Zurich Transportation Going the Sustainable Way

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Zurich, Switzerland needs tourists - but not their cars. A stellar public transport system, along with some savvy urban planning, helps gets visitors from A to B and keep the number of cars in the city to a minimum.

Autor*in Ajay Pal Singh Chabba -, 10.21.14

Zurich, Switzerland needs tourists – but not their cars. A stellar public transport system, along with some savvy urban planning, helps gets visitors from A to B and keep the number of cars in the city to a minimum.

The city has been able to design and implement a very efficient interlocking multi-modal transit system forming a great network for public transport using trains, trams and buses.  System is so effective and efficient and that most of the Zurich city citizens make use of public transport to get in and around the city.

The city gives added attention to pedestrians and bikers by giving them a bit of extra road space. Parking spaces in the city have been kept minimal since 1996, when the city capped those spaces for the use of people but not their automobiles.

Zurich also imposes a high toll to cars in their effort to keep them away from city’s main populated areas and has also has installed 4,500 sensors (induction loop sensors) to keep tabs on car movement and maintain traffic flow in the city by lengthening and shortening signal lights, often diverting the traffic at the times of congestion in city premises.

The system has been so effective that it even has fallen under criticism for favoring pedestrians and public transit. On the positive side, it has been able to keep the car ownership in the city below 50 percent, which surely is acknowledgeable.

Check out the video below to see how the city has been welcoming tourists but not their cars.

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Tips for Sustainable Travel

We go on holidays for pleasure, to discover new horizons, to relax, to meet people and to learn about different cultures. Most of the time, we are not aware that the holiday choices we make can have an impact on our destination and on the people that live there. We are often equally unaware of the implications our travel has on global environmental issues, especially climate change.