Cars: making life expensive, even for those without

[Brainonska511]

Come visit me in Minnesota when the wind chill is 30 below and the roads are covered with ice, and I will let you borrow my bike to make the six mile trip to work that I make every day.
Alternatively, you can freeze your ass off or get mugged waiting for the bus or light rail to double your commute time.

I've seen people biking in Minnesota winters, so I know it's not impossible. I don't know if it's for everyone. As for waiting for transit: that's just a frequency issue - get higher frequency, you'll wait less. Not sure about the mugging thing though. Are you afraid of poor people or something like that?

And it's not that everyone needs to move away from cars, it's that we need to move some people away from them, particularly in places where it would be possible to expand bike and transit use.

 

[pmv]

Come visit me in Minnesota when the wind chill is 30 below and the roads are covered with ice, and I will let you borrow my bike to make the six mile trip to work that I make every day.
Alternatively, you can freeze your ass off or get mugged waiting for the bus or light rail to double your commute time.

If public transport is twice as long a commute as driving then either your public transport is crap, or it's a low-population-density area where road-traffic isn't heavily congested. If the latter then it's not an area where there's an urgent need to reduce car use in the first place. I don't think cars have no place at all, just that they get used when there's no need for them and they cause more problems than they solve.

Though presumably it isn't _always_ mid-winter in Minnesota, so what's the problem the rest of the year? There's a lot of evidence that active commuting is a huge benefit to health, so what's wrong with doing it when you can?

As far as mugging goes, the only time I've had someone try and mug me (at knifepoint - guns being very rare here - and while I was walking home late at night) the bastard made his escape by running across the road and jumping in his car and driving off.

My suspicion is that criminals are lazy, which is why I've never encountered one who was truly a pedestrian. It's those in cars or on public transport you need to be wary of (e.g. that gang of youths who assaulted that lesbian couple on a bus). I mean, if it's ass-freezing weather, how do the muggers stand it, hanging around waiting for someone to actually try and use the bus?

 

[pmv]

( Said mugger didn't succeed not because I'm any sort of tough-guy - I'm absolutely not - but because I unthinkingly reacted by launching into a torrent of whingeing complaints about what a bad week I was having and how this was just the last straw and why does this have to happen to me...and at some point he apparently just couldn't stand the whining any longer - I almost shouted at him to come back because I hadn't finished complaining yet. Quite possibly we simply don't have the same caliber of muggers in the UK as you do...if yours wait around in sub-zero temperatures and snow in the hope of a victim coming along, then clearly they are made of tougher stuff)

 

[Atreus21]

The re-introduction of the Hummer thread, since zapped to The Garage, made me think of the articles below. Car culture is killing our cities and costing us tons of money, and EVs are not going to save us from the current traffic and parking crises we have wrought upon ourselves.

Cars Make Your Life More Expensive, Even If You Don't Have One

Cities are designed for cars and you’re paying for them in hidden costs and higher rent.

www.vice.com

The Massachusetts car economy is costing us $64 billion a year, and we barely notice it - The Boston Globe

A new Kennedy School report reveals what car culture costs us all.

www.bostonglobe.com

I like cars. They give us freedom and mobility. Particularly in a country this large.

 

[Zorba]

( Said mugger didn't succeed not because I'm any sort of tough-guy - I'm absolutely not - but because I unthinkingly reacted by launching into a torrent of whingeing complaints about what a bad week I was having and how this was just the last straw and why does this have to happen to me...and at some point he apparently just couldn't stand the whining any longer - I almost shouted at him to come back because I hadn't finished complaining yet. Quite possibly we simply don't have the same caliber of muggers in the UK as you do...if yours wait around in sub-zero temperatures and snow in the hope of a victim coming along, then clearly they are made of tougher stuff)

I personally think stabbing someone is much different mentally than pulling a trigger.

 

[Zorba]

I like cars. They give us freedom and mobility. Particularly in a country this large.

They do give freedom, some of the time. Is sitting in bumper to bumper traffic in DFW, Atlanta, or LA freedom, though? And all that time being completely unproductive.

I don't think cars are going away any time soon and I don't want them to. But if I could effectively take PT to work I'd do it in a second.

At least in the US, and maybe everywhere, people think there should be a single solution that solves all problems. The reality is there are some cases when public transportation would be significantly better than cars, and there are others where cars naturally win. The problem is we've tried to make cars the solution for every case.

 

[Brainonska511]

I like cars. They give us freedom and mobility. Particularly in a country this large.

Cars also enslave us to traffic and sprawl. The country may be large, but most people live in urban and suburban environments. Particularly for most of the former ones, a car should not be essential for everyday living.

 

[Atreus21]

They do give freedom, some of the time. Is sitting in bumper to bumper traffic in DFW, Atlanta, or LA freedom, though? And all that time being completely unproductive.

I don't think cars are going away any time soon and I don't want them to. But if I could effectively take PT to work I'd do it in a second.

At least in the US, and maybe everywhere, people think there should be a single solution that solves all problems. The reality is there are some cases when public transportation would be significantly better than cars, and there are others where cars naturally win. The problem is we've tried to make cars the solution for every case.

