It’s not that it’s an unpopular opinion, it’s just that none of you carless society people can offer a viable solution that isn’t just " take public transport" or even once acknowledge that people live in rurual areas where having a personal vehicle is a requirement of life. You lot talk about how “cars don’t give you freedom”, well you tell that to people with disabilities that make it hard for them to walk long distances and tell me if they would feel free in a carless society where they had to rely on public transport just to do a simple thing like go to their doctors appointments.
I would love to not have to hear and see cars driving around all day, but untill we can come up with some viable option that gives people the freedom to go where they want without the inconvenience of the car centric city designs, it’s not something we should be doing yet, we are going to leave a lot of people behind and forgotten about.
People so rarely think of the disabled. Sure, most modern buses can "kneel" to let someone with a wheelchair on or off, but that doesn't exactly make public transit disability friendly. For one thing, odds are that person has to wheels themselves pretty damn far to get to and from the bus stop. There is also generally one spot that a wheelchair will fit in and one spot only. There are also usually only two seats for the disabled/elderly and the disabled not infrequently get harassed for using those seats if they don't look disabled enough for other people's liking.
For another, there are many different types of disability. Having an elevator or kneeling bus doesn't solve every disabled person's problems with access. And what about the immunocompromised? Public transit is one of the most dangerous things you can engage in as someone susceptible to infection.
There will always be a need for personal modes of transportation of some kind. Public transportation is wonderful and I am a huge proponent of it, but it is not the be-all and end-all solution that people like to pretend it is.
Yeah these carless people shit me because they’re all fit and healthy people who live in cities, I have never once seen any of them mention anything that would positively help people with disabilities or the elderly, it’s all about them and it’s selfish, I wholeheartedly agree that car centric infrastructure design is an eyesore and we could probably do better, but like I said in My original comment, I’m yet to see them offer a viable solution that doesn’t exclude a sizeable chunk of the society.
My mum is in and out of hospital and doctors appointments and her ability to get herself there is a big part of her recovery, her independence is what gives her strength and keeps her mental health at a good level all considering, so yeah come up with something viable that isn’t just use public transport and maybe we will start to listen, but don’t call us assholes or lazy because you hate cars.
Define major cities. Even more large cities you need a car. That’s why the next place I move, I want a car to be optional for most day to day activities.
Closest bus stop to my work is a four mile walk to finish. Significant portions of that walk involve areas without sidewalks and highway traffic.
After work, I would add another ten miles to get to a bus that runs 24 hours.
Significant infrastructure work is needed before we can just give up on cars. Including a point-to-point solution that needs to be developed for folks with disabilities.
You are correct, but there are no paratransit vans that run on a regular schedule near, say, Rockford Alabama.
If you work in dadeville or sylacauga then transportation would be essential.
The alternative is to either live a self-sufficient ascetic farmer's life or to die because you have no access to work or food or anything.
Not saying it is a problem that can't be solved, just one that is a lot larger than the current system can support without "Significant inrastructure work"
I completely agree with you OP and this applies to every location on earth. People have forgotten that we have not always had cars and people have free will and with enough effort you can most definitely live without a car, especially in the modern error with on demand everything. The excuses and what about-ism on this topic is really telling!
That’s a whole other kind of pollution, though. And to feed horses at a level that could replace modern transportation would likely negatively affect human food production. And where would these horses be housed? You’d also have to prepare for the rampant animal abuse that would ratchet up.
My dad lost his licence for 3 month and now he just sits at home and asks my sister when he needs grocheries. He's acting like he's crippled now. He literally lives next to a bus stop and the supermarket is across the steet fron the other bus stop. Arguably it's closer than walking from the parking to the store.
You’re just in this weird technically correct space that isn’t a useful position to hold… None of what modern society brings is necessary since humans lived long before, but if we’re gonna make the choice between owning a car and living in some uncontacted tribe somewhere that gets is nowhere…
The best I can tell, you seem to be adding more to my statement than I implied. I am not advocating for technological regression. I am simply stating that if someone thinks they NEED a car, they are mistaken. There a plenty of people living in every type of community, including middle America, that live just fine without cars. It’s a conscious decision that can be made with certain sacrifices and effort. People over state the idea that it’s somehow impossible or not their choice. Living with less convenience is still living, and I would say in many cases a benefit to ones health, both mental and physical.
