Space for 11,500 additional shared cars
The municipality of Amsterdam expects the number of inhabitants in our capital to increase to 1 million by 2030. The municipality sees great opportunities for shared mobility to reduce the pressure on the infrastructure and says it sees room for 11,500 new shared cars.
The municipality of Amsterdam is growing and that means that the demand for mobility in the already busy capital will only increase, according to the report ‘Space for and by shared cars’ that it has published. According to the municipality, the demand for more transport should not be solved by building more roads, but by focusing on ‘a car-free city with more emphasis on walking, cycling, public transport and partial mobility’. The municipality wants to reduce the major role that private cars play by focusing on public transport and on the use of shared cars. According to the municipality, there is room in Amsterdam for at least 11,500 additional shared cars on top of the existing range.
In the report, the municipality of Amsterdam writes that private cars account for about 80 percent of the cars in the city and that together they take up about fifty percent of all street space. Meanwhile, 13 percent of the total area of Amsterdam consists of parking spaces. That should be less, according to the municipality. The report refers to the car replacement ratio (AVR), a number that indicates how many private cars can be replaced by one shared car. A city-wide AVR cannot be drawn up due to the large differences per city district or postcode area, the municipality concludes. In Sloterdijk, one shared car could replace 7.4 private cars, according to the municipality. In De Pijp the AVR would be 2.1, in Buiksloterham 5.1 and in the Western Canal Belt 4.2. All in all, the City of Amsterdam sees room for adding 11,500 shared cars to the existing range. This could serve a potential group of 187,200 ‘unused users’, accounting for 1.1 million driving hours per month.
Does the addition of thousands of new shared cars have a direct effect? According to the municipality of Amsterdam, that is not the case. “Because shared cars must first be added to the city in order to stimulate use, there is a temporary increase in pressure on space in the city. Subsequently, when people give up their own car or choose not to buy a new car , this pressure is decreasing,” the report says. All in all, it should become less attractive to have your own car in the city, among other things through “firm(er) flanking policy to steer towards desired mobility behaviour”.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl