Three questions to Ludovic Bu, sociologist and specialist in Place du Vélo in town

On the occasion of the operation “May by bicycle” which aims to encourage two-wheeled trips, the sociologist Ludovic BU draws up an inventory of the cohabitation bicycle-car in France.

The Spanish city of Pontevedra in Galicia, 80,000 inhabitants, is completely pedestrian. In France, Montpellier, Nantes, Strasbourg are less advanced examples but this is done by phase.

We are self-dependent because there are 40 million vehicles today in circulation in France. It was only seven million still 50 years ago. In fact, we organized everything to make people in their cars. We really chose to remove schools, doctors, shops, public services in villages. By concentrating them in the cities, we created mobility needs, which was very good for the automotive industry but very bad for cohabitation in public space. It is necessary to decrease the place and the number of vehicles in circulation to succeed in reducing this dependence.

It works over long distances because the economic advantage and the fact that this is not regular allow it to be easy.

It is complicated on the short distance because the economic advantage is much lower and communities do not set up incentive tools: for example, the free highway between Poitiers and Châtellerault. In France, there is a lack of political choice to limit “auto” -solution …

On a global scale is added the question of accidentology. The world Health Organization shows that road accidents are 3^e cause of mortality in the world after AIDS and malaria to the point that it speaks of pandemic.

“Any car: we stop everything and we think“ by Ludovic BU – Editions Rue de l’Échiquier

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