What is the impact of a car-free village
Homes cost less - no funds needed for driveways or garages
Workplaces cost less - no funds needed for off-street parking or large truck bays
Village costs less to build - no need for on-street parking, parking meters, parking enforcement
Village uses less land - roads narrower, no carparks for businesses, no driveways or garages
Roads are cleaner - no dripping oil, no tyre-tread marks
Roads last longer - less weight (and wear & tear) on the streets on a day-to-day basis
Roads are more attractive - paverstone roads easy to access, lift pavers - no patches
Buildings remain cleaner as the dust and grit from tyres and diesel smoke are eliminated
The air is cleaner no tailpipe and fuel tank emissions, no tyre and brake dust
Children, pets and elders safer - no risk of getting run down by a car
Elders need not leave when they lose their licence to drive - everything within walking distance
Destinations closer - Everything is in closer proximity because the village takes up less space
People live in a quieter environment, no cars passing by, especially when one is sleeping
No social pressure on status about what kind of car one drives
Dining alfresco (outside) along the street becomes far more enjoyable
Youth find other activities - society maintains a naturally higher level of non-invasive supervision
Eliminates anonymous predatory behaviour enabled by the car; fear is reduced
Safety issues around the fuel storage are eliminated (petrol & diesel kept only at the motorpool)
Save money - no need to buy, finance, depreciate, insure, license, inspect, run, fix & fuel a car.
Life is better.
In the above list, all these positive effects are local and personal. None of them have to do with climate change, peak oil or global economic crisis. For those who want to look at that big picture however, creating a car-free village has positive effects on the region and the globe:
Fact: For every 10,000 people, the average suburb has 6,000 cars in use every day*. For every 10,000 population parallel village, approximately 6,000 cars are eliminated for day-to-day use because workers commute on foot, parents take children to school on foot, people go to shops, cafes and recreation on foot. Bicycles and NEV's (neighbourhood electric vehicles) provide wheeled mobility, but the speed is limited to walking pace.
Regional impact: A local or regional authority that approves a 10,000 population suburb must spend considerable time determining the impact on their roads. Studies must be done to determine if the roads are adequate from the 6,000 additional cars. The impact of a parallel village is markedly less. There will be supply trucks and there can be expected to see regional residents as well as visitors attracted to the village. Some villagers will travel to outside destinations, especially those who need to get to the airport. But the vast majority of daily transport, the part that requires both study and expense by the local or regional authorities is not part of a parallel village.
Global impact: It is difficult to find a reputable study that shows the true and total impact of burning a tankful of petrol. We read that a litre of petrol dumps 2.39 kg of CO² in the air, but this is only the end of a very long supply line. Exploring, drilling, pumping, refining, transporting (several stages), wholesaling and retailing of petroleum all require energy, much of it polluting, and then there is the intangible costs to humanity and the Earth in terms of health and the occasional war fought over oil. To this one must add the cost of manufacturing cars and the whole infrastructure required to keep them on the road.
The industry's answer is to develop cars that travel further on a litre of petrol, or to develop second generation biofuels where the plant or algae extract the CO² from the atmosphere, so when it is burned, it only returns CO² borrowed a while earlier. These are admirable aspirations, and should be pursued, especially because the parallel village still relies on vehicular transport to connect with the outside world. However, while solutions such as using less fuel or biofuel to solve the global problems, on a local level they still result in machine-scaled local communities, when in fact many people want to live in human-scaled ones.
In a parallel village, the immediate impact is not carbon neutral it is zero carbon. No drive, no emissions.
* To get a comparable basis, see a report to Rodney District Council (click here) which states that the average number of cars per household in Rodney is 1.7 and in New Zealand is 1.6. In a parallel village, 10,000 population is projected at 2.5 persons per household, or 4,000 homes. At 1.5 cars per household, this is 6,000 cars. If we took the New Zealand national average it would be 6,400 cars for every 10,000 persons and in Rodney 6,800. More importantly, while there will be cars available to villagers at the motorpool, what the parallel village removes is the day-to-day need to drive.
