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I expect pollution to be as much of a driver of the push for electric cars as climate change. It's something that affects people directly, immediately and notic

I expect pollution to be as much of a driver of the push for electric cars as climate change. It's something that affects people directly, immediately and noticeably - it stinks. If I had a vote whether to ban combustion engines from my city (cars, trucks, mopeds, leaf blowers - everything), with a relatively short transition period (say 5 years), I'd be in favor. It would probably initially drive up prices of goods due to a shortage of electric delivery vehicles or the need to repack everything onto smaller local trucks outside the city, but I think it'd be worth it.

b9a2cab5 5y ago
It would also financially cripple any poor person that relies on a car to get to work. And public transportation won't be viable in the US until cities finally wrap their head around the reality that you need basic security checkpoints at entrances to discourage riff raff from getting in (like in China). If you've ever ridden BART, you know what I mean.
- wffurr 5y ago
  BART is uniquely bad in that respect. Significantly worse than other North American cities. Chalk it up to Bay Area dysfunction and inequality. Used EVs will be relatively affordable soon and the total cost of ownership is significantly lower.
  - refulgentis 5y ago
    > Used EVs will be relatively affordable soon We're very far away from crossing under 30K, much less 10K
    - cyberbanjo 5y ago
      Used Chevy volt for 5-15k, it seems you can get a sub 10k electric car already?
      - sokoloff 5y ago
        A Volt is a hybrid, not a pure electric. (The Bolt is Chevy’s BEV.)
        ben_w 5y ago
        Even a hybrid is probably sufficient in this context.
        sokoloff 5y ago
        Upthread context: “If I had a vote whether to ban combustion engines from my city (cars, trucks, mopeds, leaf blowers - everything), with a relatively short transition period (say 5 years), I'd be in favor.” In that context, the Volt (and other hybrids, plug-in or not) would either be banned or be required to disable their ICE engines in the city. * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28504461 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28504461
        perl4ever 5y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is_the_enemy_of_good https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is_the_enemy_of_good But EVs are really not perfect anyway. People say why have two powerplants. The reason is to get rid of the (environmental impact of) 300 mile batteries. 90% of the time, 10% of the battery is enough. From the page above: "If you never miss a plane, you're spending too much time at the airport."
        ben_w 5y ago
        Indeed, and that was for the reason of ending emissions within a city. A poor person who commutes with one is likely (even though not guaranteed) to be using it over the sort of distance where the tiny battery is sufficient, so with regard to achieving that goal rather than that method, I think hybrids would probably be sufficient.
        sokoloff 5y ago
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      My LEAF cost a little over $30K brand new (before $10K in total rebates). Used LEAFs (and Smart ED/EQs) are readily available in the $5K to $10K range.
  - NineStarPoint 5y ago
    BART existing at all puts it ahead of the majority of cities in the US (for reference, per capita San Fansisco has the second most trips on public transit of any city in the US). New York is the only US city that has comparable public transit to international contemporaries. Long decades of poor planing in the US (and in general the low population density) make it a place ill-suited to public transportation. EVs affordable enough for the poor will definitely be required here, so here’s hoping you’re right and we’ll reach that point soon.
    - gunfighthacksaw 5y ago
      >EVs affordable enough for the poor will definitely be required here Here in SW Ontario there are countless people riding those electric scooters or ebikes in the summertime. I’ve even seen old barflies hop on after drinking a pitcher and head on to the next spot. I’m sure the Bay Area has more clement weather year-round than here.
      - b9a2cab5 5y ago
        I commuted to/from a train on an electric scooter. Not only are they just not viable for any trips longer than 3-4 miles, you can't go up any sort of incline either. Mine was "overclocked" to enable up to 500w of power and I'm 180lbs, but it wouldn't be able to climb even a 10 degree incline at over walking speed. And at least the consumer ones you can find on Amazon are not robust enough to withstand even 6 months of daily use before the tire wears out, battery terminals corrode, and screws start falling out.
        ClumsyPilot 5y ago
        I've used a normal bike and an e-bike and didn't have such issues.
        b9a2cab5 5y ago
        $2k e-bikes are probably more robust than the $600 scooter I was riding and would definitely be my choice next time around. For anyone interested in e-scootering though, avoid the Segway ES series like hell and make sure you do your research.
- w4 5y ago
  > And public transportation won't be viable in the US until cities finally wrap their head around the reality that you need basic security checkpoints at entrances to discourage riff raff from getting in (like in China). It seems like you're in SF. The bad experiences you have had there do not generalize to all other cities. I've lived in several US and foreign cities that have safe public transit without security checkpoints. Omnipresent security forces shouldn't be necessary if other city and state services are functional.
  - b9a2cab5 5y ago
    US cities I've been to: East Coast city 1: no light rail, buses come every 45min East Coast city 2: no light rail, buses come every 30-45min, but at least they were free West Coast city 1: no light rail, buses come every 45min and cost $$$ if you want to take an express route SF Bay Area: BART is a disaster, CalTrain only works well during peak hours and only if you live in the Peninsula. I literally watched a group of 2 teenagers hop the fare gates, get on, then get off the station before the fare checkers got on. Every station smells like piss and most of the ones in SF proper have shit in them too. BART East Bay -> Fremont/SJ is easily a 2 hour ride because the train moves at sub-30mph in residential areas. Chicago: Trains still move pretty slowly but don't have piss and shit all over them at least. From what I can tell, buses are also not viable for reasonable transportation. Boston: Decent trains in most of the downtown/Cambridge area, but suburbs were pretty much a non-starter. In comparison: Shanghai/Beijing: security checkpoints at subway entrances, getting on/off trains is orderly and trains are clean. Trains run fast because authorities don't care about making too much noise, so you aren't better off driving because the train was running at 25mph. Trains come every 5mins or more often. You can get across the city in under an hour. For the US cities that had light rail, the issues were clearly not due to lack of funding but due to NIMBYism limiting speeds and a refusal to enforce any level of security (in the case of SF). I bet you can get BART to come every 5 mins instead of every 20mins with the same number of trains if you 4x'd the speed to 80-100 mph. BART already does over that speed in long stretches like the Bay tunnel or the long stretches in Fremont so it's not like this requires any sort of re-engineering.
    - namdnay 5y ago
- ben_w 5y ago
