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Most Americans want it to be that way, and that’s why it is that way. Zoning laws didn’t push people into a car lifestyle. Americans created those zoning laws

Most Americans want it to be that way, and that’s why it is that way. Zoning laws didn’t push people into a car lifestyle. Americans created those zoning laws because they like the car lifestyle and want to perpetuate it. The same is true for suburban zoning in general. People have not been tricked into this: this is what they want.

JKCalhoun 4y ago
I too would like the car lifestyle ... from 1950. Sadly, we have created a monster. I suspect many Americans now don't even know what a community without cars would look like, that it could even work at all.
- kodah 4y ago
  The average American likely doesn't want a life without cars. That seems to be an HN obsession seemingly (my perception) fueled by people who have lived and stayed in very dense urban areas. Creating larger spaces that aren't made for cars is great, but people will still need long-range individual transportation.
  - kiba 4y ago
    Last time I check, these 'dense' urban area aren't exactly great for anybody but cars.
    - kodah 4y ago
      Correct. The car situation is worse there, which is why I think their theories are so whacky when postulated as "get rid of cars" because it fails to be relevant beyond those areas.
    - dionidium 4y ago
      As a former resident of Manhattan, this is where I'm most resentful about car supremacy. I truly don't care that there exist car-centric suburbs. Anybody who lives there knows exactly what they're signing up for. What's insane to me is that we allow cars to dominate even our most urban spaces. When I would walk to work through Midtown, my senses were practically assaulted by automobiles. Honking, speeding, stereos blasting, engines revving, cars encroaching on the crosswalk, and on and on. It's an enormous quality of life issue and one of the things I hated most about living in NYC. "Cities are loud and dangerous. This is just life in the big city!" No, no, no, and no. Cars are loud and dangerous. This is a choice. It's not an unavoidable fact of life in cities. We choose to live this way.
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      - ryukafalz 4y ago
        Yup, I relate to this so much as someone currently living in Philly. We have basically the same issue even in Center City. Cities aren’t loud, cars are loud: https://youtu.be/CTV-wwszGw8 https://youtu.be/CTV-wwszGw8
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      - trgn 4y ago
        > What's insane to me is that we allow cars to dominate even our most urban spaces NYC would be so much better if it weren't for all the car traffic. It's not the density that's strangling it, it's the car completely degrading the experience. > "Cities are loud and dangerous. This is just life in the big city!" No, no, no, and no. Cars are loud and dangerous. This is a choice. It's not an unavoidable fact of life in cities. We choose to live this way. Yes! Americans have a real lack of imagination when it comes to city life. Makes me sad.
  - TylerE 4y ago
    And are young enough not to being dealing with physical issues/disability.
  - gernb 4y ago
    That's fine. They just need to start paying for their externities and stop relying on being subsidized by the dense urban areas. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nw6qyyrTeI https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nw6qyyrTeI
    - falcolas 4y ago
      They are. Via the same mechanisms - taxes paid to the county, who maintains that property. Plus, suburbanites bring a lot of money into the cities, even though they don't live there. Cities could incorporate suburbs into their boundaries, yet cities don't want to do that, because despite griping about their lack of paying city taxes, they don't want to pay to maintain/manage those spaces. I really believe the "suburbs cost cities money" statement is overplayed. Between county taxes (which feed back into the cities in those counties) and HOA (for neighborhood maintenance), they are paying for themselves.
      - kuschku 4y ago
        If suburbs were truly paying for themselves, cities would love to incorporate them. As they do in countries where transit oriented suburbs actually do pay for themselves. The truth is that row houses is the lowest density that still can just barely pay for maintenance of the roads, sewers, water lines, gas lines, electricity lines, and everything else. Any lower density than that, and the taxes of the residents can't cover the actual costs anymore.
  - mminer237 4y ago
    I think it's because the young people online are much more drawn to the active, exciting urban lifestyle than the average American. The average American would much rather have the safety, quiet, and just space that comes with suburban living. People want yards to play with their kids, and that sort of spread-out living just necessitates cars. Housing prices aren't high because of cars. Housing prices are high because people want their own personal space. Nobody's going to build a rail system with a thousand subway stations connecting every neighborhood in a US metro area. That would cost like a trillion dollars, plus maintenance. It's just not feasible to cater good public transport to people living that spread out. And no one wants to walk miles to a less-dense rail system or take some slow bus route. And outside of major cities, I've never heard of someone complain about cars. Most people are perfectly happy with cars. Sure they might think trains are cool, but they wouldn't want to move inward for it or pay whatever cost would be necessary for trains to come outward.
    - cycomanic 4y ago
      While all that might be true, it is also true that hardly anyone would be willing to cover the true cost of living in rural areas far away from things. In pretty much every country I'm aware of the urban population is strongly subsidising the rural. And that is only covering first order cost (just look at the massive subsidies to get broadband to rural communities), if we would put prizes on second order cost like pollution, CO2... rural living would become unpopular very quickly (the reality already is that there is a massive move into the cities not the other way around).
      - econonut 4y ago
        Could you be specific about how the urban population is subsidizing the rural? Also, where does most of your food come from? What do you mean in regards to CO2? I'd suggest that many people living a rural lifestyle completely offset their CO2 footprint due to carbon sequestration. I know I have enough trees and vegetation on my acreage to completely offset my carbon emissions. But, of course, to counter your argument I really only need to offset the extra emissions that come with driving an extra n miles into the city.
