this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
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I bet you own a car though.
Cars are freedom. You can go anywhere, anytime, without worrying about a delayed schedule or how many connections you'd need to get exactly where you're going.
You can listen to your own music and carry as much as you like, without worrying about someone trying to steal it or altercations with the public.
I agree we need electric cars, but anti-car policy is ultimately just trapping people in cities, allowing the rich to still enjoy their cars from commuter towns, etc. whilst the working class are stuck in overcrowded pod apartments. This is literally the reality in a lot of Spain, Sweden, etc. where you're lucky to get even a 70m2 apartment and parking is extortionate.
What about my freedom to walk or bike? My freedom to be able to cross the street? My freedom to get milk without taking 2000 pounds of metal with me?
Cars warp entire cities around them. In an ideal world, everyone would be able to own a car, but very few people would need to own a car
I think the view behind the anti-car movement is that there shouldn't be cars. Period. Doesn't matter what income bracket. Gas powered cars create huge amounts of pollution, all cars generate lots of waste and are in general very inefficient modes of transportation.
I believe in the end it advocates for busses and trains (above and below ground)as public transit. I think there's also a belief that infrastructure is supposed to be updated to support this. Busses get their lane, while most of a street is for people moving under their own power, be it walking, cycling or using a wheelchair.
I don't think so. Fuck-car people are rather against the omnipresence of private cars and how cities prioritize them instead of greener means of transportation, which creates mortal danger, pollution, wasted energy, wasted materials and wasted space. But I don't think they would mind the occasional car for reasonable usage like disabled people, craftsmen, public services etc.
I live in one of the cities with the "best" public transport in the world. But it's impossible for one of my friends to get to her night shift outside the city by public transport. It's like a train for 40 minutes, and then an infrequent bus and then walking - all as a lone woman at night.
Or a 30 minute drive... in the safety of your own car.
I don't see how public transport could ever be "improved" to solve that, it becomes increasingly expensive to cover every destination.
Nevermind the fact that most of the anti-car people are the same ones pushing for rehabilitative "justice", defunding the police and weak sentencing - that's not making walking at night and public transport any safer!
Personally, I find I feel much less safe when there are more and more well-armed cops out on the street than when there aren't, in regards to that last point
Different people feel differently about the safety of cops. You might live in a city that’s safe for women walking alone at night, but not everyone does.
Heavily armed cops plowing through red lights and crosswalks in their cars, at that.
It's not only the transportation means, it's also the city design which is biased by the car culture. If your friend's only reasonable solution is a 30-min driver, and she didn't intentionally decide to live in some isolated place, then the city design is a failure.
You're ignoring the thing car drivers complain about the most, traffic delays. To me real freedom is being able to get to the places I need to using my own two feet, without needing to spend thousands every year on a car, insurance, etc. Headphones also exist and let you enjoy your own music while outside of a car without disturbing anyone!
What we need everywhere is a people first policy that makes it so you don't need a car to get around, especially in cities.
I'm not sure what you are talking about with Spain. People there are not "trapped" in cities, they have good public transit in most cities and one of the best high speed rail systems in the world to get between cities, on top of that an extensive bus system that is even cheaper and extensive than the trains.
But in Spain there are not connections to most places outside cities, like most smaller towns don't even have rail connections, nevermind going to the countryside and touristic places.
Yeah, it's okay between cities (although AVE is expensive), but that's my point - it's only cities.
In Spain you can totally get the bus to most places, especially touristy places! AVE is expensive but there are budget high speed operators operating now and the bus is cheap. All these options are far cheaper than owning a car (and cheaper than owning a car in a car centric country as well!).
Also those towns that don't have good connections it's mostly poor people living there, so rather than being stuck in cities because they don't own cars, they're stuck in poor rural towns because there is no transit to other places!
Not really. Miravet is a famous tourist castle place. You can't get there via public transport from Barcelona or even from Tarragona.
Same for Besalú.
Honestly, Germany is the only place I have been where I felt I could get everywhere by train.
This may sound argumentative, it isn't:
The capitalist pitched the infrastructure cost to the government, design of transportation and city design flex around them, and now you need to buy the privilege to participate in society back from them. Where I live public transport is basically non-existent (unless you just so happen to live in a wealthy area, oddly enough) and I've known people trapped in poverty because no car means no job, but job don't pay, so they work for car because everyone is laser focused on the merits for the individual over the collective. Even if it's cooking the environment and is inefficient for moving people en-masse as well.
In the example you gave why not offer a train station that goes to the city? I'm one of the fortunate few that can take the train into the city and it has been ideal. Just me, my e-bike, and the train. No insurance; no emissions. It'd be perfect save the two tons of metal flying around me constantly.
I mean, not really. You can go with a car only where infrastructure (roads) has been built, same as transit. There's more places reachable by that infrastructure, but that is only because things have been built around it. You absolutely do have to worry about delays; there are after all things like traffic jams and road closures. You have to worry about the route you take, not in the form of what connections to take but in the form of navigating the right route. People absolutely have to worry about things like theft and altercation when driving, else people wouldn't lock their cars, and road rage wouldn't exist.
Personally, after having moved somewhere I can manage to at least live my life, without owning a car, I find it feels a lot more freeing to just be able to walk places I want to be, or get on a train that someone else is driving, than having to own some expensive machine that needs periodic and also costly maintenance, and then having to operate it constantly to get anywhere, with the risk of accidently killing someone if I make a mistake.
Yeah, I like stuff being walkable too. The situation in some parts of the US and Mexico, etc. is crazy, I remember once my hotel was across the road from some shops and there was no way to walk across!
I just dislike this idea that working people don't deserve private transport. Like here in Sweden getting the driver's licence can easily cost $3000+, then parking is $200+ a month (especially if you need a charger), tax and insurance are another $200 or so but that varies a lot, fuel taxes are very high, and there are extra fees for driving into Stockholm (although you'd want to avoid it anyway!). So including the cost of the car you're looking at almost $1000 a month or so just for the car to be drivable - when you take into account that Swedish salaries are usually less than half of their US counterparts (especially in professional jobs - Medicine, Tech, Law, etc.) it becomes really unaffordable.
Even moreso with the rampant inflation and high interest rates right now.
The point that everyone in the comments is getting at is that it should not be required for people to spend 1000s of dollars a month on a personal vehicle. It's not the transit thats forcing people to be stuck in cities, it's the lack of it and the overreliance on cars that people can't afford!
I can drive a car from where I’m at right now to where you’re at right now. And I’m not even going to ask where you’re at. I think that’s pretty neat.
But I do agree, walkability and reliable public transit are super nice. The time I’ve spent in smaller, remote ski towns where I could walk/bike or take a bus anywhere in a short amount of time are some of my favorite memories.
Cars aren’t freedom though. You can only go to places where there are roads/streets and you’re entirely dependent on energy logistics to provide you transportation. You’re entirely subject to a delayed schedule through traffic (accidents/congestion).
If you also bring your car to a public parking area, you can subject yourself to potential theft.
Of course living in a city where space is at a premium you’re going to be limited in living space but there’s nothing stopping us from Building out public transportation and alternative methods of transportation out in to suburbs.