Quote:
Originally Posted by BrianSac
Greenmidtown,
You would love Amsterdam & Berlin. Bikes and bike lanes everywhere. My partner and I rented bikes first day in both cities; we fit right in. The bike lanes are separated from car traffic with raised barriers throughout the city. In Amsterdam, bikes out number cars. The streets are narrow and streetcars run everywhere.
On another note: Compare Stuttgart with Sacramento; cities & metros areas are exactly the same size. Difference: Since WWII, with American dollars, Stuttgart put all their efforts into subways, streetcars, lightrail, heavyrail. No freeways, 4-lane autobahns connecting with major cities, but no freeways.
They have absoultely no urban sprawl, green wide open spaces immediately outside the city, pedestrian malls that are fabulous and filled with TONS of people.
They have no suburban malls...its as if you took Sunrise Mall, Roseville galleria, Arden Fair...and put all that retail on two parallel pedestrian malls, its like London or Paris or Santa Monica's outdoor mall. They have a mini grand central station benneth the mall. It's awesome.
Stuttgart is not a tourist city; its low-key, sort of unremarkable like Sacramento. (opps did I say that), but true. Screw Portland; Stuttgart should be our model city!  |
That's really funny because my mom's cousin visited us from Stuttgart in Portland and said it reminded him of Germany. Of course he was referring to the geography, forests and hills, rain. I would love for Sac to become something like Stuttgart but that's really a pipe dream. Europe just has the right mentality, community instinct, and willingness to tax for the benefit of all that we'll never have. I think even for Sac to reach Portland's level of urban planning will be a long, uphill struggle. People are really involved in local politics up their. Politicians and suburbanites alike fear Portland's urban core and capitulate willingly to their demands. Like the recent sky tram they finished building at a cost of I think 60 million dollars! We're just trying to get light-rail to the airport, streetcars, high-rise condos, a denser urban core; these are all things Portland already has and then some. We struggle to get freeways cutting through the urban core converted into streets in this city, how do we expect to set our city apart from auto-centric anytown USA if we don't even take the smallest risks?