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Texas asks people to avoid using their cars
(www.newsweek.com)
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this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2024
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Is it even possible to get around USA without cars? There's not even proper paths everywhere for pedestrians.
In certain cities yes, but not many places.
You can pretty easily do it in lots of large cities. Here in Seattle it's not hard at all going North-South with public transit. East-West is another story...
This is still harder in Seattle than in a lot of major cities, but far better in Seattle than in many other US cities. The thing we have going for us here is that we are constantly expanding and improving our public transit.
It's possible, but it's a challenge, and it often involves hiring a car (like an Uber or a taxi) for at least "the last mile" anyway.
Electric vehicles. Did you forget?
Also, the reason why walking, running, or even biking to get around 99% of the US isn't feasible is because the distances are too vast. The average commute time for people in the US is 26.7 minutes and most of that will be on a highway. Covering the same distance on a bike would take 3-10x longer (why 10x? Because of soooo many bridges that don't allow bikes or pedestrians!).
They are still cars.
Then it's a public transport failure, USA has horrible train infrastructure.
But even suburbs lack paths for pedestrians, even if you wanted to walk into town it's dangerous from the get go. The whole country is designed for cars and nothing else, there have been projects I have seen though in some cities where they tear down highways and build pedestrian areas instead, so it's not an unsolvable problem if they can beat the lobbying.
for a country that supposedly values freedom its amusing to note how few things are considered freedoms:
driving = freedom*
walking = not freedom
clean air = not freedom
quality public transit = not freedom
*with purchase of expensive vehicle
And legally-required insurance, and being licensed by the State to operate it...
It's entirely consistent with freedom. Freedom to build with little thought to long term effects. Freedom from paying for infrastructure that benefits everyone.
To do things correctly you need to restrict and regulate.
Suburbs have great pedestrian paths - if your only goal is to exercise. Those paths don't go anywhere, but living in the suburbs I many people using them for exercise.
Even for exercise they tend to be non-existent or suck, which means people end up driving to the few that are good rather than starting their jog from their front door.
Not in the suburbs near me - they are all new suburbs build in the last 3-10 years though. (3 years is important as sidewalks are built last so until the houses are all done the sidewalks don't connect). Older suburbs though, rarely have sidewalks.
That's because of urban sprawl. People prefer to drive farther and longer rather than living in higher density housing.
It's a selection effect. Those that remain are those that prefer that kind of isolation.:-) (or are trapped bc they don't know how to move away)
If you wanted to e.g. own animals like horses it can legit be better to live in a more rural area.
If that were really true, it wouldn't be necessary to restrict residential zoning density by law because people wouldn't choose to build multifamily housing even where it was allowed.
In reality, it's the opposite: dense housing is severely restricted by law, but because so many people do want to live in it, the price gets driven up to the point that they can't afford to anymore and are forced to drive farther and longer instead.
Lol, you do realize you debunked your own claim by the end of the paragraph, right?
The claim that USA has extremely lackluster pedestrian and public transport infrastructure? No, I don't think I did. I merely pointed out steps are being made in the right direction.
Sorry, that was meant for someone else, lol.