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I'm still missing a vision for a positive future which lacks EVs. Every vision of a low-carbon future requires many things to change. You're saying we should l

I'm still missing a vision for a positive future which lacks EVs. Every vision of a low-carbon future requires many things to change. You're saying we should let the current slow movement on electricty generation be an excuse for not moving on EVs (despite the fact that they're an improvement regardless). You could similarly argue that the slow movement on EVs should be an excuse from not improving electricity generation (despite the fact that there are improvements regardless). Whataboutism about one vision is worthless until you have a better vision, where we can compare the practical and political tradeoffs between them.

lm28469 5y ago
Simple: no more personal cars But yeah that would require work, let's just cry about losing convenience and continue perpetuating the same cycle again, since we have no options but to commit to our clearly unsustainable model
- goatlover 5y ago
  How is that going to work out politically? You think a majority of voters are gong to support banning all personal automobiles? In the US, banning personal firearms is non-starter, and car ownership is even more deeply embedded.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  You’re complaining about the environmental impact of reworking a few billion vehicles but blink at razing and rebuilding cities?
- afarrell 5y ago
  That would not solve the problems like transporting goods from ports and warehouses to stores or transporting equipment that a plumber or drummer needs to do their job. We'll still need electric trucks and vans.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    Presumably the parent has something more drastic in mind, like leveling every city and replanning it around bikes and extending public transit to every rural community. Basically treat every place like a dense urban area or force people to move into dense urban areas. At least those are the common, facile alternatives presented by the anti-car side of these debates. It's just urban chauvinism.
    - afarrell 5y ago
      Faced with an overwhelming problem, is is tempting to seek simple solutions which would boil the ocean. Personally, I’d prioritize suboptimal solutions which prevent a rise in ocean temperatures.
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        Maybe I'm not very clever, but it's hard to guess what you're driving at here.
        afarrell 5y ago
        1. An argument (that others are also making) that we need to be willing to accept partial solutions. 2. A pun.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        Yes, I understand that. I'm not sure which is the "partial solution" in this scenario, EVs?
    - kmeisthax 5y ago
      I've never heard an anti-car person call for public transit in the sticks. It doesn't seem viable to me[0], and I'm pretty anti-car as is. Most people live in cities or suburbs now and I don't see that changing anytime soon - so it doesn't really make sense to disrupt the lives of people living in rural areas. While "make everything dense again" is kind of the end-goal, the way we get there isn't so much by "forcing" people to move into dense urban areas. At least, not unless you consider markets to be a form of coercion, in which case everything is "forced" all of the time and I have no argument for you. What happens is that we stop overplanning zoning codes, let commercial and residential zones mix, and allow the market to do it's job rather than just lining the pockets of whoever bought into the neighborhood 30 years ago. As to your point about urban chauvinism, I do want to point out that while New Urbanism (the thing you're talking about) is really prevalent in urban spaces, so are NIMBYs. It's not so much "everyone should live like us"; it's an argument between people who want city centers to actually be cities and people who still think mixed-use land is the path to crack-era Manhattan. Dense urban spaces are already so desirable now that pretty much every formerly-cheap neighborhood has been gentrified to the hilt. If more people want to live in a dense urban area, then why shouldn't the housing market be allowed to cater to that desire and expand the urban core outwards or upwards? [0] Though I may be wrong about this. Part of the reason why Amtrak still exists in it's current form is because it's a de-facto subsidy from Acela[1] riders to rural towns with no airport links. [1] Me: Mom, can I have a Shinkansen? Mom: No, we have a Shinkansen at home. Shinkansen at home: acela.jpg
- aperson_hello 5y ago
  And it would require massive amounts of time (building the new infrastructure to support this vision would take generations), which we don't have...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

lm28469 5y ago

Simple: no more personal cars But yeah that would require work, let's just cry about losing convenience and continue perpetuating the same cycle again, since we have no options but to commit to our clearly unsustainable model

goatlover 5y ago
How is that going to work out politically? You think a majority of voters are gong to support banning all personal automobiles? In the US, banning personal firearms is non-starter, and car ownership is even more deeply embedded.
JumpCrisscross 5y ago
You’re complaining about the environmental impact of reworking a few billion vehicles but blink at razing and rebuilding cities?
afarrell 5y ago
That would not solve the problems like transporting goods from ports and warehouses to stores or transporting equipment that a plumber or drummer needs to do their job. We'll still need electric trucks and vans.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  Presumably the parent has something more drastic in mind, like leveling every city and replanning it around bikes and extending public transit to every rural community. Basically treat every place like a dense urban area or force people to move into dense urban areas. At least those are the common, facile alternatives presented by the anti-car side of these debates. It's just urban chauvinism.
  - afarrell 5y ago
    Faced with an overwhelming problem, is is tempting to seek simple solutions which would boil the ocean. Personally, I’d prioritize suboptimal solutions which prevent a rise in ocean temperatures.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      Maybe I'm not very clever, but it's hard to guess what you're driving at here.
      - afarrell 5y ago
        1. An argument (that others are also making) that we need to be willing to accept partial solutions. 2. A pun.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        Yes, I understand that. I'm not sure which is the "partial solution" in this scenario, EVs?
  - kmeisthax 5y ago
    I've never heard an anti-car person call for public transit in the sticks. It doesn't seem viable to me[0], and I'm pretty anti-car as is. Most people live in cities or suburbs now and I don't see that changing anytime soon - so it doesn't really make sense to disrupt the lives of people living in rural areas. While "make everything dense again" is kind of the end-goal, the way we get there isn't so much by "forcing" people to move into dense urban areas. At least, not unless you consider markets to be a form of coercion, in which case everything is "forced" all of the time and I have no argument for you. What happens is that we stop overplanning zoning codes, let commercial and residential zones mix, and allow the market to do it's job rather than just lining the pockets of whoever bought into the neighborhood 30 years ago. As to your point about urban chauvinism, I do want to point out that while New Urbanism (the thing you're talking about) is really prevalent in urban spaces, so are NIMBYs. It's not so much "everyone should live like us"; it's an argument between people who want city centers to actually be cities and people who still think mixed-use land is the path to crack-era Manhattan. Dense urban spaces are already so desirable now that pretty much every formerly-cheap neighborhood has been gentrified to the hilt. If more people want to live in a dense urban area, then why shouldn't the housing market be allowed to cater to that desire and expand the urban core outwards or upwards? [0] Though I may be wrong about this. Part of the reason why Amtrak still exists in it's current form is because it's a de-facto subsidy from Acela[1] riders to rural towns with no airport links. [1] Me: Mom, can I have a Shinkansen? Mom: No, we have a Shinkansen at home. Shinkansen at home: acela.jpg
aperson_hello 5y ago
And it would require massive amounts of time (building the new infrastructure to support this vision would take generations), which we don't have...
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]