  - robotnikman 4y ago
    With the rising obesity rates in America I feel that doesn't help the situation either. Many would probably rather ride in a climate controlled car than get out of breath and sweaty walking. Which is somewhat sad since more physical activity including walking or biking would help a lot here.
  - sillystuff 4y ago
    I don't want a life without a car within the constraints of the current options for going car-free within the US-- mainly living in a large high density city, and still having to contend with vehicular traffic and pollution. But, I strongly desire life without a car. If there was a 50K population max car-free walkable town with all the necessities available within said town, I would move there in an instant. I've searched for this, in the past, it doesn't exist. I live in the next best, a <50K population town where I can get most necessities via walking/biking, but have to contend with hostile vehicular traffic that is especially daunting on longer routes to the outskirts of town that are only serviced by freeways (like the college I used to work at)-- I am terrified to bicycle on these routes with 85mph traffic brushing past (technically those sections are not "freeways", but are indistinguishable save the signage "begin freeway" [no bikes] "end freeway" [bikes allowed]). For long range travel, expand passenger trains. There is an Amtrak stop in my town, and I travel via Amtrak extensively to visit friends-- it is a very nice way to travel long distances.
- twblalock 4y ago
  I know a lot of Americans who are well-travelled and have seen world-class transit in Europe and Asia, and most of them still choose to live in suburbs. The average American wants to live in a detached house that they own. This does not lead to dense cities. It leads to sprawl, which is what we got because it’s what we want.
  - kiba 4y ago
    Our choices are limited by options available to us.
    - ryukafalz 4y ago
      Yup. And the options available to us have been limited by decades of zoning policy encouraging single-family homes only. My girlfriend and I are about to move to the suburbs to be closer to her family, but it’s to an inner-ring suburb with excellent transit back into the city. There are maybe two towns for this in the area that aren’t outrageously priced, and even those two are above average. See also, “The myth of revealed preference for suburbs”: https://cityobservatory.org/the-myth-of-revealed-preference-4-suburbs/ https://cityobservatory.org/the-myth-of-revealed-preference-...
  - refurb 4y ago
    I spent time in Singapore where living in dense high rises and traveling on a very well run public transit system is commonplace. Same thing. I found that people who could afford cars bought them for the convenience (despite the 100% import duty and $100,000 COE charge for 10 year permit). And same with detached housing. It’s was pretty much the ideal for families. Constant complaints of noise in apartment buildings, crappy neighbors, limited space. Don’t get me wrong, many people like the apartment living car-free. Mostly, young, childless people. But when kids came into the picture or even wealth increased and people got older, preferences changed.
    - digdugdirk 4y ago
      The problem is the vast middle ground between those two extremes that just doesn't exist in America. In Europe they seem to be more commonly called some variation of "villages". Single family homes with small lots, with larger community greenspace, and a small central hub with some shopping for necessities and a reliable connection to a larger public transit system. Meanwhile, the American suburb seems to have been modeled after manor estates but shrunk down to a level where it doesn't make sense. Each property has more personal land, but not enough to be "self-sufficient". That slight lowering of density prevents easy walkable access to any sort of central community hub, which makes it financially unviable to have a small community shopping district. That makes a shared public transit access point difficult to implement, since there's no community hub. Everything else spirals from there, making cars (and particularly bigger cars - remember, you need to keep the "estate" supplied with the necessities from a store located a 20-30 minute drive away) the only way for a family to function. I don't want to live in Hong Kong density, but I absolutely don't want to live in the typical American suburbia.
- falcolas 4y ago
  Frankly, I'm not sure it would work. The population of the US is more than double what it was in 1950. I personally don't want to live in a dense population area - it's overwhelming, panic inducing, yet still somehow lonely. So what would a car-less community I could tolerate look like? Probably a lot like it does right now, just with more commercial entities within a mile or two of my home. It would also be a lot harder for me to access bigger commercial entities (like Walmart, Target, et.al.) since it would involve public transit that is about an hour and a half away (it's 10m by car, fwiw) in a higher density (and cost) city.
  - seabrookmx 4y ago
    Making public transit better would also really help. Then you can access those things 10m away in a similar amount of time. For large items you'd use a car or pickup for, businesses would adapt by offering delivery. It's definitely possible, but the infrastructure investment would be gargantuan.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      It’s much easier now than even a few years ago - everyone offers delivery. Same day is a bit of a sticker but you can find towns near major areas where you won’t need your car most days (assuming you can find work).
    - falcolas 4y ago
      I'd love better public transit. But public transit in rural areas (and there will always be rural areas as long as there are farms and ranches, and communities to support them) is minimal to non-existent. Use is infrequent, meaning it would either have to be subsidized, which never makes folks in the city happy, or cost an arm and a leg per trip, making it impractical for rural users.
      - seabrookmx 4y ago
        Yeah you have to draw the line somewhere. I grew up in a town of a few thousand people, 45m drive from the nearest "city." With that population density it's never going to make sense to put something like light rail on that route. So these people will continue to use cars. And that's fine.. hopefully cars continue to get safer and easier on the environment. I think it's the urban/suburban sprawls akin to LA that really could benefit from better transit/walkability.
ErikVandeWater 4y ago
Most people don't influence zoning policy or understand it at all.
- twblalock 4y ago
