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pollution.jpgOslo city centre will close to motor traffic in four years
Cars will be banned from central Oslo from 2019, and at least 60km of bike lanes built, in an attempt to tackle air pollution, local politicians have announced.
Where European capitals Paris and Belfast close streets to motor traffic for just a few hours a year, Norway's capital would be the first in the world to make the measure permanent.
On Monday the newly-elected Labour-Green-Socialist Left leadership made the announcement, with the environment and carbon emissions a key focus of the coalition.
- First 'car-free' day in Paris sees massive pollution and noise drop
“We want to have a car-free center,” Lan Marier Nguyen Berg, lead negotiator for Norway’s Green Party in Oslo, told Reuters.
“We want to make it better for pedestrians, cyclists … it will be better for shops and everyone.”
There will also be a "massive boost" in investment in public transport, with buses and trams serving the city centre, while special arrangements will be made to allow motor vehicles carrying people with disabilities in the city centre.
- Belfast follows Paris with three hour car free Sunday
Oslo has 600,000 inhabitants and almost 350,000 cars. The proposed city centre car ban area is home to just 1,000 residents, with 90,000 commuting in and out daily.
Around 400 parking spaces have already been removed from the city streets in the last three years to discourage driving.
Norway recently announced it would divest from fossil fuels, also a world first.
Earlier this year media reported Oslo could face five years of traffic misery as several of its key tunnels are due to close, one by one, for renovation. Highway officials began advising commuters in April to start walking, cycling or taking the bus instead.
Laura Laker is a freelance journalist with more than a decade’s experience covering cycling, walking and wheeling (and other means of transport). Beginning her career with road.cc, Laura has also written for national and specialist titles of all stripes. One part of the popular Streets Ahead podcast, she sometimes appears as a talking head on TV and radio, and in real life at conferences and festivals. She is also the author of Potholes and Pavements: a Bumpy Ride on Britain’s National Cycle Network.
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Wakefield alreay has this, most of the entire city centre is either fully pedestestainzed (no vehicleular traffic), or access is limited to taxies & buses, although both of them still put out plenty of polution. (Leeds is pretty similar with the core of the city center being ped only)
Does the Headrow still allow buses down it?
Last time I was in Leeds The Headrow was still open to buses, and taxis, and the odd private car or delivery.
The centre is nice but it's closely surrounded by a mini ring road of The Headrow - Market St. - Boar Lane.
I sometimes think Edinburgh is tiptoeing this direction - Rose Street, George Street, Princes street, hopeful. But then Leith Walk had a zillion pounds of disappointing upgrade recently. One step forward, one step back.
Oh how nice it would be, so many towns are already pretty ideal for this to happen, even a car free square mile or so in each city centre would be a start, make it a policy that no new city centre parking is to be built, with more park and ride facilities provided, force people into it and it could be great.
Chelmsford has a pretty bizarre one way system, if they banned cars from trying to negotiate it (half of which are trying to get to the ststion in the centre anyway) and increase the number of park and ride buses to cover for it it'd make a huge difference.
Cardiff closes the city centre when the rugby is on, and recently that has been back to back days......we survive.....and it is lush.
Permanent? No chance
Well done, Oslo, for taking this decision. Let's hope in time, as it proves a success, it will be extended to a larger area and other towns and cities follow suit.
As for British towns being in thrall to Mammon and their citizens being lazy and car-dependent, yes, they certainly are – but so are those of Amsterdam and Copenhagen. I doubt Oslo's citizens are really that different, but their government is prepared to take actions for the common good against the common desire.
There are literally dozens of towns and cities across the UK which could follow suit . Just about every city and town in Scotland and the North of England could be prime candidates - but they won't go for it. Businesses in thrall to Mammon and lazy , car obsessed citizens will see to that.
Copenhagen and Amsterdam are excellent examples of what is possible. IMO, when it comes to change, a lot of Brits prefer not to look beyond their own selfish and set ways.
http://road.cc/content/news/167112-video-mesmerising-time-lapse-copenhag...
Could this ever happen in the UK, i can dream. Plenty of towns and cities would be improved as places to live and work if you got rid of most of the cars.
There must be some towns and smaller cities in the UK which could take this bold step?
Ripon perhaps