If nothing else, car dependency is fiscally unsustainable. We might go kicking and screaming towards the solution, but eventually people will have no choice but to abandon the financial suicide that is making your city car dependent.
True, and I wish my city would realize it harder, sooner. On the other hand, I just read an article the other day that claims that the collapse of civilization has begun. A lot of societies throughout history perseverated with maladaptive habits after the local environment changed, and thus collapsed. A lot of them didn’t, though, and I hope that we’ll wise up in time.
But yeah, honestly, I’m worried myself that our society is starting to unravel if we don’t get our act together. Unmitigated climate catastrophe may well prove to be the greatest disaster in human history, if you count all the wars, famines, genocide it may cause. I sincerely hope it doesn’t turn out so dire, but so far humanity is stubbornly refusing to do anywhere near enough to stop it. Whether that’s civilization-ending or merely really frickin bad remains to be seen, but it’s also worthwhile noting that collapse doesn’t always mean post-apocalyptic; for farmers in ancient Rome around its collapse, life probably didn’t seem all that different day-to-day.
I’ve thought about that, too. How very rural people way back when may not have known or cared what empire they belonged to. I read years ago about a region France that routinely got double taxed because no one was really sure if they were French or German, and it was just easier to pay your taxes to both collectors than fight it. A society like that, yeah, they may not care so much about the empires collapse. But us? Even in the most rural areas of any ‘western’ country, the difference would likely be huge. No sanitation department, no internet, no electricity. And because, especially in the US, we have never developed a sense of personal responsibility to our communities or any kind of solidarity, we are unlikely to weather that particularly well. There’ll be no spontaneous eruption of communal gatherings and a sense of building a better community. They’ll be bastards hoarding shit and people shooting each other because there’s no one to stop it. :(
A percentage of people will, like they always do. My pessimistic view is that we just need to see how bad it gets before the pendulum starts swinging back the other way
Let me remind you that there are rural areas where people life in farms and need to drive to the factory they work in, there’s no shuttle bus, no train no nothing, and while isolated factories exist this will still be the case. They can’t really arrange a bus that goes to pick up their employees, since the roundabout would make it more gax expensive and some people live in places where a bus can’t even dream to get in.
I wish things improved, and that this became a reality for cities, there’s already cities in holland where getting the car in is prohibited, you need to leave it outside the city, but making car dependency fiscally unsustainable is punishing people that can’t have the privilege to work on other stuff. Imagine electrical technitians, they can’t take a bus/train/tram with machinery, even in a city. I’m all in for improvement and punishment for whim driving, but it needs to be regulated well not to fuck again poor people, because factory workers of rural areas aren’t partcularly rich.
Again, for reference, I don’t even own a car, I WFH and life in a town where public transport is excellent, but most of my family members live in the situation I described. Anyway, even though this post is about urban areas, there are plenty comments talking about cars as a whole, and usually policies done to fix car usage, things like gas prices and such, affect everyone, not only urbanites like me.
In a perfect world/scenario…which would never happen…
If urban centers immediately dropped their reliance on cars and individual transport systems, then there would be more gas to go to rural centers where individual transportation makes more sense (going to the store) or is mandatory (farm and other industrial equipment) making prices drop for rural gas and urban center be more self sufficient and environmentally friendly.
Urban centers dropping their car reliance isn’t achieved by making it expensive for everyone, but by banning it’s use and increasing the public transport support.
Yeah that’s a bold assumption. My bet is on “it’s going to get progressively worse and never better”. I have yet to be proven wrong. Since the day I was born everything’s been enshittening with only inconsequential cosmetic improvements (lol technology, what a joke).
Eh, I guess? Partially. I have stores nearby that I can go walking, and WFH so yeah internet reliant, but I’m a programmer so that’s already a given anyway.
I did say self sufficient with minimal transport though.
I live mostly this way. I have an electric car but I live in a very dense urban area and don’t drive much. Looking to get myself an ebike or scooter to use as my main mode of transportation.
Yeah…being a programmer, it doesn’t matter if WFH structure falls because around the same time most technology might fall. We just gotta hope that it’s multi-decades away at this point
After around 1919 and before Stalin USSR was democratic. And from 80-ies to the end. And democracy ended about 1996. Then shooting parlament from tanks, then Eltsin names his successor, then his successor wins, then removal of gubernator elections in 2002-2003, and everything else.
And in comparasion USSR was more democratic than empire except Stalin time. Stalin time managed to be even worse.
Sitting in my car right now. AC on. Had to drive my Mom to the doctor which is ~8 town blocks from home, but the road is only safe for cars. No busses in my town or county. We saw two elderly women crossing the huge parking lot on foot with grocery bags, clearly to walk home with them, and noted that they are smart.
I hate cities because of motor vehicles and all the space that is reserved for them. If all motor traffic was moved to underground, that would make the city pleasant to exist in. I would be happy if every car space was converted to greenery.
That’s my dream too, and why I’m actually sort of onboard with Musk’s vision for car metros. The issue is that I’m 100% sure they’d also want to expand surface level car infrastructure to facilitate that network.
My centrist compromise that I hope will take off in European cities over the next decade is that most two lane city streets will become one lane one way systems with protected bike lanes, pavements and trees taking the space that’s been freed up.
The only way to do it is to have everything in walking distance. Places where things are already too spread out make this very hard to do. People get used to driving everywhere and don’t want to pay to change things.
Public transit, busses, light rail, etc. Are great. No need for everything to be in walking distance.
It’s not too hard. It just takes time. A city can change hugely in 50 years.
And people don’t want anything to change. Until they get used to the new way. Then they don’t want it to change again. But everything always changes. That’s the only thing that doesn’t change.
I can walk everywhere in my city (Barcelona), but still fuck cars. Thankfully they are pedestrianising a lot of roads here too, as there are still far too many cars.
Same here, i don't often use trams or trains, i'd much rather walk or bike or whatever. But the peoblem might be the people who don't even want walkable cities, because a whole bunch of people don't walk.
I was walking through the city the other day and i was in the middle of a bunch of people. A tram was approaching from behind and pretty much everyone around me was pucking up the pace, because they wanted to catch it. It then dawned on me that most of them are way out of shape and/or overweight. I kept walking normally because i had bo rush, and i was still just as fast as the people doing the fast walk while being super exhausted after their 50m sprint.
I wish I lived closer to the city so I could walk more. Walking is the best. But I live about 17 miles from the city and couldn’t afford to move closer if I wanted to.
And here in Minnesota we’re considering boulevarding I-94 in the former Rondo neighborhood (which was a poor mostly black neighborhood that they destroyed to build I-94 in the first place). This is why we’re better than you, Wisconsin. :P
My office is off a road like this except no bike lanes. It’s a mile and a half of commercial 4 lane road followed by 2 lane residential and the speed limit is 25 on the whole thing. Everyone goes 40+ in the commercial section which at least has a grass median and sidewalks on both sides. People bike on the sidewalks even though its against city ordinances because they like to stay alive. The residential section has a stop sign every 500 feet.
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