Not Just Bikes
7 HN recommenders · recommended in 13 months, 2020–2025
3:47 · 1.3M views · Nov 4, 2019
A four-minute Not Just Bikes comparison of grocery shopping in Amsterdam versus car-centric North America, arguing that frequent small fresh-food trips beat bulk shopping. It ties this to land use and reduced food waste.
Linked in urbanism and car-dependence threads as a concise case for walkable fresh-food shopping.
13 comments from Hacker News
I think this video sums up how I, and most europeans, feel about it: this video If you don't understand the core differences between how to even buy shopping and the influence this has on how you live your life… it's not possible to explain that, actually yeah, it's possible to never do shopping by car, even to feed a whole family.
this video had me pretty convinced land use was the key to breaking through a bad food waste vs shelf-stable food trade-off.
"It's easier to fool people than to convince them that they've been fooled" I used money as it's universally understood to demonstrate how absurd North America urban planning is. But let's say for the sake of argument, you prefer non quantifiable qualities: > Instead of visiting grandparents once per month (because 2 separate trains + a bus is pretty hard trip for someone with little kids), you could visit them every weekend. Alternatively your grandparents can live within walking distance and everybody can see each other everyday or have spontaneous encounters on the streets > Instead of only seeing wild animals in the zoo, you can see them in the forest.. and still have time for chores afterwards. I'm not a woodsman but I'm pretty sure most wild animals are too dangerous for you to be close enough to have a zoo-like experience > Instead of shopping at your local store, where every single yogurt has an added thickener, you can have a better food at a cheaper price -- and spend less time on shopping per week, too. NJB conveniently has a video on this topic as well. Grocery shopping is no longer a 1-2h weekly chore and is just a quick 10 minute detour in your daily commute. The stores also have large variety of healthy produce and buying what you need immediately also results in less food waste. this video
As others have already touch on, there are no parking lots. The streets are narrow with one directional car traffic, and some of the streets around here do not allow car traffic. Most if not all of the shoppers are walking or cycling. And to be fair, I'm cheating just a bit. One of these grocery stores is a "normal" chain (Albert Heijn) whereas the other one is an organic chain (EcoPlaza) so these can coexist in such close proximity to one another. The density of grocery stores is pretty high in the Netherlands. It wasn't until writing this response that I remembered that there is a third grocery store (PLUS) that is also within 1 minute walk from my front door. If I were to increase the time from my door to ~5-6 minutes then the number of grocery stores would become 6x. I would recommend looking at this video[0] from NotJustBikes on the subject. It shows exactly the type of mindset at work when it comes to urban design and zoning. [0]: this video
Here’s a video about why small grocery stores are better called “Why Grocery Shopping is Better in Amsterdam”: this video This is why I asked you for a source. We can play anecdote versus anecdote all day. In the absence of a source I’d be very curious what you think of any specific points made in the video.