The following appeared originally in Fortnight Journal, please visit and peruse their deeply meaningful work and full cohort of contributors.
Fortnight solicited response to some of their contributions from established older-generational luminaries. This piece was responded to, in part, by one of my most valued mentors and friends, a man deeply involved in making the world a better place, Andres Duany.
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I
The city of Rhodes on the island of Rhodes in the Greek Mediterranean is the oldest still-occupied city to have been built according to a plan. It did not simply pop up and get melded together in order to keep pace with construction.
People-watching in Rhodes is incredible: locals walk to their destinations, strolling down the street to buy fresh pastries for breakfast or a new lamp for their dining room. The majority of the few vehicles you do see on Rhodes are delivery trucks—actual trucks, not small tractor-trailers—or perhaps, the occasional rubbish truck or emergency vehicle.
Everyone walks to get where they’re going, and they do what they’re doing because they can; everything they need on a daily basis is integrated into their neighborhood and easily reachable on foot in 5-10 minutes. To drive a car for almost any outing would be ridiculous. Because of this proximity of services, businesses are also smaller, and better attuned to their customers’ needs. Often, proprietors and patrons know each other and have a warm relationship. This proprietor-patron connection may even go both ways, with one baking pastries and the other repairing watches, both serving each other and the rest of their community, all within minutes—or maybe even steps—of where they reside.
I am here to visit small islands of the Mediterranean that have never had any sort of motorized transport, in order to survey and compare them with those that do, in every facet.
Leaving Rhodes, the sails flap slightly in the wind as I set course for Tilos, a tiny island less than 15 miles in length and extremely mountainous. While the wind vane is pointing almost directly at my destination, the way a sail generates movement is similar to that of an airplane wing: air flows over the curved surface of the sail, which requires an angle to the wind. Despite this less direct path of travel, traveling in this way is so enjoyable that it more than makes up for the diversion.
The boat I’m sailing is able to point pretty high, which is to say it sails well when pointed fairly close alongside the direction of the wind. Wind in the sails creates two movements. One moves the boat forward and one of heels—or tips—the boat onto its side. Once I start moving, I begin to play with the sail trim, adjusting lines and tensions until the boat is flying along, tipped on its side about 20 degrees and vibrating as it reaches forward.
The sun is shining and the salty spray is splashing up as I tear across the low waves.
II
Whether planned or not, nearly every human civilization has followed a similar logical pattern of integrated diversity. Transportation—the act of movement around the activities of life—is at the center of society. This movement describes and includes the underlying economy, culture and production that form civilization; it is the lifeblood of community. Without movement, and the interaction that comes from it, there would be no community, society or civilization.
Enter fossil fuels. The use of fossil fuels now bears many recognized evils. But when it comes to building community, the topic is almost entirely ignored. Over a century ago we began to actively, if not consciously, plan movement out of our communities. The automobile opened up the world for us, connecting remote settlements and cultures, and kick-starting the melding of a global culture and economy.
Not that there is anything wrong with that—loss of unique cultures and traditions, and the environmental and economic mess we’ve made of the world notwithstanding. In fact, I believe that automobile-based transport has been a vital component of overcoming racial divides, among other unforeseen benefits. However, the changes that we began to incorporate into the fabric of our towns and cities to accommodate the rise of the automobile served to disrupt and diminish the network of movement—and, thus, the network of community. The isolating and distancing effects of automobiles are only one part of their overall impact on society.
Cars require a specialized surface to move on; one that is made largely out of petroleum, and which requires more petroleum to be burned for upkeep. Once, these surfaces were referred to as streets, and many things went on in these streets—walking, bicycling, game playing—but as cars grew faster, larger and more precise in their movements, these streets became unsafe for any other activity aside from driving. The speeds of these vehicles, and their tendency to do an incredible amount of damage when something went wrong, led to wider lanes and rounded corners being built to protect them from each other and others from them. At this point, many streets in America ceased to exist; they were now roads, and their various uses dried up, as did the community living alongside them.
When a railway is laid, it requires a large initial effort and then a small, yet important amount of maintenance, including physical upkeep and replacement. When a roadway is built, it requires a gargantuan initial effort, output of capital and input of resources. It then requires a substantial amount of upkeep and physical replacement.
For example, the beltway around the capital of the United States has 64 square miles of surface. This distance is divided between three lanes in each direction, plus on and off ramps that are entirely renewed every 4-7 years. This outlay of expense by various bodies of governance is referred to as an investment, while the much smaller outlay to our rotting railways is called a subsidy. Nevermind the fact that a tractor trailer requires three times the amount of petroleum to move an equivalent amount of cargo an equal distance—extra petroleum not already in the roadway itself, nor burnt to build and maintain that roadway.
On an individual basis, we have stopped moving. Our cars move, our planes move, and, for some lucky few, our trains move; but by and large, we don’t. We don’t walk, we don’t bike, we don’t move. Obesity and its related health issues are becoming pandemic, especially in childhood—a ridiculous thought, given that my own childhood was spent in constant frenetic motion.
