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"Giving people more viable alternatives to driving means more people will choose not to drive, so there will be fewer cars on the road, reducing traffic for drivers."

Concise, easy to understand, and accurate. I have used it at least a dozen times and it is remarkable how well it works.

Also—

"A bus is about twice as long as a car so it only needs to have four to six passengers on board to be more efficient than two cars."

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[-] Rozauhtuno@lemmy.blahaj.zone 61 points 2 months ago

You can use the same logic to also argue that finding a parking spot will be easier. And if more people cycle there is more demand for separated bicycle lanes, which means drivers don't need to share the lane anymore with others.

[-] NateNate60@lemmy.world 19 points 2 months ago

Also, if the car park is smaller due to fewer people driving, it means it will be easier to remember where you parked your car, and you won't have to walk as far to the destination. It also means you can fit more stuff in the same space, so you won't have to drive as far to get to the places you want to go, saving you time and fuel!

These arguments are won and lost on the phrasing.

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[-] sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone 42 points 2 months ago

Someone can logically agree to something but emotionally still hate it.

Logically, car drivers should understand and appreciate the zipper merge, bc it makes traffic better. But emotionally it's too difficult for them to let someone in ahead of them.

Same thing you can explain about alternatives to cars making traffic better. But when they see money or (God forbid) space on the road going to infrastructure other than cars, it will feel like a zero sum game again.

That is the biggest challenge I've experienced in trying to promote alternatives

[-] NateNate60@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago

Opposition to the zipper merge might be a regional thing. Where I'm from, people can zipper merge just fine, especially after the state transportation agency put up a bunch of billboards telling people to do it.

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[-] Naich@lemmings.world 32 points 2 months ago

I've found that a lot of people see the use of public transport as horrors beyond comprehension, and think cycling would kill them instantly.

[-] ByteJunk@lemmy.world 25 points 2 months ago

But that's fine, no need to convince them to use mass transit.

The approach is to improve infrastructure - good buses, frequent routes, dedicated bus lanes, trains to feed from the suburbs, subway, etc.

Make it more convenient to use, and people will start using it. But you need to stop designing everything around cars, like every single store can't be a cube in the middle of a huge parking lot...

[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 8 points 2 months ago

You might meet immigrants and poor people there. THE HORROR!!!!

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[-] jjjalljs@ttrpg.network 6 points 2 months ago

People get weirdly anti social about public transit. Like, "I don't want to have to be around other people!!"

Sometimes it's racism. Sometimes it's just... anti social.

Personally I think anti-social people can go leave society, and the rest of us can build a better, more cooperative world.

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[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 28 points 2 months ago

"A bus is only helpful when it actually runs regularly. And by 'regularly' I don't mean one each morning and another one each afternoon".

[-] PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 months ago

I absolutely agree.

But if mass transit had the same investment as road infrastructure gets, it'd be a slam dunk.

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[-] drdabbles@lemmy.world 21 points 2 months ago

You're coming at this from a perspective that suggests people should have alternatives to cars, or maybe even that people deserve alternatives to cars. And that's fundamentally not how a shocking number of people think. Heaven help you if you suggest things like low cost fares for the poor or even free access to public transit.

[-] NateNate60@lemmy.world 15 points 2 months ago

Most people I have found care relatively little about the topic. They drive and think in terms of driving only because that is the context they have been exposed to their entire lives, and there's not really their fault.

If someone really is that deep into the rabbit hole then nothing you say will change their mind, so don't waste your time.

[-] Nouveau_Burnswick@lemmy.world 5 points 2 months ago

One of my coworkers believes bicycles cause car congestion. All car congestion, even the stuff on highways.

[-] mayo@lemmy.world 19 points 2 months ago

A lot of people choose not to live in the city with good transit because housing is too expensive, so they live in the 'burbs. All that extra money means they can get a fancy new car lease. They drive into the city and because cars are allowed everywhere 24/7 there is no reason for them to look for alternatives in high traffic zones.

[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 12 points 2 months ago

Have you ever considered that for many people not living in the city this "extra money" simply does not exist?

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[-] stoly@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago

That’s the old way. There’s no real difference in pricing now until you move into the exurbs. For more and more people it’s better to pay a bit more and not have to commute while having easy access to the city’s amenities.

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[-] Maggoty@lemmy.world 18 points 2 months ago

I don't understand why people are so married to the thought of driving to and from work every day. You just worked 9 hours, and you want to drive through rush hour?

[-] lemmysarius@feddit.org 5 points 2 months ago

Yea, I have been lucky to get an appartement near my place of work, only 5 min by tram. And I cant imagine having to spend in total 1-2 hours driving to and from work every day. It feels like such an incredible waste of time, when the only thing you can do is listen to music/radio/podcasts. I want to read, play my steam deck or just work on my laptop.I dont want to fight with traffic and havong to concentrate on not killing myself with the tons of metal with which Im urgently rushing around with.

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[-] PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca 12 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

As a car guy myself (barely), I think it's crazy that people are against mass transit.

Trains, teams, and busses are better by every conceivable metric, if your departure and destination is within like 20km of city outskirts. That's almost all traffic. If govts and people invested as much into mass transit as they do into roads, it'd be a no brainer. So much faster, and safer, and more convenient.

Let cars just be for rural folks and hobbyists.

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[-] frezik@midwest.social 10 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

I do "cars should not be the default". It seems to resonate with people.

[-] SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social 10 points 2 months ago

Assuming that they're thinking about it logically, not as an identity issue. If they're not, the double-think is incredible. My city is about to launch an BR(ish)T transit system, and some of the NextDoor comments are wild. One woman is convinced:

  1. The BRT platforms in the median are dangerous because they'll get too crowded for everybody to stand inside; and
  2. BRT will be a failure because nobody will ride it.

In my experience, carbrains usually think that nobody will use the alternatives at all, so it's just a waste of space and money that could be spent on cars, and that traffic congestion is the result of corrupt politicians pocketing all the tax money that could magically fix it in some unspecified way.

[-] Mr_Blott@feddit.uk 9 points 2 months ago

A bus is about twice as long as a car

???? You've either got tiny buses or are driving stretch limos

[-] NateNate60@lemmy.world 15 points 2 months ago

A 2025 Toyota Camry is 4.84 m in length. A typical US school bus is 10.5 m in length. The school bus is 2.18 times as long as the car.

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[-] Treczoks@lemmy.world 12 points 2 months ago

Probably an American posting.

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[-] Kroxx@lemm.ee 7 points 2 months ago

Y'all either circle jerk on hating cars/car culture or try to meaningfully convince people to move away from car culture. This community will never convince "carbrains" in its current state. Accept that and have fun circle jerkin' or pivot and try to change minds.

Asking "why doesn't this group we actively shit on supporting our thought process?" or "how do we get them to change/agree?" is silly.

[-] PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca 6 points 2 months ago

Welcome to social media, not sure where you've been all this time lol

[-] diskmaster23@lemmy.one 4 points 2 months ago

Like you are going to have a choice? Economically, we can't continue down the road of a car dependent society.

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[-] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 2 months ago

Your argument doesn't work to make anyone stop driving cars, though. It just makes them pro non-car in the sense of freeing up traffic so they can drive their car quicker. It doesn't make themselves take anything besides their car.

[-] NateNate60@lemmy.world 12 points 2 months ago

You don't need to convince anyone. People will convince themselves if they are given the appropriate environment. This is about convincing them to support the construction of that environment.

Think about New York. It's subject to the same cultural influences as the rest of the US but public transportation use remains high because the infrastructure is good and competitive with driving.

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this post was submitted on 25 Aug 2024
254 points (92.9% liked)

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