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> Imagine if most streets became parks/plazas Before the massive efforts of the auto industry, this is basically what they were. Streets of small European town

> Imagine if most streets became parks/plazas Before the massive efforts of the auto industry, this is basically what they were. Streets of small European towns still feel this way and the cars feel very much like the interlopers. So, a return to normalcy.

rayiner 6y ago
That framing as a way to misrepresent the fact auto industry gave people what they wanted. Many newly developed parts of Europe are the same way, because that’s what people want.
- 0xdde 6y ago
  What is this based on? A dogmatic belief that markets perfectly line up with public sentiment and desires?
- andys627 6y ago
  People didn't want cars, they wanted what the gov't subsidized. Here in the US cars are subsidized and transit, biking, walking is penalized. These dials are turned differently in different countries.
  - cringepirate 6y ago
    I don't believe that for a second. In the UK where I live the government subsidise rail. Rail is very expensive, slow and unreliable especially compared to my diesel car. I would rather cycle to the train station, get onto the train with my bike and then cycle the other side to work. However it costs me almost twice as much to do and takes me 3 times as long. Even with all the taxes on fuel, emissions and the price of repairing what is now an old car (my Car is over 15 years old and has done many many miles). Driving is cheaper, generally gets me there quicker even when travelling across the whole country. Rail tickets keep on increasing in price and the service never improves and the whole experience is unpleasant. In the rest of Europe cars are just taxed heavily and people still buy them. This idea that people don't want cars just isn't true.
    - pessimizer 6y ago
      In the UK where you live the government ripped up half the rails, then privatized the rest. Oh, Doctor Beeching! Please, Mr. Branson! The UK once subsidized a working system, then destroyed most of that system without any resulting cost savings, then sold it to billionaires who it now subsidizes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beeching_cuts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beeching_cuts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privatisation_of_British_Rail https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privatisation_of_British_Rail
      - cringepirate 6y ago
        This old attempted gotcha. It doesn't prove what you think it does. I am well aware of the story. BTW British rail stopped being profitable back in 1955 (7 years after nationalisation). It proves that maybe you shouldn't let government take public ownership of companies. Government will frequently provide the worse of both worlds as it tries to appease everyone and ends up serving no-one. The result for the UK is that we have a very expensive rail service that is horrible to use and it is simply cheaper to drive.
        andys627 6y ago
        Think of the roads as public transit. It was never "profitable" and requiring profitability is a bad way to run a transit system.
- specialist 6y ago
  That's one version. Caro's The Power Broker details how Bob Moses was the agent of the powerful forces behind the automobile. The only stakeholders not represented, or even consulted, were the average taxpaying citizens. Any dissent was ruthlessly squashed. Urban planners and normal citizens have been critical since the very beginning. The debate really picked up after WWII, with the resumption of peace time economy. By the 50s, the experts had enough real world data -- more highways creates more congestion, focus on cars to the exclusion of mass transit physically cannot work -- to invalidate the entire premise. Eighty years later, here we are still clutching at pearls, trying not to faint. As if there's anything left to debate. I shouldn't be shocked. But somehow I still am. Or maybe just disappointed.
  - ipnon 6y ago
    The history of the automobile in America is longer. Until the 1940s you will struggle to find detrimental side effects of automobile adoption. The automobile did for the town what the railroad did for the city. The negative effects of the automobile on American society, as you rightly point, are an effect of the automobiles runaway success. We passed the point where the automobile was a net positive around the 1950s. This is when planners like Moses begin forcing further adoption, that was rightly opposed at the time.
    - specialist 6y ago
      Ya, Caro's summary is very measured, which I think older, calmer me now agrees with: The problem was never the automobile per se, but the emphasis on the automobile to the exclusion of everything else. Starting with land use policies which only accommodate automobile centric development.
      - megameter 6y ago
        The biggest error in early auto policy, in my opinion, was the emphasis on straight-line speed over continuous flow. The first cars were not that fast and did not accelerate easily, so it makes some sense that there would be advocacy to get every last bit out of the engine through highway design. Add to that the requisite hype for a new, impactful technology and you get the approach that paved the earth. But we have gradually come to realize the point of traffic calming, roundabouts, transit-oriented design and other tools that make people stigmergically decide on appropriate trip plans and driving parameters.
- ipnon 6y ago
  The automobile was the original "clean" transportation. The alternative at the time of its adoption was the horse drawn carriage or buggy. American cities were literally knee deep in manure. Exercise: Graph the adoption of the automobile to the prevalence of cholera in the United States.

rayiner 6y ago

That framing as a way to misrepresent the fact auto industry gave people what they wanted. Many newly developed parts of Europe are the same way, because that’s what people want.

