4 ms·

> Most of them don't even hold a driving license Maybe true in Milan, but not anywhere in the US. Driving is near imperative in all areas of the country, unfor

> Most of them don't even hold a driving license Maybe true in Milan, but not anywhere in the US. Driving is near imperative in all areas of the country, unfortunately even in big cities, meaning everyone who can get a license, does.

chrisseaton 7y ago
Is driving an imperative even in cities like NY and SF? Where would you even be driving to or from in cities like that? Where would you be parking? I wouldn’t attempt to drive in NY in a million years.
- ghaff 7y ago
  NY (Manhattan and certain areas of Brooklyn in particular) somewhat uniquely don't really require a car. Partly it's because owning a car is a pain/expensive and partly because of transit. But it's also because there's a general mindset that as a professional 30 year old, you're not really expected to have a car and activities and people's expectations are set accordingly. In other cities--and there are other cities that have better transit options than SF which is actually fairly poor--you can get by without a car. But Uber, Zipcar, rentals, etc. only take you so far for weekend activities and visiting the friends who probably don't live on transit lines. You can manage but you adjust activities accordingly. [ADDED: Also, lots of jobs are actually outside the city and you mostly need a car to get to them.] FWIW, I know a couple who live in SF who don't own a car. But they make heavy use of Uber and car rentals of various types. Short-term rental and rideshares make not owning a car more practical for a certain class of urban dweller than it used to be. But not even having a license reduces your options, including both work and recreational options, a lot.
  - deleted 7y ago
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  - _jal 7y ago
    This really overstates things. I am car-free in San Francisco, and prefer it. It is cheaper, less stressful and generally my life is just noticeably nicer than when I had one. I use Zipcar maybe once a month. I rent a car overnight maybe once every 2 months. All in, I pay less than $1500/year on on transport. I don't have to worry about parking, parking tickets, broken windows, or street cleaning. I lived in Brooklyn for about a decade, too, and yes, NYC has better public transport, it isn't close. And to some extent, transport does effect where I go regularly. But I don't consider this a bad thing. Kids would change the equation, but I don't need those in my life, either.
  - standardUser 7y ago
    I lived for over a decade in downtown SF without a car. I can't imagine having owned a car, or needing one, or wanting to deal with the hassle of actually using one. Things certainly got better with rideshares, but transit was abundant and taxis worked fine too (sort of).
    - ghaff 7y ago
      I think a lot probably comes down to lifestyle preferences. I don't live in a city but, if I did, I'd almost certainly want a car because I'd be visiting people/doing things outside the city on a regular basis and it's pretty common that I go hiking or boating a few hours away for a day or a long weekend. There's no way I would want to feel restricted to a city especially somewhere that there are as many natural possibilities as the Bay Area. Maybe short-term and standard car rentals would suffice but that starts adding overhead whenever you want to go somewhere.
      - standardUser 7y ago
        I used BART (regional transit) or just rented a car. A weekend car rental wasn't exactly cheap, but it was basically my only meaningful transit cost, so I didn't mind.
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- acdha 7y ago
  It's not mandatory but it's quite common because it's been so heavily subsidized for the previous century. Fire up street view and look through residential neighborhoods: notice how many street parking spots and driveways there are? Here in DC, the figure is something like 40% of residents not owning cars in a city with well above average transit options by U.S. standards. That leaves a lot of people driving and if you follow the local news there are perennially tons of complaints about any change which removes even a handful of parking spaces because so many people are used to driving being the only mode of transportation which is taken seriously.
  - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
    >Fire up street view and look through residential neighborhoods: notice how many street parking spots and driveways there are? Number of parking spaces means nothing without the number of residential units. Two lanes (one on each side) of street parking in a neighborhood that's all six apartment triple deckers is very different than two lanes of street parking in a neighborhood that's all single family homes. Some of the most walk-able and bike-able places (at least in the US) still have street parking in their residential neighborhoods, there's just not much of it relative to the number of people so people use other options.
    - acdha 7y ago
      I was specifically responding to the “Where would you even be driving to or from in cities like that?” part — the huge demand for local parking makes it clear that many people have answers to those questions even if they're often “because the city has neglected transit infrastructure” or “the city chooses not to enforce traffic laws or design roads which are safe for non-car usage”.
dkarl 7y ago
I live in the U.S., and I've been surprised to hear from several people I know that their kids refused to learn to drive and get a driver's license. They all live in the suburbs, so it's utterly impractical and in every case took their parents completely by surprise. Their reasoning is, driving is harmful and passé and everybody knows we should live in dense cities and take public transit. They've never lived in a place where it's practical, but the place and way they live already seems like a relic of the past to them. To me it's stunning how powerful that presumption is, that suburban teenagers will forgo the independence that a car would give them because they perceive it as a relic of an age when people didn't know better. It gives me a lot of hope that in the future there will be political support for more radical changes than we've seen up to now. I love where these kids' idea of normal is at. However, it also makes me afraid of the degree of political and cultural polarization we're headed towards.
- kqr 7y ago
  > the independence that a car would give them If the car incentivises continued population of sparse suburbs, making them even more dependent on car travel, is it truly independence?
- ghaff 7y ago
  There have been some changes in attitudes. But give them a few years. Most kids in college don't have cars anyway. And, when they graduate, they may find not being able to drive rather limits job opportunities. Most people aren't in the position of some tech workers who can pretty much pick and choose based on where they want to live. It's not just about owning a car. A lot of even white collar jobs depend on driving. (Think just about any sales job for example [that involves meeting with customers].) Leaving aside for a moment all the recreational and social activities I would have missed out over my life by not driving, I've had jobs where I absolutely needed to drive.
  - ClumsyPilot 7y ago
    Its not so much about owning a car, as it is about using it daily for commute. And cities should be designed in such a way that it's not necessary - all residential areas in prague, including suburbs, are covered by public transport. It is much cheaper to use, than owning and maintaining a car. That what the whole planning process is for.

