Residential streets are too wide. Here's why.
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 11 ก.ย. 2017
- In many places in the United States, residential streets were as wide as busy city streets. I understand why urban streets might need to be wide - parking, buses, traffic, and bike lanes all need the room. But why do quiet residential streets need to be so wide? Why do they need parking when all of the houses on the streets have garages and driveways? Why do they need wide lanes when most of the traffic is just cars and minivans? Why are we building residential streets as wide as big city streets?
Resources on this topic:
I based this video on my Master's thesis, which my advisor and I turned into a book chapter. You can buy the book, Retrofitting Sprawl, on Amazon:
www.amazon.com/gp/product/082...
Video sources:
- Videoblocks.com
Photo sources:
- AASHTO
- Blake Wheeler (via Unsplash.com)
- Drew DeVitis psudelft2015drewdevitis.wordp...
- Google Maps
- NASA
- Wikimedia Commons
Filmed in sunny Sacramento, California.
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![[TH] VCT Pacific Stage 2 - Week 1 Day 1 // DRX vs ZETA | BLD vs TS](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/AWaOqaxN6Y0/mqdefault.jpg)
So sick of seeing people who've only ever lived their whole lives in the suburbs talk about how "Americans prefer the suburbs because they're better."
it's just the "this is normal to me so if anyone says it can be better i'll act defensively" phase anyone goes through before seeing reason
Yup, exactly. Americans don't know better because they haven't experienced a better way.
@@jukio02 there's literally no option other than driving to get most places in most neighborhoods. the car centric design is a self fulfilling prophecy.
@@jukio02 or worse, we do see better but refuse to learn from it. There's a reason so many Americans are romanticized by Europe after going there on vacation. It's not just because of the castles and tourist attractions. It's because so many cities and towns are walkable and human-sized. But apparently we can never build that here? It's really odd that walkability is only for tourism destinations in American minds.
There are pros and cons to both cities and suburbs and they apply to completely different people. Cities allow for dense housing, convinence, walkable places, public transit, etc. while suburbs allow for spacious yards, privacy, wooded areas, quietness, etc. Of course suburbanites will defend suburbs because you will never get what suburbs offer in a city, and vice versa. From the suburbanite's perspective, why would someone accustomed to 1 acre of land with trees, a private pool, space to park the boat and RV, space for the dog to play, and a house with 4 bedrooms suddenly up and move to a cramped apartment with no yard space, no trees, a disgusting public pool (that most likely includes a fee), and the need to rent storage space for anything that doesn't fit in the closet?
Street diets are a delight. Taking away lanes and adding trees do wonders. My street did this. I love it.
In Italy much streets aren’t even wide enough for two cars 😂
Thats because most of the streets were laid out in the roman era when everyone walked lol
A good reason to make a transition to bike traffic in European city centers, like in the Netherlands.
In Depok, Jakarta's satellite city you can find 4 lane streets for residential areas and nearly* 2 lane roads for main streets, as there is no standards
On a low density residential street, you don't even need two lanes. You could make do with a one way lane that connects to a bigger two way street.
Vespas!
I think that my early 1900s neighborhood strikes a pretty good balance. It has mid-sized streets with street parking on one side only.
Due to its age the streets are not on a perfect grid, and the sidewalks are lined with old trees. This gives the entire neighborhood a cozy feel, and encourages careful driving.
The first thing I noticed in US is that all things are so big compared to Europe and Asia from the food portions, cars, roads to buildings.
コイノ/ Koino people
コイノ/ Koino Not food portions lol
We like'em big round hea. Hahaha
It's because the United States has the luxury of having the space available. Europe and some of Asia is extremely dense and were platted before the existence of cars or horse wagons.
Dongs?
Why are there so many dislikes? I never imagined Street width could be such a heated topic
Sort the comments by new, people like things the way they are
Because people like cars and driving and in many cases trying to reduce their use is very difficult if not impossible. Also narrowing streets in any place that has significant snowfall? Minus well shutdown the city after every major snow storm then because between people shovelling snow and snow plows clearing the roads, the amount of piled up snow will take up practically all the road space meaning no one will be able to move anywhere.
@@UzumakiNaruto_ Trust me, snow is not a problem. Here in Norway, streets in residential areas have a paved area about 5.5 - 6 meters wide - or ~18 footsies for you Americans - and we get snow by the droves every winter. It's just piled up to the side, although sometimes it makes sidewalks unusable. Building the streets 36 feet wide - that's 12 meters - sounds laughably excessive. That's the width of a two-lane highway.
@@Codraroll
I live in Toronto and here we don't have superwide residential roads unless maybe its a newer subdivision. If there are cars parked on both sides of the street you have about 1 1/2 car spaces for vehicles to pass which of course means one person has to wait for the other to pass.
It doesn't happen very often, but usually once or twice a winter we have one big snowfall and residential roads narrow alot, especially the closer to get towards downtown which is of course the oldest parts of the city.
For me I'm not in favor of superwide residential roads, but I am for them to be wide enough that you can comfortably fit two cars passing each other with one side of the road for street parking and it would be even better if newer subdivisions would have built in roundabouts to move traffic better.
@@UzumakiNaruto_ I guess it depends on the level of thoroughfare traffic. Here, it's common only to park cars on one side of the road and keep the other lane open for cars to pass. It means someone will have to wait when two cars meet, but it doesn't happen as often. Most people walk or take public transport to work anyway, so it's not like the residential areas empty of cars in the middle of the day.
