fantastic). But yes, it does feel like cars and (somewhat uniquely to Taiwan) scooters are a bit too dominant in many areas.
Like, scooters are both good and bad here.. they don’t take as much space so you can keep the cities more compact. (And thus quite walkable). But just today I was shocked about how fast they drive through otherwise very walkable streets in, say, Tamsui (it’s true everywhere but right there it was particularly striking because the streets looked safe to walk and cars were blocked from driving through).
I would also say that many areas of Taiwan don’t have a great sense of “place” as they look like any other place in Taiwan. You can easily feel disoriented in Taipei. Still, every part of Taipei is very walkable and has great public transportation. So it’s not just cars. There’s more that goes into building a sense of “place”
Well, a lot of areas in Taipei, like Ximen and Xinyi are fine - I can totally remember it for what it is. Night markets, which is basically, large walkable area like Shihlin is also very memorable. It gets boring along Fuxing or Zhongxiao road, but when you walk along its huge pedestrian way (which is shared with bikes), you'll notice the changing facade, although they are boringly uniform. My favourite places is the same as Tokyo: Taipei's backalleys, where you'll find local shops and residential supermarket, find local groceries, food items, that is affordable, unique, and fascinating. You can find unrated food snack items, that can be hit or miss - but generally it is an experience that makes Taipei unique. It is nice to see that people still live only 5 minutes walk away from gigantic Fuxing mall or Taipei Central underground. A friend telling you to stand by at a busy Taipei cross road while he queued at "the best Chiate pineapple cake outlet" is just 15 minutes walk away from both your hotel and their residential address. It is amazing.
You can't say the same with real Americanised car-crippled cities of Australia like Sydney, where I really lived for almost 2 years. A downtown area is really downtown, chock full of business properties that gets abandoned dead at night. Pitt street is alive during the day, but totally dead appocalyptic once it gets beyond 10 PM. While Eastwood is quite walkable, Epping - the seemingly "modern suburbia" is a combination between walkable and big box stores (e.g. Coles supermarket located on Beecroft road). Good luck if you live in somewhere like Marsfield - where every American-minded folks characterise being "car-isolated" or "fake rural area design" as "homey" - nothing but residential buildings that forces you to walk for at least 15-20 minutes to nearby activities.
I've only been to Taiwan once, but I found it VERY unfriendly towards pedestrians. There were no actual pavements/sidewalks, just a painted white line or nothing at all, and there were so many motorbikes and small cars parked everywhere that as a pedestrian I had to frequently step out into the main part of the road.
Now this was just one small part of Taiwan, I'd still like to come back and explore more because I hear there are some wonderful cycle tours, particularly on the Eastern side of the island.
@@nbartlett6538 I don't know where you're from, but you also have to remember that psychology plays a massive, massive role. I'm American and would have probably felt the same way if I hadn't travelled much and went straight to Taiwan (or Vietnam, for a much more extreme example). Where are the sidewalks? There are vehicles everywhere, am I really expected to just step out into the road?!?! The answer is yes, you are, but the drivers are so much more conscious of pedestrians than in North America. In North America stepping out into a street, which is for cars, would get you killed quickly. In Taiwan, stepping out into a street is stepping into a mixed-use area for cars, bikes, scooters, and pedestrians. It feels unsafe because you (I'm guessing) have been conditioned to feel unsafe in such places, but it's far safer than you think.
@@yohannessulistyo4025stayed in Songshan and found it to be very walkable.
One thought I've had is that the local culture of any place is like the "immune system" of a place or country. When you have a unique local culture you have something worth protecting, and when you don't there's nothing keeping big franchise chains from coming in and colonizing your place. Anyway, great video as usual 🙏
One time an American friend of mine posted in a server of him parked by a large row of shops, and the thing that shocked me the most is that the car park was so big there were literally numbered signposts for you to be able to remember where you parked. I have only ever seen that in airports. It was a real culture shock for me
The Arundel Mills Mall is so big that they have parking lot gang wars
This is one of the best presentations yet. In ten minutes really shines a light what some cities get so right, and what we're getting so wrong in North America. Share this with everyone.
Actually SO STOKED to have learned the term "kissing canopy" as I've been talking about roads/streets with that exact set up my entire life and how much I loved them, and never knew there was a word for it. It happens out here in the countryside of America (yes even America) on occasion and I'm obsessed with such places. As you said, they feel so cozy and I absolutely have always loved going through them.
