| Comment | Putting cars at the bottom of that list (or more accurately, *taking practical steps* to put them at the bottom of that list; they're already at the bottom of the notional public realm hierarchy), is needed if you're to improve some aspects of public transport.
Buses can't get moving because of cars. People can't walk or cycle safely to places that are not terrible distances away, because of cars. People are disincentivised from spending time in the city centre, because it's so full of cars. Cars are wider than ever before, taking up more space than ever before, and there are more of them on our roads than ever before. This is true of Glasgow, of Scotland, the UK and a trend seen in cities across the world which have done little to divert people into other modes of transit.
We've been through 70 years of an experiment in making Glasgow (and the UK more generally) optimal for travel by car, at cost to everything else. Massive investment in road building. Roads which are unwelcoming at best and impassable at worst for pedestrians, which cut neighbourhoods off from one another. Free parking at purpose built out of town shopping malls and drive throughs. And people wonder why the city centre isn't quite what it used to be. |
|---|