Plus housing prices directly correlate with street width, which is to say that most people want to live on slow human-scale streets. If people are asked about their preferences on a survey they will say their top road priorities are fast speeds and minimized congestion but if you show them pictures and ask which neighborhood they’d rather live in, or look at their revealed preferences through housing prices, it’s pretty clear people prefer roads that are much narrower than what are being built most places.
hehe that's an awesome point about surveys being biased because of how they're set up/worded. Presumably in your example there's no room for context either. Fast speeds on *what kinds of roads* exactly?
I want to live on a road that's 300 feet wide.
@@e7venjedi exactly, there’s no one perfect type of road! I know you get this, but I wish more people understood that goodness isn’t a linear factor, it’s some higher-dimensional graph!
"But muh 9 foot wide extended cab truck with 4 foot tall suspension and 54 inch double tires won't fit on a narrower street. What about muh freedom?"
Literally someone commented that reply to me on a video while back about he drives his massive pickup to work everyday. But he wasn't being sarcastic
@grafvonstauffenburg Paloocaville*
@grafvonstauffenburg so that you know, congressman-lawyer wannabe, this was not an argument. pointing it out acomplishes nothing but making people akbowledge your lack of awareness.
@Aman Walksn2abar mate, not trying to be rude, but you're not really...not saying anything? Calling him an idiot won't really convince anyone.
@Aman Walksn2abar You didn't say anything. You just called me an idiot. Just make a point. Seriously, I want to hear your point.
One extra comment: If all the streets were smaller in a new area, you would be able to fit in more housing in the same hectare.
More houses means more people. More people in the same hectare means less room for each.
@@zack95 less room on the streets yes. The room each person has is dependent on more than just population. If more space is taken from streets or buildings are taller, each person would have the same amount of space in their house.
@@zack95 if streets are made narrower, you could fit the same amount of houses with the same amount of square footage in a significantly smaller footprint. You are not on the street the whole day nor are your neighbours, so you dont actually need that extra street
@@nadie8093 more houses means more people, means more need to move bit less move possibilities.
@@zack95 it is still the same amount of houses per street. Yes, there will be more streets leading to collector and arterial roads, but this higher density reduces the need to travel so much, and therefore, the need to move wont rise that much through those roads
The newest first comments consist entirely of
a) people defending wide streets
b) foreigners talking about how thin their streets are
You know I think these narrow streets are even just more fun to drive on. Small car, curvy streets, narrow corners, big trees canopy overhead, what fun.
My father lived on a street that was wide and people would speed up and down it. When he was looking for a home to raise his family he wanted a narrow street. So where I grew up it was narrow with barely enough room for two cars to pass.
Your videos are really informative! :) I live in Amsterdam and there are a lot of these really narrow "woonerf" streets which are really nice to be on. Also, the Dutch have managed to greatly reduce traffic and make cities more walkable and bikeable just with better planning.
Thanks! I need to visit Amsterdam!
@@CityBeautiful you should also visit Montréal and do a video on it because for North America they do city planning quite well. Same goes for Halifax.
Watching this in the UK, the road is about 12 feet wide and we have no off street parking! Very slow traffic and very few accidents.
@Matthew Barrick no they wouldn't
Hey, i am a student doing my masters degree in germany in traffic engineering and traffic simulations and im glad you are doing these videos simply to inform and educate people about how cities work :) thanks!
who else felt a sudden urge to go outside and measure the width of their street
Use google maps
I love how with these infrastructure videos The Netherlands is always looked upon for inspiration. However dumb it may sound, sure makes me proud.
Haven't seen that Woonerf sign for ages tho...
Precies dat!
Unfortunately not anymore I wouldnt live in a country like yours in 2020
@@gui18bif Why?
@@zUJ7EjVD Yes. We has Bicycles. Probably the most corona-proof form of transport other then the giant hamsterball.
... I wish I had one of those...
While looking at all those wide streets in the States, I thought to myself: "Wait until you see where I live." Then all of a sudden at 1:52, my street pops up hahaha! What a coincidence!
P.s. It's the Westerstraat in Delft in the Netherlands ;)
SchoolWok24 cool!
Nice, nederland (:
The bikes were kind of a giveaway
Doxxed. I am coming to your house.
@@blitzn00dle50 hmm
Now imagine upkeep cost over the years, even if nobody driven it street will deteriorate.
First time I have ever agreed with the author. Back when my parents' neighborhood was constructed, the 60' streets were mandated by the city. I have no idea why. It is illogical to demand on-street parking when off street parking is also required. Just eliminating one side for parking would result in no functional change. There is a big economic bonus to developers for narrow streets--more salable lots per unit area.
Hey, glad we agree on something!
Not just residential streets either. In Ogden Utah, I entered a crosswalk with the walk sign to cross what 5 or 6 lanes. Almost immediately the don't walk sign with the 24 second countdown started flashing. I'm fit and made it without issue but I could not help but think of my octogenarian mother or anyone with a walking cane trying to cross that street without getting stressed out about making it.
Cars have ro stop for crossing pedestrians. Always.
This is Utah - drivers would totally run over a pedestrian if they were in their way. And then they'd flip them the bird, curse them out, and sue them for denting their 10 year old car they think is still worth $20k.
Some people just shouldn't stand on the edge of a cliff. That's life. Same principle here.
The don't walk sign still allows people to cross when in the road.
Salt Lake City too.
Thanks for opening with our study on injury accidents :) The real problem in preventing narrower streets is the fire service. They actually can fight fires in residential neighborhoods with narrow streets as long as there is a connected network and other accommodations, but largely refuse to do so. I would love to see you explore this problem in a subsequent video.
