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• Charlotte Klein

  editor of Mobility

A crack within the heart of small cities: huge vehicles that go up midway once they park. Or SUVs which can be additionally partially within the path of the trams, stopping the tram from persevering with. Since 1980, petrol vehicles, that are nonetheless the vast majority of the Dutch fleet, have turn into on common 197 kilos heavier and 14 centimeters wider. This has to do with issues like ways (security), but additionally with trend.

Not everybody thinks it is a good growth. Consultants additionally wrestle with this: are we adapting our infrastructure to this? Or should not we associate with that?

In response to commerce affiliation Bovag, vehicles have gotten extra frequent on account of stricter security necessities, particularly to higher adapt to accidents. Vehicles are getting heavier due to new techniques to make vehicles cleaner, safer and extra snug. Electrical vehicles are a lot heavier than petrol vehicles due to their batteries.

And enormous containers are additionally extra well-liked. The Worldwide Vitality Company (IEA) is anxious about a rise in… sports activities utility automobiles, known as SUVs. Even through the corona pandemic, when automotive gross sales fell, their gross sales elevated. SUVs now account for greater than half of automotive gross sales worldwide, with development primarily within the US, India and Europe.

Marco van Burgsteden, undertaking director at CROW, a data platform that advises the federal government on highway widths and visitors lights, additionally acknowledges this. “Lots of people like huge vehicles. You sit excessive, you possibly can put one thing in it and it has a sure standing. It is also safer. For the occupants, not for the folks on the road .”

For different highway customers, larger vehicles are extra harmful. “You possibly can put half a college within the blind spot of a pickup truck. You possibly can’t see as effectively who’s strolling or driving in entrance of your automotive, the vehicles are heavier so the crash can be extra violent and if it occurs hitting a excessive grill is simply extra harmful than a hood low

Large vehicles are extra attention-grabbing for producers: the margins are larger. However huge vehicles are additionally far more costly, which is why the smaller fashions are nonetheless made: they’re nonetheless in excessive demand.

The query is whether or not parking areas needs to be transformed to vehicles in 2024. “Cities are additionally noticing that vehicles are more and more outgrowing,” says Van Burgsteden. “What not everybody realizes is that for those who provide more room, it may possibly have a beautiful impact. Greater parking areas imply extra larger vehicles.”

The place parking areas was 2 by 4.8 metres, this may now enhance to 2.5 by 6 metres.

At CROW it may possibly go two methods: following developments in society or main them. It’s not shocking when you recognize that the mission of the data platform is twofold. On the one hand, CROW should assist cities develop insurance policies concerning who’s allowed to maneuver the place and underneath what circumstances. The give attention to higher air high quality, highway security and public well being inevitably interprets into much less automotive dominance and extra consideration to strolling and public transport.

However CROW additionally produces steerage on infrastructure administration and upkeep. The road has at all times been that developments in society are pursued. Are vehicles getting larger? Then they alter roads, curves and parking areas accordingly.

Town of Amsterdam is a metropolis that will fairly eliminate huge vehicles than get them. “We wish to do one thing due to visitors security and the shortage of area, however as a metropolis now we have a restricted authorized scope for this,” says Alderman Melanie van der Horst of Mobility.

Town is investigating whether or not a ‘fats automotive tax’ is feasible. Greater vehicles take up more room, so they might pay extra taxes. It could additionally make parking within the crowded metropolis much less enticing.

French cities corresponding to Paris and Lyon and the German Tübingen have already overtaken the Dutch capital, however the query is whether or not Amsterdam can simply obtain this. In 2022, a movement within the Home of Representatives to regulate parking charges in keeping with the kind of emissions (decrease parking prices for electrical vehicles) was defeated.

However: at decrease speeds, fewer vast roads are wanted as a result of drivers weave much less. Since 30 kilometers per hour was launched in virtually all of Amsterdam, a small part of the highway has been recovered.