Comment Re:My city, Reykjavík, is trying to do this. (Score 1) 259
Evanston did a lot of that, too - broad sidewalks, killed off parking, increased density. It was an unholy mess about 15 years ago when I left college. Small businesses hated it (try walking your purchases from the hardware store back) and lots went out of business. Then they built up even more density, built a new downtown center next to the old downtown center, *finally* built some parking garages, and it started to pick up. Post-bubble rebound in the mid 2000's helped.
Honestly - Evanston is a lovely place full of liberal people on various noble quests (practical is another matter), but "kill the car"? I don't know who is saying you'll find no cars around, because it's still damned hard to find street parking and there's a constant flow of cars through the downtown streets. And where's the nearest grocery store? Closest I'm aware of is still a couple miles out of downtown, either up on Green Bay or down Chicago towards Dempster. Very much not in walking distance of anything. The cars aren't going to disappear just because there's a condo complex next to downtown. Like every other suburb, it's still very much a driving place. After all, every suburb wants to attract people from every other suburb - Evanston has dining, Skokie has Old Orchard (a large mall), Northbrook has shopping and the Botanical Garden, etc. All of that requires cars.