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You're underestimating how much people love their cars. I formerly worked at Microsoft (the Redmond campus), which bends over backwards and does pretty much eve
by Analemma_ 10y ago
You're underestimating how much people love their cars. I formerly worked at Microsoft (the Redmond campus), which bends over backwards and does pretty much everything possible to keep people from driving to work. They have company shuttle buses, they give you a free card for public transit (and Seattle's is pretty good, compared to the Bay Area's), they pay you a bonus for using carpools/vanpools, and they have bike storage and showers and pay for bike expenses. They still need acres of parking garages, which are full every day. People like driving, and there's only so much the company can do about it.
- linkregister 10y agoIt's not like these people are being irrational. If driving is faster, then these folks will do so. Given the property prices in the Seattle area, they are probably as close as possible to work as their budget will allow. They're probably at the edge of their tolerable commute as it is.
- Fricken 10y agoMaybe as self interested individuals they aren't being irrational, but collectively as a civilization, it's irrational. The early proponents of the mechanized garden city were naive, and we've carried on perpetuating that naivete for 80 years now, because that's just the way we do it. What a mess. If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.
- valuearb 10y agoIt's totally rational. Mass transit provides transport from points A to points B, C, and maybe D. Cars provide transportation to anywhere from anywhere. You regard this as irrational because you don't value individual liberty. Could cars be more environmentally sound? Yes and we are on our way to making that happen.
- Fricken 10y agoIf you conveniently ignore all the negative side effects of cars and sprawl that accomodates them, and start not from first principles but with the clusterfuck we currently inhabit, then I guess over-reliance on cars enhances individual liberty for a privileged few. With less cars you can take the bus, the train, a bike, or you can walk. You can do it whether you're rich or poor, or too old or too young to drive. With cars, you get to drive or else fuck you, and fuck your grandchildren too. Nothing about that fits into my model for individual liberty, quite the opposite.
- valuearb 10y agoSprawl is allowing another person the freedom to have a yard. But sure, we can shave a few seconds off your commute by forcing everyone into tiny apartments in this massive country with massive amounts of open space. I live in a state that appropriately funds it's freeways, so we don't have a cluster fuck. I seldom ever have to drive below 75 on the freeway.
- linkregister 10y agoMaybe one policy for an urban area doesn't fit for a rural area, and vice versa. Maybe... life is complicated and there's no intellectually easy solution for everything. (directed at both Fricken and valuearb)
- valuearb 10y agoThere is always an easy solution. The hard part is finding an easy solution that's not wrong. For example, having people pay directly for their road and mass transit use is an excellent easy solution, the hard part is addressing air pollution externalities. So toll roads, private mass transit and carbon/pollution caps/market.
- akgerber 10y agoIs requiring every adult to spend thousands of dollars a year to fully engage in society and strictly limiting how property owners use their land to maximize ease of driving your definition of 'individual liberty'?
- briandear 10y agoExplain how I'm supposed to carry groceries for a family of five on a bus or train. Please. How's a mother with a small child supposed to carry groceries home?