But our built environment has been sprawling—and our waistlines have raced to keep up—into a sticky mess where the only motion possible is that of an automobile. There are no more sidewalks. Bicycles on the road incite anger and violence, and municipalities forbid children from walking to school. For the longest time, it has been a no-chicken-no-egg situation where no one is in the streets but the cars, and therefore little thought is given to any use for streets but of cars, and so no one will enter the street.
III
Roughly halfway through my trip, it is midafternoon and I’m dropping anchor just off the island of Santorini, a crescent archipelago that is all that remains of a much larger island blown largely to nothing 3600 years ago.
Its capital, Fira, boasts winding stone-cobbled streets perched hundreds of feet up the inside of the highest edge of the volcano caldera. So steep is this cliff-hanging arrangement that you can walk for nearly a mile along one street, but to make your way over to the next street requires the use of stairs. Walking—or riding a donkey—is in fact the only way to get around Fira. The streets are dripping with life; a wonder to navigate down.
But Fira has no choice but to have car-free streets, as it is dictated by very strict physical conditions. What about international cities more akin to American—and to some degree European—sprawl?
(This essay was originally two parts, continued in “Optimodal: II“)
IV
It is a gorgeous Andean morning in Bogotá; as I walk down Carrera Septima, the largest and busiest road in the city. Yet people are smiling and laughing… and walking, biking and skating, too. It is Sunday morning and this is Ciclovia, a weekly event in Bogotá where over 75 miles of the main roads that run through the city are closed to cars. These routes are instead opened to pedestrians, bicyclists and food vendors. Droves of people—over a million—make their way out onto the pavement to buy some fruit, some hot chocolate, and stroll into downtown, play in a park or visit a museum. Conversations are had, friendships made, future spouses met—all because cars have been taken out of the equation.
At other times in Bogotá, the scene on these roads is very different: congested, slow, dirty and full of cars. Ten years ago, the city enacted the Pico y Placa (Peak and License Plate) rule, restricting the use of vehicles, even taxis, on two varying days a week according to license plate numbers.
For example, if you have a 1 or a 2, you don’t get to drive within city limits on Monday. Despite this rule, traffic still reaches a standstill on major roads on a near-constant basis.
Prior to this rule taking effect, Bogotá celebrated a citywide Dia Sin Carros, a private-car free day (public vehicles and taxis still allowed), once a year, on February 7. In addition to being a wonderful event—though not a holiday, most people still go to work like usual—this 10-hour period has huge impact on air quality.
What is even more striking are the reasons that this policy is a success: namely, Bogotá’s 205 miles of integrated, connected bike trails. These are not bike lanes painted on the roads and streets, but rather, a parallel yet separate system of bicycling infrastructure, much of which runs alongside the Transmilenio busses.
Over the last decade, Bogotá took its largest transverse roads and either offset car lanes to the outside, or removed the cars permanently, turning them into bus-only routes and padding the bus right-of-way with wide pedestrian and bicyclist berths as well as seating, water features, sculpture, trees and plants. Bogotá called this a Transmilenio. This phenomenon is in no way unique to Bogotá, but, while existing individually in other cities worldwide, has come together to form a wonderfully cohesive system. And this, in a city and country that has been at the center of political and financial upheaval for decades, with class disparity and economic struggles to parallel those of any Latin American city.
But the walking fabric of Bogotá, while wonderful in some specific sections (like historic Candelaria, or recently redeveloped Zona Rosa), is largely sprawling. This is the case, be it edge sprawl with Corbusian tower-in-the-park syndrome, or dense urban sprawl with entire blocks consisting of nothing but the concrete wall of some inhumanly-scaled building. These problems, this same leeching away of street life and movement, can be tracked largely back to when Corbusier came through in the 1940s and enacted a master plan of car-centric greenways, thereby subverting the original city grid. Corbusier, while a great architect, didn’t translate concepts well into city planning, and left physical (and academic scars) on the urban landscape that are still vivid today.
V
While most of the world has been subject to some amount of sprawl, there are still small Greek islands that have never felt the tonnage of an automobile. As I head to one of the most famous of these, Idhra, the gorgeous Mediterranean day turns ugly as quickly as I can turn my head. The seas start to get choppy as the wind picks up force but loses a cohesive and consistent direction, lulling to five knots (nautical miles per hour) and then gusting up to 40, whipping the waves ever higher.
Sailing a 42-foot sailboat on your own is a neat, if perhaps also impressive, feat, but I’ve been hugely aided by an integrated navigation system and self-furling main sail. This essentially means that I can manage sailing on my own, as the system does as much of the heavy lifting as I would like to execute at any given time. Except now.
As technology tends to do, the system fritzes as things get rough. With winds like this, it is imperative that I get the sail down before the boat damages itself—and probably me—and possibly even tips over. The winds keep increasing, gusting up to 60, and the tension completely overwhelms the automatic furler and renders the mechanical furling option inoperable. Grabbing my knife, I start cutting the mainsheet line, dropping hundreds of pounds of canvas sail on top of me, quickly gathering and folding it out of the way while tying it down as best I can.
