We want to communicate an alternative vision. We’re talking about changes that will get people out of their cars, that will make it difficult and expensive to drive. Of course, some drivers just don’t want to get out of their cars. And some people don’t want to consider alternatives, because it forces them to question their own behavior, to accept that every time they get in their car, they somehow, in some small way, harm their neighbors and use an unfair share of the scarce public space of the city. They don’t see how change can give us healthier children, improved social activity and a better economy.

This is going to be a decades-long process. There are a number of things we have to do. A lot of people assume that the car is important, essential and properly used. Therefore, if there’s not enough space to park, you need to create more parking. If there’s not enough road space, you should create more road space. That’s essentially what the story of the 20th century was. Sidewalks were narrowed, parking was added, the city became more friendly to cars and more hostile to people. But all of those efforts still failed to make the car work in New York City. The automobile does a bad job as a transportation technology in the city because it’s so spatially inefficient.

MG:

I don’t want to eradicate cars, but I think we could reduce them by 90%. The automobile is one of the most significant technologies in this country, but it is fundamentally misused. Capable, healthy people should not be driving within the city at all. Any trip that you make on a regular basis, whether it’s going to school, work or the grocery store, should be possible without driving a car. Automobile trips should be limited to those where people are leaving the city or the occasional trip that requires a vehicle, such as carrying cargo.

The remaining traffic, whether it be automobile or truck, could be concentrated in space and time. Some streets could be fully pedestrianized and some could be auto-oriented. Maybe a street allows traffic from 6am until 10am, but then from 2pm until 5pm, when kids get out of school, auto access is radically reduced. You can concentrate the harm onto the auto-oriented streets and free up more space to be beautiful, peaceful and safe.

I think 20% of the streets in Manhattan alone could be fully pedestrianized, with no cars, buses or bikes. We should have a comprehensive network of pedestrian streets. Broadway, for the whole length of Manhattan, could be fully pedestrianized. On the east side, maybe Lexington Avenue. We could do that.

This is also good for business. Kalverstraat, a fully-pedestrianized street in Amsterdam, has the highest retail rents in all of Holland. Here in New York, the street with the highest retail rents outside of Manhattan is Brooklyn’s Fulton Street on Fulton Mall — which has no cars. No one wants to live on a street that’s choked with a lot of nasty traffic. No one wants to work, shop or eat dinner on a street that’s polluted, loud, dangerous and unpleasant. Automobiles are bad for business.

Property owners are one of the constituencies we want to reach. The easiest way to increase property value in the city is to get rid of cars on the street. When the real estate industry realizes that, we’ll start to see more change.

Of course, the transportation dynamics in Manhattan are different from those in eastern Queens or parts of the Bronx. There are neighborhoods in which getting rid of cars simply doesn’t work. But things can be done in every neighborhood. It’s just a question of engaging the residents and finding how they want their streets to be.