Bonn public space

Just a quick and dirty grab from Google Earth showing the public space in Bonn where I enjoyed my beer.  I was in Marktplatz (easy to recognize because of the sea of blue dots -- these are embedded photographs taken mostly by tourists -- you can see how popular this particular spot is) I was sitting somewhere near where you see the shadow cast by the high facades.  Also notice that the central core of old Bonn is completely car free.  And we'll look at this as North Americans and say "ok, but we can never be like Bonn."  But working out all of the reasons why this may be true is a very interesting exercise that to me goes far beyond snow.  Imagine a mid-sized city -- Bonn's population is about 300K -- not much different to Kitchener-Waterloo, Ottawa, Hamilton, etc. -- where there was the political will to just close the core to cars.  Just close it for, say, May to October.  See what happens.