I decided to walk to my nearby grocery store last night even though I live in a car dependent suburb. I’m lucky that there’s at least a side walk all the way until you get to the parking lot, but it was still surreal walking back home at night - I didn’t see anyone outside their house, and I felt like an outsider in a sea of parked cars on the street
I was surprised to see Old Québec mentioned! I live 10 minutes from Old Québec, and it is, indeed, a treat to navigate on foot. The different elevations and alleyways make for a fun and interesting walk every time, even though I've lived here for 27 years and am fairly used to seeing it.
Merci d'avoir mentionné notre belle petite ville :)
This video published in the same week that the British prime minister Rishi Sunak declares that he is in favour of more air pollution, higher traffic neighbourhoods, and higher speed limits in cities. And the main opposition leader Keir Starmer declines to oppose any of this because he doesn't want his party to be labelled "anti-car" 😡
How can that be when Rish! has working-class friends?
@@arabcadabra8863 not everyone has a grasp on the role their environment is playing on their own quality of life. even when people have experienced both good and bad environments, the question of why doesn't cross their mind
Hey at least Sadiq Khan is sticking to his guns and is expanding ULEZ. LTNs and improved cycling infrastructure has been great for London and it'll only continue to improve despite whatever the tories or Keir Starmer's diet tories think of it.
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What happens when there is no election for PM
I just came back from a neighbourhood in New Delhi called Malviya Nagar. I lived there in my childhood, and I occasionally go there for getting things and for childhood memories. There's a metro currently under construction near my house which is due to be completed by 2026, so the only way I can go to Malviya Nagar right now is by car, which is really annoying because you can actually see that the neighbourhood, especially its downtown area, was made with pedestrians in mind but had to be remodified by cars.
I really wish I was the mayor of Delhi. My first act would be to tear down all the concrete streets from the neighbourhoods of New Delhi and replace them with the classic brick streets/green spaces. But then again, too many people now own cars there. So they wouldn't really support such a decision, no matter how much trouble it causes them.
Look at a city in the Netherlands, and you'll see their are parts of the city appointed to be for cars. It doesn't mean cars can't be used. It just means not everywhere or not everywhere at high speed.
another viewer from New Delhi! Yeah, Malviya Nagar is just one of many such places and markets in Delhi that really should not be ceding so much space to cars and parking. Tight streets are meant for pedestrians, yet you have people trying to jam their SUVs and sedans through every single day and it's crazy!
Most people sadly don't know what they want.
Or at least their idea of what the solution is will never deliver the thing they actually want.
In urban design a lot of things are innitialy not intuative. Like for solving congestion the answer obvioudly is always more roads. But that doesn't solve congestion at all and creates new problems on top of the old ones.
Congestion is a problem of having to many cars on the road. Solving that problem is done by lowering the amount of cars on the road. Not providing more space for the to many cars.
Or what people think is convenient rarely ends up convenient when implemented as it has to be implemented to service all, not just you.
Like having a parking spot close to the store, for 1 person that would be convenient. But for all shoppers you end up with huge parking lots, ending up pushing shops far away from eachother, anding up pushing people into their car to hop between shops which ends up contributing massivly to the amount of cars on the road and congestion.
Actual convenience is to be able to rapidly get to the place where all shops are close together, you can walk straight in without having to find a parkingspot somewhere far away, hop into the places you need to be and quickly get on transportation that drops you of close to home again.
It saves at least half the time, don't have to think about much and don't have to pay attention to anything and while traveling you can actually do something else if you want. That is actual convenience.
@@nkg1190 I don't live in New Delhi anymore though. Now I live in Vasant Kunj which is in South West Delhi. But yeah, it's just a few kilometres away from my house.
@@abcdefgh1279 I think he changed it to say brick streets now. :)
Watched this on nebula and have to come here and support as well. Your videos have given me a completely different view of the world and as someone who doesn't drive I finally feel like I'm not the crazy one. Things are messed up! It bums me out that my youth and life in general might have been so much different and more rewarding if I grew up in a country with more pedestrian freedom and better transportation options. But at least I'm aware of it now and actively seeking out a unique place to live with better public infrastructure. You got me out of the fog of "why do I feel like shit here?". And I will be forever grateful for that.