  If that was true, then NIMBYism would have no political force — but it clearly does.
  - ErikVandeWater 4y ago
    It doesn't take a majority to enforce NIMBYism. Just a small, very politically active group.
- sidlls 4y ago
  True but not quite accurate. Locals influence zoning laws when they speak at city/town council meetings and go door to door trying to influence or get the support of their neighbors for them. It’s not “most” voters: but only in the sense that that is true for all public policy. Zoning isn’t special.
  - ErikVandeWater 4y ago
    My entire point is that it is not the majority. > Zoning isn’t special. twblalock is acting like zoning is special though.
Sir_Son_Son 4y ago
How could we forget the time the American public bought up their street cars and retired them?
- twblalock 4y ago
  The streetcar “conspiracy” is a tired old cliche. Americans wanted cars. They would have saved the streetcars if they had valued them as highly as they valued cars.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    Busses are better than streetcars in every conceivable way except “poors actually use busses”. So novelty streetcars are much more desirable than busses.
- crisdux 4y ago
  That being a major factor in the demise of streetcars is highly disputed. There was an interesting conversation about this on hn last month. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32166175 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32166175
syzar 4y ago
At this point I think most Americans simply can’t conceive of a society that isn’t car centric. Some want a car centric society because they don’t know another way. Walkable communities are overall healthier and I think it would be best to get away from a car centric society even if it’s something people don’t desire. The average commute is something like 20 miles one way. This number increases as the population increases and maintaining that infrastructure long term is a waste of resources and environmentally unsound.
nick_ 4y ago
woopwoop 4y ago
If this were true, I'd think Manhattan apartments would be cheap.
- throwaway0a5e 4y ago
  Manhattan apartments are subject to a lot of the same price forces as commercial equipment. Their cost reflects the ready access to money making opportunties.
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
  They would be if there wasn't so much money to be made in Manhattan. The price of Manhattan apartments has almost nothing to do with how desirable it is - other than the fact that desirability is largely a function of the financial opportunities there. Park City, Utah is expensive and nothing like Manhattan - so is Malibu and Ketchum, Idaho. San Jose is a large city and much more expensive than NYC (in terms of house prices). Outside of downtown and a few neighborhoods nearby, it's mostly a car-hell. Los Angeles isn't far behind in terms of prices - it's the second largest city in the US - and the majority of it is less walkable than halfway decent suburbs. On the flip side, Chicago is mostly walkable and bikable - yet it's substantially cheaper. Does that mean people don't want that? I doubt it. You can find plenty of counter-examples based on price and population and trying to extrapolate what people want. People like a lot of different things. Looking at one desirable place isn't going to tell you much. If you can make an argument that Manhattan has so much financial opportunity BECAUSE it's walkable, bikable, mass-transitable - I'm listening. But keep Chicago in mind. Because it has all of those things - is the second most densely populated city and the third most populous - yet it's basically average price for the country - which makes sense, because it also has average wages and high property taxes...
  - shuckles 4y ago
    You’re comparing incomparable values. San Jose house prices are high because you can’t amortize the land costs. Square foot by square foot, Manhattan land is far more expensive than San Jose. Chicago land may appear cheaper, but it’s only because they have higher taxes on it than San Jose.
dont__panic 4y ago
Most Americans don't have a choice. Why are cars and phones giant these days? Is it because nobody wants smaller ones, or because perverse market incentives have distorted offerings in a chase for product growth? Why is the USA unbearably car centric? Is it because nobody wants to get around any other way, or because perverse market incentives have distorted the world around us in a chase for GDP growth? Some people like cars. But the price premium of the small number of walkable places in the US (and the fact that that kind of infrastructure is literally illegal to build today) implies that there is a significant portion of people who like walkable places.
- atwood22 4y ago
  > Why are cars and phones giant these days? Is it because nobody wants smaller ones, or because perverse market incentives have distorted offerings in a chase for product growth? Do you have kids? If you did, you’d know that many people want bigger cars. I drive one of the smallest cars you can buy in the U.S. Now that I have a kid, I’m going to buy a big SUV. Kids require a lot of stuff. Taking them on public transport is a huge pain. Even if you don’t have kids, I’m sure you’ve been annoyed by a stroller on the subway.
  - dont__panic 4y ago
    Those big cars are the kind of "perverse market incentive" I'm talking about. Why do you need a big car to transport your children? Because: - you can't walk anywhere useful with your kids (so you must get in a car) - public transportation is inconvenient or expensive - biking is dangerous - the big car makes you feel safer because all of the other cars are big Why are those things the way that they are? Because people chose to drive cars, live far from useful things in the suburbs, and that eroded the ability to bike or provide useful and affordable public transportation. I grew up in a car-centric place. The "big SUV" as your only gateway to the outside world is effectively a prison. You can't do things on your own. You don't build a mental map of the world you live in. You don't get to do things outside unless it's in your yard or at some structured activity accessed by car. Why do you think the "teenagers hate the suburbs" trope is so common? I know raising a kid is difficult, even though I have not raised one myself. I know that they require all kinds of stuff to take out into the world. But somehow in NYC people get around with a single stroller and a backpack with kids, frequently taking public transit. > Taking them on public transport is a huge pain. Even if you don’t have kids, I’m sure you’ve been annoyed by a stroller on the subway. Maybe at rush hour. But I largely just appreciate the fact that a parent is trying to raise their kid to walk places and live in the world, instead of isolating them in a car in a suburban hellscape. Again -- perverse incentives have made the world this way. It doesn't have to be this way.
