#1 Street Smarts for Smart Streets

Cars have taken up a lot of space in our growing cities. But are they a good answer to the question of mobility? It’s quite clear they’re not. Cities are now taking different measures to counterbalance that. So what is the way forward, and how do we get there?

Ann Plas

Mobility Policy Advisor Ghent, 🇧🇪 Belgium

Ann is the vice-mayor’s senior mobility policy advisor. For the past few years she worked on strategising and implementing a mobility overhaul for the city, which consisted mainly of freeing the inner city of motorised through traffic. This project was not without hurdles, but because of its success the so-called ‘circulation plan’ is now planned to expand to the periphery of the city as well.

Mikael Colville-Andersen

Founder of Copenhagenize Copenhagen, 🇩🇰 Denmark

Urbanist at hart, Mikael has strong ideas of what a cityscape should look like. With the Copenhagenize Design Company he exports the idea of bicycle urbanism across the globe, planning mobility networks with simplicity and common sense, while influencing policies to (re)align with human nature for more liveable cities.

Horace Dediu

Analyst & podcast host Helsinki, 🇫🇮 Finland

With a background as a prominent analyst in the tech and automobile industry, Horace was enamored when he first came across an electric bicycle. After coining the term micromobility, he’s on a quest to spread the word about these lightweight electric vehicles, organising events and hosting a podcast on the topic. Schooled as a business pundit, yet with a keen eye for the social and environmental impact.

Additional notes & links

  • While most North-Americans look to Europe as the land of cyclists and their infrastructure, the US actually once was a world leader in bike lanes. Check out this LA bicycle highway in the early 1900s:
No, these are not flowers, it’s a bicycle graveyard in Shanghai. (📷 Yibo Wang / Shutterstock)

Credits

🎵 All music by Lennart Schoors, except:
Lee Rosevere – More On That Later

📷 Pictures:
Mikael Colville-Andersen by Rui-Camilo.de

Transcript