Yes. My subdivision in the middle of Thornton, CO, has not been annexed because the streets are too narrow. Truthfully, I'm okay with this because I still get city fire service, but don't have to pay city taxes.
Maybe just get smaller fire trucks like in Europe? 😂
@@eesti919 Right. Eone has a ladder truck with only a 12' outrigger spread (HP100). Others also.
@@eesti919 and smaller houses. Smaller rooms!
Smaller everything!
Live on a pod!
Like the good little slave you are!
That unused parking is there for when we have parties and people come over
That is what lawns are for. Overflow parking
Wide lanes are awful. Worst part is the anti-pedestrian lack of sidewalks because of the massive suburban streets. So awful
Come to Japan, most residential streets are 10 foot wide.
I want to go! I've seen pictures of some amazing narrow streets and want to experience them firsthand.
36 foot wide streets! :O In the UK most residential streets are 12 foot wide if that!
You don't, my road for example has a row of parked cars in the left lane and the right lane is used for two way traffic. Drivers just let people go when needed.
In Germany you can only park on one side ande the oher lane has to be shared in both directions
MrRandomname1011 i know i love the uk except you don't have free speech or guns and your healthcare is atrocious
steve b they park half on the sidewalk and only on one side like the others said and you pull into a gap to let people pass. Most residential areas don't have constant traffic
It's common in Australia (well Sydney) too. Residential streets in older or brand new areas are usually about 6m wide (the post war to early 1980's suburban areas have very wide, american style streets) , cars park down both sides and two way traffic is allowed in the middle, the general etiquette is it to pull into a driveway/empty space to allow an on coming car to pass...It works well as there is low traffic volumes on side streets, some beach neighborhoods become a nightmare on the weekend though
Our street is wide and motorists use it like a speedway. I witnessed a few accidents in a very short time too. I wrote to council and pleaded to do something such as planting trees or even blocking part of the road as a thoroughfare. I haven’t heard boo. I wrote twice over 2 years ago. It’s got me thinking to write again and this time put in some facts about safer street design. Good video. :)
A lot of great arguments in here, and we're starting to see some of the retrofits mentioned at the end here in Minneapolis. As I was watching, I thought about the expectation that people would use their garages and driveways for parking, rather than street parking, in two contexts:
I grew up in Austin, Minnesota (population 25,000). Our residential streets were very wide. Almost everyone kept their cars in their garages, but there was a very particular (and ridiculous) social etiquette about guests parking. When you were visiting, it was generally considered rude to park in the person's driveway. It was also rude to park in front of a house other than the one you were visiting. There were hardly ever any cars parked on the street, but people treated the space in front of their house like it was their own personal guest parking space. Totally unnecessary.
Then I thought about my in-laws in Chicago. Many of their residential streets are narrow enough to have to be one-ways, but EVERYONE parks on the street. We sometimes have to park several blocks away because we can't find a closer space. They have alleys and garages, but almost no one parks their car in their garage, apparently because they believe it's more likely to get broken into. (I've never quite grasped that argument, especially since once while we were visiting a drunk driver came careening down the street, scraping the sides of every parked car on one side of the street for several blocks!)
Anyway… my point is, I feel like there's a lot of stubbornness and inertia to overcome in the U.S. to make these kinds of changes widespread. I hope to be proven wrong!
But... Super Bowl parties
That's what i was thinking.
Any parties. Most suburban neighborhoods in the Chicago area have a similar space utilization for on street parking ..... until someone throws a huge party. These are areas without other options for getting to someone’s home.
Screw the NFL. Bring back XFL.
If u Live near the creator of This video I'm sure he would be cool with you talking on his lawn after all it's safer
Re: Super Bowl parties-- It IS possible for people to carpool, or to use Uber. In fact, if alcohol is to be served at this Super Bowl party, having designated drivers is highly advisable.
Now, extended family get-togethers like Thanksgiving or Christmas... *THAT'S* a legit reason for having surplus parking capacity! Not to mention that streets need to be broad enough for First Responders to react to 911 calls. If you or a loved one were having a stroke, would you really want the ambulance driver to have to slowly thread their way through narrow streets to reach you?
Great video. Having moved from the UK to the USA I can safely say the roads here are massive compared to Europe.
But why would you move to the worst developed country
All this wasted pavement, and in San Francisco you can't even find parking within 2 blocks of your own front door. I guess being surrounded by ocean on three sides is kind of a bitch.
Don't buy a car then...
sf has pretty narrow streets especially considering youre on the same level as nyc, chicago and boston
@@iamcleaver6854
In america, that is a death sentence. Public transport, if it exists in the area, is only intercity. Amtrak may have a few lines, but not feasible or timely, and definitely not cross country.
@@user-nf9xc7ww7m In San Francisco? The city that has metro and trams?
@@iamcleaver6854 san fransisco public transport is way to expensive to use on a daily bases.
Narrow Streets, Less Accidents. Wide Streets MORE ACCIDENTS.
narrow streets = less cars too. people hate driving on narrow streets. so no wonder its less accidents.
