Once you stop to think about it, it's absolutely infuriating how vehicle-oriented our pedestrian crossings are. Stuck in the heat, or in the rain, breathing vehicle exhaust, jabbing at the crossing button and having to wait for a whole cycle of traffic phases, while vehicle users sitting in climate-controlled cabins are afforded priority. Or crossing something like the Sungei Rd - Bukit Timah Rd double whammy, and you might be given so little time to cross that even able-bodied pedestrians must either jog or get stuck waiting in the middle for another cycle of traffic phases. Over and over, all these little details add up to a very clear message that the automobile is king.
oh dang, i gotta talk about how 2 stage crossings which are supposed to improve the walking experience end up being used to optimise car flow some day!
Being born and raised in Melbourne, I have taken this all for granted and envied Singapore's public transport. But I haven't taken Melbourne's public transport for decades since graduating from university and these days cycle primarily for pleasure rather than going to and from the city. You have opened my eyes to see how far Melbourne's cycle planning has come from the eyes of an "outsider", but of course there s still plenty of room for improvement. Thanks for a great video.
Not gonna lie, my mind was blown to see the immediate green pedestrian light for the traffic light system in Melbourne. I can’t tell you how many Walking Tours (which explores walking durations between MRT stations) recordings I botched and had to re-record, just because I arrive a little too late at an intersection in Singapore. It can take up to 2 minutes for the traffic lights at an intersection to cycle through its complete set of signals, which is a long and needless wait under the hot sun. I hope the authorities here can look into this. This is something that is likely very cheap to implement, and this change alone will improve the walking experience of millions of pedestrians here.
hah! finally someone else who understands the pain of waiting for no good reason 😂 anyway, thanks for uploading walking tours to your channel i'm sure many people will find them useful!
@@tehsiewdai 1 of the pedestrian traffic light crossing at the S'goon/Braddell & Bartley Rds junction is 1 of the biggest offenders where pressing the button to cross the road activates the green man for only 1 of the intersecting road's 2 carriageways, & you're expected to wait another traffic light cycle (which is ~2.5min long) at the intersecting road's centre median before pressing your way to cross the next carriageway. & even if you're lucky to have someone opposite the road to press the button on the traffic light to activate the 2nd carriageway's green man for you, it lasts for barely 10s, so you won't make it there on time unless you run, or wait thru another traffic light cycle at the centre median
Ok there's news that that junction will have its staggered traffic lights removed by mid-2023. Let's see how things change for the better/or worse from then
Hey mate, loved this video! I'm a transport planner in Melbourne and actually work on some of the projects that you mentioned. Give me a shout if you'd like any information. Looking forward to see your other videos!
It sucks that Singapore has one of the world's best public transportation infrastructure but once you step out of an MRT station or bus stop, you often step into hostile car-centric road infrastructure. One feature of traffic lights as mentioned in 6:17 is the "immediate green man" thing. I remember one of Not Just Bike's videos describing a similar feature of traffic lights in the Netherlands. Yet, Singapore doesn't have such a system. It's just baffling how Singapore can innovate and invent new and advanced technologies, yet can't get simple stuff like this right! On a side topic, do you or does anyone know what happened to the pedestrian scramble crossing at Orchard Road back in 2017? Why was it discontinued after the trial? Would love to know more about this and I can't find any information on Google.
The "immediate green man" is one of my pet peeves in Singapore. If you missed pressing the button, even by a second, before the traffic turns green, you got to wait for the entire traffic cycle to finish before it is your turn to cross the road. I also can't quite understand why the pedestrians green light don't just turn green automatically when the traffic for cars (in the same direction) turns green.
There was a trial to pedestranize Orchard Rd previously too but that also meant that buses running thru it had to be diverted away & stop further away, which risks making buses less attractive as a transport mode. Think we should remember that some other pedestrian streets e.g. in Melbourne & Zurich still allow trams on them, which we don't have
It's time for Singapore to walk the talk. Government always talks about going car-lite but so far little has been done to reduce car traffic on the road. Cars still get priority and pedestrians especially cyclists need to suck thumb. Road infrastructure in Singapore is primed for this. Compared to other cities, we can very easily convert our streets into more pedestrian, cyclist and transit friendly, thanks to our high density and already excellent public transport. We have the means to do it, and it's about time we do it
Singapore's car lite strategy is purely income based. Make the car the most convenient and most expensive form of transportation. This will allow the rich to be more comfortable and safer than the rest of the population, while making sure traffic is not congested. Very disappointing...