  I think security checkpoints are the wrong solution to the wrong problem. Yes, American public transport and city design does indeed suck — I am not an American, but I have visited for a total of 4 months, used public transport in NYC, Boston, Bay Area, and the SanFran-Davis-Sacremento line — but here in Berlin there aren’t even ticket barriers, and nothing particularly exciting happens here even from the homeless person[0] who begged on my pre-COVID commute. Some fairly fancy busking from time to time, but that’s the peak of excitement. [0] I assume. Just one person, recognised their practiced speech. Might have been selling German equivalent to the Big Issue for all I know, as they didn’t really get in the way of anyone.
  - luckylion 5y ago
    Berlin's public transport is pretty dirty though. If I had to live in Berlin, I'd get a car, even if it takes more time. I realize everyone has a different threshold for what they consider dirty, and people voluntarily living in Berlin seem to have a much higher threshold than me, but yeah, I'd prefer some checks in exchange for clean & undamaged public transport.
- thefounder 5y ago
  >> until cities finally wrap their head around the reality that you need basic security checkpoints at entrances Sounds like you live in a "war zone". I don't know any place in Europe with that kind of security.
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    Yeah it's bad enough to deal with all that when flying. If this would come to the metro I'd never use it again. All we really have in terms of crime is pickpockets. Adding security will just make them operate more on the streets. We don't have a totalitarian state here like China. That's a good thing.
    - b9a2cab5 5y ago
      I'm not talking about the millimeter wave scanners TSA has where they make you take off your shoes and take out all your stuff. We're talking 1-2 officers who quickly glance inside your bag and maybe a metal detector you walk through, similar to the security at a football game. It's more intended as security theatre by the presence of officers to discourage petty crime than to catch terrorists. Forcing criminals to move to the streets makes public transportation more appealing, I think that's obvious enough.
      - thefounder 5y ago
        >> glance inside your bag and maybe a metal detector Why would you like transportation staff to treat you like a criminal? >> Forcing criminals to move to the streets Maybe a better approach would be to have less criminals rather than to move them around?
        b9a2cab5 5y ago
        > Why would you like transportation staff to treat you like a criminal? Because I accept that a slight inconvenience will lead to a much better riding experience. For example, Amtrak has aggressive fare checkers onboard (full pass of the train every few minutes) who will remove a lot of the type of people that cause disruptions. If you've already been checked, you have a ticket stub above your seat. Is it a coincidence that Amtrak trains are also very clean and have basically no crime? I feel comfortable using my phone on Amtrak without gripping it with two hands and constantly looking around me to prevent theft - I can't say the same about BART. > Maybe a better approach would be to have less criminals rather than to move them around? SFBA cities' budgets are quantified in the billions. We can afford to work towards having less while simultaneously reducing the locations they have access to for committing crime.
- Nbox9 5y ago
  Imagine being exposed to some of the most vulnerable and desperate people in The United States and thinking “We should keep them out” instead of “We should help them.”
  - krisoft 5y ago
    These are not incompatible thoughts though are they? One can think that we should help the homeless while also think that the public transport is not usable for their own usage while it also acts as a homeless shelter. I’m not living in a city where this is a problem, so maybe my viewpoint is naive here. I want my tax to be spent on helping the homeless, even if that means that I have to pay more, and I also don’t want to sit next to someone on the bus who had no opportunity to wash in the last weeks. I don’t feel that these thoughts are in conflict.
  - fennecfoxen 5y ago
    It’d be quite nice to help them. The SF budget certainly tries, though $50,000 for a tent is a little on the steep side. “Free rein to abuse the subway system and its riders” is however a policy with very limited utility when it comes to helping people, and the costs are very high. Transit systems should keep them out insofar as they are not engaging in transit.
- occz 5y ago
  These problems do not exist for much of the rest of the worlds public transportation systems. The problem that San Francisco is facing, and that you should attempt to solve instead of spending energy on excluding already poor people from public transportation, is homelessness.
- throwawaysea 5y ago
  In the least we need better surveillance of public spaces and facial recognition for (limited) use when a crime is involved. If criminals aren’t brought to justice and don’t face consequences, there is no deterrent and they’ll perform more crimes and bigger crimes. It is why BART escalated from isolated crimes to an entire train being raided by 50-60 robbers with no arrests (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bart-robbery-oakland-teens-storm-passenger-train-strongman-thefts/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bart-robbery-oakland-teens-stor...).
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
WarOnPrivacy 5y ago
> It would probably initially drive up prices of goods due to a shortage of electric delivery vehicles or the need to repack everything onto smaller local trucks outside the city, but I think it'd be worth it. There was a decade where we often ate plain white rice exclusively, as it was all we could afford. Even a small jump in prices would have increased the number of days where we couldn't afford any food at all. Many, many folks are in similar situations. I feel we should factor them into these equations.
- brendoelfrendo 5y ago
  I feel like this is an argument in favor of broader social safety nets, not against pollution prevention.
- dillondoyle 5y ago
  Plus getting enough chargers, and upgrading old homes & grids to support that is expensive. I think we should spend a BIG chunk of a (hopefully passed) reconciliation bill on that instead of expanding highways.
throwawaysea 5y ago
I am not sure it affects people as directly as you claim, at least not everywhere. I can see that argument in Los Angeles or Mumbai, but not in Seattle or Portland, where the air is fine and there’s no “stink” even with people mostly using combustion engines.
- nikkwong 5y ago
  Politely disagree. I ride a bicycle as a means of transportation around Seattle and the exhaust from vehicles is so unpleasant that it makes me consider either not going out, or also driving a vehicle instead to get around. Further, it's just unpleasant to be trying to enjoy a walk around the city; or being anywhere near a road and then having the jarring experience of being surrounded by a plume of fumes. They stink & they're terribly unhealthy to inhale. And even when you're not noticing them acutely, they're probably wading into your lungs at some degree as long as you're within X distance from a road. I think cities would be much more pleasant without them.
  - throwawaysea 5y ago
    I also bike and walk around the city alongside driving, and have almost never smelled or seen a “plume of fumes”. Vehicles today emit very little human-detectable pollution. These aren’t dirty two stroke engines like on a leaf blower, but heavily regulated and incredibly advanced engines. The only times I can think of when I’ve seen a problem is when the rare vehicle (like an older semi) is emitting dark clouds of smoke, which is atypical. I’ve also eaten at many outdoor dining setups that are in the parking lane of a road with motor vehicles and neither I nor those with me thought it to be unpleasant. It feels to me like the imagery you’re drawing (“plume of fumes”) is hyperbole. What am I missing here? Do you have video of what you’re describing or some other way to help me understand?
    - nikkwong 5y ago