matthewdgreen 4y ago
I think most Americans would like to have the conveniences of a walkable area and the space/affordability advantages of a suburb. Some parts of the world accomplish this by building many walkable towns and neighborhoods that people can live in. For some reason in much of the US we give people a binary choice of living in a small number of extremely expensive, dense cities -- or living in sidewalkless suburban strip-mall hell with a massive commute. I don't think any of this precisely "what people want", really: most folks are just given a very small menu to choose from.
- ryukafalz 4y ago
  Agreed. And we used to build those in-between places in the US; most of the remaining walkable small towns in the US were built a long time ago. (I’m about to move to one because yeah that’s what I’m looking for; glad I live on the east coast where there are still a few options.) But we’ve largely outlawed building any new ones.
- bombcar 4y ago
  Walkable towns abound in the US. They’re all what most would consider “rural” but a town that’s not even two miles wide can’t help but be walkable. But people don’t want them, they prefer the suburbs or the city - the suburbs often because it’s near the jobs in the city and yet still has some of the spacing they want. One solution is to stop building suburbs as they were in the 50s and build them as many small towns even if butted up against each other. Even the worst suburbs have shopping areas, etc, that could be spread out and made accessible.
- riversflow 4y ago
  > I think most Americans would like to have the conveniences of a walkable area and the space/affordability advantages of a suburb I don't know about that. It seems to me that most Americans will sit and wait in their idling car for several minutes so they can get a parking spot that is 100 feet closer to the store's entrance. I personally park my car immediately when I get in a lot and start walking, which makes it very noticeable how many people would rather hunt for a spot slightly closer. Also, in larger shopping centers my observation is that most people will move their car between each shop to minimize walking.
honkycat 4y ago
Highly skeptical of this claim. Citation please. When has public opinion ever influenced the US government? They do what they want and manufacture consent later.
mrpopo 4y ago
Most people want what they have been told to be desirable. No offense to free thinkers out there, but our mind is mostly shaped by our experiences in society.
- bombcar 4y ago
  We’re also very good at demanding small cars and walkable cities while buying massive SUVs and moving to the suburbs.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  It is ironic that the thread that demonstrates Americans' philosophy of car-loving also demonstrates Americans' philosophy of decision making. Sure Bobby, you're in control, this was all your decision :)
pickovven 4y ago
No one is swimming across this river so clearly we don't need a bridge. Your assertion certainly explains why the most walkable places in the country also have the highest housing costs, no one wants to live there!
- atwood22 4y ago
  And yet, the most expensive places to live in dense areas are single family homes. Like how much does a brownstone in Greenwich Village cost? 15 million? Clearly in any environment, a single family home is the most desirable option. People may be willing the settle for a different option in exchange for some other benefits like having a lot to do, but given the choice they’ll still pick a single family home.
timssopomo 4y ago
It seems a bit of a stretch to suggest that the public at large "wanted" to adjust zoning laws to end up with a car-centric environment. Automakers created the concept of jaywalking [1]. Judges defended the rights of the public to enjoy the streets without cars [2]. Firestone Tire, Standard Oil of California, Phillips Petroleum, GM, and Mack Trucks were convicted of conspiring to monopolize the sale of buses and related products to local transit companies [3]. We live in a manufactured environment, and its manufacture was the result of a decades-long marketing and lobbying effort by industry interest groups, not some grassroots democratic movement. That said, people generally resist any kind of change. That's _why_ it took nearly 50 years of lobbying and an unelected tyrant like Robert Moses to, for instance, really shift New York City's infrastructure in favor of cars. The question is how to make it clear to individuals why a life stuck in traffic isn't in their best interest anymore and hold the government accountable for making improvements. [1] https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history [2] https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/when-cities-treated-cars-as-dangerous-intruders/ https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/when-cities-treated-cars-... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp...
- twblalock 4y ago
  The law against jaywalking is an excellent law. Look at some of those colorized YouTube videos of cities in the early 1900s, like this one: https://youtu.be/1Ok_lwYyHWo https://youtu.be/1Ok_lwYyHWo It’s insanity. People dodging cars, cars dodging people and each other. At modern road speeds that would result in mass death. Besides all that, yes of course we live in a manufactured environment. All environments are manufactured to some degree. And of course car companies lobby for things. But lobbying is not guaranteed to win. People strongly resist things they don’t like. You know what else GM was doing at the time? Selling lots and lots of cars to people who wanted to buy them.
  - kuschku 4y ago
    That's interesting, do you think the UK is a place with mass death? (It has no laws against jaywalking). Or Germany? (Crossing a red light is a fine of a few euros, but crossing roads elsewhere is legal).
legitster 4y ago
Not necessarily. Lots more people would want to live in cities, but it's cities that are keeping people out. You wouldn't want to build a 10 story apartment building out on the edge of town away from transit - but it's patently bizarre that cities like Seattle and San Francisco have single family zoning within walking distance of their downtown core.
- wszfahwbwbaha 4y ago
  Not really. It's just how the cities where built. If not they would be like NYC and the people that live in SF and Seattle don't want that
wszfahwbwbaha 4y ago
Yep. I love cars. Left NYC so i could get one.
goodpoint 4y ago
> they like the car lifestyle and want to perpetuate it Are you sure? Polls show that most people in US are fond of the walkable spaces of university and company campuses, European cities, Disneyworld, even shopping malls.