"In North America, I think about streets and roads. My mental map is based on major streets and cardinal directions. But in Amsterdam, I think about places. I’m in one place, and I think about all the places I need to pass through in order to get to another place. My mental map is full of the best routes from one place to another, and I think about the city as a series of unique places. This strong sense of place makes the city mean something to me. I actually care about these places, and I like being in them." Really the crux of the whole thing and why Americans will remain atomized and dependent on the whims of their corrupt elite. I always wished my generation would have woke up earlier to basic stuff like not having to grovel to be able to walk to the store or live in a town without a car, it feels too hopelessly late to give my children a mental map of places if I were to raise kids there
Crazy excited to see my town (Glasgow) shown! and praised!
Yeah, Outside of the homelessness and wannabe roadmen Glasgow is pretty nice
Visiting family in Mostar, Bosnia a few years back really opened my eyes. It had such a vibrant feeling compared to the sprawl of stroads and narrow sidewalks I grew up in. Each and every shop I walked past expressed immense cultural and historical beauty and was a genuinely enjoyable experience to just walk around in.
first time i have ever heard bosnia described positively..
@@lurjiit's because Mostar is one of the handful of places worth visiting there. Most of Bosnia isn't much to write home about, although it has quite beautiful nature, it still pales in comparison to Croatia and Montenegro in that regard.
I've been in holidays in Mostar and indeed, it is a beatifiul place. The fact that the whole city is entrenched around a valley (which gives it an absolutely gorgeous look when you're approaching it) alongside the fact that many of its places are open to walk through makes this city absolutely great
I'm glad you showed a clip of Kensington market here in Toronto. It shows that mixed use with shops and residential can easily blend together. It's why people who live there defend it so fiercely. Starbucks wanted to set up shop and the association there turned them away. I'm sure some might call that NIMBYism, but refusing to allow giant chains to piggy back on home-grown culture is generally a good thing (as mentioned in the video).
the Glaschu Alba for an industrial city changing its identity touched me deeply, just seeing gaelic really shows how Scotland is trying and truly needs to redefine itself. ❤ love from Alba 🙏
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Id say it like this: In Europe and many other places they see public space as the area for everyone. In North America its the space for no one, its just space between spaces which can be used to put stuff you dont want in the space that matters, like roads, carparks, giant big bix stores and fast food places. This is probably just grown in that way since of course space is way more abundant in North America. They never had to consider their " in between" space as the precious commodity it is in Europe.
But Europe too is huge and most of Europe is just forests and meadows. Europe could just build wider rather than dense if space really was a problem. Instead I believe the more likely reason for low density in the United States is early enthusiasm for cars and auto industry lobbying/bribes.
@jakub.kubicek Most European countries are way more densely populated than the US, let alone Canada. But also, there are, of course, historical reasons to build dense. Like the lack of cars, yes, but also for defensive purposes. Plus climate reasons, most South European cities were built dense to provide shade when air-conditioning was not yet available. These reasons and more cause European cities to be much more sustainable and naturally leads to enclosed public spaces as described in the video.
@@jakub.kubicek The auto industry's popularity and power were part of it, but as with many things about the US, it's the racism. The white majority wanted to avoid and live separately from a formerly-enslaved black underclass that they feared as a source of crime and depravity. Car-centric suburbia without transit access offered the white majority a means to do so; the auto industry merely exploited those already-existing fault lines. Basically, European attitude: "I want my countrymen to have access to good transportation options." US attitude: "I've got a car, why should my taxes pay for shiny trains for Those People?"
@@Zalis116 Nail, meet hammer.
Older areas weren't like this. Space has nothing to do with it.
Your channel is the most valuable channel on CZcams.
“A place that could be any place is no place at all” that hit me a little different
When I arrived to my area of the US, the first thing I noticed is how much nature there is. And as I lived here, I also started to notice how little did I want to explore it.
Thinking about that, I made sense of it: It was very beautiful... from a car. But there was no way for me to go in for a walk. I noticed that instantly and intuitively.
It is such a pity, because this place could be one of those cities that you visit on your holidays on purpose, but instead of mixing the gorgeous nature and the city, they separate the two, making the city look like Anywhere, USA.
What an absolute waste of potential.
I am actually considering a career in urban planning thanks to you. Thank you for teaching me the way cities should actually be designed.
It would be interesting to see in 5 or 10 years how many orange-pilled viewers went on to pursue careers in planning, civil engineering, environmental studies, etc.
Try politics or media if you actually want to make a difference. Planning is the easy part
This is EXACTLY why I love living in Boston. Boston feels like no other US city. It's distinct from New York, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco, or whatever other actually urbanized city in the country feels like, all of which have their own character as well. Growing up in the suburbs of San Diego, driving through the suburbs of New England feels exactly the same, just with different and more trees. Where I live in Boston has rail transit, multiple bus routes, shops, restaurants, groceries, medical offices, and everything else I need on a day-to-day basis within a 10-minute walk. We're fighting to get even more dense, transit-oriented housing built in my area, because the dense housing we've already put up has led to a revitalization of the area.