Probably the gov't traditional idea of car-light is remaining reliant on walking & public transport e.g. being patient enough to wait for your bus to arrive
Enjoyed the video as always. Can definitely relate to the traffic signal here when crossing junctions as a pedestrian. It always baffled me why it doesn't turn green for pedestrians by default! Attitude in Singapore is definitely different. Many will continue to use the excuse that Singapore is too hot for cycling, which is why cycling consistently takes the lowest priority as the mode of transport.
Singapore really has a long way to go for bike friendliness. sidewalks are rarely even wide enough for 2 bikes coming from opposite directions to pass comfortably
I always hated how CBDs are the only nice areas to live without a car in most Anglosaxon countries, but glad to see Melbourne is making massive improvements on their bike infrastructure.
Well, that's largely true in Melbourne too. Most of this pedestrian/ cyclist friendly infrastructure don't really exist once you leave the dense inner city apart from some cycling trails in parks or running along land reserved for freeways.
Couldn't help but notice in 6:59 and earlier that the pedestrian crossing signals start with audio cues. These should be the case everywhere, and it's especially useful for visually impaired people! Great video and it great see how much improved Melbourne has become (at least near the city centre for now). Was kinda shocked in Singapore that most traffic lights aren't as smart
singapore's point of view is vehicle > bicycles/public transport, one of the places where there is a designated cycling track on roads in singapore is the tmcr, its unsafe due to the large amounts of heavy vehicles on the roads and no filter between road and cycling track. The bus stop along tmcr requires cyclist to go into a very tight cycling track. But this is just tmcr and its one straight road along the coastal where there is no use for the track except for probably clocking your best time along the road idk? but even if its just a cycling track i feel that its gonna be useful in the cbd area and will aid some bit.
Well done for showcasing the real world application of car-lite with your experience in Melbourne. LTA has so many world references to emulate from but is slow to commit to best practices.
I only just came across this video. Thanks for making it -- it's a pretty good summary, and it's nice to see an outsider's perspective. As someone who prefers to get around by bike/foot/public transport, it feels like Melbourne has been improving - but it's still very frustrating sometimes that the pace of change can feel very slow. The covid bike lane transformation was awesome; it's unfortunate that some local governments have already reverted some of the changes. "Respect" is an interesting word to use - especially in the inner areas I find most people driving cars to be pretty good, if sometimes a bit careless. If you're cycling, you get a bit less respect, but that's mainly because you're in more direct conflict (and there's a media empire that more-or-less runs constant anti-cycling content); but luckily there are people working in infrastructure that care about making positive change (and unfortunately also a number who don't). Like any big city, it's a complex mess; it is both better for cycling and worse for cycling than a lot of people realise -- even locals. It feels a bit like we're on the cusp of change. There is good demand for a less car-dependent way of getting people around; if we had a state government that prioritised it then major change could happen quickly.
I think you’re dead right about being ‘on the cusp of great change’ it’s taken a lot of time but I think most Melburnian’s are starting to recognise the value of having great bicycle infrastructure. Things like Skyrail have highlighted just how convenient it is to have a dedicated bicycle path that can get you across town as fast if not faster than a car. I also think the invention of the electric bicycle and it’s ease of use and mass proliferation has contributed a great amount as well. It’s now easier than ever, almost trivially easy, to go car free in Melbourne and more more every day people are realising that.
I went to Melbourne last month and I really love how the some streets in CBD share all possible modes of transport by having tram lines in the middle, narrow roads for slow car, designated bike lanes, and footpaths reserved only for pedestrian. So much walkability and options to travel in a single street.