      I don't know what to tell you if you say that you bike around the crowded city streets of Seattle and you have never smelled vehicle exhaust. I in particular do not have a very keen sense of smell and hardly a minute goes by without having to hold my breath to wait for a plum of fumes to disseminate. Yes, I would agree that the plumes are not visible, but that is not what I'm claiming. Just because they are not visible does not mean they are not affecting our health.
duxup 5y ago
I remember my first trips to Europe. I was from a suburban (although not connected to an urban center) town in the Midwest USA. After a few days in the city my eyes were red and itchy. Took me a bit to figure out it wasn't allergies to something new... it was just the vehicle exhaust. The smell of diesel exhaust still makes me think of London, Paris... etc. Somehow that imprinted on me. They're actually good memories, but just an unusual spell to associate them with.
- obedm 5y ago
  I lived in cities all my life, until two years ago when I moved to the very green suburbs of Budapest. Now, Whenever we go to the city, I notice how much it stinks. It's so weird because I never noticed that before. My nose for used to "clean" hair now. And I don't even live away from the road. I'd like to move even more into the woods.
  - occz 5y ago
    This might depend on which city you refer to. For example, I wouldn't say that Stockholm has any discernable smell to it.
    - beebeepka 5y ago
      Maybe Stockholm has plenty of wind? Big cities tend to stink. Didn't bother me until my 30s, now I can barely tolerate the smell, not just the fact that it kills us. But hey, people want cars. Lots of dirty but cheap cars. Almost nobody seems to care. It's just the nature of living in a poor country I guess.
      - occz 5y ago
        Stockholm isn't particularly windy. I think cars generally contribute to bad smells, and poor waste management infrastructure can also contribute to bad smells (think garbage bins out on streets instead of enclosed, for example)
amluto 5y ago
There might be better bang for the buck by starting with the more highly polluting things. Other than CO2, things like leaf blowers are _vastly_ worse than cars. Also, excellent electric leaf blowers are widely available and appear (at least at my local Home Depot) to be _less_ expensive than their gas equivalents. I see no reason for a 5-year phaseout — one year ought to be plenty.
- occz 5y ago
  They need not be mutually exclusive - we can do both, and we should.
- R0b0t1 5y ago
  This might be a hard sell. ICE lawn equipment might be slightly heavier, but it also performs much better in my experience. Total run time and emitted particulate matters, do you actually have reason to believe the total output of lawn equipment is comparable to vehicle output?
  - thomasqm 5y ago
    From trustworthy wikipedia: "A 2011 study found that the amount of NMHC pollutants emitted by a leaf blower operated for 30 minutes is comparable to the amount emitted by a Ford F-150 pickup truck driving from Texas to Alaska. The two-stroke engines used in most leaf blowers operate by mixing gasoline with oil, and a third of this mixture is not burned, but is emitted as an aerosol exhaust. These pollutants have been linked to cancer, heart disease, and asthma," cited with https://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/features/emissions-test-car-vs-truck-vs-leaf-blower.html https://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/features/emissions-test-... and https://www.wsj.com/articles/leaf-blowers-are-loud-ugly-and-dangerous-1539903772 https://www.wsj.com/articles/leaf-blowers-are-loud-ugly-and-...
    - R0b0t1 5y ago
      Ah, you're right. I remember seeing these ages ago, I wonder how I forgot. There's 4-stroke lawnmowers though, how bad are they?
0-_-0 5y ago
The difference in pollution between electric and ICE cars might be small, since most pollution is so-called "Non-exhaust emissions", like road surface wear, tyres and brakes: https://www.emissionsanalytics.com/news/pollution-tyre-wear-worse-exhaust-emissions https://www.emissionsanalytics.com/news/pollution-tyre-wear-...
- namdnay 5y ago
  Electric cars use their brakes far less. If you play around with the regenerative breaking you can handle 90% of situations without ever touching the brakes And your article is only talking about local particulate pollution, let’s not forget the bigger issue of CO2
- chithanh 5y ago
  ICEs use friction brakes. Electric (and hybrid) vehicles normally use regenerative brakes, and friction brakes only as a backup system.
- robocat 5y ago
  From link > [We] performed some initial tyre wear testing. Using a popular family hatchback running on brand new, correctly inflated tyres, we found that the car emitted 5.8 grams per kilometer of particles. That is 5.8kg per 1000km!!! An article that makes such ridiculous claims can be dismissed as trash. A small car tire weighs about 7kg[1], so absolutely no tyres or brakes left after less than 10000km. Also note the the vast majority of tyre particles are larger than 50um. By weight, I would guess less than 1% of wear by weight was < PM10 - see graph[2] from the first paper I found that measured tyre wear[3]. Edit: I'm not saying tyre and brake particulate doesn't matter, but I am saying that link looks to be solidly in the stupid camp. [1] https://www.oponeo.co.uk/blog/how-much-does-a-tyre-weigh https://www.oponeo.co.uk/blog/how-much-does-a-tyre-weigh [2] https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0301679X20301936-fx1_lrg.jpg https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0301679X203019... [3] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0301679X20301936 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03016...
  - 0-_-0 5y ago
xnx 5y ago
Also a huge win for noise pollution.
hhjinks 5y ago
I lived in Berlin for a year and literally can't go to big cities anymore. The pollution triggers my asthma to the point I have continuous attacks despite taking all the medication I can responsibly take. Thankfully my home town is far less polluted, but even there my asthma is being triggered. I had a meltdown after having an attack _from opening my window for 30 minutes_. I can't imagine how terrible it must be for people without easy fallback options.
- johnzim 5y ago
  I had a similar situation with London. Ironically I moved to California as the new annual fires started.
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    California was much worse in the 70s/early 80s, where it wasn't forest fires but car exhaust and power plants causing dirty air. A lot of my older friends who grew up in the two big California metro areas have asthma. They cleaned up the air by the late 80s, but now forest fire season is a huge problem instead.
  - DenisM 5y ago
    I highly recommend N95 masks against forest fires from personal experience.
- robocat 5y ago
  I get hay fever, and I moved to a location with reliable onshore breezes. The move has definitely helped reduce the problem, although I still get hay fever on days when the wind comes from the rural inland, and there are days I can’t go into town because of pollen (for example Silver Birch trees). If your asthma is seasonal, then try and find out the source(s)?
  - hhjinks 5y ago
    I have chronic bronchial asthma, and it has gotten worse three times now. Unfortunately there isn't much I can do but get a new treatment plan whenever that happens.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
