ThosePedestrian mobility
Shoulder champion, must the Canton of Geneva do more?
Do you need a network of pedestrian networks throughout the territory or concentrate efforts to facilitate the movements of people with reduced mobility? Vote on September 28.
The Greens’ initiative intends to increase the space of roads devolved to pedestrians, believing that walking is the poor parent of mobility and territory planning in Geneva. His detractors judge this text at the boutish and believe that it aims to “rot the life” of motorists.
TDG
- Geneva must decide between an initiative of the Greens and its counter-project defended by the right.
- The initiative targets a network of pedestrian arrangements throughout the canton.
- The counter-project focuses on the accessibility of developments for disabled people.
- Associations representing people with reduced mobility favor the initiative.
Geneva, champion of pedestrian trips in Switzerland, Voting on September 28 on the “pedestrian initiative: for a canton that works”, deposited by the Greens. The people will choose between this text and their counter-project, adopted by the right majority of the Grand Council.
The left recommends rejecting the counter-project, accepting the initiative and favoring it in the subsidiary issue. This is the opposite for the parliamentary right (MCG, LJS, the Center, PLR and UDC), on which the Council of State is aligned. The green’liberals call for double yes by favoring the initiative.
This provides, throughout the territory, a network of specific developments for pedestrians in and between districts and municipalities. They will have to be continuous, direct, comfortable and secure. Their universal accessibility, that is to say for people with reduced mobility, will be guaranteed. The flows between pedestrians and cyclists will be separated. Strong pedestrian axes will be developed, as well as more pedestrian areas and a pedestrian priority.
At least 40 million francs will be budgeted each year to carry out projects. The first actions should see the light of day two years after the adoption of the text.
Gymkhana in Geneva
But is the canton of Geneva really the AS of pedestrian trips? Yes, welcomes the green deputy Cédric Jeanneret: “A small territory with few elevations explains that walking is the first Geneva mode of transport. It represents 39% of trips and up to 50% in town. ”
However, deplores our interlocutor, “pedestrians that we are all share” the crumbs “of the roads. The initiative aims to restore a certain balance in favor of those who favor the least greedy movements in public space. It takes 37 times less for a pedestrian than for a car. ”
Walking in Geneva would too often be a gymkhanaalso due to the lack of continuous routes and due to too long fires. Not to mention the risks for security: “There are no sidewalks in the street that crosses Choulex where I live, illustrates Cédric Jeanneret, the children crowd against the walls to go to school, which pushes parents to take them by car.”
By encouraging to leave its motorized vehicle to the garage, the initiative will decrease the traffic jams in favor of those who cannot deprive themselves of their car, starting with transport professionals and companies, insists the ecologist. Who adds: “walking is also less pollution and noise is good for health and it is more security, social ties and attractiveness for the canton.” Given from this angle, “pedestrian developments report more than they cost”.
“Useless pedestrian initiative”
Not all are by this opinion! “The goal is to rot the lives of people who have no choice but to move by motorized vehicle,” replies the deputy PLR Murat Julian Alder, author of the counter-project. Because the initiative will involve removing parking spaces, to encroach on the road tracks or even on the agricultural area in the countryside, protests the right. “This violates the freedom to choose the mode of transport and the principle of their complementarity,” insists the elected PLR.
The initiative provides in particular to separate the flows between pedestrians and cyclists.
LUCien lucky/TDG
According to him, the success of the march in Geneva proves that “the initiative is useless and that it will not decrease the use of the car. Because it is already possible to move on foot almost everywhere, with the exception of certain distant municipalities. ” During parliamentary debates, several interventions also pointed out “the absurdity” of wanting sidewalks on country roads.
Recognizing black dots, Murat Julian Alder believes that it is a question of targeting improvements rather than imposing a global “technocratic and complex” solution.
It still describes “irresponsible and disproportionate” to budget 40 million per year without knowing what they will be concretely affected.
“Masterful” …
On the other hand, “the hearings of the representatives of the disability environments underlined the need to improve the accessibility of developments for people in wheelchairs”, continues the PLR. It is therefore on this aspect that the counter-project has been concentrated.
It stipulates that pedestrian paths will have to “take into account” the needs of people with reduced mobility and that the state “promotes” their mobility. No later than eight years after the adoption of the action plan for active mobility (PAMA), two major pedestrian axes (“masterful”) will also have to be made, Respecting the standard on “traffic spaces without obstacles”. This projects these developments in 2028, since the Grand Council has already adopted PAMA 2024-2028, drawn up by the Department of Health and Mobility.
The counter-project also provides within this period a “clear pedestrian signage” in all of the municipalities. In this regard, Murat Julian Alder as Pama propose to draw inspiration from Thônex, which has installed panels indicating the travel and bicycle travel times to the main infrastructure of the town. “This, which, concretely and at a lower cost, will encourage walking,” says the deputy.
“Alibi and redundant”
“It’s good, but these panels are minimalist,” comments Cédric Jeanneret, for whom “only the quality of the arrangements can make the difference”. For defenders of the initiative, this counter-project is an alibi to make it flow: redundant with Pama, it will allow nothing more than this roadmap.
This already plans to create more than 80 km of arrangements for pedestrians and cyclists, including at least two magistral pedestrian. Two continuous, secure and marked corridors have been identified: one path by parks, Pâquis at the airport; And an axis passing through Cornavin, Bel-Air, Rive and the Eaux-Vives station. It will still be a question, in particular, of ensuring the continuity of cycling and pedestrians at customs crossing points.
At the Grand Council, the State Councilor responsible for mobility, Pierre Maudet, underlined the advances that this plan has already allowed since the deposit of the initiative. He also insisted on the importance of good collaboration with the municipalities to achieve concrete progress, a collaboration that the initiative, imposed from the top, would risk undermining.
On the contrary, retorts Cédric Jeanneret, the initiative “will make it possible to carry out many pedestrian developments in the municipalities that the latter wish, but which are too often blocked by the canton”.
The green deputy concludes: “Yes, sidewalks are necessary, including in the countryside where joggers endanger themselves along the roads.” According to him, there is no question of encroaching on agricultural land, but on the automotive tracks by choosing to “give priority to the most vulnerable road users”.
The disability world is riding for the initiative
Judging the counter-project “neither useful nor harmful”, the Geneva Federation of associations of disabled people and their relatives (Fégaph) does not make a voting recommendation on her, while calling for accepting the initiative, informs his secretary general, Cyril Mizrahi, also a socialist deputy.
According to him, the counter-project is duplicating with the Constitution, which already guarantees universal accessibility for people with reduced mobility.
The PLR Murat Julian Alder is false: “A specific law is more restrictive and will allow you to go further than the status quo or the initiative, the formulation of which is vague.”
Cyril Mizrahi refers the “compliment” to his sender: “The initiative guarantees universal access to all pedestrian arrangements, while the counter-project only speaks of taking into account the particular needs of people with reduced mobility, which is absolutely not binding. In fact, for example, public lighting is increasingly reduced, to the detriment of pedestrian safety, and in particular that of the visually impaired. ”
“By providing for an annual budget, the initiative gives itself the means of its ambitions, while the counter-project may only return to DIY,” said the president of the club in wheelchair, Corinne Bonter-Merier.
“We support the objective of providing the entire territory with secure and continuous routes,” she concludes. I have an in-charge friend whose father has a motorhome on the outskirts. When she goes to see it, the bus leaves it in the middle of nowhere, it must travel more than a kilometer without sidewalk. ”
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