4 ms·

If you live in anything like a real city and don't absolutely need a car to commute, the misery of street parking alone vastly outweighs any kind of occasional

• andrepd 4y ago
  It's misery to you, the driver, and misery to someone else. It's depressing to think the sheer area of land in cities that is dedicated to (free) parking. That the space of what could easily be a nice park or a playground is instead used to store a dozen cars. Not to mentioned the economic value wasted.
  • rootusrootus 4y ago
    Where is this free parking you speak of? I live in a largely suburban city (couple million people) and the vast majority of parking lots are neither free nor taking up land which would otherwise be used by a park or playground. It's nearly all underground, or on top of buildings, or along the street, and almost none of it is free. We have lots of parks. I'll give the benefit of the doubt and just assume a different life experience, and not just hyperbole.
• galangalalgol 4y ago
  What is a real city? I live in one of 20 biggest in the US, but even #2 LA is pretty hard to get around without a car. My experience in traveling has been that places where carless transportation is easy, are places I can only afford to visit, not live.
  • loloquwowndueo 4y ago
    If you limit yourself to the US this will of course be the case - the tendency in urban development has been shaped by cars for a long time.
  • swexbe 4y ago
    If you don’t count the suburbs LA wouldn’t be anywhere close to #2.
    • jgwil2 4y ago
      I'm not sure what you mean by this... if you only count the population inside the city limits? Then LA has nearly 4 million residents (of course, inside city limits includes a lot of neighborhoods that are suburban in character). Whether you're talking city limits or metro area, LA is number 2, though the Chicago metro area is pretty close behind.
  • mightybyte 4y ago
    I think this is a common misconception. People say this about NYC, but it's simply not true. I have artist friends who live in NYC and make something like 30k / year. No, you probably won't be able to live in Manhattan with that kind of money but NYC is much bigger than Manhattan and it is still possible to live quite affordable and have access to the city's public transit and not need a car.
    • unsupp0rted 4y ago
      It's one thing to survive, it's another to thrive. Sure the wonder of living in NYC for some people is worth the lower comfort of daily life. I hate and avoid cars too and that alone is a major factor in where I choose to live. But if they're living on $30k in NYC, do they share their home with one or more roommates? Could they handle a $500 unexpected expense or would it devastate them? At some age you want to be able to live life a bit more comfortably than in your early 20s, say.
      • mightybyte 4y ago
        In this case I would say very much thriving. This person could easily handle a $5,000 unexpected expense. When I moved to NYC, I was able to get a very comfortable apartment outside Manhattan but still very convenient to subway lines, and my rent (by far my largest recurring expense) was lower than I had been paying in my first job out of college 7 years earlier. Sure I had a roommate, but 7 years earlier I had was living with my S.O. Why do we automatically assume that a roommate == lower comfort of daily life than living with an SO? In my case, I was unquestionably more comfortable in my 30s in NYC than in my 20s in the suburbs in a single family home.
    • HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
      NYC is an outlier in the US, though. I haven't lived there in a long time, but I lived in Brooklyn both with and without a car. The car rarely added any convenience and was a royal pain in the ass to find parking for. If not for the fact that my job was in CT and I ended up moving there, I would have sold it. However, everywhere else I've lived, life was much easier with a car.
  • ajoseps 4y ago
    LA is probably the least public transport friendly major city in the US. It's been improving but it's not great
  • pwpw 4y ago
    I sold my car when I moved to LA because traffic was so horrible. I intentionally moved into an apartment close to a metro line, which I took into work. For groceries, I rode my bike into the neighborhood city center (which many LA neighborhoods have). I loved playing Game Boy or reading a book on my way to and from work. Getting around the neighborhood by bike was wonderful with the LA weather. Occasionally I would go somewhere that needed a car such as off to the mountains to ski, so I would ride with my friends who were joining. If no one owned a car, I’m sure we could have rented. I also once got staffed down in OC for work, so I talked with someone on my team and coordinated carpooling with them, which allowed us to use the HOV lane and improve the horrid traffic situation. My coworker was happy to go out of their way to pick me up in exchange for HOV access. I’ve since lived in big Texas cities and have been able to also live without a car, but I find it much more difficult because there are zero viable public transit options. LA’s public transit is nothing to write home about, but it is usable. You just need to have a good attitude and plan your life ahead of time. Ride sharing and rentals can fill in the rest. To your point, LA became much more affordable when I got rid of my car. My situation was not perfectly replicable by all, but I do think the issue of car ownership and getting around without one isn’t an all or nothing affair for every citizen. In my situation it worked. For others, it would not. It would be great if more cities simply allowed for the option of getting around without a car and invested in alternative modes of transit. Ideally for me, I’d have a car that I would use for some errands and take public transit for others.