@@theX24968Z that means that you don't need mazes to stop people from driving trough neighbourhoods
@@timmerman135 reduce the traffic and raise the speed limit on the highways so we don't need to drive through a neighborhood
If less people drive through neighborhoods and more of them take the highway because there's less traffic on the highway, then in the end there's more traffic on the highway. That's one of the major problems with the "more, faster, wider roads" approach to traffic problems. Also, traffic on highways is not caused by low speed limits, and if you don't remove the underlying causes, what you're doing is, at best, getting people to traffic jams (where the speed limit does not matter) faster, and at the worst, increasing the rate at which accidents occur on top of that.
kekw
In my area the amount of on-street parking used is likely closer to 85%. I've often wondered why people use the street when they have driveways, garages and in some cases also allies and parking pads. Although having 3-4 cars, a motorbike, a project vehicle and using the garage mostly for storing junk is probably the issue.
Yeah, probably!
A garage makes an ideal storage and utility space with its huge door, while being okay to get dirty. Modern cars do not need to be babied indoors. Attached garages surrounded on the sides or top by living space are also inefficient in extreme outdoor temperatures, every time the door is opened. Parking more frequently used vehicles on the street can save time.
The issue is america was built with cars in mind. You can't ride a bike to work. And double parking your wife or mother is a great way to piss them off. Also this is highly exaggerated. Many residential roads are so narrow when oncoming traffic comes someone has to pull off to the side.
Oil is a big factor in that, or the ease in which to take off from the side of the road as opposed to cramped narrow streets where cars would rather honk at you as they're speeding by instead of waiting for you to safely get out.
Its actually much safer to pull away when you're parked on the street versus backing out of a driveway
This is a really great point for suburban-style residential neighborhoods, but think for a sec about cities with densely-constructed residential neighborhoods, particularly on the East Coast. I live in a predominantly residential neighborhood in Baltimore, a city where the rowhouse is king, and most of the housing stock in the inner neighborhoods was constructed before the advent of the automobile and associated amenities like the driveway and garage. Homes were built to fill the width of lots, and most of the depths as well. Given that Baltimore is still a fairly auto-dependent city, many residents rely primarily on on-street parking. That on-street parking actually has some pretty great benefits for us, too.
As you noted, the presence of parked cars narrows the driving path. For us, this slows the speed of cars on our residential streets. Additionally, the band of parked cars between the main driving path and the sidewalk creates something of a protective barrier for pedestrians and cyclists (most of our new bike paths are placed between the sidewalk and on-street parking).
All I'm trying to say, really is that on-street parking is still, in certain cases, very useful. It can promote both residential density and a sense of safety for non-drivers.
Shawn Soviak you are showing other great examples of why narrow works and planning is important. Large roads for nothing that he is targeting are in suburbia not downtown residential neighborhoods.
EVEN if you have a parking lane, it makes sense to put obstructions in so parking gets saver.
BTW 36 feet? Really? 11 metres? That's the sort of width a rural 60 mph single carriageway would have.
I do like that neighborhoods have excess parking, since there are times where more parking than usual is needed, such as for family gatherings, parties, and so on. I don't care that there may be room for a neighbor's visitor in my driveway, my driveway needs to be clear so I can go to work, go buy things, or perhaps just get away from the noise of a neighbor's party.
The Seattle street's parking still seems pretty excessive to me...
I recently moved to a neighborhood with narrow streets and it sucks. I am constantly feuding with the neighbors over parking. At night every single slot is taken. I want to go back to the wide street neighborhood I grew up in.
Novusod you don't have a driveway/ garage?
Even contemporary garages are short as hell. My Corolla barely fits in the place I currently reside at. A sedan would require me to move the garbage cans to a spot with less fung shooey. My company pickup that is loaded with equipment I need will not fit at all, nor would the Galaxie that was offered to me that desperately needs indoor space.
John R communist always want to take away from you.
Many of our streets on the Texas coast are wide to act as secondary water storage to prevent flooding.
As a truck driver i LOVE Texas roads. :D
And extra routes for evacuation. Though I've only seen it happen a few times.
Tom Forge That really helped last year. /s
Tom Forge Texas forever
I know this is a little old, but definitely see a lot of planned communities now with narrower residential streets for the reasons you mention.
Always showing the Netherlands as an example. Touché.
The netherlands just happens to be the most advanced in urban planning. Deal with it 🤷♂️
@@slc679 Advanced? More like boring.
@@BenchFox_ boring? How tf is a good street design boring?
@@walterclements7968 It's not the street design that's boring; it's the planning in general, since all the houses are pretty much the same. (in general)
@@BenchFox_ yeah we have our famous "rijtjeshuizen" and I can't but agree with the fact that they are quite boring. Luckily, newer neighborhoods are not as boring as those. From the 1930's there was just a big demand for housing and they chose quantity over originality.
I'd say the biggest obstacle isn't residents wanting their street parking or even traffic engineers clinging to their outdated standards, it's fire departments. As roads in north american got wider, fire departments kept buying bigger and bigger equipment. But they wanted bigger equipment, bigger toys, and demanded wider roads. I've seen countless developments that wanted to have narrower roads denied because it didn't meet some insane fire department regulation that would let them park two huge big-rig sized fire trucks side by side and have room to turn around comfortably. And who's going to say no to the fire department? Who's going to reign in their quest for bigger and bigger "apparatus" ? No one, it's political sucicide to challenge a fire department.
That's very true! The developers of Village Homes in Davis, CA wanted narrow streets and literally had to mock up proposed roads and have the fire department try it out to see if their trucks could navigate them.
Furthermore, lots of other countries use smaller fire apparatus than we do and their cities aren't burning to the ground...
Perhaps it'd be wise to build streets like that one in Seattle, but have a minimum width of space where there are no trees along a straight path. That way, a fire truck could if necessary mow through the dirt/plants, but it wouldn't be an issue otherwise.
