I started work on Project Pedestrian in March 2025 in a city I’d never been before: Lyon, France. I didn’t know much about Lyon before going there and that was the point. Walking is a good way to get to know a place, and I wanted to learn about Lyon by walking in it. It was my good fortune to find myself in a city that had a plan to make itself pedestrian-friendly. Significant portions of Lyon between the Saône and Rhone rivers have been designed to give priority to pedestrians and cyclists.

The result is substantial parts of Lyon have a lot of people walking and biking with limited vehicular traffic, and the loudest sounds are birds, people talking, and church bells. “The Lyon Confluence project is a unique opportunity to give the city back to its pedestrians.” You can read more about it via the link. Regina, Saskatchewan where I live, had a multi-year study to determine the fate of its block-long pedestrian street before deciding to retain it.