Forum menu
Edukator - that article is a bit odd as it does not really cover the Shore area well which is where many of the changes have occurred and concentrates more on the arty / expensive stuff not the stuff that is free.
This is where a lot of the action from trainspotting occurred and when I moved here 35 years ago there were hookers on the street corners, the roads were used as rat runs and some of the pubs were pretty dangerous places
Some measures have been taken to make it a bit better, better trains, better buses, a few cycle lanes etc, but they're few and far between.
IMHO a lot more measures have been taken to make it better by comparison, reduced speed limits, anti-congestion measures, increased taxation etc.
(agreeing with you) What really winds me up is the "stick" measures that are accompanied with absolutely no alternatives. Congestion charging has worked pretty well in London because public transport is robust - particularly in the last 10 years as the Overground has become better joined up with the underground. So people have shifted en masse away from cars onto those alternatives.
But in other places, this idea of having ULEZ, or things like passes to drive on certain roads, where there isn't the alternative, is absolutely rank. You see it in Dublin: unless you're going into the centre the public transport is utter crap - things like one bus an hour (if the driver can be bothered), no trains on bank holidays, meaning there's no alternative to driving.
Crazylegs - it doesn't have to be like that ( tho it often is) Granton waterfront shows a very different picture tho small shops are scarce
(doesn't help either that a lot of what is being built is low-density, the sort of 2-up, 2-down semi with a driveway that planners assume everyone wants but which makes it very difficult to achieve the population density for a truly workable 15-min city concept).
the prevailing attitude I hear in many places like here and with a similar demographic of well off homeowners is that new build estates are all "tiny shoeboxes with postage stamp gardens"
so...uh... whats the solution?
when I moved here 35 years ago there were hookers on the street corners, the roads were used as rat runs and some of the pubs were pretty dangerous places
I moved to the prosperous bourgeois town of Pau 34 years ago and there were hookers on street corners (or sitting by a red light in the window), the route nationale went right through the center, some of the bars I gave a wide berth and riots were common in la cité. It's pedestrianised now but I quite miss seeing the hookers, one got murdered. 🙁
This is where a lot of the action from trainspotting occurred and when I moved here 35 years ago there were hookers on the street corners, the roads were used as rat runs and some of the pubs were pretty dangerous places
I started working for a Leith based offshore shipping company in 1990.
The "gentrification" had just started, there were quite trendy real ale bars and restaurants, mixed with old school sailor bars, like the Drawbridge and the Port of Leith. The hookers seemed to get most of their business off the truck drivers.
One night, one of the lads took me to some of the other places, one was at the foot of a tower block. That was an eyeopener that night!
Funnily enough, we used to wander around Leith and regularly up and down Leith Walk into Edinburgh and I never got any trouble. The same could not be said of my native North East England!
Facebook now feeds me this stuff and I know I should resist wallowing in the stupid, but sometimes I just can't.
Here's today best responses
With all due respect.While your comments could have perhaps held some water a few years ago..And in particular the 15 minuete city referance..However In this particular case you are on the wrong side of history as it were..I dont need or feel that i have to elaborate or for that matter provide the overwhelming amount of information and interest this subject attracts.Should you be bothered to do even a minimal amount of reaserch you could educate yourself, so not to fall into the trap of making assumptions about something you obviously no nothing about. But still need to have your say via this particular medium. But i also have no doubt you spend many an-hour typing away repeating your misinformed inaccurate nonsense. With this in mind, the most appropriate way to finish my post to you is with these words. Put together by a much more intelligent, and person substance than you will ever be..."You Can Lie About The Facts, But You Cant Lie About The Consequences Of The Facts"n
actually the surveillance is already there...I have a friend that works in that area, its worse than China...and if you did just basic research, I don't no like read WEF 2030 agenda manifesto, or say listen to some of the 'professionals' and talks from Davos, or bill gates, or read the book covid 19 by klaus swaubb...you may get it...or you may carry on in your little bubble, and comply with everything...remember a dog will react if you suddenly tighten and shorten their chain...but a link at time? They barely notice...what this is called is conditioning..like they admitted covid 19 was at Davos...so how obedient are you?
