(2023-03-01) The15-minute City, Where Urban Planning Meets Conspiracy Theories

The 15-Minute City: Where Urban Planning Meets Conspiracy Theories. In 2012, Portland, Ore., adopted a plan for “20-minute neighborhoods,” in which residents could live within a half-mile of amenities such as grocery stores, parks and elementary schools.

The concept gained new momentum during the pandemic, which altered both the daily lives of millions of newly cooped-up commuters,

One of the most aggressive efforts has been in Paris, where before the pandemic, the mayor, Anne Hidalgo, effectively declared war on cars in an effort to reduce their planet-warming emissions. She later made the idea of a 15-minute city a centerpiece of her successful re-election campaign in 2020.

*One of her advisers, Carlos Moreno, a French academic... outlined three key features during a TED Talk in 2020.

“First, the rhythm of the city should follow humans, not cars,” he said. “Second, each square meter should serve many different purposes. Finally, neighborhoods should be designed so that we can live, work and thrive in them without having to constantly commute elsewhere.”*

In Oxford, a centuries-old university town that has long been bedeviled by traffic congestion, local officials have referred to the 15-minute-city concept as part of their long-term development plans

plan last year to install “traffic filters,” which would limit access on six roads in the city during certain times of day. The filters are cameras, not physical barriers, that take photos of vehicles’ license plates. Fines are then issued to those without a permit. Officials said the system was intended to reduce traffic and move it out to the “ring road” that encircles the city. But it led to widespread confusion

In addition to the traffic filters, some areas in Oxford have been designated “low-traffic neighborhoods,” a system used in cities across Britain in which bollards or other barriers prevent vehicular traffic on certain streets, to the dismay of some drivers and residents.