Barcelona is redesigning 21 downtown streets to prioritize people, not cars – fast company

ADELE PETERS
It’s a light version of the city’s revolutionary car-free neighborhood superblock program, but in a more central area.

In central Barcelona, one in three streets will soon become “green axes” that prioritize people on foot and bikes instead of cars. On those streets, 21 intersections will be converted to public squares, so no one in the area is more than around 650 feet from a small park.
“We want Barcelona to be a sustainable city, to be a livable city,” Janet Sanz, the city’s deputy mayor for ecology, urbanism, and mobility said in a recent interview. “And we understand that today in our public spaces, we have a lot of social and community activities, but they are dominated by private transportation, both moving cars and parked cars.”