No more facebook today I promise 😀
Some measures have been taken to make it a bit better, better trains, better buses, a few cycle lanes etc, but they're few and far between.
IMHO a lot more measures have been taken to make it better by comparison, reduced speed limits, anti-congestion measures, increased taxation etc.
Congestion charging has worked pretty well in London because public transport is robust...You see it in Dublin: unless you're going into the centre the public transport is utter crap - things like one bus an hour (if the driver can be bothered), no trains on bank holidays, meaning there's no alternative to driving.
I don't know Dublin well enough to comment but in London the process was the other way around: the congestion charge (to reduce traffic demand) and a huge amount of street engineering (to prioritise buses and bikes and pedestrians, and improve traffic flow) was necessary to make public transport more robust.
A "consumer choice" modal shift where car drivers decide that taking public transport is cheaper, quicker and more comfortable isnt gonna happen without a stick that makes driving more expensive and slower, and frees up road space.
"You Can Lie About The Facts, But You Cant Lie About The Consequences Of The Facts
Yeah you can. You just did!
No more facebook today I promise
I deleted it last year. It really is utter garbage
All the algorithm does is push right wing garbage, conspiracy nonsense etc to my feed, despite, or perhaps because, these things being the polar opposite to what I actually believe.
95% of posts in my feed were from people or groups I don't follow. I rarely saw anything from people I actually know. The entire thing is based around triggering people with rage to keep them interacting.
My wellbeing is genuinely significantly improved since I ditched it
Even Facebook Marketplace isn't any good any more. There's no normal people selling their own stuff - it's all traders.
There's only been one occasion I've heard '15 minutes cities' being brought up in conversation in real life.
It was in the co-op down the road where the lady serving at a till was loudly having a moan about it (method of controling us etc etc) loudly to a customer.
Her last comment to him was to, 'look it all up on Facebook'.
I really don't like SM.
(As far as I'm concerned STW is a community, not a SM platform, thank goodness.)
15 minute places are ace though I can't think of many proper 15 minute cities. Lots of towns though
Well, I live, literally a stone’s throw from what used to be the A350 trunk route from the M4 down to the South Coast, and was effectively the outer edge of town when I was growing up. At a brisk walk, it’s a twenty minute walk into the centre of town! It was a small market town, not a city, but it’s expanded dramatically, a bypass has been built, now being dualled, so all the new residents, ie those over the last twenty-odd years, all shop outside of town, because that’s where the supermarkets are.
Having said that, there’s a decent size Tesco Express in town, but that’s about it.
Things Fell Apart podcast is an interesting listen. It’s more about disinformation than conspiracy theories
And it is this episode I believe that covers the origins of the 15 minute city IIRC: BBC Audio | Things Fell Apart | S2. Ep 7: You’ll Own Nothing and You’ll Be Happy
I live in a little town called Brighouse and can get almost anything I need within 15 mins, apart from, maybe fashion, but as it's Brighouse that's irrelevant. I love it, especially not having to get my van out unless I'm going to work.
We aren't far from the train station so easy to go further afield on the train, including the airport. There's even a nice young man on an electric bike who delivers drugs to a chap round the corner to save him travelling more than 15 mins 🙂
At the moment we are undergoing a bit of disruption as they pedestrianise parts of town but in the future the bars and cafe's will be able to expand outside.
I do agree with the congestion charge idea for some town/city centres but I have a complaint about my hometown of Bradford. They have included the ring road all the way out almost to Bingley. Wherever else I go the Ulez allows me to at least go around the city.
“She kept saying “they” and “them” a lot.”
This is a thing nowadays apparently, and you can lose your job for not complying….. 😉
Here's today best responses
when anyone starts a reply with "with all due respect" at least you you know exactly what's coming next
Crazylegs - it doesn't have to be like that ( tho it often is) Granton waterfront shows a very different picture tho small shops are scarce
Oh I know it *shouldn't* be like that but it is (mostly) like that because we paint ourselves into a corner in terms of housebuilding, location etc, create a load of people who have little option but to drive for all their amenities, shopping etc and then wonder why there are so many people driving.