I'd be curious to know what part of Boston you live in that's being "revitalized". Also New England suburbs, although much more car dependent than ideal, are fundamentally built differently than suburbs in many other parts of the country. New England suburbs were small towns absorbed into the cultural and economic sphere of larger cities. Most NE suburbs at the very least have walkable downtowns/main streets, and many of them are genuinely walkable and have decent transit. (Ie Salem and Reading ma, Barrington and Bristol ri, or long island suburbs of NYC. They're far from perfect but nothing like San Diego suburbs
@@oaxtec765 I live in a “streetcar suburb” within Boston city limits where there used to be a lot of industrial land, which has since been fairly recently (past decade or so) been re-zoned as mixed-use residential. New 4-over-1 and buildings are adding hundreds of new units of housing to the area and creating places for human-scale businesses to open up. Bicycle infrastructure is (slowly) improving, and I see more and more families in bikes, kids in cargo bikes, and non-car transportation choices daily. It’s becoming a lovely place to live, if only we could build enough housing to make it affordable!
Jerma didnt see any of that as worthwhile huh💀💀
For singaporeans, especially those without cars, we define our travel and mental maps heavily with public transport, so bus numbers and train stops. The size of the country means that a lot of it is suburbs. Walkable suburbs though.
I'm on vacation now in Haarlem and I paid a visit to Amsterdam. It's really so nice here. The Dutch really know what's important.
When people say Americans have no culture, this is what they mean, and they're completely correct.
I always laugh when I hear this because, if anything, there is too much culture but a lot of it is trash. Then I think of something worse - the consumers of that culture outside of the States. What does it say about them?
@@dexterwestin3747 Where is the "too much culture"? I don't see it. Most American culture is just commodity fetishism, where corporations have incorporated their brands and consumerist products into tradition, say for example grabbing a drink of (brand) beer and watching the NFL or MLB game. That's like the pinnacle of most American's "culture" and its just them consuming stuff.
(Sorry, I ended up ranting a bit below.)
Any lingering bits of culture came before cars were developed and corporations seeking profits above all else became the American bible. Now this country is run by oligarchs who have no care for culture. Just look at Hollywood, those who have concentrated all the wealth would rather see actors and writers homeless and starving (their words) than pay them. They also want to just develop shows and movies using AI, which is devoid of culture. The internet has been consolidated into like 5 websites, one of them we're conversing on, that all share the same black/white bland color scheme, with profiles with limited customization of profile pics and banners (we used to be able to customize the entire HTML and JavaScript of our profiles), and are owned by like a handful of billionaires. Older Americans don't do anything at night besides stay in their homes, as there's no more third places (those were all destroyed due to racism & to destroy chances of worker/racial solidarity) watching 24/7 news channels pumping them with exaggerated crime statistics and fearmongering about "others". Younger Americans can't leave their homes until they turn 16 and can drive, the right of way for "freedom" in the US is literally becoming an indentured servant to the auto, gas, and insurance companies they'll be paying til the day they die. So now the American youth mainly just stays home inside, as outside is hostile, overpoliced, and for cars, meaning they develop less social skills, interact in person less, and have a harder time developing community, which are all essential requirements of developing culture.
@@Rose-bc3ll Is this satire? Can't tell if this word salad is satire or not.
Americans bulldozed most of their culture to make room for generic buildings and car roads.
@@Rose-bc3ll There are very good reasons why most sites won’t let you customize your profile page using raw code anymore. Cross-site scripting vulnerabilities were very common back in the day precisely because of user supplied JavaScript in things like profile pages. HTML customization died because of things like phishing s (X-FRAME-OPTIONS didn’t show up until around 2009 and wasn’t fully implemented until around 2015).
It is definitely due to the carcentric planning, but that is not all. I grew up near a small city in the Midwestern USA. We used to have lots of little mom-and-pop stores downtown, plus local restaurants and big single-screen movie theaters with ornate decor. Then in the 1980s, everyone wanted a mall. So the city tore down many of these little mom-and-pop stores and the ornate old theaters to put in a big flashy new mall. But by the 2000s, big box stores started popping up on the outskirts of town, and soon the mall was dead. We in the USA seem to follow the latest fads instead keeping what works best.
