Slow down the cars. Stop trying to provide auto access to every single doorstep... how far do we go with "drive thru?" Churches? Funeral homes? Gun stores? Liqueur stores? Perhaps if people walked to the nearest Jack in a Box, they might actually work off some of that super sized, uh, stuff.
Slow down the cars.
This makes it easy for others to integrate into the traffic pattern. It saves gas, and reduces the damage and injuries of accidents.
It's really that simple. Stop building city surface streets like limited access freeways, and stop pushing speeds up to 45, 55 and 65MPH on those streets.
Slow down the cars, add trees and medians and sidewalks and suddenly an area becomes people friendly.
The other thing that can be done is to increase the density of cities... quit the suburban push.
Along with that, make certain streets and inner city core areas pedestrian only. (Gee, suddenly we start looking just like European cities).
Look, keep freeways for cross town traffic and city to city traffic... but stop trying to make the city streets look like freeways. Encourage people to get out of their cars and walk. Or cycle.
