Milan Announces Ambitious Scheme To Reduce Car Use After Lockdown

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Milan is to introduce one of Europe's most ambitious schemes reallocating street space from cars to cycling and walking, in response to the coronavirus crisis. The northern Italian city and surrounding Lombardy region are among Europe's most polluted, and have also been especially hard hit by the Covid-19 outbreak. Under the nationwide lockdown, motor traffic congestion has dropped by 30-75%, and air pollution with it. City officials hope to fend off a resurgence in car use as residents return to work looking to avoid busy public transport.

The city has announced that 35km (22 miles) of streets will be transformed over the summer, with a rapid, experimental citywide expansion of cycling and walking space to protect residents as Covid-19 restrictions are lifted. The Strade Aperte plan, announced on Tuesday, includes low-cost temporary cycle lanes, new and widened pavements, 30kph (20mph) speed limits, and pedestrian and cyclist priority streets. The locations include a low traffic neighborhood on the site of the former Lazzaretto, a refuge for victims of plague epidemics in the 15th and 16th centuries. Work could start on an 8km stretch of Corso Buenos Aires, one of the city's most important shopping streets, by the beginning of May -- with a new cycle lane and expanded pavements. The remainder of the work will be completed by the end of the summer, officials say.

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