I actually ride my regular commute on the bike-lane roundabouts featured at 5:30 in south melbourne. I like them a lot cause they feel safe, making it clear bikes have the right-of-way. Astounding how many people actually choose to ignore them in favour of speed, but oh well.
the difference between singapore and melbourne here is unbelievable, and i'd expect them to be a lot more similar. it is really cool to see melbourne actually doing things to make itself friendly. it was legitimately surprising for me to see a new world anglosphere city with so much friendly infrastructure, and it makes me jealous, too! it is frustrating how easy it would be for toronto to take similar initiatives like melbourne and it just doesn't and it is genuinely terrifying to walk around, even in the CBD!
One of my favourite bike trails is the Djerring trail. With the Level Crossing removals from Caulfield-Dandenong, there's a trail between the two rail bridges and it's very modern. Along the trail are also small parks, gyms, basketball courts, tennis courts and more. It's a very great design.
Singapore could be so nice if it wasn't that conservative in it's politics. I'll be visiting next month and experience it on my own. I am exited to see how it compares to other cities I've been to.
Quite ironic that LTA deemed it too difficult to build an interchange passageway connecting Rochor & Jln Besar MRT stations because it'd planned to build the North South Corridor expressway tunnels just above them
I really like your comments about the different ‘CBD’s. Singapore def has amazing public transport and is generally walkable. But it’s still open to imagine Singapore CBDs transformed into ones like in Europe (or like Melbourne in this case), with fewer lanes for cars, more cycle lanes, or even new tram tracks!
Finally a video comparing Melbourne with Singapore. You should do a video about the extensive off road paths such as Eastlink trail and Dandenong Creek trails but also dangerous stroads out in the suburbs such as Springvale road as well, if you get a chance to visit these places. Springvale road is one of the most dangerous roads in Australia and is very hard to cycle there.
In fairness he did show Mickleham Rd in Broadmeadows and Dorset Rd in Croydon so I think that was a well made point in this video that we’re not perfect, Melbourne is as Teh noted a large sprawling city which is in a process of urban renewal what makes it special is that there is a visible effort to make a difference and as a city it is way further along than a lot of other cities especially Anglosphere cities (all Australian cities are imo). If Amsterdam/Holland is the proof that it can exist the Melbourne/Australia is the evidence that it can change.
Please work at URA/LTA next time bro 😂It's unsustainable how our car-lite strategy seems to be more of implementing higher COEs or new MRT lines, but less so on how to optimize the pedestrian and cycling experience. If our structure in supporting "last-mile" walking or cycling can be beefed up the benefits can go above and beyond just relying on neighbourhood bus routes too.
Seeing my local area as the example for bad sprawl bike paths felt validating. If you come again, I'd be happy to show you more sprawl and our difficulties with implementing what the inner suburbs have into the current wave of new suburbs
I really like that instant green man traffic light. Singapore has the same traffic light technology as Melbourne yet the latter is able to provide a much more smoother and pleasant pedestrian crossing experience. Singapore's approach needs a complete makeover and the planners ought to learn from these cities. It's infuriating that over here we have to wait for almost 5 mins or so just for the green man and watching vehicles zoom by.
Very interesting outsider's point of view as a Melbourneite I considered Melbourne's cycling infrastructure to be lacking, where now it might be tolerable after seeing your point of view.
Suggestion for a video about Discongressional Right Turn. It kills pedestrians every year (including someone close to me) and it pains me to see why nothing has been done about it. Should it even exist? I know its an issue that doesn't get much coverage but its an issue I wish got more attention. Keep up the great work!
Great video, really enjoyed it As someone who lives in Melbourne myself, you’re right that it is on the right track, but it has a long way to go before cycling becomes a truly viable option for all ages and abilities. The protected bike lanes are good but often very disconnected, and the protection typically disappears at intersections. There is one “Dutch style” intersection in East Melbourne/Fitzroy, and it’s fantastic but it’s the only one of its kind. Also, regarding little streets, they’re great in theory but I think it will take a while before they realise their full potential. Pedestrians do have right of way and should theoretically be allowed to walk along middle of the street at will. In practice though, cars go much faster than 20kph and won’t yield to pedestrians. Cycling is still quite uncomfortable on these streets, and Pedestrians usually still stick to the very narrow sidewalk, even when the street is busy and there’s not much space on the sidewalk. I think one way to fix this would be to raise the whole street to sidewalk level, and include a contraflow cycle lane. The mix of encouraging pedestrians to walk in the middle, as well as bikes coming in the opposite direction would make cars go much slower.
