Europe Plans To Ban Petrol Cars From Cities By 2050 695
thecarchik writes "Can you imagine a future — thirty-nine years from now — where there are no engines humming, no exhaust smells, no car sounds of any kind in the city except the presumably Jetsons-like beeping of EVs? The European Commission can, and it has a transportation proposal aiming to do just that by 2050. Paris was the first city to suggest a ban on gas guzzlers in their city core, but this ban takes it to whole different level by planning to phase out all petrol cars completely from the city streets. While Paris was motivated by reduced pollution, the EU has broader aims of reduced foreign oil dependence, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, increased jobs within the EU, and improved infrastructure for future economic growth."
By 2050? (Score:5, Interesting)
39 years away is a LONG time. Many politicians will have a chance to overturn this during that time.
Or if you're an optimist, perhaps the free market will have beat them to the punch by then. Or you might point out that there already is a modern city without petrol cars. [wikipedia.org]
Western Europe is crowded, fragmented (Score:2, Interesting)
and too far in the north.
In other words, a rather bad place to live and do agriculture.
But then this permanent disadvantage has become our strength.
We have to do things right, because we don't have the space for "badlands".
We have to do things efficient, because we don't have resources to waste.
And while cultural diversity makes trade difficult, it also serves as a constant reminder that there is more than one way to do it.
In the long run the economy flourishes when it has to overcome challenges.
European cars are superior because fuel is expensive.
American cars are crap, because GM has no ambition.
Re:Typical Euro politics (Score:1, Interesting)
Why do people always want to slap more taxes on my daily commute? Seriously, do you have a fetish with me slaving away with little to show for it at the end of the month?
Or do you seriously believe that I drive my car from and to work because it's fun? In that case I have news for you: It's not. I do it because it's less not fun than taking public transportation. I could comfortably live with a car in my garage I take out once a week for the fun of it or even none at all if you seriously want me to... if, IF I didn't have to do pesky little things like be places on fricking time every day and go groceries shopping and stuff.
So either you make it so that I don't have to go to work that far away or you shut the fuck up about how I get there.
And no, getting another job somewhere else is not an option. Changing my profession is not an option. Sacrificing what little comfort in life I have for your stupid ideas is NOT a FUCKING OPTION!
People should stop expecting everyone else to bend over backwards for their nutcase ideas. Make it so that my life gets comparatively BETTER from how it is now by adopting your way of thinking and we'll talk. What you are doing now is telling the nigger-slave to work harder or else he gets the whip. I would have thought we were beyond that way of thinking by now. (sorry for the harsh, non-pc stuff, but I didn't want to invoke Godwin's Law and I am watching Roots these days...)
Re:Western Europe is crowded, fragmented (Score:3, Interesting)
What are you talking about?
Even though Europe is quite far in the north, its climate is perfect for agriculture thanks to the Gulf Stream.
It is actually one of the most agriculturally privileged regions in the world, which is one of the reasons for its important role in the development of civilization and culture (if you don't have to worry too much about having enough to eat you can spend your time on making life easier and more enjoyable in other ways).
Why is that hard to imagine? (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, how is it a stretch to imagine a future where the primary source of energy is not derived from burning dead dinosaurs and plants?
Dont get me wrong, I love my Jeep! It is a hobby for me, but I certainly do not expect it will be my primary mode of transport in 20+ year. At least I hope to god we would have progressed a bit faster than that.
The move off fossil fuels is just like anything else that's hard; if you don't start at some point, you will never get there.
Re:Euro politics ignoring realities (Score:4, Interesting)
True. And you can extend the reach, speed and comfort of a bicycle by help of a small electric engine-and-battery. Because bicycles are amazingly energy-effective. On level ground, a bicycle needs aproximately 40 wh (or 0.04Kwh) of energy for each mile traveled.
A modern lithium-ion battery holds 300-600wh/litre, thus a 3-litre battery weighing around 10kg, holds sufficient energy to propel bike and rider over aproximately 35 miles. If you use the battery merely as "support", doing most of the pedaling yourself, but letting it help out with the trickier parts, that range gets even better.
Re:That all makes sense for SUVs . . . (Score:4, Interesting)
"Pedestrianised" - where will the bikes and buses go then? Walking is not a replacement for either of these, for distances over a mile.
I mean to change [almost] all the white roads on this map [google.co.uk]: restrict them to pedestrian and cyclists (and similarly for the City and the East End). Or, just change them so there are no through routes for car-sized vehicles, i.e. by blocking roads with bollards wide enough to let a bicycle pass (but I think signs and a little enforcement should be sufficient).
It would be a much nicer place to be at all times of the day.
Re:Fake Environmentalism (Score:4, Interesting)
Here's the real story on this: Actually solving the environmental problems we collectively have is really expensive and inconvenient. But thanks to a lot of hard work by a lot of environmentalists, the masses generally believe that the environmental problems like climate change exist and should be fixed, but at the same time don't want to pay for fixing them. What's happened over the last decade or so is that the PR and business types have figured out that it's far cheaper to pretend you're doing something about it than it is to actually do something about it. The public wants environmentalism at little-to-no personal cost, so what these folks are doing is pretending to give them just that.
I'll give you a good example of this: thanks to the efforts of a lot of farmers and hippies going back since the 1970's, organic produce has developed a reputation (deservedly or not) for being tastier, more environmentally friendly, healthier, and better for small farmers. However, you could really only get the stuff at farmer's markets or food coops. So what the big agribusinesses did was went to the USDA, got words like "organic" and "free-range" defined for marketing purposes, put together farms that technically met that definition but were nothing like what the hippies were doing, and started selling the stuff in grocery stores as if it were the same thing (and in some cases, lying about that too, and just slapping the"organic" label on non-organic produce).
Re:To expensive (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:To expensive (Score:5, Interesting)
The hilarious thing about Germany is, thanks to the Greens being in government for ages and the constant propganda spewing from Greenpeace et al., the German public are stongly against nuclear power. They're even shutting down their existing nuclear plants. How they expect to meet the huge increase in electricity demand on the grid that electric cars will cause without nuclear is beyond me; they're already getting 80% of their energy from... coal and gas. With no nuclear, they can throw vast amount of money at wind/solar and I predict they will still be spewing tons of crap out into the environment because of... coal and gas power stations.
Re:The Real Problem (Score:4, Interesting)
The internal combustion engine was and for the near future still is the most economically viable, everyday practical and most lightweight means of generating motive power for cars and motorcycles.
That may change within the next 20 years or so, in fact I personally hope it changes withing the next 5 or 10, so we can use what oil we have left for things we have yet to develop alternatives for.
Electric power is close, but it's still not quite there for everyday usage. For a lot of people it's perfectly fine and the percentage will grow larger as battery tech and electric drivetrains are developed further. But for some things, motorcycles in particular, electric power is simply too heavy and too cumbersome to "refuel". For now.