The conspiracy part arises (or is bolstered by) any measures to deter driving because people associate driving with freedom, so "they" are trying to stop you driving, "they" want to take your freedom away, "they" will stop you going more than 15 minutes from your house.
Am I the only one who thought this was going to be about really short city breaks?
In many ways we've got the society "they" wanted because "we" are complicit. When "they" built out of town stores "we" stopped using more expensive local shops where it was difficult to park (and God forbid "we" walk). When "we" complained about the traffic that generated "they" built ring roads and express roads. When "we" complained about local taxes and voted for cuts "they" made them. Ultimately "we" are responsible.
On this forum several are upset that in-town Alpkit stores can't compete with Decathlon's superstores supplied by Decathlon running goods trains direct from China, but happily buy from decathlon. "They" didn't force us to Internet shop, "we" chose to. Nobody forces me to use own/use our car but "we" do and this morning it'll get used to drive to horse riding because on about 50% of the trips we're not motivated enough to ride the bikes there and arrive wet. And so on.
Greed, convenience and laziness has got "us" here
Greed, convenience and laziness has got "us" here
and weak town planning.
the netherlands limits supermarket sizes in town centres and bans them in out of town shopping centres with the result their town centres are not dead like ours
the netherlands limits supermarket sizes in town centres and bans them in out of town shopping centres with the result their town centres are not dead like ours
Quite often in Spain, you'll see a supermarket built with 3 or 4 floors of apartments on top. So instead of a warehouse style building with a load of wasted roof space, you get a good bit of living space and a ready made set of customers for the shop.
It's why cities that are predominantly office space in the centre fared so badly during Covid. There's a whole ecosystem of cafes, takeaways etc built up on the basis of that transient daily population of people coming in, working, going home but no-one actually living there.
You need multi-use spaces; everything should be built with a mix of residential, work, leisure, shopping, dining etc. not just massive swathe of identikit semi-detached houses.
and weak town planning.
Throw in a bit of Nimby-ism to that analysis as well. I used to live in Hebden. Sainsbury's wanted to open a smaller supermarket on an other-wise derelict bit of land in the centre of town, there was a massive campaign to prevent it happening based mostly on them, well, being Sainsbury's and not a local store. In the meantime, the 'local' grocer went bust because they couldn't compete with the Co-Op supermarket (somehow doesn't suffer the same hostility), and the land is still derelict.
The public - can't please them - can't shoot them in the face.
Does anyone know why a basic urban planning idea has attracted such nonsense? Is anyone actually concerned about it?
Are we just in a place now where everything can be a conspiracy?
Should I just spend less time on Facebook?
I’ve never met anyone in real life who has ever even mentioned it never mind suggested it as a conspiracy! I have also never seen virtually no conspiracy theory stuff (of any sort) on Facebook, and very little politics, their algorithm feeds you stuff it “thinks” you like engaging with. You don’t need to spend less time there - just less time reading posts from headbangers!
Like a lot of parents, we're in a whatsapp group with other parents in the class. That's the only place I see conspiracy stuff hinted at.. e.g. Please sign this petitition against Digital ID (linked via a dodgy right wing website) or watch out for this person near the kids playground, with little information on whats happened other than "i heard this from someone"
a facebook local group had acouple of 15min City conspiracy nuts on it
This is an interesting site to show what's 15 minutes walk from somewhere of your choosing.
15 mins gets me most places in the relatively small market town I live in, but not the secondary school or the doctors. 20 mins gets me pretty much everything.
Quite often in Spain, you'll see a supermarket built with 3 or 4 floors of apartments on top.
Spanish towns and cities, especially those not so touristy, are very dense. The vast majority of people live in flats and English style housing estates are rare. Pampelona, Lugo, Burgos, Léon... are just a wall of typical 6 to 10 storey buildings as you approach. Fewer people have cars and it's quite possible to live without one as everything you need is nearby. Living in Sitges and working in Barcelona the car was a non-essential used only on occasional weekends for leisure.
