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Thanks for this interesting story. Like very much to read them.It seems to be just the older ones they're banning.
Makes no sense to me to ban the newer ones that aren't so polluting, just as it makes no sense to me that younger people aren't buying them as frequently, especially in cities like Genova or hill villages and towns.
Bicycles are impossible on that kind of terrain, if you're walking long distances it's tiring, and there's nowhere to park a damn car, even a small one.
Genova: my favorite Italian city for lots of reasons, but extremely frustrating to navigate until you get used to it. I drove there to see family. BIG MISTAKE. The car spent four days in the garage. Then I couldn't get out of the city. Just kept going around and around because of all the one way streets. I could SEE the DAMN entrance to the highway but couldn't access it. Believe it or not, I paid one of the young boys at a restaurant to drive with me to just about the entrance ramp. Where there's a will there's a way. Oh, and if you're arriving from eastern Liguria, as I did, you have to drive on top of these sky high areas over gorges and then what seem like hundreds of pitch black gallerias that were bored into the mountains. All at extremely high speeds of course. It was worse than driving Highway 1 in California or the Amalfi coast. I was white knuckled the whole way. The next time I took a boat from La Spezia.
A now funny memory, which was panic inducing at the time involved me getting literally "stuck" in my car. on a tiny street leading into the town square of Pontremoli. Vehicles are banned in the square, and while I might have chanced it, I was going wrong way on a one way street and there were two policemen in the square. Italian male gallantry notwithstanding, I don't think it would have gone down well.
Thank God for the Italian tendency toward anarchy. An old man came out and told me to back up until I reached a set of very shallow stairs leading to an alley, and with him standing there and directing me, I managed to make a three point turn up the stairs and head the other way. I came back the next day with a bottle of wine for him.
Looks manageable, right? Just imagine it narrowing precipitously right around the corner.
Places like that demand a scooter. Imagine what you save on gas too.
I'm also prejudiced because my father couldn't afford a car in Italy, so we went everywhere on motorcycles and scooters. Loved it. Still do.
As for pollution, as I said, go ahead and ban the old ones unless they can somehow change the motors, but let's not lose sight of the big picture, as most people do in this climate change focused world.
One supercargo ship pollutes as much as millions and millions of cars. Those tourist ships docking in the ports of Genova and La Spezia bring business, but they also bring pollution. Venezia is deteriorating partly because of them. I doubt they'll be banning them. Older people who love their Vespas can be pushed around more easily.
Europe and the U.S. are also not the big offenders. Go hound the Chinese and the Indians and the Russians.
How I love them:
Thanks for this interesting story. Like very much to read them.
Hope I can "discovery" Genoa myself some day in the near future.
Your description naturally corresponds well to the articles:
"In Genoa, though, the Vespa is part of the furniture. Perfectly adapted to nipping in and out of the alleys of the historical centre, it is not the retro fetish object it has become in Milan or Rome, let alone London or New York. “In Genoa, it’s not a fashion,” says Nicora. 'We use it.'
Vespas slip seamlessly into the tightly parked ranks of two-wheelers that flank the city’s streets, lining piazzas and courtyards, and underneath the flyover on Via Aurelia. Everyone uses them: tattooed millennials, bespectacled housewives, grannies riding in tandem. There is none of the free-for-all traffic slaloms you see in other Mediterranean cities such as Marseille; they slot in an orderly fashion into the traffic flow. Vespas seem vital here: public transport coverage is thin in Genoa, with a single, eight-station metro line, and the Ligurian hills, rising steeply up from the port, aren’t bike-friendly."
The second one:
"While the classic Vespa is an iconic design everywhere, in Genoa the model is ubiquitous. Scooters in general play a vital role in the city, where public transport coverage is sparse; the city’s single metro line has only eight stations."
I don't know why, suddenly I felt like I shoud buy a Vespa (a "green" one, of course). Probably a fetish, as the article mentions. Lol
You mentioned supercargos; and I just remembered to have read that another important vector of polution are airplanes, and they're many. Making them "green" seems to be a big challenge though.
@Pax
Indeed. I was surprised on how much polution an oldie produces:
"The earlier two-stroke engine burns a mixture of oil and gasoline, producing as much pollution as 30-50 four-stroke engines according to some estimates"
And they're many in Genoa. The measure of authorities is understandable.
I had my fill of going the wrong way in a one way street and Google Maps directing me to take them in my recent trip to Italy. Genoa would be great to visit with a professional guide driving a mini-bus .
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