In order to get rid of my car, I would have to quit my job, grow my own food, homeschool my kids, and pretty much only go outside of my homestead on special occasions. Then I wouldn’t be able to afford my mortgage. Our society isn’t conducive to that type of lifestyle. For reference, I live on a ranch, the closest grocery store is a 30 minute drive, the closest neighbor is at least a mile. We have no public transport, no Uber or lyft service, no taxis, etc. I love living out here though. I can see the milky way every night, I can camp and hike on my own property, I can enjoy nature in a way not many can. I don’t think I could give that up, if for nothing else, my mental health.
Yeah bit hard to tell in this post that’s why I asked, I live in the country but no on a large property so would absolutely love to have enough land to go camping on my own property. Maybe build my extensively large model train set I keep dreaming about across my land.
Reaaallly depends where. If it’s in a city that has adequate mass transportation, absolutely. If it’s a place with extensive urban sprawl and non-existent or incomplete mass transit, it’s very hard, unless you’re willing to spend hundreds of $ a week on ride-shares. Having said that, if by “most”, you mean the world population in general, then yes you are correct since the majority of the world is in Asia where mass transit is more common. Then again, those countries that have good public transportation already have most of the people using them.
I live in a third world Asian country. The public transport in the city is terrible. There are very few train stops and they move slowly.
You may have to wait for multiple train cars to come as there are so many people and when you finally get on one you are so jam packed that you literally can’t take a deep breath.
Ride shares cost as much as owning a car without the benefit of ownership. Also taking the bus here has long lines at rush hour and you may wait for over an hour to get onto a bus.
So having a car while it’s not necessary, I don’t think I can be blamed for it. It will literally save me hours of waiting for available public transportation.
The last time my wife and I took the train, while wearing masks, we both got Covid. We were vaccinated and had a booster and still got it. That alone made us decide to not take the train anymore as it’s too risky to do so.
We can pay maybe 6x as much on a ride share , but if we get Covid we are both out of work for at least a week. Not to mention the suffering.
Agreed, I’ve lived in a town of 300 in the Midwest where this would be impossible, the nearest grocery store was 20 miles away. However, I now live in a city with around 1mil, and here I absolutely agree with OP.
I will say though that even in a town of 300, most families do not need as many cars as they have. Even getting to work and driving that far, I’ve seen couples with 3, even 4 cars. That’s ridiculous.
I’d change this to “Most people in the modern age are too lazy to change their habits”, meaning things like carpooling, or reducing trips, or thinking about hybrid/EV options.
Just watch, their reply is going to be “It doesn’t do enough”. I’ve tried reasoning with these people. If a solution isn’t 100% perfect then they think we should throw it in the trash. My main thing I hate about politics these days. There are no compromises, there’s no partial solutions. If it’s not perfect then it’s a terrible idea that should be gutted and thrown out. Meanwhile the world burns while wait for a perfect solution that’s hundreds of years off.
The very definition of “Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good”
There is an underlying issue with the car and oil industry funding car designed cities and ruining public transportation that makes some level of push back on different versions of cars being more of the same avoidance of acknowledging that designing cities based on cars is counterproductive.
But it is a case of treating everywhere the same as a dense, urban setting and blaming the existence of cars in any way instead of the design decisions and malicious actions by businesses that ruined good public transportation in the many places that it does make sense.
Absolutely. I actually just learned recently about a rail line that used to exist between my town and our capital city, had trips multiple times a day. Oil came in, built the roads, and the rail died. They had the chance to buy out the rail and make it public but decided the car was the future.
I think it’s a two pronged approach. In urban areas I am pushing for rail and more public transit. I am in Seattle where we have a new rail line opening next month and expanding to a dozen new stations over the next few years, and even more after that. I gladly fill out surveys and pass information, and I’m even happy to pay the taxes to help build it.