> If I had a vote whether to ban combustion engines from my city (cars, trucks, mopeds, leaf blowers - everything), with a relatively short transition period (say 5 years), I'd be in favor. Banning sales of internal combustion engine vehicles and products on a short timeline might be reasonable, but banning the operation of ICE vehicles is financially a very regressive policy. Buying a new electric car to get to work might not seem like a big deal to professionals in six-figure jobs, but it would be a crushing blow to someone making $15/hr who plans to drive their Honda Civic until the wheels fall off. Any actual policy decisions will need to focus on new car sales while also incentivizing people to upgrade to EVs. Maybe a cash-for-clunkers style program that takes ICE vehicles off the road and subsidizes the purchase of a new EV. Outright banning ICE transportation is a no-go unless we have a plan to alleviate the financial burden a sudden change puts on the lower class vehicle owners. It can be done, but it would be expensive.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  That is pretty American focused. In developing countries, low end wages aren't enough to buy cars anyways, and the rich people clogging the roads can afford EVs. Even in the rest of the developed world, cars are much more of a luxury item, and ICE vehicles and/or gas to power them are already ladened with lots of taxes (so buying an EV in Norway can be cheaper than buying an ICE).
  - Permagate 5y ago
    I'm not sure where you got the idea that the rich people clogged the road in developing countries, but we heavily depend on cars/motorcycles for our transportation. Poor people use them all the times (especially motorcycles). And people with low wages do take loans just to buy a cheap car/motorcycle, even way before buying a house since they provide immediate benefits with manageable monthly installments. EDIT: It makes me think why there is not much push for electric motorcycles. Whenever EV is mentioned, it's always been a car.
dundarious 5y ago
In a narrow sense I strongly agree, but more generally, I think this is impossible without reversing the neoliberal slide and massively increasing the welfare floor — look at the Yellow Vests in France.
bcrosby95 5y ago
Exhaust isn't the only car pollution. There's also tire and brake wear. But I'm not sure which is worse at this point.
timwaagh 5y ago
It will have to be done at some point. It's also an unjust policy to leave these ice vehicles riding around because not everybody is allowed to drive but everybody suffers the loss of life due to pollution. Before there was no alternative, but now there is one there is ample justification for a ban.
seanmcdirmid 5y ago
> I expect pollution to be as much of a driver of the push for electric cars as climate change. It's something that affects people directly, immediately and noticeably - it stinks. Ya, this is why I expect China to follow through with their EV plans much more thoroughly than the USA. Global warming is abstract, but bad dirty air is a very concrete motivator. For that reason, urban in the states with bad air pollution like LA or Salt Lake City should be big into this also (though bad in the USA is 100+ 2.5 PPM, whereas in China it is 300+ 2.5 PPM).
screye 5y ago
Most hybrids are cheaper and overall more sustainable than fully electric cars. The vast majority of trips are.less.than 50 miles, so mining 300 miles.worth of more battery ends up causing a lot of pollution and a fresh disposal problem. Hybrids with 50 mile electric range and ICE after are much better options. Minimizes pollution at source and point of use. All while being monetarily affordable.
devwastaken 5y ago
Your city would collapse, and the new jobless and homeless would torch it. Electric vehicles are far too expensive, and always will be. They're luxury cars for comparatively wealthy privileged people. Everyone else has a 20 year old gasoline car that still runs. This is all due to American cities passing the bill down and never building proper robust public transportation. Now you can't because thousands of business's are in the way, and the wealthy like being in their private little car.
patagonia 5y ago
Electric cars still create pollution due to breaking and tire wear.
peoplefromibiza 5y ago
I think we should collectively focus on priorities. Replacing flights below a thousand kms with trains and limit road transport to a bare minimum and switch what's left to EVs (or hybrids) would have a big impact already, while also being economically sustainable. After all companies in the GDO are among the largest and most profitable in the World. Most cabs are already hybrid even here in Italy that historically resist to changes. The TCO is already lower than ICEs. An immediate ban on ICE vehicles would only affect the pockets of the low income segment of the population. The big chunk of pollution comes from vehicles running continuously, commuters use their cars to go to work and go back home.
- cal5k 5y ago
  > I think we should collectively focus on priorities. Nobody operates that way though. Too much discussion of public policy seems to be oriented around "if only 'we' could just..." rather than "How can policy align selfish motivations with positive outcomes?" Example: despite the rhetoric you'll find on Twitter, practically everyone who got the COVID vaccine did so because they didn't want to get seriously ill from COVID themselves, not because they really care that much about people they don't know. Similarly, "we" will not be adopting more train travel any time soon unless there's a very compelling reason for individuals to do so. Train travel in North America mostly sucks.
  - peoplefromibiza 5y ago
    > despite the rhetoric you'll find on Twitter, practically everyone who got the COVID vaccine did so because they didn't want to get seriously ill from COVID slightly off topic, but I'll tell you that my main drive to get a vaccine was because if I got covid it would mean be stuck home in quarantine and avoid contacts. Of course I would have done it anyways because I believe in vaccines and all that, but incentives are an angle that should be explored by rule makers. GDO is a big polluter, let's tackle that issue before flooding the city centers with electric scooters that solve nothing and will be abandoned when they are not a novelty anymore and the cold season will knock on the door. p.s. I live in Europe, Italy, and trains are quite good for long distances, unless you live south of Naples, and I've stopped flying from Rone to Milan 10 years ago. Unfortunately high speed trains are not exactly cheap, but not more expensive than flying.
megablast 5y ago
Electric cars still create large amounts of pollution. The number one cause of micro plastics near waterways is from car tyres. Then manufacturing and mining pollution. It’s a awful idea to replace all cars with electric cars.
jimmaswell 5y ago
Couldn't you move instead of forcing all your neighbors to bend to your wishes?
- tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
  I suspect most of my neighbors don't own cars either, simply based on available parking vs. the number of apartments.
chongli 5y ago
Unfortunately banning ICE vehicles is only part of the story. A major health risk in cities is fine particulates caused by tire and road wear. Switching the entire ICE vehicle fleet over to EVs would eliminate pollution from combustion but have no effect on tire/road wear particulates.
belorn 5y ago
It seems that most thoughts seems to go towards transportation if we banned internal combustion from the city, but to me my first thoughts goes to power and heating. It would be interesting to see some number of how much of air pollution in cities comes from traffic and how much comes from other uses of internal combustion.
stjohnswarts 5y ago
I consider myself more of a climate lukewarm-er than full on my panic alarmist but I can agree on the less pollution for our world the better. My worry is more about the anthropocene than GW. I think tech will fix the latter but we have absolutely destroyed the environment
croumet 5y ago
> need to repack everything onto smaller local trucks outside the city So basically creating a new problem. If there is one thing urban environment is 100% dependant on is heavy transportation.
lenkite 5y ago
> If I had a vote whether to ban combustion engines from my city (cars, trucks, mopeds, leaf blowers - everything), with a relatively short transition period (say 5 years), I'd be in favor. Said by someone who has never been poor.