To the bolded: I'll take it, versus the alternative.

 

[Atreus21]

Cars also enslave us to traffic and sprawl. The country may be large, but most people live in urban and suburban environments. Particularly for most of the former ones, a car should not be essential for everyday living.

I don't say we shouldn't have public transportation or mass transit.

 

[fskimospy]

I don't say we shouldn't have public transportation or mass transit.

Right, and the point of this thread is we’ve gone too far in terms of subsidizing car usage, especially in cities.

People don’t think about it because it’s always been this way but Manhattan for example has billions of dollars worth of real estate devoted to allowing people to store their cars for free. That’s insane! All of it should be eliminated.

 

[Brainonska511]

I don't say we shouldn't have public transportation or mass transit.

I know. I'm just pointing out that the so-called "freedom" of a car isn't really all that it's framed to be.

 

[ch33zw1z]

To the bolded: I'll take it, versus the alternative.

What's the alternative? Sitting on a public transport next to some dirty liberal city slicker?

 

[Zorba]

To the bolded: I'll take it, versus the alternative.

What do you see as the alternative? I don't think anyone is saying all cars should be taken.

 

[snoopy7548]

Cars also enslave us to traffic and sprawl. The country may be large, but most people live in urban and suburban environments. Particularly for most of the former ones, a car should not be essential for everyday living.

The side-effect of reducing sprawl is incredibly densly-packed cities, like what you see in China and India. No thanks.

 

[Brainonska511]

The side-effect of reducing sprawl is incredibly densly-packed cities, like what you see in China and India. No thanks.

.... The options aren't suburban wasteland or China. JFC

 

[Commodus]

The side-effect of reducing sprawl is incredibly densly-packed cities, like what you see in China and India. No thanks.

You can have densely packed cities without going full-on Beijing or Mumbai. It's just that the US needs to stop acting as if it has infinite space, or pretending that it's acceptable to spend an hour-plus driving to work. Ideally, we'd switch all essential driving to autonomous vehicles and get rid of many of the unnecessary car parks and garages.

 

[Vic]

I love cars (currently own 3 and do track days in the summer), but have to say that the black-and-white arguments from the car side are pretty disingenuous. If you love your car, great. But you shouldn't be forcing non-drivers to pay for your car too. Or forcing city dwellers to pay for expensive highways so that a few can live in suburban enclaves. Which is what is happening.

 

[pmv]

The odd thing is that the economics of car-travel are an area where normally right-wing types can suddenly turn socialist - in that they want subsidies like free on-street parking, and for things motoring-related to not be properly costed.

In my opinion it's a rare case where some change could be beneficial for almost everyone - but some seem to have developed a kind of addiction to the idea of being able to drive everywhere at all times. Right-wingers who bang on about the market and opposing subsidies and socialism in any other area, often seem to turn driving, irrespective of the cost it imposes on others, into a marker of political identity. It seems paradoxical to me.

Some conservative political commentators will react with near-panic at any suggestion of restrictions on motoring habits.

At the same time, it's also true that being 'Green' can become a marker of wealth as well. As far as I can see, China is in the process of transitioning from one to the other - from the idea that having a car and driving everywhere is a marker of wealth and success and that only the plebs rely on a bike...to the inverse-snob idea that the real elite have bicycles But aside from all the competing status-signalling, it just would be more pleasant and more efficient for everyone if there were far, far fewer cars being used in urban areas.

 

[Commodus]

The odd thing is that the economics of car-travel are an area where normally right-wing types can suddenly turn socialist - in that they want subsidies like free on-street parking, and for things motoring-related to not be properly costed.

In my opinion it's a rare case where some change could be beneficial for almost everyone - but some seem to have developed a kind of addiction to the idea of being able to drive everywhere at all times. Right-wingers who bang on about the market and opposing subsidies and socialism in any other area, often seem to turn driving, irrespective of the cost it imposes on others, into a marker of political identity. It seems paradoxical to me.

Some conservative political commentators will react with near-panic at any suggestion of restrictions on motoring habits.

At the same time, it's also true that being 'Green' can become a marker of wealth as well. As far as I can see, China is in the process of transitioning from one to the other - from the idea that having a car and driving everywhere is a marker of wealth and success and that only the plebs rely on a bike...to the inverse-snob idea that the real elite have bicycles But aside from all the competing status-signalling, it just would be more pleasant and more efficient for everyone if there were far, far fewer cars being used in urban areas.

The irony is that the right-wingers may end up losing their beloved cars due to market forces. The long-term goal of many companies is to switch from personal car ownership to riding in hailed self-driving cars that are available around the clock. You don't need an abundance of parking when cars will rarely hang around longer than it takes to pick someone up.

 

[ondma]

I love cars (currently own 3 and do track days in the summer), but have to say that the black-and-white arguments from the car side are pretty disingenuous. If you love your car, great. But you shouldn't be forcing non-drivers to pay for your car too. Or forcing city dwellers to pay for expensive highways so that a few can live in suburban enclaves. Which is what is happening.

