05-28-2021, 07:55 AM
(05-27-2021, 09:53 PM)plam Wrote: I don't know how one would express and establish a claim about roofs ruining things, but I've seen enough cases that I have some suspicions about them. Perhaps it is a claim about pedestrianization not always working as we might hope.
That actually makes a lot of sense.
Although I haven’t kept up with news from Ottawa, I know that at one time there was a lot of discussion about Sparks St., 5 of 7 blocks of which are fully pedestrianized. One obviously dumb thing about that is that bicycles were also forbidden; I don’t know if that is still true. I always liked it; with the full width of the street dedicated to non-motor-vehicle traffic, it was quieter and more comfortable to walk on. But supposedly the inability to drive there made it harder to run a business. I’m skeptical, but it’s at least possible that the ability to drive in front is more important than it seems at first glance. I don’t think parking as such is the issue; this always comes up in the context of curb parking, of which there just can’t be that much due to the way geometry works.
More generally, I think the issue with enclosed streets has to do with the walls, not the roofs; it’s entirely believable that the walls built to complete the enclosure have subtle effects on traffic which end up making the spaces not function. I still claim this is something that can be fixed with careful design (including but not limited to where the doors go), but I also acknowledge that it may be harder than it appears to do the “careful design”.