4 ms·

Making cars electric doesn't solve any of the problems with cars though. Cars, no matter the technology, are the problem. I'd much rather get rid of more or les

by bedobi 5y ago

Making cars electric doesn't solve any of the problems with cars though. Cars, no matter the technology, are the problem. I'd much rather get rid of more or less all cars, permanently, period.

have_faith 5y ago
Cars create opportunities for working class people that wouldn't exist otherwise. You're advocating for removing mid to long range personal transportation entirely? what's the basis for this? I'm all for city neighbourhoods being less car centric.
- bluGill 5y ago
  Sure, but they are still deadly. Self driving isn't ready yet despite the low bar of needing to be better than humans
- bedobi 5y ago
  Of course you can't stop at simply getting rid of cars and calling it a day, there's countless other things that would have to come with that. Obvious ones include improving public and active transport, but really, fundamental transformation of entire cities to be less like Houston and more like Tokyo and Amsterdam is what's needed. People love to respond that that's too expensive or unworkable or unrealistic or whatever, ignoring that it's actually the status quo that is too expensive, unworkable and unrealisitc, and that there are now a bunch of previously car centric cities that have been deliberately and fundamentally changed very successfully.
  - xwolfi 5y ago
    But that's silly. Everyone agrees with you but what if you need to go to your grandparents in the country side village of 200 farmers ? You could build a once-a-day bus line or you could just let people take a non polluting car from a lot outside the city. Cars are not the problem: it's their aggregation in dense city + their pollution. Remove the pollution, people stop dying, we can then discuss your dream of perfect public transport for optimization's sake.
  - post_from_work 5y ago
    >>>People love to respond that that's too expensive or unworkable or unrealistic or whatever, ignoring that it's actually the status quo that is too expensive, unworkable and unrealisitc I'd want to see some numbers to support that. What does it cost to provide round-the-clock availability of secure, climate-controlled public transport to every possible location, urban or rural? Bullet trains on standby at 0100hrs to take 1 guy from Osaka to Kanagawa would cost a fortune. In comparison, while PARKING and roads definitely have costs associated with them, the hardware/infrastructure is largely concrete, and inexpensive to maintain when operating below capacity. So 1-2 people can hop in a car and take a road trip at a far lower net/civilization-wide resource expenditure. Japan has great public transport. Japan also has great cars and a very healthy car community. What part of Japan's transportation approach classifies it as "unworkable and unrealistic" to such an extent that completely banning cars is the optimal solution?
xwolfi 5y ago
I don't get that one. Cars are mostly fine if they don't pollute. They'd just be large bicycles. Why do you think the concept of automated personal transport is "the problem" ? I think for instance we can't possibly build enough railway and bus network to serve every inch of the territory and it's simply to allow fast speed individual transport to distribute the load. It can be even automated with no pilot control, but it's impossible to schedule-base every location in a city without displacing people, rebuilding cities entirely around specific common transport etc. In Europe and Asia, where we build a lot of cities organically, it seems silly. In the US, where cars are even MORE prevalent to the point cities are built for them rather than humans, it will never disappear.

by bedobi 5y ago

Making cars electric doesn't solve any of the problems with cars though. Cars, no matter the technology, are the problem. I'd much rather get rid of more or less all cars, permanently, period.

have_faith 5y ago

Cars create opportunities for working class people that wouldn't exist otherwise. You're advocating for removing mid to long range personal transportation entirely? what's the basis for this? I'm all for city neighbourhoods being less car centric.

bluGill 5y ago
Sure, but they are still deadly. Self driving isn't ready yet despite the low bar of needing to be better than humans
bedobi 5y ago
Of course you can't stop at simply getting rid of cars and calling it a day, there's countless other things that would have to come with that. Obvious ones include improving public and active transport, but really, fundamental transformation of entire cities to be less like Houston and more like Tokyo and Amsterdam is what's needed. People love to respond that that's too expensive or unworkable or unrealistic or whatever, ignoring that it's actually the status quo that is too expensive, unworkable and unrealisitc, and that there are now a bunch of previously car centric cities that have been deliberately and fundamentally changed very successfully.
- xwolfi 5y ago
  But that's silly. Everyone agrees with you but what if you need to go to your grandparents in the country side village of 200 farmers ? You could build a once-a-day bus line or you could just let people take a non polluting car from a lot outside the city. Cars are not the problem: it's their aggregation in dense city + their pollution. Remove the pollution, people stop dying, we can then discuss your dream of perfect public transport for optimization's sake.
- post_from_work 5y ago
  >>>People love to respond that that's too expensive or unworkable or unrealistic or whatever, ignoring that it's actually the status quo that is too expensive, unworkable and unrealisitc I'd want to see some numbers to support that. What does it cost to provide round-the-clock availability of secure, climate-controlled public transport to every possible location, urban or rural? Bullet trains on standby at 0100hrs to take 1 guy from Osaka to Kanagawa would cost a fortune. In comparison, while PARKING and roads definitely have costs associated with them, the hardware/infrastructure is largely concrete, and inexpensive to maintain when operating below capacity. So 1-2 people can hop in a car and take a road trip at a far lower net/civilization-wide resource expenditure. Japan has great public transport. Japan also has great cars and a very healthy car community. What part of Japan's transportation approach classifies it as "unworkable and unrealistic" to such an extent that completely banning cars is the optimal solution?

xwolfi 5y ago

I don't get that one. Cars are mostly fine if they don't pollute. They'd just be large bicycles. Why do you think the concept of automated personal transport is "the problem" ? I think for instance we can't possibly build enough railway and bus network to serve every inch of the territory and it's simply to allow fast speed individual transport to distribute the load. It can be even automated with no pilot control, but it's impossible to schedule-base every location in a city without displacing people, rebuilding cities entirely around specific common transport etc. In Europe and Asia, where we build a lot of cities organically, it seems silly. In the US, where cars are even MORE prevalent to the point cities are built for them rather than humans, it will never disappear.