Summarizing discussions
Brenda Pérez <[email protected]>
| Newsgroups | gmane.politics.activism.carfree-network |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <!&!AAAAAAAAAAAYAAAAAAAAAOA13/oQ0m1Fm/lAv0YRrekCkAAAEAAAAHDKC3OkncVNt1dCEk6rcVsBAAAAAA==@ciudadhumana.org> |
Trying to summarize some of the important discussions of the last days, Ill point out some of my opinions: About the networks name: I believe having the word carfree in the networks name gives an accurate idea about what we dont want. But its not clear about what we want and how we want to do it. Nevertheless, I think changing the name is not an alternative. We could have a slogan or something that focus attention in proximity and livability. About the kind of cities that should host carfree conferences: Sure its nice to have the conferences in carfree spaces and towns. That gives strength to our ideals. But as I said in the closure of our conference in Bogotá: the conference has to be an instrument by which people who knows more that the 101 carfree could illustrate those that have not a clue. This could lead the movement to be more than just a reunion of the same. About what the objectives of the network are: do we only want to share carfree good practices? Wouldnt be great to share some bad practices? Or help cities where the car is a king, as Agustín says, to even hear about our idea of what development is? About what the main focus of conferences should be: Although I agree with the idea of spotlighting on urban planning issues more that in transport shift, the reason for it wouldnt be that we already have lots of sustainable transport conferences. There is an entrenched ethnocentric thought underlying that reason. Here in Latin America we perhaps have two or three important conferences that are all crammed with public transport and BRT topics. Just recently bike and pedestrian issues got into scene. Land use and urban planning have been mentioned by Lloyd and some other heroic people a few times. The main assistants are always transport engineers and technicians. No citizens pass by. Were not tired -as you are- of sustainable transport conferences. Please have this in mind. Otherwise, dont call yourself world carfree network. Again, proximity is more an idea of alternative development than sustainable transport, and I find that much more valuable, but I also believe promoting bike and pedestrian mobility and claiming for proximity planning is a double way strategy, and different people have to be reached (citizens and decision-makers, respectively). About the idea of compromising city halls in developing permanent carfree projects in each conference: Great! We tried to do it for the conference in Bogotá, but we hadnt enough time and budget Finally Id like to clarify that if Im being so critical to the network is because I believe that our ideals must be spread out mainly in places where is harder to accomplish it and also because I sometime get tired of discussions that get nowhere. Regards, Brenda Pérez [carfree_network] list guidelines and unsubscribe information are found at http://www.worldcarfree.net/listservs/. Send messages for the entire list to carfree_network-3hfIC0tI0F+k/GrYEfjPQuG/[email protected] Send replies to individuals off-list.