People got cars in large part because new development was done in car-specific ways rather than dense ways that support alternatives. I recommend Robert Caro's

People got cars in large part because new development was done in car-specific ways rather than dense ways that support alternatives. I recommend Robert Caro's The Power Broker, which goes into how new development was shaped by roads without planning for rail or mass transit, and how even as this was being built in the 1950s people understood induced demand and how roads couldn't scale and advocated for the inclusion of planning for mass transit but were overruled. This led to sparse suburban development that required cars, but didn't have to be the case. Once it was in place it was prohibitively expensive (and in many cases impossible) to change.