JKCalhoun 4y ago

I too would like the car lifestyle ... from 1950. Sadly, we have created a monster. I suspect many Americans now don't even know what a community without cars would look like, that it could even work at all.

kodah 4y ago
The average American likely doesn't want a life without cars. That seems to be an HN obsession seemingly (my perception) fueled by people who have lived and stayed in very dense urban areas. Creating larger spaces that aren't made for cars is great, but people will still need long-range individual transportation.
- kiba 4y ago
  Last time I check, these 'dense' urban area aren't exactly great for anybody but cars.
  - kodah 4y ago
    Correct. The car situation is worse there, which is why I think their theories are so whacky when postulated as "get rid of cars" because it fails to be relevant beyond those areas.
  - dionidium 4y ago
    As a former resident of Manhattan, this is where I'm most resentful about car supremacy. I truly don't care that there exist car-centric suburbs. Anybody who lives there knows exactly what they're signing up for. What's insane to me is that we allow cars to dominate even our most urban spaces. When I would walk to work through Midtown, my senses were practically assaulted by automobiles. Honking, speeding, stereos blasting, engines revving, cars encroaching on the crosswalk, and on and on. It's an enormous quality of life issue and one of the things I hated most about living in NYC. "Cities are loud and dangerous. This is just life in the big city!" No, no, no, and no. Cars are loud and dangerous. This is a choice. It's not an unavoidable fact of life in cities. We choose to live this way.
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    - ryukafalz 4y ago
      Yup, I relate to this so much as someone currently living in Philly. We have basically the same issue even in Center City. Cities aren’t loud, cars are loud: https://youtu.be/CTV-wwszGw8 https://youtu.be/CTV-wwszGw8
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    - trgn 4y ago
      > What's insane to me is that we allow cars to dominate even our most urban spaces NYC would be so much better if it weren't for all the car traffic. It's not the density that's strangling it, it's the car completely degrading the experience. > "Cities are loud and dangerous. This is just life in the big city!" No, no, no, and no. Cars are loud and dangerous. This is a choice. It's not an unavoidable fact of life in cities. We choose to live this way. Yes! Americans have a real lack of imagination when it comes to city life. Makes me sad.
- TylerE 4y ago
  And are young enough not to being dealing with physical issues/disability.
- gernb 4y ago
  That's fine. They just need to start paying for their externities and stop relying on being subsidized by the dense urban areas. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nw6qyyrTeI https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nw6qyyrTeI
  - falcolas 4y ago
    They are. Via the same mechanisms - taxes paid to the county, who maintains that property. Plus, suburbanites bring a lot of money into the cities, even though they don't live there. Cities could incorporate suburbs into their boundaries, yet cities don't want to do that, because despite griping about their lack of paying city taxes, they don't want to pay to maintain/manage those spaces. I really believe the "suburbs cost cities money" statement is overplayed. Between county taxes (which feed back into the cities in those counties) and HOA (for neighborhood maintenance), they are paying for themselves.
    - kuschku 4y ago
      If suburbs were truly paying for themselves, cities would love to incorporate them. As they do in countries where transit oriented suburbs actually do pay for themselves. The truth is that row houses is the lowest density that still can just barely pay for maintenance of the roads, sewers, water lines, gas lines, electricity lines, and everything else. Any lower density than that, and the taxes of the residents can't cover the actual costs anymore.
- mminer237 4y ago
  I think it's because the young people online are much more drawn to the active, exciting urban lifestyle than the average American. The average American would much rather have the safety, quiet, and just space that comes with suburban living. People want yards to play with their kids, and that sort of spread-out living just necessitates cars. Housing prices aren't high because of cars. Housing prices are high because people want their own personal space. Nobody's going to build a rail system with a thousand subway stations connecting every neighborhood in a US metro area. That would cost like a trillion dollars, plus maintenance. It's just not feasible to cater good public transport to people living that spread out. And no one wants to walk miles to a less-dense rail system or take some slow bus route. And outside of major cities, I've never heard of someone complain about cars. Most people are perfectly happy with cars. Sure they might think trains are cool, but they wouldn't want to move inward for it or pay whatever cost would be necessary for trains to come outward.
  - cycomanic 4y ago
    While all that might be true, it is also true that hardly anyone would be willing to cover the true cost of living in rural areas far away from things. In pretty much every country I'm aware of the urban population is strongly subsidising the rural. And that is only covering first order cost (just look at the massive subsidies to get broadband to rural communities), if we would put prizes on second order cost like pollution, CO2... rural living would become unpopular very quickly (the reality already is that there is a massive move into the cities not the other way around).
    - econonut 4y ago
      Could you be specific about how the urban population is subsidizing the rural? Also, where does most of your food come from? What do you mean in regards to CO2? I'd suggest that many people living a rural lifestyle completely offset their CO2 footprint due to carbon sequestration. I know I have enough trees and vegetation on my acreage to completely offset my carbon emissions. But, of course, to counter your argument I really only need to offset the extra emissions that come with driving an extra n miles into the city.
- robotnikman 4y ago
