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Comment by NalNezumi | Hacker News Reader

The article don't have a good picture of a small road. Here's an example https://kuruma-news.jp/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/20230214_g...

Usually these roads are so small, you can barely fit a car and maybe one pedestrian on one / each side. And these streets are quite common in residential area. As in the picture, usually there are light poles along the pedestrian street. the pictures pole is pretty small but normally they're big enough you can only circumvent it by going in the path of the car, and that's a Hotspot when people get hit.

I didn't even know you were allowed to drive 60km/h on those streets. Most people slowed down because the chance of damaging your car is quite high

Edit: also why big American car are not that popular in Japan. You can't even reach your house for many, if you get an American car

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The really big thing in Japan is you're not allowed to park ("litter") your car in the street. In fact you can't even buy a car unless you can prove you have somewhere on your own land where you can park it. It makes a big improvement to walkability and general attractiveness of neighbourhoods.

There’s a hack though, just put on your hazards and you can park wherever you like!

I’m kidding of course but I see many people do this and it’s super frustrating.

Also fyi, you can buy a kei car without a parking certificate

In Germany that would probably be a "verkehrsberuhigter Bereich", Traffic calming area with a speed limit of 7 km/h.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_street#Around_the_world

Sweden has a similar concept where car and pedestrian traffic share the same space. The rule says that pedestrian has priority.

A less-known aspect of this is that bike traffic (and scooters) are also limited to 7km/h. Very few people actually follow that traffic rule, and enforcement is very rare. There are shared bike and pedestrian roads where bikes are allowed to go faster, but they are more rare and has their own designation.

Your edit reminds me of some years ago at a conference an American was asking in a boasting way what some European people thought of cybertrucks. I don't know if he owned one or worked on them or just liked them, but he seemed to want some praise on it. They tore into it including how big it was relative to narrow European streets and that they wouldn't be legal to sell in Europe. The guy didn't talk to them after that

> was asking in a boasting way what some European people thought of cybertrucks

Not a lot at announcement and even less now, not seen one in the UK (they aren't road legal).

In general, all cars are too wide now because they have gradually maximized their width up to a limit. The old Italian Fiat cars were much more nimble, of course.

I saw one in Austria for the first time just a couple of weeks ago. It had Polish number plates, so presumably it is legal to buy and register one there, and to drive it in other EU countries.

There are some loopholes that exist for many european countries. The Netherlands has one cybertruck afaik.

"The Secret to Japan's Great Cities" (Not Just Bikes) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlwQ2Y4By0U

(thank you, cassepipe)

The Secret to Japan's Great Cities - Not Just Bikes

Consider at least giving the title of what you want to share and even to add a small description as to why this is worth anyone's time

“It’s because they have walkable space and public transportation.”

— <https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/2447794-walkable-cities>

Even 30 seems a bit optimistic and 60 is insane.

It is insane that 60 was ever considered a limit :P 20 seems much more than needed

Ultimately the limit is mostly decided by the width of the road. You can set a 10km/h limit but if your road is wide and straight, many will just go at whichever speed they feel comfortable with. The reverse is also true: I can bet it was very rare for anyone to ever reach 60km/h on streets like those shown in the picture.

So to really enforce slower traffic, narrow down your street to the bare minimum required for a car to pass through. Add obstacles as small turns or bumps. You'll also gain space for sidewalks and cycling paths.

> In traffic, energy used over a specific period of time (power) translates into speed. In this case, the critical quantum will appear as a speed limit. Wherever this limit has been passed, the basic pattern of social degradation by high energy quanta has emerged. Once some public utility went faster than 15 mph, equity declined and the scarcity of both time and space increased. Motorized transportation monopolized traffic and blocked self-powered transit.

>...

> From our limited information it appears that everywhere in the world, after some vehicle broke the speed barrier of 15 mph, time scarcity related to traffic began to grow. After industry had reached this threshold of per capita output, transport made of man a new kind of waif: a being constantly absent from a destination he cannot reach on his own but must attain within the day.

https://www.davidtinapple.com/illich/1973_energy_equity.html

In a street like that the even 30km/h is too fast.

I'm surprised the limit was so high on those narrow, low visibility streets to begin with. In many EU countries the limit is 30km/h even on streets that are double the size, if they're in residential neighborhoods to increase pedestrian safety.

All of the posted limits around my area are 30 or lower on this type of street. It seems like the real change is if the limit is unposted the assumed default is now 30 instead of 60, which is probably fair.

Back in the early 00s my host family had an imported left hand drive chevy blazer, and it felt enormous there. I can only imagine in the years since how ridiculous it would be with ballooning SUV sizes.

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