City Beautiful, the rest of the world doesn't burn to the ground without wide streets because *houses aren't made of a freaking wood!* That's a huge fire hazard in the US, so you've got to follow the fire department regulations, or else you might die in flames and fumes along with quite a few of your neighbours.
And the collision statistics aren't representative, because those neighbourhoods with wiggly tiny streets certainly attract higher level of middle class, while the standard streets have homes affordable to wider range of buyers. And the income level has a pretty big separation -(and segregation)- of people
Markus Socius
Wrong.
Jarren Butterworth I'm sure you or someone you know will thank that "insane fire department regulation" when your or their house is on fire with the kids and the dog trapped inside.
It's not just political suicide to challenge a fire department, at worst it's actual suicide.
I think this is a much bigger problem out west than on the east coast of the USA. I live in GA and there are very few streets that are too wide to the degree you are talking about. My sister just moved to. Denver and I was blown away by how wide some of the residential roads are there. They could fit two GA residential roads on most Denver residential roads.
Charlie Vollenweider I live in GA too, and I don't know of any residential streets that are as wide as the ones in the video.
+Ur Nan There are a few in some of the cities. State Street between 10th and 16th in Atlanta comes to mind. But they are normally through streets in dense areas where most if not all of the street parking is used/needed.
Virginia is full of them, basically any street in the 757 fits those descriptions
Dude i live in nyc we dont have wide roads i drive a semi truck for a living but narrow roads are fun makes a nice challenge
I’m subscribed to a biker’s channel on TH-cam who always praises Amsterdam. I bet this guy will love this video and agree with everything. He has a lot of contempt for cars and loves his bike lanes.
NJB?
Mean while in portland, our big roads are too narrow and our residential streets never had the space to be big any way. lol
good.
I know you're American-based, but could you also include metric measurements where possible for your international audience?
Yes, I will in the future! Sorry about that. I wish the U.S. was on metric.
Wal Nutz damn fucking straight. Fuck these commie metric bastards. Base 12 master race
The metric system is used by the rest of the world, aka the majority. And I am NOT a communist. MS is easier to work with, converting from one measurement to another: 2 kilometers = 2000 meters for exemple. Do the same when converting 2 miles to yards. MS is just shifter the point and done. NO need for calculations. On a hot day I carry 2 liters of water in my backpack. What is the weight of the water? 2 kilograms, because one liters = one kilograms. One gallon = 8.44 lbs, not handy to work with.
Mardiff V. You do realise he is trolling, don't you?
City Beautiful the us is on metric, it's just most of us prefer the current system.
It also makes street races feel faster.
Stephen Jin AE86❤️
Great New Urbanism concept!! Love these videos: keep ‘em coming!!
wide streets are ugly, incentivize driving instead of walking / transit which adds to congestion and air pollution.
Lol narrower streets may be safer but there is more road rage.
In the UK our streets are waaay to narrow as most people use on street parking.
DSQueenie I definitely agree with you. I'd say average UK roads are the exact opposite of roads in North America, with different problems. Plus you often have to wait because there aren't enough lanes or lots of intersections / traffic lights
use public transport :-p
That's due to different problems, though. Most of the streets in the UK, in particular in London and other old cities, weren't designed for cars and have been retrofitted to accommodate them. The city isn't following a design and everything is quite haphazard. When we eventually do away with the need for the vast quantity of cars we drive this will return to being a beautiful and interesting place to move around in, but while cars are still required it's a nightmare. He's not saying the US should copy this, he's saying that streets should be designed using the results of research done on this topic. The narrow streets he's proposing, such as the ones in Seattle shown, are specifically built for all traffic to accomplish a specific task in that area.
The UK's narrow streets combined with driving on the opposite side of the road make it very stressful for visitors to drive there. I scraped a hubcap on my rental car, luckily they didn't notice lol
Jackasses are going to drive slow camper vans anyway. At least the U.S. has room to go around them.
This is a great video that asks such an innocent question that few people ever stop to consider - why are residential streets so wide when houses along them have driveways and garages? There are big implications from this simple question and this video makes it quick and easy to engage. Well done!
Lol the amount of dislikes is hilarious. I can only imagine these people are watching this video thinking "he's gonna take away muh freedom with his narrow streets!!" and then drive off in their pickup.
Totally irrelevant.
“How dare these people allow poor people into MY BEAUTIFUL SUBURBAN NEIGHBORHOOD. How dare they limit the freedom of my burger-loving consumerist self, who drives in the biggest beautiful truck in the world.”
Here's the flaw in your video. When I have people over they can't just park in some random neighbors drive way. So while there may be plenty of space in garages and drive ways. I nor my friends own that space so they can't park there and have to park in the street.
Exactly, there needs to be room for drivers to either pass each other or enough room so they can get very close and one driver pulls over for the other driver. If roads were as narrow as suggested in the video, and someone (quite frequently) has a party, then one of the drivers has to wait at a intersection (neighborhood) for the other car, 2 middle sized houses away to drive. It would be counter productive.
The History Nerd Or you widen the sidewalks so that they can function als additional guest-parking...
Roy Hoeksema that's not what sidewalks are for. Id rather not have to walk into the street every time I pass a house because someone parked their F150 in the middle of the path
I live in a suburb, and we use our sidewalks to AVOID the road and the cars
OpticObsidiaN That's why you should *widen* them and get markings on them so people know how far on the sidewalk they can park.
As a new driver who gets nervous when driving a little bit over the speed limit, and drives a little bit farther right than most, wider roads are my dream.