The immediate danger over, I am able to start up the engine and drive the boat through the fury until the storm passes, leaving me green and queasy, but otherwise no worse for the wear. By the time I get to Idhra, the storm has calmed and mostly blown over. I am able to anchor and take the dinghy in and contract help in the re-rigging of my mainsheet. And then, it’s off to explore the island.
Idhra boasts spectacular public spaces, be it its plazas, or stairways up the hillside between its buildings. The city is compact and vibrant, centered on the small harbor, and the rest of the island is close and ecologically pristine. Though it is telling that the only motorized vehicles on the island are garbage trucks.
Inhabited by farmers and herders as early as 3000 BC, Idhra has played home to as many as 16,000 people at once. Famine struck Idhra during World War II, when 80 percent of the population died of starvation; since then, the population has stayed in the few thousands and the island has ceased being self-sufficient. This was largely the case of the smaller islands I found in my journey through the Dodecanense and Cyclades islands. While each was car-minimal or car-free (and adorable, quaint and very healthy on a number of other levels), the influx of tourism and cheap oil had weakened these isles’ pre-existing self-sufficiency. The residents had lost valuable cultural knowledge and skills along the way.
This story, of subjugation of healthy systems and movement, is generally true to some degree in my wider travels. Regardless, whenever I come to ground in a foreign city, I remain able to quickly orient myself and efficiently get around with little to no struggle—and no car. Operating car-free in an American city, however, is entirely another story.
VI
For the past eight years, I have lived in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area and strived to use my car as little as possible. In college, living barely 45 miles away from my father, it would take me close to four hours—90 miles actually traveled—to navigate the light-rail, bus, metro, plus another bus and 3/4 mile walk to his house to visit on the weekends.
When I lived in West Baltimore and worked 14 miles north of home, I attempted to take one of two mass transit options: the light-rail, which, despite my living downtown and working in a highly walkable town center, left me walking over seven miles each day in addition to waiting for the infrequent trains. After taking a new job at the edge of D.C. I was excited to be able to start taking passenger rail and only have a mile walk at each end of the commute—only to be halted by the erratic schedule and high expense, as well as the fact that my bike wasn’t allowed on the train.
Soon thereafter, I moved into the city, primarily to be able to use the metro, though the better city life played a large part as well. Again, a change in jobs and a move to Arlington (originally a part of D.C. until 1847) led to difficulty.
My commute to the kayaking outfitter was 30 miles, and even with traffic, took me 30 minutes in my car; by metro it took an hour and 40 minutes, time I could ill afford to lose. As I was frequently kayaking before and after work at the time, and there is no metro access to the Potomac River—nor are kayaks welcome on the metro cars—I wound up driving while working there.
Finally, a year and a half ago I took a new job with an urban tree canopy advocacy group that was 4.7 miles away, as the bird flies. Still, it took me 45 minutes of bus and metro train to get to work. I could ride my bike to work in that amount of time, and did, except when bitterly hot, bitterly cold, wet or rainy—or, as often was the case, when my job had me riding a work bike 20 miles through the city streets, pulling 300 pounds of tree care equipment.
Even bicycling, however, was a struggle because I lacked safe space to ride. I experienced no regard, or worse, from drivers. I was unable to take my bike on metro trains during commuting hours, and had nowhere to lock my bike once I arrived, and generally lacked of access to post-ride showers.
Facing these, and various other stumbling blocks to just commuting car-free—much less running errands and living the rest of my life that way as well—I hate to say it, but the tempting ease of using my car won out more than I would have liked. It takes either an incredible amount of dedication, time and money to stick with car-free living—or, such a lack of money that there is no other option.
In America, and likely in other cities and countries worldwide affected by sprawl and lack of functional movement, the story is the same. But the picture isn’t always so harsh. Bicycling as a commuting option is on the rise. “Sharrow,” the share-arrow painted onto street lanes, instead of separate and often dangerous bicycle lanes, has become a real word. D.C. Metro has embarked on an ambitious plan to begin catering to other modes of incoming traffic than just cars at their outlying stations. Citizen groups in Dallas are pulling off wildly successful guerilla efforts to take back their streets from the cars, rekindling vibrant street life. Cities across America are starting their own Ciclovia events, and car- and bike-sharing clubs are popping up everywhere.
No single approach will repair the situation we find ourselves in. However, our food is still shipped cross-country in semi trucks and our rail system, while being spoken frequently about, is a crumbling disgrace. A changing physical infrastructure is critical to success, but without an accompanying mental shift, it won’t go anywhere, and likely won’t even get built. More and more, we have people at the various governmental levels who understand and will listen, but if they don’t have the words and the voices, they can’t make a difference. Go ride a bike… to work. Go get your groceries… on foot, and when you have to walk for miles to do so, half of it without sidewalks, and occasionally having to run across eight lanes of traffic despite having a walk signal.
Call your representative—Hell, call them all. And keep calling. Keep walking. Keep learning.