b9a2cab5 5y ago

It would also financially cripple any poor person that relies on a car to get to work. And public transportation won't be viable in the US until cities finally wrap their head around the reality that you need basic security checkpoints at entrances to discourage riff raff from getting in (like in China). If you've ever ridden BART, you know what I mean.

wffurr 5y ago
BART is uniquely bad in that respect. Significantly worse than other North American cities. Chalk it up to Bay Area dysfunction and inequality. Used EVs will be relatively affordable soon and the total cost of ownership is significantly lower.
- refulgentis 5y ago
  > Used EVs will be relatively affordable soon We're very far away from crossing under 30K, much less 10K
  - cyberbanjo 5y ago
    Used Chevy volt for 5-15k, it seems you can get a sub 10k electric car already?
    - sokoloff 5y ago
      A Volt is a hybrid, not a pure electric. (The Bolt is Chevy’s BEV.)
      - ben_w 5y ago
        Even a hybrid is probably sufficient in this context.
        sokoloff 5y ago
        Upthread context: “If I had a vote whether to ban combustion engines from my city (cars, trucks, mopeds, leaf blowers - everything), with a relatively short transition period (say 5 years), I'd be in favor.” In that context, the Volt (and other hybrids, plug-in or not) would either be banned or be required to disable their ICE engines in the city. * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28504461 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28504461
        perl4ever 5y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is_the_enemy_of_good https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_is_the_enemy_of_good But EVs are really not perfect anyway. People say why have two powerplants. The reason is to get rid of the (environmental impact of) 300 mile batteries. 90% of the time, 10% of the battery is enough. From the page above: "If you never miss a plane, you're spending too much time at the airport."
        ben_w 5y ago
        Indeed, and that was for the reason of ending emissions within a city. A poor person who commutes with one is likely (even though not guaranteed) to be using it over the sort of distance where the tiny battery is sufficient, so with regard to achieving that goal rather than that method, I think hybrids would probably be sufficient.
        sokoloff 5y ago
  - sokoloff 5y ago
    My LEAF cost a little over $30K brand new (before $10K in total rebates). Used LEAFs (and Smart ED/EQs) are readily available in the $5K to $10K range.
- NineStarPoint 5y ago
  BART existing at all puts it ahead of the majority of cities in the US (for reference, per capita San Fansisco has the second most trips on public transit of any city in the US). New York is the only US city that has comparable public transit to international contemporaries. Long decades of poor planing in the US (and in general the low population density) make it a place ill-suited to public transportation. EVs affordable enough for the poor will definitely be required here, so here’s hoping you’re right and we’ll reach that point soon.
  - gunfighthacksaw 5y ago
    >EVs affordable enough for the poor will definitely be required here Here in SW Ontario there are countless people riding those electric scooters or ebikes in the summertime. I’ve even seen old barflies hop on after drinking a pitcher and head on to the next spot. I’m sure the Bay Area has more clement weather year-round than here.
    - b9a2cab5 5y ago
      I commuted to/from a train on an electric scooter. Not only are they just not viable for any trips longer than 3-4 miles, you can't go up any sort of incline either. Mine was "overclocked" to enable up to 500w of power and I'm 180lbs, but it wouldn't be able to climb even a 10 degree incline at over walking speed. And at least the consumer ones you can find on Amazon are not robust enough to withstand even 6 months of daily use before the tire wears out, battery terminals corrode, and screws start falling out.
      - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
        I've used a normal bike and an e-bike and didn't have such issues.
        b9a2cab5 5y ago
        $2k e-bikes are probably more robust than the $600 scooter I was riding and would definitely be my choice next time around. For anyone interested in e-scootering though, avoid the Segway ES series like hell and make sure you do your research.
w4 5y ago
> And public transportation won't be viable in the US until cities finally wrap their head around the reality that you need basic security checkpoints at entrances to discourage riff raff from getting in (like in China). It seems like you're in SF. The bad experiences you have had there do not generalize to all other cities. I've lived in several US and foreign cities that have safe public transit without security checkpoints. Omnipresent security forces shouldn't be necessary if other city and state services are functional.
- b9a2cab5 5y ago
  US cities I've been to: East Coast city 1: no light rail, buses come every 45min East Coast city 2: no light rail, buses come every 30-45min, but at least they were free West Coast city 1: no light rail, buses come every 45min and cost $$$ if you want to take an express route SF Bay Area: BART is a disaster, CalTrain only works well during peak hours and only if you live in the Peninsula. I literally watched a group of 2 teenagers hop the fare gates, get on, then get off the station before the fare checkers got on. Every station smells like piss and most of the ones in SF proper have shit in them too. BART East Bay -> Fremont/SJ is easily a 2 hour ride because the train moves at sub-30mph in residential areas. Chicago: Trains still move pretty slowly but don't have piss and shit all over them at least. From what I can tell, buses are also not viable for reasonable transportation. Boston: Decent trains in most of the downtown/Cambridge area, but suburbs were pretty much a non-starter. In comparison: Shanghai/Beijing: security checkpoints at subway entrances, getting on/off trains is orderly and trains are clean. Trains run fast because authorities don't care about making too much noise, so you aren't better off driving because the train was running at 25mph. Trains come every 5mins or more often. You can get across the city in under an hour. For the US cities that had light rail, the issues were clearly not due to lack of funding but due to NIMBYism limiting speeds and a refusal to enforce any level of security (in the case of SF). I bet you can get BART to come every 5 mins instead of every 20mins with the same number of trains if you 4x'd the speed to 80-100 mph. BART already does over that speed in long stretches like the Bay tunnel or the long stretches in Fremont so it's not like this requires any sort of re-engineering.
  - namdnay 5y ago
ben_w 5y ago
I think security checkpoints are the wrong solution to the wrong problem. Yes, American public transport and city design does indeed suck — I am not an American, but I have visited for a total of 4 months, used public transport in NYC, Boston, Bay Area, and the SanFran-Davis-Sacremento line — but here in Berlin there aren’t even ticket barriers, and nothing particularly exciting happens here even from the homeless person[0] who begged on my pre-COVID commute. Some fairly fancy busking from time to time, but that’s the peak of excitement. [0] I assume. Just one person, recognised their practiced speech. Might have been selling German equivalent to the Big Issue for all I know, as they didn’t really get in the way of anyone.
- luckylion 5y ago
  Berlin's public transport is pretty dirty though. If I had to live in Berlin, I'd get a car, even if it takes more time. I realize everyone has a different threshold for what they consider dirty, and people voluntarily living in Berlin seem to have a much higher threshold than me, but yeah, I'd prefer some checks in exchange for clean & undamaged public transport.
thefounder 5y ago
>> until cities finally wrap their head around the reality that you need basic security checkpoints at entrances Sounds like you live in a "war zone". I don't know any place in Europe with that kind of security.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  Yeah it's bad enough to deal with all that when flying. If this would come to the metro I'd never use it again. All we really have in terms of crime is pickpockets. Adding security will just make them operate more on the streets. We don't have a totalitarian state here like China. That's a good thing.
  - b9a2cab5 5y ago
    I'm not talking about the millimeter wave scanners TSA has where they make you take off your shoes and take out all your stuff. We're talking 1-2 officers who quickly glance inside your bag and maybe a metal detector you walk through, similar to the security at a football game. It's more intended as security theatre by the presence of officers to discourage petty crime than to catch terrorists. Forcing criminals to move to the streets makes public transportation more appealing, I think that's obvious enough.
    - thefounder 5y ago
      >> glance inside your bag and maybe a metal detector Why would you like transportation staff to treat you like a criminal? >> Forcing criminals to move to the streets Maybe a better approach would be to have less criminals rather than to move them around?
      - b9a2cab5 5y ago
        > Why would you like transportation staff to treat you like a criminal? Because I accept that a slight inconvenience will lead to a much better riding experience. For example, Amtrak has aggressive fare checkers onboard (full pass of the train every few minutes) who will remove a lot of the type of people that cause disruptions. If you've already been checked, you have a ticket stub above your seat. Is it a coincidence that Amtrak trains are also very clean and have basically no crime? I feel comfortable using my phone on Amtrak without gripping it with two hands and constantly looking around me to prevent theft - I can't say the same about BART. > Maybe a better approach would be to have less criminals rather than to move them around? SFBA cities' budgets are quantified in the billions. We can afford to work towards having less while simultaneously reducing the locations they have access to for committing crime.
Nbox9 5y ago
Imagine being exposed to some of the most vulnerable and desperate people in The United States and thinking “We should keep them out” instead of “We should help them.”
- krisoft 5y ago
  These are not incompatible thoughts though are they? One can think that we should help the homeless while also think that the public transport is not usable for their own usage while it also acts as a homeless shelter. I’m not living in a city where this is a problem, so maybe my viewpoint is naive here. I want my tax to be spent on helping the homeless, even if that means that I have to pay more, and I also don’t want to sit next to someone on the bus who had no opportunity to wash in the last weeks. I don’t feel that these thoughts are in conflict.
- fennecfoxen 5y ago
  It’d be quite nice to help them. The SF budget certainly tries, though $50,000 for a tent is a little on the steep side. “Free rein to abuse the subway system and its riders” is however a policy with very limited utility when it comes to helping people, and the costs are very high. Transit systems should keep them out insofar as they are not engaging in transit.
occz 5y ago
These problems do not exist for much of the rest of the worlds public transportation systems. The problem that San Francisco is facing, and that you should attempt to solve instead of spending energy on excluding already poor people from public transportation, is homelessness.
throwawaysea 5y ago
In the least we need better surveillance of public spaces and facial recognition for (limited) use when a crime is involved. If criminals aren’t brought to justice and don’t face consequences, there is no deterrent and they’ll perform more crimes and bigger crimes. It is why BART escalated from isolated crimes to an entire train being raided by 50-60 robbers with no arrests (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bart-robbery-oakland-teens-storm-passenger-train-strongman-thefts/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bart-robbery-oakland-teens-stor...).

