Sunday, January 02, 2011

Square Head

On a recent trip to the south of France, I saw a lot of pragmatic, creative, effective transit infrastructure:
  • Elevators and escalators all through Monte Carlo to move residents up and down the steep streets.
  • Tunnels tucked away in congested areas to divert traffic underground.
  • Underground parking tucked away all over the place. Seven levels of parking under the old town of Monte Carlo.
  • A shopping zone in Nice with the street permanently blocked to cars (with an LRT running where the road was) but with lots of parking behind the stores.
  • Many, many trains.
  • Ferries.
  • In Nice, rental bikes. (As I noticed in Washington DC a couple of months ago, these don't seem to be used at all. I know they're popular in Holland; I don't know why they seem to be a dud in some other places.)
  • Buses running within and between towns that are so clearly marked that newcomers to the area can use them without trouble.
  • Convenient parking everywhere: street parking and parking lots.
  • Despite issues such as roads built by the Romans, narrow Medieval streets, huge amount of tourists, and a high cliff running through the densest areas, lots of cars moving well.

And this is off-topic, but here's an office building in Nice. God, I love France!

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