But most of America is not that dense, and for them I say transit should still be pushed. I’d love to see more commuter rail, we love our suburbs, an easy thing to do is big park and rides in the suburbs where a rail line takes you into the city. It’s easy because the rail is usually already there, cheap, and easy to run and manage.
I’m just a realist when it comes to transit. It’s being built, but not in the time that we need it. For America, I just push that those who are already in the market for a car, consider an EV. Don’t go get one if you don’t need a new car. If you’re a 2+ car household, absolutely one of them should be an EV. If anything the cost savings of not spending a ton on gas is huge. There’s nuance to everyone’s transportation, and man am I just tired of the “My one solution fits everyone perfectly” crowd.
SIGH okay, I’m not even getting into this argument here because I’ve had it too often. Usually who have this opinion either A) Live in a city with great public transportation or B) Live in a country in a place like Europe who have no concept of how rural America is with how little transit there is.
Long story short. The “EVs are not a solution” is a very very basic take because no one is saying they are a solution - they are a stopgap that reduces emissions in the short term while we push over the next century to build our more public transit. Tiny tiny towns that have 300 people are not going to get a rail line, or even a bus line before their neighboring cities, and yes I mean cities of 200k that don’t even have a rail/bus line. Yes, the “We should build more rail” is obvious. It’s the obvious best solution. However, unless you have a few trillion dollars lying around, it aint going to happen in the next decade whereas EVs can jump in now.
In the Midwest town I referenced above like I said there is nothing, not even a gas station in the town, the nearest store is 20 miles away. There are no bus lines, there is no rail, there is nothing. I’ve posted this question to others and they all break down to “Well they should have transport”. Yes! They SHOULD. But they don’t, and government is completely unwilling to build anything. So that argument falls apart to just “Well I think EVs are bad” without seeing the nuance that maybe there are some good places for them.
That’s it, that’s all I’m going to reply to this, unless you can tell me you have lived in a town <500 people in the middle of nowhere America, then I don’t think your point of view is completely relevant. And this is coming from a massive train nerd who is pushing for more rail everywhere.
There, I had the entire argument for you, we can skip the next 2 hours where you try to tell me my points are all terrible and that we should have mass transit everywhere. I know.
…the nearest store is 20 miles away. There are no bus lines, there is no rail, there is nothing. I’ve posted this question to others and they all break down to “Well they should have transport”. Yes! They SHOULD.
But should they? At that point what mass transit would be economically feasible? I would think even a bus at that rate of ridership would be a waste.
I’m a fan of always saying yes to that. Mass Transit (and most public works projects) are very much “If you build it, they will come”. If people have a convenient way to move around that’s an alternative, they’ll use it. Even a small town like that, a bus that stopped there and a few other towns every couple of hours could be used for people commuting to work, going out in the evening, or just frequent trips to nearby towns. The hard part is convincing leaders that there will be a demand for something that the area has never had before - but the demand always comes.
God I feel your pain. The last person I try to say that not having a car in a rural area is impossible. Basically wanted to just force move everyone to the city. When I asked about farms he said the farmers could stay but all of their services had to move to the city. Yeah …
I’ll say I’m about halfway to “just live in cities”, but I’ll explain why. I come from the Midwest, the breadbasket, the most lucious soil on the planet and the perfect place for agriculture. My entire life I saw the best farmland paved over for walmarts, stripmalls, and endless suburban sprawl. For those who live in areas like that, even towns of 15k, they think they live rurally, but they’re really wanting to live an urban life claiming they’re rural. So for those people, yeah, I do say we should give up the notion of them being rural and move to an actual city with actual city life.
Let the actual rural folk do what they do best, and let them live rural lives, and give that land over to those who want to work it. We don’t need more big box retail taking up good farmland.
That entirely depends on the distance from your job and stores and the quality of public transportation and also the country you’re talking about. If you’re talking about Brussels, sure. If you’re talking about Dallas, it’s a whole other story.
And then, of course, there are people who live in smaller U.S. towns with equally poor public transportation.
And then there are the people in rural America with no public transportation.
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