Big box stores and meds corporations are able to "wow" small town councils with promises of new employment and huge boost to city revenue. Sounds great. So they sign the deal.
Until Walmart demands a tax incentive or else they'll go to the town next door instead, and oh by the way they'll need a dedicated traffic light at the entrance (@ about $500k per intersection). Oh and they actually only employ about 12 people full time everyone else is treated as disposable part time labor.
Due to tax breaks for mega corps, and the increased demand on services (Walmart needs power, water, etc) cities often need to raise taxes, further hurting their residents. The icing on the cake is the 40+ acres of land dedicated to it and all the asphalt. Further entrenches car dependency. Further making residents poorer.
Most of the profits from the big box store get funneled up to the corporate mothership out of state. Big box stores and mega corporations are a net drain on cities.
One of the best things that would help keep small store competitive would be to remove mandatory parking requirements. In most cities you can only legally build what is essentially a big box store. No mom and pop store can afford 20 acres for parking lot. Remove parking requirements and cities will shrink, by having more businesses in the same amount space.
"Car sewer" is a magnificent turn of phrase.
Greetings from Poznań! It's a total construction zone right now, but can't wait to see how it'll look when it's done. They're moving cars out of the city centre and adding new bike lanes, too. Exciting times!
Just from watching these videos, I would love to visit and even live in the Netherlands! The public transport, cycle lanes and overall convenience all appeal to me. I've even started learning Dutch in the hopes that one day, I'll visit it!
Same here, I began to learn Dutch a few months ago with longer-term plans to move to the Netherlands. By now I've visited a couple times since my sister lives and studies in Amsterdam and although not everything is perfect by their own standards, during each visit I had a hard time believing that I wasn't dreaming and how incredibly pleasant it feels to just be in Dutch places. Veel succes met je plannen!
Same here. I am hoping to visit the Netherlands next year with my family. My wife is still reluctant but said she was ok with the idea of moving there. It will be a few years though as we don't want to move until our dog passes away.
I've been learning Dutch as well.
Guys we have a housing crisis here in the Netherlands. Also, a lot of refugees from wartorn places and places with no food would like to live here. Can you please just stay put and join a local version of Strong Towns in changing your own environment? Thank you.
Guys we have a housing crisis here in the Netherlands. Also, a lot of refugees from wartorn places and places with no food would like to live here. Can you please just stay put and join a local version of Strong Towns in changing your own environment? Thank you.
@@atropatene3596 I don't see the US changing much in the next 50 years in this regard. There are some pockets where there is progress, but those places have become pretty expensive. I understand some of the challenges facing the Netherlands right now. We will see where things are in a few years. I'm open to other parts of Europe too.
As a subscriber from Budapest I really appreciated that you also showed examples from Central Europe.
I love Boston, going there back in 1992 and it’s a place I’ll never forget and it will always have a special place in my heart, a city which will always have a special place in my heart as long as I will live. So walkable and whenever my aunt uncle needed to go out of town, they rented a car. Beautiful architecture and history. Many beautiful older buildings in many American cities fall victim to “progress”. I live in Jacksonville, Florida and it’s so far spread out, people NEED a car to get everywhere and public transportation is nothing at all to brag about, the polar opposite of Boston. Thank you for the great videos!
Every time i watch one of your videos i get depressed thinking of all the childhood memories lessons and experiences i missed because of this god awful infrastructure, I remember once i wanted to walk home from school, and i ended up getting yanked out of a bush from a security guard because it was to dangerous to walk home, or how everyday id want to hang out with friends but I wasn’t allowed to leave the yard and I didn’t know anyone in my suburb anyway
As someone whose currently living in Broward County FL, but goes to uni in Savannah Ga, the description of going through places rather than basing it off cardinal directions & roads hit the nail on the head. It’s interesting that when I explain a concept like this to people here in Broward, they genuinely don’t understand what I’m talking about. It’s hard spreading this broader awareness of the designed world around you. You do a fine job though!
The older part of Savannah is laid out as a grid. But it is the multiple squares that truely make that part of the city great. Cool oasis full of old oaks and shade.
What the fuck is FL and Ga?
@@Man-in-the-green flerovium and gallium my dude
also a Broward resident here. really anything that isn't south of I-195 is a car dependent hellhole. you simply can't live without a car if you live in Broward and Palm Beach counties. and FDOT is adding another lane to I-95 to add another lane to the express lanes. Florida is simply terrible If u don't live in Miami proper.