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WarOnPrivacy 5y ago

> It would probably initially drive up prices of goods due to a shortage of electric delivery vehicles or the need to repack everything onto smaller local trucks outside the city, but I think it'd be worth it. There was a decade where we often ate plain white rice exclusively, as it was all we could afford. Even a small jump in prices would have increased the number of days where we couldn't afford any food at all. Many, many folks are in similar situations. I feel we should factor them into these equations.

brendoelfrendo 5y ago
I feel like this is an argument in favor of broader social safety nets, not against pollution prevention.
dillondoyle 5y ago
Plus getting enough chargers, and upgrading old homes & grids to support that is expensive. I think we should spend a BIG chunk of a (hopefully passed) reconciliation bill on that instead of expanding highways.

throwawaysea 5y ago

I am not sure it affects people as directly as you claim, at least not everywhere. I can see that argument in Los Angeles or Mumbai, but not in Seattle or Portland, where the air is fine and there’s no “stink” even with people mostly using combustion engines.

nikkwong 5y ago
Politely disagree. I ride a bicycle as a means of transportation around Seattle and the exhaust from vehicles is so unpleasant that it makes me consider either not going out, or also driving a vehicle instead to get around. Further, it's just unpleasant to be trying to enjoy a walk around the city; or being anywhere near a road and then having the jarring experience of being surrounded by a plume of fumes. They stink & they're terribly unhealthy to inhale. And even when you're not noticing them acutely, they're probably wading into your lungs at some degree as long as you're within X distance from a road. I think cities would be much more pleasant without them.
- throwawaysea 5y ago
  I also bike and walk around the city alongside driving, and have almost never smelled or seen a “plume of fumes”. Vehicles today emit very little human-detectable pollution. These aren’t dirty two stroke engines like on a leaf blower, but heavily regulated and incredibly advanced engines. The only times I can think of when I’ve seen a problem is when the rare vehicle (like an older semi) is emitting dark clouds of smoke, which is atypical. I’ve also eaten at many outdoor dining setups that are in the parking lane of a road with motor vehicles and neither I nor those with me thought it to be unpleasant. It feels to me like the imagery you’re drawing (“plume of fumes”) is hyperbole. What am I missing here? Do you have video of what you’re describing or some other way to help me understand?
  - nikkwong 5y ago
    I don't know what to tell you if you say that you bike around the crowded city streets of Seattle and you have never smelled vehicle exhaust. I in particular do not have a very keen sense of smell and hardly a minute goes by without having to hold my breath to wait for a plum of fumes to disseminate. Yes, I would agree that the plumes are not visible, but that is not what I'm claiming. Just because they are not visible does not mean they are not affecting our health.

