Variations

So how far away do you have to park your car?

There are three different district layouts below, giving three different answers to this question.

Car-lite District

This layout provides access to a car club (or carshare) car within a 2 minute walk of every home.

Up to a 2 minute walk to a carshare car

Buildings	Pedestrian street	Green space	Road/parking

A car club gives residents easy access to a car when they need it, but without all the expense and hassles of owning a car of their own.

I can’t understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I’m frightened of the old ones.

- John Cage

Users pay a small annual membership, and after that it's pay-as-you-go. Vehicles can be rented by the hour, or for days at a time. So you only pay for a car when you need it, not when you don't.

Insurance is included in the price. And someone else takes care of all the servicing and maintenance.

Gardens and shrubbery hide parked cars from passing pedestrians

And with a city-wide car club, it would be possible to offer a massive variety of vehicles: small cars; family cars; sports cars and convertibles; pick ups and estates for moving goods; 7-seater people carriers; luxury cars; even specialist vehicles like the tilting Carver One.

I believe this layout offers the best compromise between a fully pedestrian community and nearby access to a car.

Carfree District

With this layout, car club vehicles and cars belonging to residents are parked in the peripheral car park, leaving the district entirely carfree.

Up to an 8 minute walk to a car

It offers a slightly higher quality pedestrian environment, but some residents will be in for an 8 minute walk every time they need use of a car.

Radburn District

The ultimate have-your-cake-and-eat-it district, this layout is based on Radburn, New Jersey.

Can park on your own property

The main thoroughfares within the district are still the pedestrian streets. But here, residents can park their own cars on rear driveways.

Driveways are provided to the rear of houses

However, this layout will tend to encourage greater car use than car-lite and carfree districts. Front gardens would have to shrink drastically to achieve the same density due to the space taken up by the extra roads. And the rear driveways will eat into back gardens.

Note that the centre of the district remains fully pedestrianised. High density living and cars do not mix.

Pick 'n Mix

All three of these district types could be built within the same city, offering residents a choice of lifestyles: completely carfree; easy access to a car club car; or parking at the rear of their property.

And most importantly, all three district types maintain an excellent pedestrian environment, with cars tucked away behind buildings, and pedestrians always having priority over drivers.

There's never any waiting for the little green man.

Phasing

Until the city reaches a sufficient size, residents will have to travel outside the city often for jobs and services. Thus extra car parking would be provided during the construction phase, arranged so that every house still fronts onto a pedestrian street.

The extra car parks during the construction phase...

Once the city has grown large enough, these extra car parks would then be replaced by buildings.

... are later replaced by more housing and shops.

Imperfect Circles

The diagrams above show each district as a perfect circle, but this is more for reasons of simplicity than a design choice.

In reality, each district would be shaped by the local geography somewhat. And jagged edges will lead to more interesting streets within.

The outer-most districts could also be made larger, permitting a lower density at the cost of green space and a longer walk to public transport

For greater diversity, some districts might also be built smaller and denser than the standard, with others built larger and less dense.

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