Good design thanks to critical thinking

Here are some more comments from a recent trip to Dubai.

We have covered their shopping centres. Now let's look at the state of the roads there.

And, apologies for, yet again, focussing on criticism of that city. There are many great things about it too (such as night-swimming in the lukewarm sea at Kite Beach - and many other delights too).

We just think that it is easier to learn from the silliness of others than from one's own .

Upfront, it needs to be stated that modern Dubai is a very young city. Large parts have been added only fairly recently. In city-lifetime-terms we are looking at 'yesterday'. They had centuries' worth of wisdom (from elsewhere) to work with and to improve on.

The Roads

The Dubai road system is an abomination.

Walking there, for example, is a huge challenge. Good-enough sidewalks do not generally exist. Walk anywhere, at any time of the day or night, and you will be next to a road that is jam-packed with cars. And those cars are barely moving due to traffic congestion.

In a city with thousands of cars with brand names such as Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, Bugatti, and with more than six BEVs per square kilometer (most of which are Teslas), this is a crying shame.

All of this is due to the pathetically 'designed' road system. The Netherlands have more than 113 roundabouts per sq km and France has almost 43 000 roundabouts throughout the country. Most of these were there long before present-day Dubai was conceived.

True, there are a few roundabouts (i.e. traffic circles) in Dubai too, but the 4-way traffic light system is everywhere.

Rather than learning from the European experience (and improving / innovating on top of it), a semi-American approach of automobile supremacy was implemented. So, yes, now there are initiatives to improve all of this nonsense. How incredibly sad is this?

Even the Good will Die Young

So, it is difficult to walk. To Cycle?

For almost 30 years I commuted by bicycle, on average probably around four times a week and did so from homes in places such as Durbanville and Table View to work-destinations in the Cape Town City Centre, Claremont and Woodstock.

And back again at night.

I cycled up and down 'Armageddon' roads such as Voortrekker Rd, Albert Rd and Otto du Plessis (before the cycle path was eventually built there).

I am, by all counts, a very experienced and battle-hardened cyclist. Yet, you will not find me on a bicycle anywhere in Dubai, except at the specially built (but short) stretches such as at Kite Beach. I survived Cape Town's traffic and its minibus taxi mayhem for many decades. Even so, the Dubai cycling challenge is way out of my league.

And so?

This is the part of the post that one now needs to draw conclusions based on the above. What can we learn from this? What does this mean for us? For business strategy?

Well, I'll leave it up to you to draw your own conclusions. We really don't need to spell this out. The implications and the 'learnings' should be crystal clear. We must identify those huge logs in our own eyes too.

Many years ago, when I was the general manager for a Dutch-owned software house here in Cape Town, we asked our Dutch colleagues to comment on South African silliness when they visited here. Interesting thoughts came out of those discussions.

So, yes, perhaps get an outside view too, but be certain you will be getting such 'independent' views from those who are prepared to speak the truth to your cheque-book power.

How do we design and grow our businesses, projects and ventures without messing it up equally badly? That's the question to answer.

Some (perhaps) Interesting Info

Pavements

An example of pavement madness is shown (in two images) below.

These photographs were taken right in front of the building where we stayed, but this type of idiocy can be found all over Dubai; cargo-cult pavements built with zero thinking/design.

This section of pavement is literally only about 8m long. Yet, it has at least three major flaws leading to danger for pedestrians. (1) To the one side it runs straight into a road and hedge - and cars move surprisingly fast down that paved road towards or away from the booms. (2) To the other side there is a huge signboard that obscures visibility when one wants to cross the road at the zebra-crossing (and remember this is a drive-on-the-right city, so you literally have to peer around the board). And, (3) if you choose to walk further in that direction, the pavement ends to enable parking space for (yeah, much much more important) vehicles.

Teslas

Next to the (fairly random - we had to pick up something there) stretch of service road shown below, we counted 13 parked Teslas (let alone those on the roads to the right of this service road).

NEVs really are a 'thing' in many places around the world now.