sadly melbourne is still very car centric and until there's a larger emphasis on cyclist and pedestrian infrastructure, it's going to take some time before people choose to go cycling cuz the truth is that all it would really take is decent cycling infrastructure to major points of interest (stations, shopping centres, schools but that's already actually being popular) and i feel that more people would cycle but yeah, we're definitely on the right track and i hope that through more concern with public transport we'll be considered a lot more
Wow! I haven't been to Melbourne in more than a decade, I think, and even back then it was a pretty great city. But now it's even better! Continuous footpaths in Australia! That's great!
Right now in Jakarta the city govt is investing a lot on sidewalk upgrades and unprotected bike lanes, sadly they’re mostly empty except in certain areas like Dukuh Atas Transport hub Also a One way stroad near the Old Town has been converted into a pedestrian plaza
the helmet law is a bit nuts. even a short trip around the State Library can get you stopped and written up. i've been here my whole life, and complied with it everytime, but after seeing urbanist content in other countries, i was a bit peeved about being unable to have my hair up in a ponytail and get around on bike, but people in Amsterdam can just hop on and ride anywhere.
Amazing video! So much detail and so comprehensive. Often people are quite down on cycling in Melbourne so it would great to get an outsiders perspective, and great that you had a good experience in the city. When you take a step back the transformation has been quite incredible, particularly in the CBD and inner suburbs, 20 years ago very little of this was in place. Still a long way to go, of course, and it can be very inconsistent, but it's good to get a detailed take on the progress. Subscribed and looking forward to more videos!
Cities I've cycled in: London, Nottingham, Leeds, Paris, Amsterdam, Rome, Madrid, Barcelona, Milan, Frankfurt, Koln, Zurich, Tokyo, Osaka, Taipei, Sapporo, Anchorage, Hong Kong, Singapore, Penang, Colombo, Bangkok, Chiangmai, Hanoi, Vancouver, Toronto, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Perth, Adelaide, Darwin, Cairns, Brisbane, Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne. Melbourne is at least trying. But, it's the only place I've been hit by a car; I had to swerve to avoid being doored in the narrow cycle lane "kill zone" between the parallel parked cars and the roadway. So, hit from behind and took a slide over the Commodore's roof. Just unlucky I guess? The worst place to cycle, by far, was Sydney.
Really good video mate, interesting to see walkability etc of my home city compared to sg, quite eye opening. I'm glad you enjoyed your trip, thanks for the content
I'll be waiting for your video about little streets. I'm currently living on one such little street and it's the most lively place I've ever lived with children playing, neighbors chatting, and of course cheap and delicious food stalls right at the doorstep.
I was in Melbourne until 2016 for my degree and haven’t went there since. It’s great to see there’s more protected bicycle lane in the CBD area. Definitely an improvement compared to when I was there. 👍🏻 Amazing content as always!!
Re that "shared bus/bike lane". In Victoria ALL bus lanes are bike lanes and bus drivers must overtake bicycle riders with a minimum of 1 metre of space, just like all other drivers. Generally bus drivers are somof the BEST behaved towards bicycles, as long as you do not gutter-hug. Ride wider and they will know they must change lanes to overtake you, and usually do it better than car drivers.
Fun fact: you can hook turn at any intersection in Victoria, signalled or unsignalled! (on a bike) Edit: The immidiate (mind my spelling lol) go for peds mustn't be in other cities in Victoria... not in mine
Can confirm that unfortunately the extended pedestrian light system isn't as widespread as it should be in Melbourne. It is a great surprise when you get one though!
Great video, but I disagree (based on my observations) of the beg button usage. Out in the suburbs, if you miss pressing the button before the change, then you've missed it, and have to wait for a entire cycle change. Overall - really good observations.
