Living street

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Living Streets is the name of a UK campaign group, formerly the Pedestrians' Association
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A living street is a street in which, unlike in most 20th century streets, the needs of car drivers are secondary to the needs of users of the street as a whole. It is a space designed to be shared by pedestrians, playing children, bicyclists, and low-speed motor vehicles. This contrasts with the shared space scheme philosophy which gives all road users equal priority in community spaces.

Some national schemes with similar principles are home zones in the United Kingdom, woonerf in the Netherlands and shared zone in Australia. Most side streets in Tokyo are used similarly, without a similar national scheme.

For much of the twentieth century, streets were designed to ensure traffic flow, but it has become apparent that streets have many social and recreational functions which are severely impaired by fast car traffic. The living street is an attempt to design for all the functions of streets.

These streets are often at the same grade as curbs and sidewalks. Cars are limited to a speed that does not disrupt other uses of the streets (usually defined to be pedestrian speed). To make this lower speed natural, the street is normally set up so that a car cannot drive in a straight line for significant distances, for example by placing planters at the edge of the street, alternating the side of the street the parking is on, or curving the street itself. Other traffic calming measures are also used. However, early methods of traffic calming such as speed humps are now avoided in favor of methods which make slower speeds more natural to drivers, rather than an imposition.

The woonerf movement originated in the Netherlands in the seventies. Living streets have become common there, in Germany, and in Scandinavia, and are increasing in Britain.

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