Nobody is paying directly for my car. Yes, they are paying indirectly through taxes to support the highways, but that is the way society works. We pay as a member of society for a lot of different things. Some of those things we benefit from, some we dont, at least directly. I have no children still in the education system, but I still pay a significant portion of my property tax for supporting public schools. Same with paying federal and state taxes to subsidize medical care, low income housing, food stamps, and on and on. Same with traffic infrastructure. Everyone pays in, some benefit and some dont. Even if one takes public transit though, they still benefit from the business and cultural opportunities provided by the traffic infrastructure.

However, I would support something like a dollar per gallon *nationwide* (so all have to pay it, not just in some states) gas tax to support the infrastructure, investigate alternative energy sources and contribute to mass transit.

 

[pmv]

Nobody is paying directly for my car. Yes, they are paying indirectly through taxes to support the highways, but that is the way society works. We pay as a member of society for a lot of different things. Some of those things we benefit from, some we dont, at least directly. I have no children still in the education system, but I still pay a significant portion of my property tax for supporting public schools. Same with paying federal and state taxes to subsidize medical care, low income housing, food stamps, and on and on. Same with traffic infrastructure. Everyone pays in, some benefit and some dont. Even if one takes public transit though, they still benefit from the business and cultural opportunities provided by the traffic infrastructure.

However, I would support something like a dollar per gallon *nationwide* (so all have to pay it, not just in some states) gas tax to support the infrastructure, investigate alternative energy sources and contribute to mass transit.

Yes, but I notice that many of those who want subsidised driving also complain about subsidised state-education and push for it to be made more-and-more market-based. There is a clear double-standard - tax money for building roads appears almost unlimited, while suddenly cash is in short supply when it comes to any other form of transport.

Also, children are not the same as cars. I don't mind paying for educating and keeping-alive other people's children, I resent paying for their cars. Cars don't have human rights.

And I have to pay for car users in so many different ways (I have to pay a service charge to maintain the car park where I live, even though I never use it, when I go to the supermarket I am paying a surcharge on prices to pay for the cost of the large car park, with all that wasted space, I have to pay for the damage constantly done to the pavements by cars parking on them, and on and on it goes...).

Just tonight I noticed a car that had crashed at, some speed from the looks of it, into a lamp-post just down the road (the driver must have been drunk or just an idiot!) - local taxes have to pay for the repairs to all the street infrastructure that gets damaged by drivers driving into them, especially as most of the time it's a hit-and-run situation. The taxes motorists never stop complaining about don't pay for all the costs they impose.

And just consider the disproportionate amount of throughfare space cars take up compared to bicycles or buses or pedestrians, per traveller. That's valuable land they are using for free, never mind for parking on. That space is a scarce resource in cities, so using it for storing vehicles or for travelling using over-sized ones, is plain greedy.

All of this only applies to cities, of course, 'highways' that run between cities are not so much of a valuable resource. The more expensive land is the less justifiable it is to use it for cars.

 

[ondma]

Yes, but I notice that many of those who want subsidised driving also complain about subsidised state-education and push for it to be made more-and-more market-based. There is a clear double-standard - tax money for building roads appears almost unlimited, while suddenly cash is in short supply when it comes to any other form of transport.

Also, children are not the same as cars. I don't mind paying for educating and keeping-alive other people's children, I resent paying for their cars. Cars don't have human rights.

And I have to pay for car users in so many different ways (I have to pay a service charge to maintain the car park where I live, even though I never use it, when I go to the supermarket I am paying a surcharge on prices to pay for the cost of the large car park, with all that wasted space, I have to pay for the damage constantly done to the pavements by cars parking on them, and on and on it goes...).

Just tonight I noticed a car that had crashed at, some speed from the looks of it, into a lamp-post just down the road (the driver must have been drunk or just an idiot!) - local taxes have to pay for the repairs to all the street infrastructure that gets damaged by drivers driving into them, especially as most of the time it's a hit-and-run situation. The taxes motorists never stop complaining about don't pay for all the costs they impose.

And just consider the disproportionate amount of throughfare space cars take up compared to bicycles or buses or pedestrians, per traveller. That's valuable land they are using for free, never mind for parking on. That space is a scarce resource in cities, so using it for storing vehicles or for travelling using over-sized ones, is plain greedy.

All of this only applies to cities, of course, 'highways' that run between cities are not so much of a valuable resource. The more expensive land is the less justifiable it is to use it for cars.

Well, you can always move and shop at a different store if those most likely minimal charges bother you that much.

 

[pmv]

Well, you can always move and shop at a different store if those most likely minimal charges bother you that much.

Why should I have to move? My point is that there's an unquestioning acceptance of subsidies for motoring, and I want that to change, because it makes life worse for everyone. It's economically irrational and largely driven by the power of special interest lobbying.

 

[pmv]

Cars are just a woefully wasteful use of space for urban transport.

 

[Victorian Gray]

I like cars. They give us freedom and mobility. Particularly in a country this large.

Freedom and mobility for the average city driver