Of the places I've lived the south Birmingham suburbs were the most devoid of local services and the place living without a car was the most difficult partly because using a bike has always felt suicidal - over an hour to walk to a swimming pool (Sparkhill or Solihull baths). Aberystwyth was good, Aberaeron not bad, Pau excellent, BSM good, Sitges good, Munster good, Nancy excellent... .
Living in Sitges and working in Barcelona the car was a non-essential used only on occasional weekends for leisure.
Same, I live in a suburb of Manchester, I already live in a 15 minute environment. There's nothing I can't get locally including my GP -literally across the road, a supermarket -again across the road the other way, 2 bike shops etc etc and a tram station to get further afield if I need to. Now, personally I hate living in a city, but it's obviously got upsides.
After reading this thread I think I must live in one of these "15 minute cities" well, 10 minute, and not a city. A coastal village with 3 primary schools, 1 secondary school, a football club, a cricket club, a supermarket, numerous eateries, hardware shop, post office, a doctors, a vets, dentist, pet shop, cafes, butchers, green grocers, 11 boozers, an industrial estate, a leisure centre, a train station and all the other usual bits n bobs like charity shops, bakers, vintage shops, barbers, key cutters etc. Beach on my doorstep, local off piste trail laden woods a 10 minute bike ride away.
Works well for me WFH full time, meant we could get rid of one of our cars saving us around 400pm (finance, tax, insurance) and despite it being a faff if I ever do need to go anywhere mid week outside of the village when the other halfs using the car for work, everything I need is in walking distance
But yeah conspiracies can be mad and the strings pulled together to justify them, I used to love going down the rabbit holes on youtube back in the day before they tweaked the algorithm to stop pushing them so much. MK Ultra, Hollow earth, 9/11 inside job, deep state, kalergi plan, weather control, illuminati, celebrity cloning, and my favourites always been big foot. Never believed any of them, just enjoyed the content.
For some reason around the time covid kicked off and the anti vaxxers went nuts I got the ick with it all.
anyone who studied Ograde/StandardGrade/Nat5 geography in Scotland will have considered the consequences of the exact opposite of 15 minute cities - when slum tenement residents were shipped off to outskirts with zero facilities. The people in my life most likely to jump on a 15 minute cities are bad bandwagon (who aren’t proper tinfoil hat wearers) are my in laws. They are the sort of gullible types who would read something in the daily express and believe it is fact. However they might see through the arguments as they complain their small town is sprawling with no facilities, and has lost its community spirit as it’s just a commuter dormitory for Edinburgh!I know a lot of it seems to be centered on Oxford, but a 15 minute scheme in Glasgow seem to have triggered similar conspiracy nonsense.
Open a map of Europe and pick a city at random, its probably a 15 minute city as most of Europe's cities are built around dense urban housing, like mid rise apartments, rather than single dwelling suburban sprawl.
My wife's family are from Brasov, Romania and despite having half the population of Glasgow its probably less than a fifth of Glasgow's size. It does have an proper city centre, but shops and services are just built into the fabric of all the little districts so its more like a 10 minute city.
People still drive everywhere though.
Leeds is pretty much stopping all traffic going through the city centre apart from buses and taxis. They're doing by installing 'bus gates' so if you drive down there you get a fine. Seems a perfectly good idea to me. I'd much prefer more pedestrianisation.
TBF they made Leeds awful to drive round in the 1970s?
(doesn't help either that a lot of what is being built is low-density, the sort of 2-up, 2-down semi with a driveway that planners assume everyone wants but which makes it very difficult to achieve the population density for a truly workable 15-min city concept).
I think the recent guidance about presumption of approval for building within a certain distance of rail/tram stops mandates higher densities
Conspirary loons are loons, but this sounds like an absolutely mental case of council overreach
As above, you can still drive from one side of Oxford to the other, you juts can't go through the city centre to do it. It's apparently had pretty spectacular positive effects on bus journey times etc. in the two months since it's been running, and this is with a pretty small enforcement zone.
https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/ca04d9f2caca421a8a1b426eb9f1d3ef
Nic Laporte - 15 Min City in the Netherlands.