  With the rising obesity rates in America I feel that doesn't help the situation either. Many would probably rather ride in a climate controlled car than get out of breath and sweaty walking. Which is somewhat sad since more physical activity including walking or biking would help a lot here.
- sillystuff 4y ago
  I don't want a life without a car within the constraints of the current options for going car-free within the US-- mainly living in a large high density city, and still having to contend with vehicular traffic and pollution. But, I strongly desire life without a car. If there was a 50K population max car-free walkable town with all the necessities available within said town, I would move there in an instant. I've searched for this, in the past, it doesn't exist. I live in the next best, a <50K population town where I can get most necessities via walking/biking, but have to contend with hostile vehicular traffic that is especially daunting on longer routes to the outskirts of town that are only serviced by freeways (like the college I used to work at)-- I am terrified to bicycle on these routes with 85mph traffic brushing past (technically those sections are not "freeways", but are indistinguishable save the signage "begin freeway" [no bikes] "end freeway" [bikes allowed]). For long range travel, expand passenger trains. There is an Amtrak stop in my town, and I travel via Amtrak extensively to visit friends-- it is a very nice way to travel long distances.
twblalock 4y ago
I know a lot of Americans who are well-travelled and have seen world-class transit in Europe and Asia, and most of them still choose to live in suburbs. The average American wants to live in a detached house that they own. This does not lead to dense cities. It leads to sprawl, which is what we got because it’s what we want.
- kiba 4y ago
  Our choices are limited by options available to us.
  - ryukafalz 4y ago
    Yup. And the options available to us have been limited by decades of zoning policy encouraging single-family homes only. My girlfriend and I are about to move to the suburbs to be closer to her family, but it’s to an inner-ring suburb with excellent transit back into the city. There are maybe two towns for this in the area that aren’t outrageously priced, and even those two are above average. See also, “The myth of revealed preference for suburbs”: https://cityobservatory.org/the-myth-of-revealed-preference-4-suburbs/ https://cityobservatory.org/the-myth-of-revealed-preference-...
- refurb 4y ago
  I spent time in Singapore where living in dense high rises and traveling on a very well run public transit system is commonplace. Same thing. I found that people who could afford cars bought them for the convenience (despite the 100% import duty and $100,000 COE charge for 10 year permit). And same with detached housing. It’s was pretty much the ideal for families. Constant complaints of noise in apartment buildings, crappy neighbors, limited space. Don’t get me wrong, many people like the apartment living car-free. Mostly, young, childless people. But when kids came into the picture or even wealth increased and people got older, preferences changed.
  - digdugdirk 4y ago
    The problem is the vast middle ground between those two extremes that just doesn't exist in America. In Europe they seem to be more commonly called some variation of "villages". Single family homes with small lots, with larger community greenspace, and a small central hub with some shopping for necessities and a reliable connection to a larger public transit system. Meanwhile, the American suburb seems to have been modeled after manor estates but shrunk down to a level where it doesn't make sense. Each property has more personal land, but not enough to be "self-sufficient". That slight lowering of density prevents easy walkable access to any sort of central community hub, which makes it financially unviable to have a small community shopping district. That makes a shared public transit access point difficult to implement, since there's no community hub. Everything else spirals from there, making cars (and particularly bigger cars - remember, you need to keep the "estate" supplied with the necessities from a store located a 20-30 minute drive away) the only way for a family to function. I don't want to live in Hong Kong density, but I absolutely don't want to live in the typical American suburbia.
falcolas 4y ago
Frankly, I'm not sure it would work. The population of the US is more than double what it was in 1950. I personally don't want to live in a dense population area - it's overwhelming, panic inducing, yet still somehow lonely. So what would a car-less community I could tolerate look like? Probably a lot like it does right now, just with more commercial entities within a mile or two of my home. It would also be a lot harder for me to access bigger commercial entities (like Walmart, Target, et.al.) since it would involve public transit that is about an hour and a half away (it's 10m by car, fwiw) in a higher density (and cost) city.
- seabrookmx 4y ago
  Making public transit better would also really help. Then you can access those things 10m away in a similar amount of time. For large items you'd use a car or pickup for, businesses would adapt by offering delivery. It's definitely possible, but the infrastructure investment would be gargantuan.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    It’s much easier now than even a few years ago - everyone offers delivery. Same day is a bit of a sticker but you can find towns near major areas where you won’t need your car most days (assuming you can find work).
  - falcolas 4y ago
    I'd love better public transit. But public transit in rural areas (and there will always be rural areas as long as there are farms and ranches, and communities to support them) is minimal to non-existent. Use is infrequent, meaning it would either have to be subsidized, which never makes folks in the city happy, or cost an arm and a leg per trip, making it impractical for rural users.
    - seabrookmx 4y ago
      Yeah you have to draw the line somewhere. I grew up in a town of a few thousand people, 45m drive from the nearest "city." With that population density it's never going to make sense to put something like light rail on that route. So these people will continue to use cars. And that's fine.. hopefully cars continue to get safer and easier on the environment. I think it's the urban/suburban sprawls akin to LA that really could benefit from better transit/walkability.