7:08 can’t agree more to this!! Exactly! Yaloh, they want to reduce car ownership in Singapore but prioritise vehicles than pedestrians. We pathetic pedestrians have to wait under the hot scorching sun while admiring those luxury cars, and the cycle repeats. Absurd!
This video is great. I am local to Melbourne and am learning from this. A car hit and run me on my scooter today (he ran a stop sign) and I went to the police. I've only had my scooter for one week. I know I will die on my scooter.
Are you an architect or urban planner ? Love your vlog… about urbanism and public spaces / transport. Hope to see more content from urban rejuvenation, greening the city to placemaking
This is a great video, I loved your commentary however at 7:30 you mentioned that cyclists going straight have priority over drivers turning into side streets (I’m assuming you mean turning left) - I always thought that too but I looked up bike road rules on the VicRoads website and it says that the cyclist must give way to cars turning left, meaning the car takes priority… I’ve never known that as I’ve always given way to cyclists when I’m turning left (no wonder I always get someone angrily beep at me 😂). Melbourne is very confusing at times but I enjoyed this video! I’m trying to build up the confidence to ride to work on Spencer street from Southbank.
While the City of Melbourne and some inner suburbs are definitely excellent for cycling and pedestrians, it's a shame that so much of the rest is still auto-centric sprawl that has yet to progress much past widening roads and building carparks. Generally the furthest out you can get with a bike are the train station bike cages, and maybe some off-road paths along a creek
Wow, cycling infrastructure in Melbourne is decades away from what we have in Switzerland! Here protected intersections don't exist (you almost always cycle on the road, and rarely on the sidewalk with pedestrians), nor do protected roundabouts, even when they are 2 lanes wide. Even protected bike lanes are extremely rare, it's almost always a painted bike lane or a sidewalk divided by a yellow line where no ones knows where to ride or walk, resulting in conflicts. We also have to yields to cars almost all of time, especially at intersections. Even when you're cycling on a mixed-use path along a road, you still have to yield to cars entering and leaving the road. This forces you to constantly stop and go, so much so that some cyclists prefer to ride on the road than on the mixed-use path. Progress is still really slow, and new 80km/h are still build with no bike infrastructure or a painted bike lane at best. When cycling advocacy groups ask for protected bike infrastructure, they always refuse because they "don't have the budget for that" and then proceed to build a 5 lane road where traffic volumes are nowhere near that high. And sadly, those advocacy groups are often filled with fearless road cyclists (because that's almost the only people who do cycle here) who don't understand that painted bike lanes are not excellent bike infrastructure as they claim. It really saddens me that even car-centric cities in the US are making more and faster progress than we do here. The reason is that lobbys are extremely powerful in this country. For example, Swiss people refused to get 5 weeks of paid vacation like every other country instead of 4 because the employer lobbys generated a lot of propaganda. They also refused to get a single-payer health insurance system instead of the extremely expensive private systems we have, since health insurance companies also propagated a great dose of propaganda. And now the car lobby is preventing good protected cycling infrastructure, because it would take away a tiny bit of space for cars...
@@tehsiewdai In my hometown of Neuchâtel with a population of about 50k, it's awesome! We have buses coming up every 10min on most lines and they almost always arrive within 3min of scheduled arrival. Commuter trains are a bit disappointing though, they're always on time but they come only once an hour (except at rush hour on some lines where it's every 30min). Now I moved to a bigger city, Lausanne (population of 400k) and things are definitely not as great. The train network is better though, with a frequency of 15min on many stations in the city. But while the subway system is great (very high frequency and completely separated from the road, with one line that is an automatic underground line and the other is more a sort of light rail with its own single track and priority at intersections), the bus system is not reliable. Buses constantly get stuck in traffic, up to the point where it's often faster to walk than travel by bus. They often bunch up, forcing you to wait much more than you should just for a snail-paced ride. They're also terribly overcrowded, so much that you sometimes need to wait for the next bus because you can't get in. So the only viable alternatives are driving and cycling, but since cycling is dangerous and stressful, most people prefer to drive. Since drivers are fed up with the traffic, they're exceptionally aggressive, much more so than any other city in the country (except Geneva maybe). Which makes cycling here even more dangerous! And it's going to remain dangerous for a while, as new projects often include bike infrastructure of very poor quality (mostly bike lanes that disappear right before intersections and suicidal 2 lanes wide roundabouts), and that's when there actually is some bike infrastructure. But I live in western Switzerland, the part of the country that is much more car-centric. I've visited other cities and things are surely better there. Public transit is reliable and more frequent, trains have better coverage and frequency, cycling is much more pleasant with better bike infrastructure and less aggressive drivers, and as a result there is much less traffic than in Lausanne. And yet these cities are also hilly like Lausanne, with is often used as an excuse not to build bike infrastructure. So it just goes to show that having that much traffic and no viable alternative is a political choice and not something inevitable as many people seem to think
@@korranis1 and how do you suggest we do that? bulldoze houses to build dedicated and separated bike paths criss-crossing the city like cycling freeways?
