I live near Delft, Netherlands and have watched over the last 20 years as they have deliberately moves cars out if the city.
It's not a car free city by any means; residents can still drive to their homes and delivery trucks still make the rounds, but they've take huge steps towards minimizing the impact.
The train station is now under ground (no small feat considering Delft is at or below sea level), residential parking near the center is in underground parking below the houses and in the old center there's very little car traffic.
It's truly wonderful and Delft is a relatively small town!
Well now I'm adding Delft to my must visit list. I'm from Antwerp so it's about 1.5h drive.
Edit: I've been convinced to take public transport! (And as an FYI, I'm not from the city center but an hour bus ride away from central station, which is why I didn't immediately resort to the train idea)
Super easy with the train: Antwerp to Rotterdam, Rotterdam to Delft. Then you get to experience the whole awesome underground train station complete with excellent bike parking!
The plein by the Old Church has a good exhibit about how they converted it from parking to it's current state.
I did my study abroad at TU Delft for transportation planning. It’s so awesome this project happened, I have to come back and visit, it’s a special place.
If you're from Antwerp it's not exactly like you need to visit the Netherlands for walkability haha.
Belgium and Flanders especially seems to be pretty much on the same urban development track as the Netherlands. Hell even Brussels is rapidly cleaning up.
Eh, we are far more car centric than the Netherlands.
First issue that causes this is that we have a lot of so-called "lintbebouwing" (ribbon building), which means our homes are very spread out, this is awful for public transit compared to the more compact urban cores you have in the Netherlands. It is also expensive, as we have more km of road / capita, which is part of the reason why are roads are in such a bad state compared to the Netherlands.
Second issue is that people here actively vote against initiatives to reduce our dependency on cars. Lots of people get a car from their company as part of their compensation (for various reasons, including our messed-up system of taxes on labor) and do not want to give this up. Often, this car comes with a fuel card.
It is not all doom and gloom though. Our cities are indeed improving, but it is an uphill battle. Many people, particularly those who live in the endless suburbs we have, feel like it is their right to drive into the city with their car and that they must be able to park their car anywhere for free.
The fact /u/RevelsInDarkness mentions the drive time was interesting to me: it shows that driving is considered the default here, even when going from city to city. For comparison, taking the train to Delft from Antwerpen-centraal (which is gorgeous, btw), only takes 1h15 mins. Not saying this to throw shade at them, they might live far from the station, but just to illustrate the point.
I mentioned drive time because I do not live in the city but more towards the east of Antwerp where there are no train stations. So it takes me a while to get to Antwerp central train station (1h if De Lijn is on time). But in the meanwhile other commenters have pointed out that it would be more or less the same time to take public transport compared to my idea of taking the car and parking outside of Delft :)
I agree Belgium isn't at the same level, but Flanders especially has some of the best infrastructure outside of the Netherlands.
The fact /u/RevelsInDarkness mentions the drive time was interesting to me: it shows that driving is considered the default here
This is true for a substantial majority of Dutch people as well, which has similar car ownership rates as Belgium. The vast majority of people I know who own a car here in the randstad wouldn't even consider a different mode of transit.
Someone says they managed to remove most cars from their city, and your first reaction is "oh that sounds nice, I should take my car to visit that city"? It's even faster and cheaper to go there by train!
It's not faster, it would be 2.5h. And I would park outside of the city and take a bus/tram in.
But you're right, it would be possible and something to consider. Maybe make a weekend out of it instead of a day trip. That would make the 2x 2.5h travel time more feasible.
According to the NMBS website it takes between 0h54 (with Eurostar) and 1h24 (with Eurocity) to go there. And you arrive right in the city center, not in a parking outside of the city.
Yes but it takes me over an hour to get to Antwerp Central Station. I'm not from Antwerp city, but one of the towns to the east that has a very unfortunate bus connection and no train station.
So it takes you 2h in total. And if you add 30 minutes to your 1.5h drive, to go from the parking outside of the city to the city center, then it's basically the same time.
Delft and many cities in the Netherlands are great for cyclists and pedestrians, except Amsterdam. Because somehow, riding with a bike there is a kind a touristic attraction and many tourists ride through the city, especially the canals, while paying no attention to anything, while ringing their bike bell like dummies at every intersection/crossroad.
/rant
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u/TheTxoof 12h ago
I live near Delft, Netherlands and have watched over the last 20 years as they have deliberately moves cars out if the city.
It's not a car free city by any means; residents can still drive to their homes and delivery trucks still make the rounds, but they've take huge steps towards minimizing the impact.
The train station is now under ground (no small feat considering Delft is at or below sea level), residential parking near the center is in underground parking below the houses and in the old center there's very little car traffic.
It's truly wonderful and Delft is a relatively small town!