duxup 5y ago

I remember my first trips to Europe. I was from a suburban (although not connected to an urban center) town in the Midwest USA. After a few days in the city my eyes were red and itchy. Took me a bit to figure out it wasn't allergies to something new... it was just the vehicle exhaust. The smell of diesel exhaust still makes me think of London, Paris... etc. Somehow that imprinted on me. They're actually good memories, but just an unusual spell to associate them with.

obedm 5y ago
I lived in cities all my life, until two years ago when I moved to the very green suburbs of Budapest. Now, Whenever we go to the city, I notice how much it stinks. It's so weird because I never noticed that before. My nose for used to "clean" hair now. And I don't even live away from the road. I'd like to move even more into the woods.
- occz 5y ago
  This might depend on which city you refer to. For example, I wouldn't say that Stockholm has any discernable smell to it.
  - beebeepka 5y ago
    Maybe Stockholm has plenty of wind? Big cities tend to stink. Didn't bother me until my 30s, now I can barely tolerate the smell, not just the fact that it kills us. But hey, people want cars. Lots of dirty but cheap cars. Almost nobody seems to care. It's just the nature of living in a poor country I guess.
    - occz 5y ago
      Stockholm isn't particularly windy. I think cars generally contribute to bad smells, and poor waste management infrastructure can also contribute to bad smells (think garbage bins out on streets instead of enclosed, for example)

amluto 5y ago

There might be better bang for the buck by starting with the more highly polluting things. Other than CO2, things like leaf blowers are _vastly_ worse than cars. Also, excellent electric leaf blowers are widely available and appear (at least at my local Home Depot) to be _less_ expensive than their gas equivalents. I see no reason for a 5-year phaseout — one year ought to be plenty.

occz 5y ago
They need not be mutually exclusive - we can do both, and we should.
R0b0t1 5y ago
This might be a hard sell. ICE lawn equipment might be slightly heavier, but it also performs much better in my experience. Total run time and emitted particulate matters, do you actually have reason to believe the total output of lawn equipment is comparable to vehicle output?
- thomasqm 5y ago
  From trustworthy wikipedia: "A 2011 study found that the amount of NMHC pollutants emitted by a leaf blower operated for 30 minutes is comparable to the amount emitted by a Ford F-150 pickup truck driving from Texas to Alaska. The two-stroke engines used in most leaf blowers operate by mixing gasoline with oil, and a third of this mixture is not burned, but is emitted as an aerosol exhaust. These pollutants have been linked to cancer, heart disease, and asthma," cited with https://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/features/emissions-test-car-vs-truck-vs-leaf-blower.html https://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/features/emissions-test-... and https://www.wsj.com/articles/leaf-blowers-are-loud-ugly-and-dangerous-1539903772 https://www.wsj.com/articles/leaf-blowers-are-loud-ugly-and-...
  - R0b0t1 5y ago
    Ah, you're right. I remember seeing these ages ago, I wonder how I forgot. There's 4-stroke lawnmowers though, how bad are they?

0-_-0 5y ago

The difference in pollution between electric and ICE cars might be small, since most pollution is so-called "Non-exhaust emissions", like road surface wear, tyres and brakes: https://www.emissionsanalytics.com/news/pollution-tyre-wear-worse-exhaust-emissions https://www.emissionsanalytics.com/news/pollution-tyre-wear-...

namdnay 5y ago
Electric cars use their brakes far less. If you play around with the regenerative breaking you can handle 90% of situations without ever touching the brakes And your article is only talking about local particulate pollution, let’s not forget the bigger issue of CO2
chithanh 5y ago
ICEs use friction brakes. Electric (and hybrid) vehicles normally use regenerative brakes, and friction brakes only as a backup system.
robocat 5y ago
From link > [We] performed some initial tyre wear testing. Using a popular family hatchback running on brand new, correctly inflated tyres, we found that the car emitted 5.8 grams per kilometer of particles. That is 5.8kg per 1000km!!! An article that makes such ridiculous claims can be dismissed as trash. A small car tire weighs about 7kg[1], so absolutely no tyres or brakes left after less than 10000km. Also note the the vast majority of tyre particles are larger than 50um. By weight, I would guess less than 1% of wear by weight was < PM10 - see graph[2] from the first paper I found that measured tyre wear[3]. Edit: I'm not saying tyre and brake particulate doesn't matter, but I am saying that link looks to be solidly in the stupid camp. [1] https://www.oponeo.co.uk/blog/how-much-does-a-tyre-weigh https://www.oponeo.co.uk/blog/how-much-does-a-tyre-weigh [2] https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0301679X20301936-fx1_lrg.jpg https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0301679X203019... [3] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0301679X20301936 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03016...
- 0-_-0 5y ago

xnx 5y ago

Also a huge win for noise pollution.

hhjinks 5y ago

I lived in Berlin for a year and literally can't go to big cities anymore. The pollution triggers my asthma to the point I have continuous attacks despite taking all the medication I can responsibly take. Thankfully my home town is far less polluted, but even there my asthma is being triggered. I had a meltdown after having an attack _from opening my window for 30 minutes_. I can't imagine how terrible it must be for people without easy fallback options.

johnzim 5y ago
I had a similar situation with London. Ironically I moved to California as the new annual fires started.
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  California was much worse in the 70s/early 80s, where it wasn't forest fires but car exhaust and power plants causing dirty air. A lot of my older friends who grew up in the two big California metro areas have asthma. They cleaned up the air by the late 80s, but now forest fire season is a huge problem instead.
- DenisM 5y ago
  I highly recommend N95 masks against forest fires from personal experience.
robocat 5y ago
I get hay fever, and I moved to a location with reliable onshore breezes. The move has definitely helped reduce the problem, although I still get hay fever on days when the wind comes from the rural inland, and there are days I can’t go into town because of pollen (for example Silver Birch trees). If your asthma is seasonal, then try and find out the source(s)?
- hhjinks 5y ago
  I have chronic bronchial asthma, and it has gotten worse three times now. Unfortunately there isn't much I can do but get a new treatment plan whenever that happens.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

> If I had a vote whether to ban combustion engines from my city (cars, trucks, mopeds, leaf blowers - everything), with a relatively short transition period (say 5 years), I'd be in favor. Banning sales of internal combustion engine vehicles and products on a short timeline might be reasonable, but banning the operation of ICE vehicles is financially a very regressive policy. Buying a new electric car to get to work might not seem like a big deal to professionals in six-figure jobs, but it would be a crushing blow to someone making $15/hr who plans to drive their Honda Civic until the wheels fall off. Any actual policy decisions will need to focus on new car sales while also incentivizing people to upgrade to EVs. Maybe a cash-for-clunkers style program that takes ICE vehicles off the road and subsidizes the purchase of a new EV. Outright banning ICE transportation is a no-go unless we have a plan to alleviate the financial burden a sudden change puts on the lower class vehicle owners. It can be done, but it would be expensive.

