[jensen123]

Car free city centers sound like a good idea.

I wonder if the success Ljubljana has already had is making them arrogant and foolish, though. That "zero waste" strategy sounds like extremism to me. I'm not saying recycling is bad, but is it really necessary to be so extreme about it?

Also, I wonder about the privacy implications of that "smart card" that is being used to check out bikes, pay transit fares etc. Do you have to use your real name and address in order to get it? Does this mean that every single trip that you make is stored in some central database?

[JakaJancar]

Recycling culture is on the level of San Francisco, I would say. I had no idea Ljubljana is recycling 2/3 of trash (if there is extremism, it must be in the sorting facility somewhere, because it isn't felt).

The RFID card (Urbana) is similar to Clipper/CharlieCard/MetroCard/Oyster/... You can buy it anonymously and use it, or you can link it to your identity (required for discounted passes e.g. student, or if you want to be able to reclaim balance in case of loss). Nothing special here, except that it's maybe accepted for bikes/parking as well.

[gandalfar]

Urbana card is accepted also for public bike rental system and for city operated parking garages, and street level parking meters.

[orkaa]

It also holds my gym monthly pass and unlocks the lockers there.

Pretty versatile card :)

[napoleoncomplex]

For the card type which has your name, in the early days, probably 6, 7 years ago, the national "information commisioner" (office which oversees personal information use in companies/government) carried out an audit of the system. Turns out noone thought of anonymizing the trips, and they were forced to update the system soon after, to strip all personal info out of trip data.

As the previous commenter mentioned, there's also a card type which requires no personal info, and you can load it up with cash.