The 'continuous sidewalks' in Melbourne are a lie. While it clearly looks like pedestrians have priority, the drivers legally have priority. So while it's nice that drivers are slowed and you don't have to step down to road level you're still required to yield to drivers at the intersection. It's ridiculous.
I live in Melbourne. Great video! However, you didn't quite get everything right in this video. For instance, the law is that drivers must give way to pedestrians crossing the street that they are turning into. It does NOT require drivers to give way to pedestrians crossing the street the driver is emerging from. In other words, the continuous footpaths, despite their affordance, do not give legal priority to the pedestrians. Hilariously, sharrows hold no legal significance in Victoria that I can find. Technically, cyclists must always keep to the left (unless turning right or when there are multiple lanes) even if it places us in more danger. I doubt anyone would get in trouble for following a sharrow though, because it's obviously confusing. Drivers aren't taught about them either so probably have little clue (or varied interpretations) about what they mean. Also, it's really funny hearing positive things said about Melbourne's cycling infrastructure. I do ride in the suburbs, but I've not thought kindly of the choices being made. Loads of so-close-yet-so-far infrastructure fails. Stupid laws that are about motorists' convenience over cyclists' safety (e.g. mandatory bike lane usage). The inner city is doing good things though, but there aren't people good enough to argue against the "But bike lanes cause congestion!!1!" crowd, so it could all swing the other way at any time. The general public aren't really pro bikelane, but maybe warming to it in the city centre.
Melbourne would be a lot nicer if at least all of the "Little" streets in the CBD were pedestrianised (Little Collins Street etc.) but ideally all the CBD streets should be pedestrianised or at least mostly pedestrianised (think Acland Street where cars still drive but the speed limit is very low and they cannot continue through to the end of the street because it's a dead-end with the plaza beyond the tram terminus) and traffic that would usually go through the CBD could go via Wurundjeri Way/Docklands Highway instead
Singapore's COE is skyrocketing yet its roads are automobile-centric. This is what happens when the country is rules by rich car-driving reality- unaware PAP "elites".
Do pedestrians need to wait for the green signal at traffic lights in Australia? I thought there were no "jaywalking" laws in AU/NZ like there is here in the UK? I will also say that (for now), the UK, generally as a whole has better bike and public transport and pedestrian infrastructure than Australia especially since you are not required to wear a helmet as a cyclist but at least Melbourne kept their "first-gen" tramway network unlike everywhere in the UK except Blackpool & the Isle of Man and well, the UK didn't turn into a neo-fascist, communist hellhole in 2020 like what Daniel Andrews did to Victoria State or Jacinda Ardern did to New Zealand.
You can be fined if you cross within 20m of a signalised pedestrian crossing, but in reality you generally can just cross the road anywhere you like if you can make it
whenever I'm cycling, i usually do break this rule (if i know the traffic light cycle already)... mate I'm not wanting to lose momentum and therefore delaying my journey by 5 minutes by following a main road that has a shared path intersecting with a motorway entrance. (yes, the legal way takes about 5 minutes more... my total trip takes 15-20 minutes, one traffic light crossing also doesn't have pedestrian signals for my direction... so jaywalk?)
