converting an area is hard, but a street is easy. we don't need to pedestrianize whole city centers, just pick the streets where it makes sense. cars don't need every street. people are perfectly willing to walk a block if that's their only option. if you close a street to cars, people will park on the next street over and walk.

the street parking in front of a business is never enough for all the patrons of that business anyways, people are usually parking and then walking 1-2 blocks to get where they're going. removing the street parking in front of a business only removes the hope of finding that perfect parking space.