However you bring up good points.
killer video! this is my new favorite channel!
Parking on one side only. Narrowing of intersections. But then. Builders build one car spots and car centric households buy two cars and plug up the on street parking again. And they put two thousands of junk in their garages and leave their 30,000 car outside and claim there is not enough parking.
Man, I live in England, and I think you shouldn't complain. A normal suburban English street has barely enough space for one car. I look up to US streets.
Mimi Kal That's not the case in all European countries tho. England just sucks
Roy Hoeksema It is. Atleast the ones in the EU trust me roads are small everywhere i have been in Switzerland,Italy and germany lol everyone of them has some small roads somewhere not just an british problem
Yes...
Yes but england and all of europe has a much better bike road system, smaller cars, and slower speed limits than in the US
Joseph Kroll and 4 times the price of petrol/gas
I agree but I also have a big family. When we do parties, we take about 15 spaces. Where I live it isn’t a problem but relatives that live inside of cul-de-sacs or residential zones it’s quite hard to find spaces.
Just park a walk away
Gerard Curtis just move to a communist country and stop trying to change ours
Americans need communism too.
Fascist Swan your idea of "communism" is whatever boomer era neocon ""conservatives"" tell you. Think for yourself, moron
A.M. Utt, so why don't you tell the whatever boomer era neocon ""conservatives"", and the working class, who benefits from what, and why?
I would put bike/escooter lanes on every street everywhere
4:45 - “only 16ft wide”, in the UK most new residential estates are about this wide (4.8m - and still used for on street parking), with roads about 6m (20ft) wide used for the “spine road” / local distributor road … maybe slightly larger if it’s a bus route.
It's still better to have something too wide than something too narrow - in London suburban streets are always double parked so it's difficult enough to get a car going in one direction down the road (almost no one has a garage big enough to fit a car in)
Milo Anderson double parking is legal in london? Wtf?
Nathan I think he means both sides are parked
Shigaru What is this German technology you speak of? One way streets you say? Why that's genious, they've done it again those brilliant German engineers.
Yeah, this whole debate sounds crazy if you live in the UK where residential streets are like 15 feet wide and nobody has a driveway.
Laughs in NYC: side walks are 8 feet wide in some areas, and with some spots with tree planters, the sidewalks are 4ft wide
Being from sac, the b roll in your videos always catches me off guard. This one basically had my morning commute in it.
Driveways don’t always provide enough parking for visitors particularly when you have a rental with roommates. Having a visual gap between parked cars and your lane helps you see hazards. Opposing traffic still needs to pass. Try backing in a trailer or larger car into your driveway from a narrow street. Larger trucks need to still navigate these roads with other traffic as well. Fire and ambulances also need more space to ensure they can get on scene quickly.
Try doing you count of parking in the evening when all the residents are home or weekend evenings when people have a gathering at their home, parking becomes an issue.
These are fine points - but should we really be designing capacity for “what if they have a party?”. It seems excessive, surely people can get taxis if they’ll be drinking - or walk a bit further?
I suppose as I come from The UK (where it’s normal for cars to be parked both sides and you pull in to let others past) I don’t think it’s that much of an issue - as traffic levels on residential roads (not through routes) should be fairly low, and if higher the road can be made 1 way?
Thank you for this awesome video! Very thoughtful and informative!
Glad you liked it!
This is such a great idea, I would love to see this in major sprawl capitals like Houston and Los Angeles.
I wish this was in Plano, where I live
I live in the netherlands and we have those “woonerf” you showed, and indeed you dont want to drive the speed limit of 30 kmh bc it so narrow most of the time
The speedlimit for a woonerf in the Netherlands is 15 kmh though ;)
The suburban neighborhood I live in hardly ever has any on-street parking available. Partly because there's only parking on one side of the street and most of the houses have 1-car garages with extremely narrow driveways. Also because it seems almost all my neighbors think that their 2-4 person household needs an extensive fleet of vehicles which would not physically fit onto their 1 acre lot without demolishing the buildings first.
Most two way street in New York City is technically too narrow. Sometimes when you're driving you have to stop to allow a bigger vehicle to past by and on top of that the street also has parking on both sides😭
Tj Flex sounds like everyday things in my country too (Indonesia) but we drive smaller cars here so yeah...
Tj Flex All streets suck in New York. Cars are basically useless there, they should invest in pedestrian and bike-only zones. And fix the cycling infrastructure.
Nope, 10 million people live in NYC, and until they fix their public transportation system, a car is more of a viable option. Plus cyclist don't always use their lanes, don't wear helmets and do a lot of dumb shit.
ForeignBorn Patriot Cars are not viable in New York City, especially in Manhattan. Everything in the city rely heavily on public transportation. When it shuts down, the city that never sleeps goes to sleep. This is not Los Angeles
IngeniousFirefly I've been living in NYC for 32 years. Yes I drive and love it. Fuck the train and the bus with all their delays and fucking idiot passengers.
In the uk our streets are just wide for 2 cars
Exactly, and it's much better that way
Same here in Canada
You aren't even free over there. Free speech guns and big roads. Murica fuck ya
Same with Malaysia. Very, very narrow.
routemaster 387 I have lived in both, grew up in the US but have lived in the U.K. for over a decade now. I miss the wider roads of the US. Firstly, I spend most of my residential driving time here pulling in behind parked cars so other cars can pass (or waiting while someone else does the same for me), delivery trucks often struggle to negotiate the narrow space, and also between the narrow roads and the narrow pavements, there is no room for the kids in the neighbourhood to go out and play, like there was in my old neighbourhoods in the US. I agree with his points here about how it makes you slow down and pay attention, and that many American roads are too wide. But I don’t see it as the narrower, the better. The situation gets even worse when you go to a newly built estate, they are like rabbit warrens, and it’s proven that it affects mental health.