ErikVandeWater 4y ago

Most people don't influence zoning policy or understand it at all.

twblalock 4y ago
If that was true, then NIMBYism would have no political force — but it clearly does.
- ErikVandeWater 4y ago
  It doesn't take a majority to enforce NIMBYism. Just a small, very politically active group.
sidlls 4y ago
True but not quite accurate. Locals influence zoning laws when they speak at city/town council meetings and go door to door trying to influence or get the support of their neighbors for them. It’s not “most” voters: but only in the sense that that is true for all public policy. Zoning isn’t special.
- ErikVandeWater 4y ago
  My entire point is that it is not the majority. > Zoning isn’t special. twblalock is acting like zoning is special though.

Sir_Son_Son 4y ago

How could we forget the time the American public bought up their street cars and retired them?

twblalock 4y ago
The streetcar “conspiracy” is a tired old cliche. Americans wanted cars. They would have saved the streetcars if they had valued them as highly as they valued cars.
- bombcar 4y ago
  Busses are better than streetcars in every conceivable way except “poors actually use busses”. So novelty streetcars are much more desirable than busses.
crisdux 4y ago
That being a major factor in the demise of streetcars is highly disputed. There was an interesting conversation about this on hn last month. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32166175 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32166175

syzar 4y ago

At this point I think most Americans simply can’t conceive of a society that isn’t car centric. Some want a car centric society because they don’t know another way. Walkable communities are overall healthier and I think it would be best to get away from a car centric society even if it’s something people don’t desire. The average commute is something like 20 miles one way. This number increases as the population increases and maintaining that infrastructure long term is a waste of resources and environmentally unsound.

nick_ 4y ago

woopwoop 4y ago

If this were true, I'd think Manhattan apartments would be cheap.

throwaway0a5e 4y ago
Manhattan apartments are subject to a lot of the same price forces as commercial equipment. Their cost reflects the ready access to money making opportunties.
onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
They would be if there wasn't so much money to be made in Manhattan. The price of Manhattan apartments has almost nothing to do with how desirable it is - other than the fact that desirability is largely a function of the financial opportunities there. Park City, Utah is expensive and nothing like Manhattan - so is Malibu and Ketchum, Idaho. San Jose is a large city and much more expensive than NYC (in terms of house prices). Outside of downtown and a few neighborhoods nearby, it's mostly a car-hell. Los Angeles isn't far behind in terms of prices - it's the second largest city in the US - and the majority of it is less walkable than halfway decent suburbs. On the flip side, Chicago is mostly walkable and bikable - yet it's substantially cheaper. Does that mean people don't want that? I doubt it. You can find plenty of counter-examples based on price and population and trying to extrapolate what people want. People like a lot of different things. Looking at one desirable place isn't going to tell you much. If you can make an argument that Manhattan has so much financial opportunity BECAUSE it's walkable, bikable, mass-transitable - I'm listening. But keep Chicago in mind. Because it has all of those things - is the second most densely populated city and the third most populous - yet it's basically average price for the country - which makes sense, because it also has average wages and high property taxes...
- shuckles 4y ago
  You’re comparing incomparable values. San Jose house prices are high because you can’t amortize the land costs. Square foot by square foot, Manhattan land is far more expensive than San Jose. Chicago land may appear cheaper, but it’s only because they have higher taxes on it than San Jose.

dont__panic 4y ago

Most Americans don't have a choice. Why are cars and phones giant these days? Is it because nobody wants smaller ones, or because perverse market incentives have distorted offerings in a chase for product growth? Why is the USA unbearably car centric? Is it because nobody wants to get around any other way, or because perverse market incentives have distorted the world around us in a chase for GDP growth? Some people like cars. But the price premium of the small number of walkable places in the US (and the fact that that kind of infrastructure is literally illegal to build today) implies that there is a significant portion of people who like walkable places.

atwood22 4y ago
> Why are cars and phones giant these days? Is it because nobody wants smaller ones, or because perverse market incentives have distorted offerings in a chase for product growth? Do you have kids? If you did, you’d know that many people want bigger cars. I drive one of the smallest cars you can buy in the U.S. Now that I have a kid, I’m going to buy a big SUV. Kids require a lot of stuff. Taking them on public transport is a huge pain. Even if you don’t have kids, I’m sure you’ve been annoyed by a stroller on the subway.
- dont__panic 4y ago
  Those big cars are the kind of "perverse market incentive" I'm talking about. Why do you need a big car to transport your children? Because: - you can't walk anywhere useful with your kids (so you must get in a car) - public transportation is inconvenient or expensive - biking is dangerous - the big car makes you feel safer because all of the other cars are big Why are those things the way that they are? Because people chose to drive cars, live far from useful things in the suburbs, and that eroded the ability to bike or provide useful and affordable public transportation. I grew up in a car-centric place. The "big SUV" as your only gateway to the outside world is effectively a prison. You can't do things on your own. You don't build a mental map of the world you live in. You don't get to do things outside unless it's in your yard or at some structured activity accessed by car. Why do you think the "teenagers hate the suburbs" trope is so common? I know raising a kid is difficult, even though I have not raised one myself. I know that they require all kinds of stuff to take out into the world. But somehow in NYC people get around with a single stroller and a backpack with kids, frequently taking public transit. > Taking them on public transport is a huge pain. Even if you don’t have kids, I’m sure you’ve been annoyed by a stroller on the subway. Maybe at rush hour. But I largely just appreciate the fact that a parent is trying to raise their kid to walk places and live in the world, instead of isolating them in a car in a suburban hellscape. Again -- perverse incentives have made the world this way. It doesn't have to be this way.

