Imagine the relative peace and quiet (you could probably hear people walking and shuffling about), the absence of exhaust fumes (smell the bread from the bakery around the corner), the serenity even (no more road rage, no accidents).
Imagine how this would affect the way we lead our lives...
How would people get around to get to work, visit their friends and family, go out to the theatre in the evenings, get to their yoga classes, do their grocery and other shopping? How would people move houses? How would houses and buildings be built and destroyed? How would businesses get their goods and supplies, furniture, their repairs done? How would waste be taken away and out of sight (and smell), if at all?
Perhaps our traditional vehicles would be replaced with others (e.g. trams powered by renewable energy?). Perhaps they are here to stay, if in slightly amended, less polluting versions...
But no matter what, without these "heyday long gone vehicles" and their less polluting relatives, the way we work and live together - our whole system - would be fundamentally shifted. This is the shift that is needed in our mindsets and indeed in our imagination in order to conceive of and work towards a truly beautiful future.
To warm up this shifting Utopian imagination, all you need to do is to think of the chain reaction that would be set-off if, for example, nobody had the possibility of jumping into a car to do their grocery shopping or a supermarket didn't have its trucks to deliver its "fresh" groceries from this moment forward...
P.S. This book gives a fascinating insight into city logistics and development from the perspective of feeding cities and from the moment the potentially first human settlement that resembled a city was formed: http://www.hungrycitybook.co.uk/
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