But this is not an inherent property of cars. It is only true because we invested all our transit dollars in highways. Cars are not inherently better and roads are not free. If we invest more in public transit we can reduce our need for cars.
The first step is recognizing that cars are not ideal, and the second step is doing something about it. It’s not really a problem if it would take decades, as governments do tend to exist for decades and do plan accordingly.
But what we cannot do is pretend that cars are inherently superior, ignoring the unprecedented investment we made in highways to make that happen.
But it also isn’t the case that improvements will take decades. Maybe solving the problem completely would, but local governments can convert big dangerous streets in to walkable areas with safer bike transport in just a few years or less.
Solving the whole problem would take decades but then, governments do tend to deal in decades long plans when needed. If they’re ever going to launch new national rail projects, they’re going to need the public to recognize the value of alternatives to cars.
> But this is not an inherent property of cars. It is only true because we invested all our transit dollars in highways. Cars are not inherently better and roads are not free. If we invest more in public transit we can reduce our need for cars.
Personal modes of transport like cars and bicycles give you more degrees of freedom compared to public/shared modes with respect to:
Maybe this is true but I’m not convinced “more degrees of freedom” is a useful metric here. It’s not as simple as three bullet points - there is an entire infrastructure that must be built up around cars and that infrastructure has serious problems of cost and land use.
But if you like bullet points, cars are:
a) expensive to operate
b) dangerous to pedestrians
c) more polluting than trains or bicycles
Now I don’t actually think this form of argument is comprehensive but you see that we can easily pull out pluses and negatives without taking a holistic view.
If it is self-evident that bullet trains and their infra are superior to cars and their infra (as your response implies), what are the reasons you think bullet trains have not spread?
I'd like to know why you think cars are not inherently better as it seems very obvious that they are. That is why people overwhelmingly prefer to use them.
No mode of transportation is truly inherently better since they all have unique strong and weak points, but...
Cars as the main method of transportation are obviously not good. They're too inefficient, no matter how you look at them. Manufacturing, infrastructure requirements, footprint per person, energy use, impact on human health and the environment. Cars suck.
People use whatever's most convenient and that's realistically going to be whatever the government has invested in the most.
The more car dependent a society, the more degenerate it is. This is hard to understand due to how car-infested most of the world is. Watch some videos by the Not Just Bikes channel on youtube [1] to see what the world could look like instead. Here's some poignant examples (direct links): [2][3][4][5].
What supports the argument that people overwhelmingly prefer using cars over other transportation methods?
There was some study done in past decade that found that in the US only about 60% of 18 year olds had drivers licenses. Is that because of preference, or other factors?
Real estate located where it is possible to live without owning a car tends to be priced much higher than comparable real estate located where it is inconvenient to not own a car. Is this because people's preferences, a significant under supply relative to only a portion of the market's of demand, or other reasons?
That sounds more like correlation than causation. Places with decent public transit are almost without exception very dense. Of course you wouldn't want to drive there. But if you live somewhere not as cramped, the experience is quite different.
People prefer a lot of things, it's almost never an indicator for what is better or worse. By most metrics, cars are a worse alternative. However, if the infrastructure has already been built around cars, it's hard to change that.
What metrics count? Cars are worse for the environment and health, the infrastructure is more expensive, accidents are worse, they cost more, and they create tremendous opportunity costs by creating car centric cities. One could go on.
They are more practicable/convenient because the infrastructure is already in place. Also, in more rural areas there might never be an alternative. That is pretty much it.
> If we invest more in public transit we can reduce our need for cars.
No we can't. It takes 30 minutes to get to the airport for me by car - even during rush hour, or 1.5 hours by express bus.
Or for a friend of mine - 40 minutes by car, or 2 hours by train + bus.
Sorry, but there's no fix you can apply to public transport that will fix this.
Public transport is also more expensive - I took a group to Washington D.C. by metro - it cost around 5x as much as driving did (we drove the next day) including paying for parking. And the metro was far far slower.
Yeah public transit isn’t great for large groups. Fortunately, 90% of all trips that transit could replace are single occupancy vehicles.
There’s no reason that bus has to take 3x as long as driving. Reducing the number of stops to a strategic few could make it very comparable to driving, especially if busses are given their own traffic lane.
That has more to do with the middling state of public transit in the US than it does with public transit itself.
In Taiwan, when you land at TPE, there is an express MRT line that connects directly to Taipei Main Station. You can also hop on the High Speed Rail and connect to southern destinations. Bypasses all of the traffic and congestion.
Fantastic way to travel and makes it so much more convenient.