Seminole county goon here. I navigate exclusively via I4, they made it bigger and traffic still blows. Well not for me, I work nights, but if I leave late and don't hit OBT by 6:30, I'm fuckin hosed.
I had noticed it before, but it was when my wife & I started road tripping around the US 7 or 8 years ago that the sameness of everything really hit me. Once you leave historic cores, everything starts to look like a carbon copy. Same building design for strip malls, for condos, for apartment complexes, etc. Same shops and restaurants. Same signage. Same wide roads & intersection design. Was that wing place we went to just outside of Montgomery or just outside of Mobile? I don't remember. Where was that hotel with the funny doorman? It was a Marriott just off the highway...next to a La Quinta...next to an Ihop...? Was it in upstate New York or on the outskirts of New Orleans? I don't know.
Sometimes the only way I can really remind myself that I'm somewhere different is by what little nature I can see. More seagulls? Probably in New England. Weird little black birds that aren't crows, but kinda look like them? Texas or the Gulf Coast. Is the dirt reddish brown (Virginia) or yellow-brown (Maine). The region I'm in has exploded in the last 40 years and there's a horrible monotony in everything around here. But that carbon-copy dullness is everywhere you look in the US. All those bits of video you showed from Canada and various parts of the US all look like Northern Virginia. It's all very sad.
As a Mobilian, I did not expect to see my city mentioned in a comment on a Not Just Bikes video. 🤣
8:52-8:58 - The fact that there are cities and countries who care about this stuff makes me feel really good for them. Be it keeping the phone booths alive or preserving the heritage and heritage of the cities, is all very very cool. Development always needs/has to be wholesome; and not devastating and destructive.
I watched the video on Nebula, but just came on here to comment: I really love the fact that you write the name of the places in their native language and script, makes it feel very respectful to all the cool places you highlight!
You made a small mistake in the locations, the Sandman is not in Porto but in Gaia. Gaia being south of the Douro river and Porto being North.
Other than that, fantastic video as usual.
I highly recommend the book “A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction” by Christopher Alexander, Sara Ishikawa, and Murray Silverstein.
It speaks in-depth about the concepts in this video.
One of urbanism´s classics indeed.
Btw, in Germany, every small town still has the historic market place that is a pedestrian wide square. Some towns do it better but still, it’s quite awesome
Melbourne, Australia is the definition of the mix of these two. Unique architecture based on area, general walkability, and streets based on how these suburbs developed historically right up until the 1960s in the inner city suburbs, particularly around public places of gathering like markets (the suburb-based Melbourne markets are great and all of them have a unique atmosphere to them! And not many tourists visit alot of them when they should!), but the outskirts is American suburbia hell. Not Just Bikes would find it fascinating in both extremes visiting here!
An interesting tidbit about this topic: When the opened a Mcdonald in old Québec city, the city insisted on a bunch of conditions so that the building would match the surroundings (Mcdonalds wanted the usual red and yellow deisgn). The result is actually a kinda unique Mcdonald that tour guides point to.
Glad McDonalds was bullied from city centers where I live by local businesses and mostly relegated to outskirts and malls.
I grew up hating cities, but I realized even when I walked through the rural areas my mind still divided it into places. There was the pine grove, and the field area. and the open old age trees and I loved it. I'm 30 and recently discovered cities with places, and I like how much art and character there is to look at from how they lay the bricks and the details in the architecture and the decorations they add. A lot of US cities are just a sea of same-y unappealing concrete that's too spaced out. My friends and family think I'm crazy that I'd rather walk the urban powercenters than drive. I hate being car dependent so if I can walk, I will even if it's not the best walk.
I love how visual this video is. Its like you are spoon feeding us to see what we stubbornly don't.
NJB at its finest. Eye-opening comparisons of how much better things could be. I will be showing this to city reps and whoever will listen.
I really like this video. Not showing just Amsterdam, but also Sneek, Kobenhavn, Athina, Porto, Barcelona. Places which look awesome!
Every US/Canada shot I have seen in your video is what we in Eastern Europe call "an industrial zone" - a place with factories and storage spaces with large roads and parking lots for trucks and tracks for trains. Unless people work there, most people avoid those areas.
Why just Eastern Europe, thats industrial zones and outskirt highway areas in all of Europe. They are all utilitarian that way cause nobody lives there.
A city is a reflection of it's values. That hit so hard. When I look at nowhere places like that, the values I feel it represents are: "I want every for cheap as possible and to make maximum profit with no other consideration and then get the hell away from everybody else"
I like how the CC goes "[Tram sound intensifies]"