As someone who lives in Germany, I can tell you that narrow roads are an absolute nightmare!
DaInsano cool, aber wer hat gefragt?
@@Montabaurhood lmao
Wide suburban streets are mandated by the fire department in order to fit their huge trucks. That's ironic, because the increased traffic deaths caused by wider roads is greater than the number of people saved by EMS.
Wide streets are good for playing hockey and basketball!!! Where would my childhood be without that.
In parks, plazas, gardens and other types of spaces located between dwellings to facilitate physical activities. Kids playing on the road is quite dangerous to say the least.
FifthGear why would you play in a garden, unless you want your mother to smack you
6 In _Swedish in other parts of the world, garden is used instead of backyard.
You could add a small Court in your backyard. Cheaper than a hospital bill if your kid gets hit by a car for playing in the street.
Wide streets for kids to play in? What a great idea!
Could I also interest you in a shark tank swimming pool?
People get pissed off if you park in their driveway, though. I don't think completely eliminating on-street parking is a good idea. Reducing it to one side of the road, or those other options you showed, may be ok.
in germany you just park on the driving lane and then threre is only one driveway so you have to wait
In Canada, we also have wide streets and at first I wondered about that until I saw that when it snows, cars park at 45degrees as they have to share the road with all that snow, until it is removed.
I live in a small town where, within the last 1-2 years, one of its major residential arterial roads received a major redesign. I don't recall the old design very well (so much as I recall, as a bicyclist, avoiding using the street whenever possible!) but the new design features vehicle parking on only one side of the road ... which generally goes mostly unused.
Here in the UK our residential streets are pretty narrow, problem is most houses don't have garages, so people park on the road, making it a nightmare to get through
It's hardly a "nightmare".
You had some good valid points in this video, but dont forget about the millions (probably even billions) of $$$ it would save the goverment; reducing used asphalt / plumming etc. would on itself be a good point to rethink the current way of contructing roads in America.
@Αγαπη Laird Thank you!
As a UK resident, I have to smile to myself at what Americans perceive as narrow streets. I've just actually paced my street out: the roadway is ~22' wide with a 6' pavement [sidewalk] on either side. From my front door to the pavement is 7'. There is no off-street parking and cars are parked on _both_ sides of the street. There is a short stretch in the middle of the street where parking is only permitted on one side to allow cars to pull in for passing...it is not a one-way street!
It's interesting for places like where I live that get massive amounts of snow during the winter because you can lose 1/4 or even 1/2 the width of the road to snowbanks after a blizzard and once you get the freeze-thaw cycle going those snowbanks might as well be concrete.
At first I thought this video was ridiculous, but then I remembered that I am from Canada and 1/3 of the road goes to piling snow lol
Well it depends on where in the USA you’re talking about, the roads where my father lives are around 30 feet wide while where I live it’s about 22 feet and some country roads where my grandma lives they are around 12 feet
CSI Agent Bobcatfinder true dat. But there are many suburban residential areas with ridiculously wide roads
Super nice video, thank you!
Dude I love this channel
Lots of angry suburbanites hitting dislike on this one lol
Narrower streets also gets parked cars off the road....which prohibits easy car break ins...imagine all thr catalytic converters saved....also I. Cities like Pirtland it will stop people from parking junker broken down cars and rvs in public neighborhoods they dont pay taxes and contribute to...
Man I love your channel
In the UK some streets are narrow because they are based off the old road system built many many years ago. In general it isn’t too bad, it’s just when you get old roads with older properties built on them. You have cars parked on both sides and you have to wait for an opportunity to pass if another car is coming.
Woah that Seattle street is BEAUTIFUL and I imagine it's also more exciting to walk, ride or drive on it.
Another benefit: higher density housing. If streets are narrower, then there’s more space to build housing for any given residential subdivision space. You couldn’t retrofit that, but could for new developments.
Great video and a balanced view of street width. At what time of the day did you survey parking? My guess is 9 pm would be the most accurate. I live in neighborhood with students and young families (two store condos). My street is empty during the day and above capacity at night. Furthermore, using garages for parking cars is a great idea but it may not viable for many Americans. At least in my neighborhood, people use garages as extra storage despite limited parking.
If density and distance permits, they should use that extra space for some kind of dedicated bus lanes or even light rail
As a norwegian who has driven down in Germany, France and Italy I was quite pissed at how narrow the streets are and how small everything is over there. You really don't want to follow that model, america.
don't worry, we won't
And in Germany no one cares if the street is narrow, the just speed up, stupid asholes. I´m just used to our narrow streets, but I more like the wide streets in the us, also how people drive there it is way more relaxing. It is that all the americans complain about the horrible traffic in LA but, I hate the traffic here in Germany more, for more than one reason.
That´s because there is no time to waste in germany :D es gibt nur ein Gas, Vollgas *lol*
LegendMeadow the idea is that you ride your bike or take the bus instead
Totally agree, however, what he's talking about here is simply inserting certain beautification projects that will manipulate driver psychology and help to slow drivers. Not actually narrowing the streets.