This guy has quite a few good videos on YT about sustainable travel, bikes in general, cycling around Vancouver and Netherlands.
15 minute places are ace though I can't think of many proper 15 minute cities.
Paris is a good approximation, being to some extent a conglomeration of 15-minute cities in the form of arrondissements. If someone had carved out our arrondissement and dumped it in the countryside it would have been a well equipped small town.
Simultaniously the idylic past they long for, and the future they fear.
Spanish towns and cities, especially those not so touristy, are very dense. The vast majority of people live in flats and English style housing estates are rare. Pampelona, Lugo, Burgos, Léon... are just a wall of typical 6 to 10 storey buildings as you approach. Fewer people have cars and it's quite possible to live without one as everything you need is nearby. Living in Sitges and working in Barcelona the car was a non-essential used only on occasional weekends for leisure.
From my limited understanding this is partly because of Spanish history. On its return to democratic government, they had a lot of ground to make up in terms of sufficient housing, so went on a big building spree - and I guess it was possible to just put in lots of high-density stuff all at once, rather than the low(er) density organic sprawl that's more common in the UK (and N America)
Exactly - with a dose of anything [insert politician you don't like] says is clearly bad!Simultaniously the idylic past they long for, and the future they fear.
On this forum several are upset that in-town Alpkit stores can't compete with Decathlon's superstores supplied by Decathlon running goods trains direct from China, but happily buy from decathlon.
Decathlon does fine in city centres: one of its London stores is in Kensington, one of the most expensive parts of town.
Agreed with your more general point that the "they" is really "us".
I would suggest Stirling is a 15 minute city.
Even the new development areas to the south of the city are getting new school, new shops, expansion of the business sites, park and ride (local and national bus services), cycling and walking routes, expanded healthcare, quality green space in planning. I'm current confident that the aspirations and plans will not be as good in reality, but the majority of it seems to be progressing well.
From my house it's 0 mins to green space, walking and cycling, 5 mins to school or shops; 10 mins to city centre, local hospital, and 5-15 mins to all sorts of employment, recreation, retail and services.
As someone who lives in a small highland town I understand the concept of fifteen minute cities. It certainly seems a long way away from the reality of a rural life. Shops are about 10-20 minutes walk, hospital is roughly the same for basic needs. Anything beyond basic it's about 2 hours drive to Inverness. Secondary school and local doctors are in the same place which is about 15min drive in winter, in the summer with tourist traffic on the one road in and out the same journey can be over an hour each way.
It certainly seems a long way away from the reality of a rural life
Yes, but to be fair, it's intended as an urban planning concept
It certainly seems a long way away from the reality of a rural life
Yes, but to be fair, it's intended as an urban planning concept
It’s not just that cities have most amenities within 15 minute walk, the conspiracy theory suggests that people will be forced to entirely exist in 15 minute cities. There will be no rural life.
I would suggest Stirling is a 15 minute city.
Even the new development areas to the south of the city are getting new school, new shops, expansion of the business sites, park and ride (local and national bus services), cycling and walking routes, expanded healthcare, quality green space in planning. I'm current confident that the aspirations and plans will not be as good in reality, but the majority of it seems to be progressing well.
From my house it's 0 mins to green space, walking and cycling, 5 mins to school or shops; 10 mins to city centre, local hospital, and 5-15 mins to all sorts of employment, recreation, retail and services.
I'm not sure it is! Your local hospital is now quite limited - it has no A+E, no maternity? - how much stuff is done there and how much do people from Stirling have to go to FVRH? Its University is not in the city, but must be a major part of the people movement - there's bits of the city you can get to it in 15 minutes but not all. I'm sure the average StU student will spend more than 15 minutes getting to lectures from home (unless they live on campus). Its heading in the right direction but then its small <50K people.
FVRH is 12 mins from my house, 16 on the bus.... 😉
You're right. But then is it realistic that *every* resource is within 15-20mins? Would we need multiple sites for the university, or every medical site to have maternity. I think for me the principle of a lot of, but not all, resources within short distance is ok.
Otherwise we get all dictatorial and unaffordable....