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America's love with cars is founded on fear and selfishness
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this post was submitted on 15 Feb 2024
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Unpopular Opinion
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You literally can't commute in the US without a car. There aren't any sidewalks and everything is so spread out it would take a full day to get groceries by bike.
I live in Denver. Transit is decent. The light rail can be a faster commute during rush hour. Plenty of regional buses to go hiking and skiing. Under 10 min walk to multiple grocery stores. Regional bike path network span multiple cities.
It's not perfect, but I've been car free for over two years with very little issue.
Edit, to add to this: It's more convenient for me to take the train to the airport or the bus to the slopes. Some ski resorts will charge more for daily parking then a round-trip bus ticket. And driving to the ski resorts is a traffic nightmare, much rather just sit on the bus and not worry about it.
Agreed that it's doable in a number of areas. I'm in the suburbs where that's harder, though I happen to be near a grocery store at least.
I moved from the suburbs to the city. I sacrificed a bit of living space and have higher rent. But the increased rent is offset by the lack of car payments, insurance, etc.
Everyone's situation is different and not everyone has the flexibility to move. But there are many cities in the US that are affordable and have decent transit. Just depends on what you value.
Ok? Some places it snows and some places it's hot. Are we just describing things now?
Some places you can commute with transit and some places you cannot. The original thread was making the statement that you could not commute in the US without a car.
Which is true, for some places in the us. And some it is.
What if you work in Denver and live in Firestone?
Obviously there are already public transit offerings in urban areas
I would move to somewhere closer? Even when I regularly drove I would move, take a different job, etc instead of dealing with a long commute. To me it's just not worth it.
You say obviously but the original thread was started by someone who made a blanket statement about the US. There are millions of people in the US who commute without a car. I was curious and looked up some data: https://data.census.gov/table/ACSST1Y2018.S0801?q=S0801:+COMMUTING+CHARACTERISTICS+BY+SEX&hidePreview=true
I would even argue that some of that 85% could switch to transit with very little effort. But as the OP stated, I think there is a cultural aversion to transit in the US. So there's some of that 85% who could use transit but choose not to.
"just move" is a privileged statement
I agree, which is why I said "Everyone’s situation is different and not everyone has the flexibility to move" below.
You can in certain areas, but certainly not all, likely most.
Only in cities. And if you ever want to explore outside the city, good luck.
Try cycling on a road with big trucks passing you at 90kph every three seconds. You will quickly learn to stay inside.
And your solution is...?
No solution, only eternal suffering.
I live in the midwest and that is fairly accurate for the most part. But when I travel to cities I favor public transportation where I can. I do know that only works becsuse I am staying in downtown areas where they haven't killed the public transportation yet, but there are examples that it still works and could be expanded if we decided to do so.
I also think most people haven’t tried and would be pleasantly surprised if they did. Even in the US, almost half of all trips are bikable or walkable distances. It doesn’t have to replace your main commute, just some of your trips.
We’ve all met those people who get in their car to drive two blocks instead of walking, even in good weather. Cars are so dominant that there’s a lack of imagination around using anything except cars.
And it's our selfish culture that allows that to continue to be the standard. For example in my home state Amtrak is trying to to provide inter city service, and the governor said that "they don't want it". The sad part is most of the citizens agree. That is the culture of selfishness.
I don't think it can be completely blamed on culture or simply "selfishness". There is a group of powerful lobbyists that are influencing policy:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highway_lobby
There are absolutely people who love their cars, and/or are assholes, but that isn't the only reason it isn't a priority. There is a big cost associated with any infrastructure project and the US is a relatively large country to cover. Also people from rural areas have no idea what "good" looks like in terms of mass transit.
I can agree with that. Although I do think those lobbyists are mostly successful because people are perfectly content to continue driving. I'm happy that big transit projects are being funded now. They're always expensive, they always go over cost and over time, but when they're finished people never think about that. Look at the chunnel