Thats the reason why so many people in the US just commutes with big suvs and pickup trucks while drowning in endless debt. Narrower streets means they will have to make a smarter choice in life. And lower accidents and pedestrian fatalities
I grew up in Eugene, OR and most neighborhoods don't have sidewalks. So with wide streets, people drove way too fast and walking home after school or in the morning was dangerous. Also just found your channel and I love it.
In part of western Sydney they built a whole suburb with narrow streets. As people still parked on both sides of the road, fire trucks couldn't get through and houses burnt down.
Found your channel a week ago, I've already watched a good amount of your videos. keep up the good job. TH-cam is my main source of entertainment and I always can spot a channel that will take off. Keep plugging away at it, sometimes you got to upload for 3 years before TH-cam's algorithm likes you and promotes you.
I found your channel because I'm a huge infrastructure nerd (my icon is the Boston MBTA "T") and had to search for stuff like this for youtube to suggest your channel. However I bet you could take about rocks with enthusiasm and people would subscribe, you just sound so happy reporting on a normally mundane topic. City planning isn't exactly entertainment haha, but you are very engaging and that makes for a enjoyable video to watch. =)
If you are looking for video suggestions I got a couple, but one thats been bugging me is building codes and red tape. The empire State building was built in a year, now it takes many years to get a skyscraper off the ground. Make a video about regulations of current times and how they help and how the harm. Obviously we don't want slave labor or misplaced highways but when it takes from 2011 to 2018 to plan and build a fully functional New Tappan Zee Bridge and the old one is bad shape. Its kind of scary that timely government hurdles risks peoples lives on the old infrastructure that isn't being dealt with.
Thanks for the kind words! Your video idea is really good and something that would fit into this channel well. It's a good question and the answer can help illuminate the process of land development, architectural design, and government regulation for people who may not know about it. The only problem, of course, is that I only have time to make one video per month and so many ideas for videos! But I'm absolutely adding your idea to the list. Thanks again!
Mass Hole yep it's all government red tape and unions. A lot of older infrastructure was privately built. Did you know the Tappan zee was built in a ridiculous location where the Hudson is wide because they didn't want to share revenue with the port authority. Government is crazy
Mass Hole In The Netherlands, there is a requirement that any public building be architecturally unique and interesting. So if you're building a church, a shopping centre, a sports hall, or anything open to the public, you need to create an architectural work of art.
Either I’m just that bored or you make a good video, because I just watched a 5 minute video simply talking about street sizes.
Well done sir!
Thanks!
I always assumed that suburban streets were so wide so that way in the future when the urban area spreads out more, the suburban streets were already accomadated for an urban enviornment.
In my neighborhood, all of the houses have 2 car garages and a 4 car driveway, yet people own so many cars due to suburbia that it overflows into the street and people prefer to use their garages as smoking rooms.
The whole issue of on-street vs. driveway/garage parking as you presented here is way too simplistic. To start with, it does not take into account that those using each car may not be leaving and returning in an orderly fashion, and that there would be need for someone to have to move their car to let another in or out all too often. Referring back to your video on metro systems and why they aren't as many in the US partially because of the car culture and Americans wanting their independence the car gives them, which is why for one single-family home in the suburbs you might have upwards of 3-4 cars. Now, a home with a wide driveway that can accommodate 3 cars side by side is fine, but what happens in older neighbourhoods with room only for narrow but deep driveways.
(This is quite common in many neighbourhoods of Toronto, where the detached garage is in the back, and the driveway runs almost the entire length of the property. Yes it can accommodate 3-4 cars, but those cars are all in a row, and if the driver of the one at the very back needs to get out, that can be a nightmare.)
Thanks for the thoughtful comment! I chose to measure absolute spaces in garages and driveways, as opposed to convenient spaces in garages and driveways because one is objective and the other is subjective. Sure, it can be inconvenient to move a car to allow another to leave in a narrow driveway, but the occupant may prefer that situation to parking blocks away from their house in places where on street parking is scarce. Furthermore, in my study I make the point that most of the housing built in the postwar era have driveways at least two and more typically three cars wide (in the area I studied). While some families may have four or more vehicles, Census data on car ownership says that the typical family has between 2-3.
I also note that on-street parking is more used in older neighborhoods with less off-street parking, like you mention in Toronto. In my experience, those streets are also already narrower than the newer suburban streets and wouldn't be prime candidates to remove on-street parking anyway. Let's start where the problem is most acute, in very low-density suburbs with houses that have wide driveways.
Fair enough, good points all around. I know that my grandparent's neighbourhood - where my cousin and her family still live - was one of the first post-war planned neighbourhoods, in '46-'47. That had narrow streets, save for the main artery coming in from the busy corner, and had single car garages with driveways that 'could' accommodate two cars. For the 40's, 50's, and 60's, this was all fine and good, even into the 70's and 80's, there was still enough space to have another car parked on the street.
Even in the 21st Century, it is still feasible in terms of parking, as opposed to newer subdivisions where we see the problems you've mentioned in this video.
We have a similar set up, but our back yard is large enough to fit another house there; so we treat our driveway as if it were a one-way street. We park 3 cars on one side, in a line, and leave the other side open to fit a 4th car in half of the garage (It’s a 2 car garage. The side blocked by the 3 cars is used for storage). When the outside cars come or go, they use the yard so they can parallel park in the drive way. No one gets blocked in or out.
No more drive ways or parking spaces. Keeping roads and cars out populated areas would reduce pedestrian deaths to almost nothing. Let's not build our cities around cars, let's build them around people.
Dave Greenlaw Fix your car culture than. Also, older neighbourhoods should have space cleared out for shared parking.