CALIFORNIA WILL STUMBLE WITHOUT WALKABLE CITIES
We are in a crisis. Our cities are unwalkable, unbikeable and downright dangerous for anyone who either does not, or chooses not, to drive. If California wishes to be the state that makes the path going forward, to be an example for others to follow, then we must start working today on that solution. Thankfully, there is an answer.
We must make walkable, bikeable and transit-accessible cities. Anything less is abandoning our future for today’s convenience.
To even participate in Californian society, you need to own a car in most cities and towns. You want to work? You need a car to ensure you can get there in any sort of timely manner. You want to go on a date? Well, you’d better have a car; otherwise there is nowhere you can get to, and moreover, you’ll need it to prove to your date that you’re financially self-sufficient. Do you want to go to a Padres game? Driving will take you 40 minutes from Escondido to get to Petco Park. Public transit, on the other hand, will take you roughly two hours. Is there any question as to why people drive everywhere now? We have singularly failed to provide adequate public transit, even to a large sporting event, which we know that tens of thousands of people will attend. So what does everyone do? We drive. Which means traffic, pollution, noise and all the nightmarish parking problems that naturally follow as we all take to the road.
If we are serious about the dangers of the health risks of our unwalkable cities, we should slap a surgeon general’s warning on every apartment, condo and house in neighborhoods with poor walkability. Every property should be sold with a warning saying that these homes are dangerous to your health because the neighborhoods can’t be safely or reliably walked or biked. According to the San Diego County Air Pollution Control District, 70 percent of the region’s air pollution comes from motor vehicle traffic. Our noise pollution comes from that traffic as well. By failing to design walkable neighborhoods with adequate transit connections, we have condemned ourselves to dirtier air and a louder environment. Air pollution and noise pollution have longterm health consequences, none of them positive.
Parking is a doubleedged sword for our cities. High traffic means more customers, more residents and more tourists, but large traffic volumes mean finding parking is a pain, the roads are packed and the flow of traffic becomes deadlocked. However, the answer is quite simple. Make communities and cities navigable without requiring a car. People generally take the path of least resistance, so we can reduce the amount of traffic on our streets by making our public transit have competitive arrival times.
I know what you’re thinking: “That’s all well and good, but what about in a big American city? Without cars, businesses won’t get the traffic they need to remain in business.” This is false. Well-intentioned but false. For example, the city of Copenhagen, Denmark, turned its Strøget commercial district into a pedestrian-friendly area with no cars or motorbikes. Walking, cycling and public transit are the only means of getting around. The businesses saw an increase in revenue and profit, traffic decreased in the local area and it is one of the most successful commercial areas in the city. San Diego, by contrast, has more than twice the population of Copenhagen, and we still insist upon choking ourselves with car-dependent development. When cities have created pedestrian streets, cities benefit. Even our suburbs can benefit from reducing traffic by investing in public transit. Streetcar suburbs used to be widespread in the U.S., bringing people to and from work, and all of their shopping needs.
Cars are just one of many ways people move around. The places that people want to spend time in are also the places you can’t just drive a car through. Who would enjoy Disneyland if everyone drove from ride to ride, food cart to food cart? Nobody wants a freeway outside their front door, and yet we have gutted city centers with highways, leaving them addicted to car-dependent infrastructure.
We have a crisis of incomplete streets in our communities — streets meant to move cars instead of people. California must become competitive at creating walkable, bikeable and transit-accessible spaces, or we will be left behind as other cities embrace a new vision of the future.
We have condemned ourselves to dirtier air and louder cities.