chrisseaton 7y ago

Is driving an imperative even in cities like NY and SF? Where would you even be driving to or from in cities like that? Where would you be parking? I wouldn’t attempt to drive in NY in a million years.

ghaff 7y ago
NY (Manhattan and certain areas of Brooklyn in particular) somewhat uniquely don't really require a car. Partly it's because owning a car is a pain/expensive and partly because of transit. But it's also because there's a general mindset that as a professional 30 year old, you're not really expected to have a car and activities and people's expectations are set accordingly. In other cities--and there are other cities that have better transit options than SF which is actually fairly poor--you can get by without a car. But Uber, Zipcar, rentals, etc. only take you so far for weekend activities and visiting the friends who probably don't live on transit lines. You can manage but you adjust activities accordingly. [ADDED: Also, lots of jobs are actually outside the city and you mostly need a car to get to them.] FWIW, I know a couple who live in SF who don't own a car. But they make heavy use of Uber and car rentals of various types. Short-term rental and rideshares make not owning a car more practical for a certain class of urban dweller than it used to be. But not even having a license reduces your options, including both work and recreational options, a lot.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- _jal 7y ago
  This really overstates things. I am car-free in San Francisco, and prefer it. It is cheaper, less stressful and generally my life is just noticeably nicer than when I had one. I use Zipcar maybe once a month. I rent a car overnight maybe once every 2 months. All in, I pay less than $1500/year on on transport. I don't have to worry about parking, parking tickets, broken windows, or street cleaning. I lived in Brooklyn for about a decade, too, and yes, NYC has better public transport, it isn't close. And to some extent, transport does effect where I go regularly. But I don't consider this a bad thing. Kids would change the equation, but I don't need those in my life, either.
- standardUser 7y ago
  I lived for over a decade in downtown SF without a car. I can't imagine having owned a car, or needing one, or wanting to deal with the hassle of actually using one. Things certainly got better with rideshares, but transit was abundant and taxis worked fine too (sort of).
  - ghaff 7y ago
    I think a lot probably comes down to lifestyle preferences. I don't live in a city but, if I did, I'd almost certainly want a car because I'd be visiting people/doing things outside the city on a regular basis and it's pretty common that I go hiking or boating a few hours away for a day or a long weekend. There's no way I would want to feel restricted to a city especially somewhere that there are as many natural possibilities as the Bay Area. Maybe short-term and standard car rentals would suffice but that starts adding overhead whenever you want to go somewhere.
    - standardUser 7y ago
      I used BART (regional transit) or just rented a car. A weekend car rental wasn't exactly cheap, but it was basically my only meaningful transit cost, so I didn't mind.
deleted 7y ago
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acdha 7y ago
It's not mandatory but it's quite common because it's been so heavily subsidized for the previous century. Fire up street view and look through residential neighborhoods: notice how many street parking spots and driveways there are? Here in DC, the figure is something like 40% of residents not owning cars in a city with well above average transit options by U.S. standards. That leaves a lot of people driving and if you follow the local news there are perennially tons of complaints about any change which removes even a handful of parking spaces because so many people are used to driving being the only mode of transportation which is taken seriously.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  >Fire up street view and look through residential neighborhoods: notice how many street parking spots and driveways there are? Number of parking spaces means nothing without the number of residential units. Two lanes (one on each side) of street parking in a neighborhood that's all six apartment triple deckers is very different than two lanes of street parking in a neighborhood that's all single family homes. Some of the most walk-able and bike-able places (at least in the US) still have street parking in their residential neighborhoods, there's just not much of it relative to the number of people so people use other options.
  - acdha 7y ago
    I was specifically responding to the “Where would you even be driving to or from in cities like that?” part — the huge demand for local parking makes it clear that many people have answers to those questions even if they're often “because the city has neglected transit infrastructure” or “the city chooses not to enforce traffic laws or design roads which are safe for non-car usage”.

dkarl 7y ago

I live in the U.S., and I've been surprised to hear from several people I know that their kids refused to learn to drive and get a driver's license. They all live in the suburbs, so it's utterly impractical and in every case took their parents completely by surprise. Their reasoning is, driving is harmful and passé and everybody knows we should live in dense cities and take public transit. They've never lived in a place where it's practical, but the place and way they live already seems like a relic of the past to them. To me it's stunning how powerful that presumption is, that suburban teenagers will forgo the independence that a car would give them because they perceive it as a relic of an age when people didn't know better. It gives me a lot of hope that in the future there will be political support for more radical changes than we've seen up to now. I love where these kids' idea of normal is at. However, it also makes me afraid of the degree of political and cultural polarization we're headed towards.

kqr 7y ago
> the independence that a car would give them If the car incentivises continued population of sparse suburbs, making them even more dependent on car travel, is it truly independence?
ghaff 7y ago
There have been some changes in attitudes. But give them a few years. Most kids in college don't have cars anyway. And, when they graduate, they may find not being able to drive rather limits job opportunities. Most people aren't in the position of some tech workers who can pretty much pick and choose based on where they want to live. It's not just about owning a car. A lot of even white collar jobs depend on driving. (Think just about any sales job for example [that involves meeting with customers].) Leaving aside for a moment all the recreational and social activities I would have missed out over my life by not driving, I've had jobs where I absolutely needed to drive.
- ClumsyPilot 7y ago
  Its not so much about owning a car, as it is about using it daily for commute. And cities should be designed in such a way that it's not necessary - all residential areas in prague, including suburbs, are covered by public transport. It is much cheaper to use, than owning and maintaining a car. That what the whole planning process is for.