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seanmcdirmid 5y ago
That is pretty American focused. In developing countries, low end wages aren't enough to buy cars anyways, and the rich people clogging the roads can afford EVs. Even in the rest of the developed world, cars are much more of a luxury item, and ICE vehicles and/or gas to power them are already ladened with lots of taxes (so buying an EV in Norway can be cheaper than buying an ICE).
- Permagate 5y ago
  I'm not sure where you got the idea that the rich people clogged the road in developing countries, but we heavily depend on cars/motorcycles for our transportation. Poor people use them all the times (especially motorcycles). And people with low wages do take loans just to buy a cheap car/motorcycle, even way before buying a house since they provide immediate benefits with manageable monthly installments. EDIT: It makes me think why there is not much push for electric motorcycles. Whenever EV is mentioned, it's always been a car.

dundarious 5y ago

In a narrow sense I strongly agree, but more generally, I think this is impossible without reversing the neoliberal slide and massively increasing the welfare floor — look at the Yellow Vests in France.

bcrosby95 5y ago

Exhaust isn't the only car pollution. There's also tire and brake wear. But I'm not sure which is worse at this point.

timwaagh 5y ago

It will have to be done at some point. It's also an unjust policy to leave these ice vehicles riding around because not everybody is allowed to drive but everybody suffers the loss of life due to pollution. Before there was no alternative, but now there is one there is ample justification for a ban.

seanmcdirmid 5y ago

> I expect pollution to be as much of a driver of the push for electric cars as climate change. It's something that affects people directly, immediately and noticeably - it stinks. Ya, this is why I expect China to follow through with their EV plans much more thoroughly than the USA. Global warming is abstract, but bad dirty air is a very concrete motivator. For that reason, urban in the states with bad air pollution like LA or Salt Lake City should be big into this also (though bad in the USA is 100+ 2.5 PPM, whereas in China it is 300+ 2.5 PPM).

screye 5y ago

Most hybrids are cheaper and overall more sustainable than fully electric cars. The vast majority of trips are.less.than 50 miles, so mining 300 miles.worth of more battery ends up causing a lot of pollution and a fresh disposal problem. Hybrids with 50 mile electric range and ICE after are much better options. Minimizes pollution at source and point of use. All while being monetarily affordable.

devwastaken 5y ago

Your city would collapse, and the new jobless and homeless would torch it. Electric vehicles are far too expensive, and always will be. They're luxury cars for comparatively wealthy privileged people. Everyone else has a 20 year old gasoline car that still runs. This is all due to American cities passing the bill down and never building proper robust public transportation. Now you can't because thousands of business's are in the way, and the wealthy like being in their private little car.

patagonia 5y ago

Electric cars still create pollution due to breaking and tire wear.

peoplefromibiza 5y ago

I think we should collectively focus on priorities. Replacing flights below a thousand kms with trains and limit road transport to a bare minimum and switch what's left to EVs (or hybrids) would have a big impact already, while also being economically sustainable. After all companies in the GDO are among the largest and most profitable in the World. Most cabs are already hybrid even here in Italy that historically resist to changes. The TCO is already lower than ICEs. An immediate ban on ICE vehicles would only affect the pockets of the low income segment of the population. The big chunk of pollution comes from vehicles running continuously, commuters use their cars to go to work and go back home.

cal5k 5y ago
> I think we should collectively focus on priorities. Nobody operates that way though. Too much discussion of public policy seems to be oriented around "if only 'we' could just..." rather than "How can policy align selfish motivations with positive outcomes?" Example: despite the rhetoric you'll find on Twitter, practically everyone who got the COVID vaccine did so because they didn't want to get seriously ill from COVID themselves, not because they really care that much about people they don't know. Similarly, "we" will not be adopting more train travel any time soon unless there's a very compelling reason for individuals to do so. Train travel in North America mostly sucks.
- peoplefromibiza 5y ago
  > despite the rhetoric you'll find on Twitter, practically everyone who got the COVID vaccine did so because they didn't want to get seriously ill from COVID slightly off topic, but I'll tell you that my main drive to get a vaccine was because if I got covid it would mean be stuck home in quarantine and avoid contacts. Of course I would have done it anyways because I believe in vaccines and all that, but incentives are an angle that should be explored by rule makers. GDO is a big polluter, let's tackle that issue before flooding the city centers with electric scooters that solve nothing and will be abandoned when they are not a novelty anymore and the cold season will knock on the door. p.s. I live in Europe, Italy, and trains are quite good for long distances, unless you live south of Naples, and I've stopped flying from Rone to Milan 10 years ago. Unfortunately high speed trains are not exactly cheap, but not more expensive than flying.

megablast 5y ago

Electric cars still create large amounts of pollution. The number one cause of micro plastics near waterways is from car tyres. Then manufacturing and mining pollution. It’s a awful idea to replace all cars with electric cars.

jimmaswell 5y ago

Couldn't you move instead of forcing all your neighbors to bend to your wishes?

tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
I suspect most of my neighbors don't own cars either, simply based on available parking vs. the number of apartments.

chongli 5y ago

Unfortunately banning ICE vehicles is only part of the story. A major health risk in cities is fine particulates caused by tire and road wear. Switching the entire ICE vehicle fleet over to EVs would eliminate pollution from combustion but have no effect on tire/road wear particulates.

belorn 5y ago

It seems that most thoughts seems to go towards transportation if we banned internal combustion from the city, but to me my first thoughts goes to power and heating. It would be interesting to see some number of how much of air pollution in cities comes from traffic and how much comes from other uses of internal combustion.

stjohnswarts 5y ago

I consider myself more of a climate lukewarm-er than full on my panic alarmist but I can agree on the less pollution for our world the better. My worry is more about the anthropocene than GW. I think tech will fix the latter but we have absolutely destroyed the environment

croumet 5y ago

> need to repack everything onto smaller local trucks outside the city So basically creating a new problem. If there is one thing urban environment is 100% dependant on is heavy transportation.

lenkite 5y ago