0xdde 6y ago
What is this based on? A dogmatic belief that markets perfectly line up with public sentiment and desires?
andys627 6y ago
People didn't want cars, they wanted what the gov't subsidized. Here in the US cars are subsidized and transit, biking, walking is penalized. These dials are turned differently in different countries.
- cringepirate 6y ago
  I don't believe that for a second. In the UK where I live the government subsidise rail. Rail is very expensive, slow and unreliable especially compared to my diesel car. I would rather cycle to the train station, get onto the train with my bike and then cycle the other side to work. However it costs me almost twice as much to do and takes me 3 times as long. Even with all the taxes on fuel, emissions and the price of repairing what is now an old car (my Car is over 15 years old and has done many many miles). Driving is cheaper, generally gets me there quicker even when travelling across the whole country. Rail tickets keep on increasing in price and the service never improves and the whole experience is unpleasant. In the rest of Europe cars are just taxed heavily and people still buy them. This idea that people don't want cars just isn't true.
  - pessimizer 6y ago
    In the UK where you live the government ripped up half the rails, then privatized the rest. Oh, Doctor Beeching! Please, Mr. Branson! The UK once subsidized a working system, then destroyed most of that system without any resulting cost savings, then sold it to billionaires who it now subsidizes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beeching_cuts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beeching_cuts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privatisation_of_British_Rail https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privatisation_of_British_Rail
    - cringepirate 6y ago
      This old attempted gotcha. It doesn't prove what you think it does. I am well aware of the story. BTW British rail stopped being profitable back in 1955 (7 years after nationalisation). It proves that maybe you shouldn't let government take public ownership of companies. Government will frequently provide the worse of both worlds as it tries to appease everyone and ends up serving no-one. The result for the UK is that we have a very expensive rail service that is horrible to use and it is simply cheaper to drive.
      - andys627 6y ago
        Think of the roads as public transit. It was never "profitable" and requiring profitability is a bad way to run a transit system.
specialist 6y ago
That's one version. Caro's The Power Broker details how Bob Moses was the agent of the powerful forces behind the automobile. The only stakeholders not represented, or even consulted, were the average taxpaying citizens. Any dissent was ruthlessly squashed. Urban planners and normal citizens have been critical since the very beginning. The debate really picked up after WWII, with the resumption of peace time economy. By the 50s, the experts had enough real world data -- more highways creates more congestion, focus on cars to the exclusion of mass transit physically cannot work -- to invalidate the entire premise. Eighty years later, here we are still clutching at pearls, trying not to faint. As if there's anything left to debate. I shouldn't be shocked. But somehow I still am. Or maybe just disappointed.
- ipnon 6y ago
  The history of the automobile in America is longer. Until the 1940s you will struggle to find detrimental side effects of automobile adoption. The automobile did for the town what the railroad did for the city. The negative effects of the automobile on American society, as you rightly point, are an effect of the automobiles runaway success. We passed the point where the automobile was a net positive around the 1950s. This is when planners like Moses begin forcing further adoption, that was rightly opposed at the time.
  - specialist 6y ago
    Ya, Caro's summary is very measured, which I think older, calmer me now agrees with: The problem was never the automobile per se, but the emphasis on the automobile to the exclusion of everything else. Starting with land use policies which only accommodate automobile centric development.
    - megameter 6y ago
      The biggest error in early auto policy, in my opinion, was the emphasis on straight-line speed over continuous flow. The first cars were not that fast and did not accelerate easily, so it makes some sense that there would be advocacy to get every last bit out of the engine through highway design. Add to that the requisite hype for a new, impactful technology and you get the approach that paved the earth. But we have gradually come to realize the point of traffic calming, roundabouts, transit-oriented design and other tools that make people stigmergically decide on appropriate trip plans and driving parameters.
ipnon 6y ago
The automobile was the original "clean" transportation. The alternative at the time of its adoption was the horse drawn carriage or buggy. American cities were literally knee deep in manure. Exercise: Graph the adoption of the automobile to the prevalence of cholera in the United States.