matthewdgreen 4y ago

I think most Americans would like to have the conveniences of a walkable area and the space/affordability advantages of a suburb. Some parts of the world accomplish this by building many walkable towns and neighborhoods that people can live in. For some reason in much of the US we give people a binary choice of living in a small number of extremely expensive, dense cities -- or living in sidewalkless suburban strip-mall hell with a massive commute. I don't think any of this precisely "what people want", really: most folks are just given a very small menu to choose from.

ryukafalz 4y ago
Agreed. And we used to build those in-between places in the US; most of the remaining walkable small towns in the US were built a long time ago. (I’m about to move to one because yeah that’s what I’m looking for; glad I live on the east coast where there are still a few options.) But we’ve largely outlawed building any new ones.
bombcar 4y ago
Walkable towns abound in the US. They’re all what most would consider “rural” but a town that’s not even two miles wide can’t help but be walkable. But people don’t want them, they prefer the suburbs or the city - the suburbs often because it’s near the jobs in the city and yet still has some of the spacing they want. One solution is to stop building suburbs as they were in the 50s and build them as many small towns even if butted up against each other. Even the worst suburbs have shopping areas, etc, that could be spread out and made accessible.
riversflow 4y ago
> I think most Americans would like to have the conveniences of a walkable area and the space/affordability advantages of a suburb I don't know about that. It seems to me that most Americans will sit and wait in their idling car for several minutes so they can get a parking spot that is 100 feet closer to the store's entrance. I personally park my car immediately when I get in a lot and start walking, which makes it very noticeable how many people would rather hunt for a spot slightly closer. Also, in larger shopping centers my observation is that most people will move their car between each shop to minimize walking.

honkycat 4y ago

Highly skeptical of this claim. Citation please. When has public opinion ever influenced the US government? They do what they want and manufacture consent later.

mrpopo 4y ago

Most people want what they have been told to be desirable. No offense to free thinkers out there, but our mind is mostly shaped by our experiences in society.

bombcar 4y ago
We’re also very good at demanding small cars and walkable cities while buying massive SUVs and moving to the suburbs.
bowsamic 4y ago
It is ironic that the thread that demonstrates Americans' philosophy of car-loving also demonstrates Americans' philosophy of decision making. Sure Bobby, you're in control, this was all your decision :)

pickovven 4y ago

No one is swimming across this river so clearly we don't need a bridge. Your assertion certainly explains why the most walkable places in the country also have the highest housing costs, no one wants to live there!

atwood22 4y ago
And yet, the most expensive places to live in dense areas are single family homes. Like how much does a brownstone in Greenwich Village cost? 15 million? Clearly in any environment, a single family home is the most desirable option. People may be willing the settle for a different option in exchange for some other benefits like having a lot to do, but given the choice they’ll still pick a single family home.

timssopomo 4y ago

It seems a bit of a stretch to suggest that the public at large "wanted" to adjust zoning laws to end up with a car-centric environment. Automakers created the concept of jaywalking [1]. Judges defended the rights of the public to enjoy the streets without cars [2]. Firestone Tire, Standard Oil of California, Phillips Petroleum, GM, and Mack Trucks were convicted of conspiring to monopolize the sale of buses and related products to local transit companies [3]. We live in a manufactured environment, and its manufacture was the result of a decades-long marketing and lobbying effort by industry interest groups, not some grassroots democratic movement. That said, people generally resist any kind of change. That's _why_ it took nearly 50 years of lobbying and an unelected tyrant like Robert Moses to, for instance, really shift New York City's infrastructure in favor of cars. The question is how to make it clear to individuals why a life stuck in traffic isn't in their best interest anymore and hold the government accountable for making improvements. [1] https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history https://www.vox.com/2015/1/15/7551873/jaywalking-history [2] https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/when-cities-treated-cars-as-dangerous-intruders/ https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/when-cities-treated-cars-... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_consp...

twblalock 4y ago
The law against jaywalking is an excellent law. Look at some of those colorized YouTube videos of cities in the early 1900s, like this one: https://youtu.be/1Ok_lwYyHWo https://youtu.be/1Ok_lwYyHWo It’s insanity. People dodging cars, cars dodging people and each other. At modern road speeds that would result in mass death. Besides all that, yes of course we live in a manufactured environment. All environments are manufactured to some degree. And of course car companies lobby for things. But lobbying is not guaranteed to win. People strongly resist things they don’t like. You know what else GM was doing at the time? Selling lots and lots of cars to people who wanted to buy them.
- kuschku 4y ago
  That's interesting, do you think the UK is a place with mass death? (It has no laws against jaywalking). Or Germany? (Crossing a red light is a fine of a few euros, but crossing roads elsewhere is legal).

legitster 4y ago

Not necessarily. Lots more people would want to live in cities, but it's cities that are keeping people out. You wouldn't want to build a 10 story apartment building out on the edge of town away from transit - but it's patently bizarre that cities like Seattle and San Francisco have single family zoning within walking distance of their downtown core.

wszfahwbwbaha 4y ago
Not really. It's just how the cities where built. If not they would be like NYC and the people that live in SF and Seattle don't want that

wszfahwbwbaha 4y ago

Yep. I love cars. Left NYC so i could get one.

goodpoint 4y ago

> they like the car lifestyle and want to perpetuate it Are you sure? Polls show that most people in US are fond of the walkable spaces of university and company campuses, European cities, Disneyworld, even shopping malls.