5 ms·

I think the question that anyone that rejects cars would ask is "why do you choose to live 60km from your work?".

by hgomersall 4y ago

davidMC1982 4y ago
Because his partner works 60km in the opposite direction?
- mcv 4y ago
  It's generally better to live close to one person's workplace than right in between the two.
  - HardlyCurious 4y ago
    Why?
    - mcv 4y ago
      So only one person instead of two has to suffer through a dreadful commute, you need only one car instead of two, one parent works close to where the kids go to school, etc. If you live in the middle, everything is far away for everybody. That doesn't mean it's not viable to live in the middle, but I think these are some pretty good arguments why it's often preferable to live close to at least one partner's workplace. Obviously it's not going to work for everybody, but if you're thinking about where to buy your house, this may be worth taking into consideration.
      - HardlyCurious 4y ago
        Would you volunteer to have twice the dreadful commute for the benefit of your partner, or do you see yourself being the beneficiary of this configuration?
        mcv 4y ago
        My wife and I seem to disagree who is the beneficiary of this configuration. She seems to like driving. And she likes that I live close to home.
  - iso1631 4y ago
    Modern advice is to move jobs every 2-3 years. You want to move house every 2-3 years? Move the kids schools every 2-3 years?
    - MarceColl 4y ago
      I've moved between jobs every 1-2 years for the past 10. I've never been more than an hour away (and that was one job that was particularly far away). In most cases, because we have a good public transit system, I'm within 10-15 minutes by subway or 30/40 minutes walking. I don't even consider it too much. Never moved house.
- hgomersall 4y ago
  I think you're missing the point... If you reject car ownership and the associated commute etc, you structure your life around that. You get a job and a house that are compatible with that philosophy. As a couple, neither of you would have a job that requires you to commute such distances.
  - hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
    Couldn't think of a better argument for why most people do not reject cars. Restricting your employment options to a small, say cyclable area around where you live can be extremely limiting for your employment opportunities, especially if you have a partner that also works. Especially considering the point another commenter said that oftentimes central business districts where the best jobs are can be prohibitively expensive for housing. I'm not one to discount the cost of a long commute, and I'm hopeful that more remote and flexible work options will make it so people have less time commuting. But people like to own cars because in most cases they can be incredibly useful, and ignoring that fact won't help people transition off them.
    - hgomersall 4y ago
      But that's precisely the point. Many people (and arguably the young people in the OP), value life over "employment opportunities". That's the philosophy behind why many of us reject cars in our daily lives. Those hours of commuting I don't have to do I spend with my children. Equally, the commuting I do do is free exercise.
    - Aunche 4y ago
      >Restricting your employment options to a small, say cyclable area around where you live can be extremely limiting for your employment opportunities You're missing the forest for the trees. If you live in a mid-sized city in the Netherlands and want to limit yourself to a 1 hour commute by public transit, there are just as many, if not more opportunities than if you live in a mid sized city in the US like Richmond because the Netherlands is that much denser, and transit optimizes for commercial centers. The difference that in the Netherlands, you still have the option of commuting by car, whereas, in the US you'd have to move.
Tade0 4y ago
Perhaps because real estate/rent is simply too expensive anywhere closer.
- hgomersall 4y ago
  Whenever I've heard people make that argument, what they actually mean is "The huge house I want to live in I can afford if I spend an hour a day in the car, oh and people that live in the cities should not make it harder for me to pursue such a path by restricting car usage. Externalities be damned, won't someone think of my being unable to afford a 5 bedroom house with a big garden in the city".
  - WarOnPrivacy 4y ago
    >> Perhaps because real estate/rent is simply too expensive anywhere closer. > Whenever I've heard people make that argument, what they actually mean is "The huge house I want to live in I can afford if I spend an hour a day in the car...." Or it's because it would require 3x-6x their income to afford to live anyplace closer. A major factor of employee shortages is exactly that. There are no homes within 50 mi (often much further) of that job that can be afforded with those wages. We live 45mi out from a (until recently, inexpensive) US metro area and we require 4 incomes to cover basic expenses.
  - lotsofpulp 4y ago
    It is both the desire to not live in an apartment, but rather have a detached single family house with a garage and backyard, and also a desire to live away from people below your socioeconomic level and near people at or above your socioeconomic level (referred to as “good schools”). If Americans were okay with living in Tokyo sized abodes, then there would be sufficient density for sufficient housing and job opportunities to exist in a region that could support sufficient public transit.
    - johnwalkr 4y ago
      There’s plenty of detached houses in Tokyo (even in the 23 wards) and they cost 1/4 of what they cost in a major American city. Tokyo is denser than any American city but less dense than Paris, and greater Tokyo, which is even cheaper for housing, still has great transit/no need for a car for most people and has a density of only 1000/km^2. Also available in Tokyo is small apartments for single people. A minimum wage worker there will live in a small apartment, yes, but can survive without 5 roommates in a moldy basement suite. Americans would be okay living in “Tokyo sized abodes” if they knew what that actually meant and didn’t assume all of Tokyo looks like Shibuya. One thing I’ll grant is that garages are rare, because they count as finished space for property tax purposes. Tokyo is actually a great example of what a city without car-centric planning and free parking everywhere can be like and a perfect example of a “15 minute city”. It’s not only about transit, but what transit and walkability encourages. I lived there for 6 years in a very residential neighborhood, but I was still within 10 minutes walking of virtually any daily necessity, 5 or so grocery stores, dozens if not hundreds of restaurants, 3 public baths, one of which was a legit onsen, a few furniture stores, and even 2 aquarium shops. I’m trying to think of a counter example and I can only think of one thing that wasn’t a ten minute walk away: a movie theatre, although there were multiple within a 15 minute train ride.
fleddr 4y ago
Because I can't afford to move to the city where I work. Because even if I could, work is unstable, I can't keep moving. Because I have a girlfriend, any move closer to work is further away for her. Because my family and friends are here, and I need to take care of my parents.
maxsilver 4y ago
Because most people don't have the luxury of choosing those things. - I don't have any meaningful control over where I'm allowed to work - I don't have any meaningful control over where my spouse is allowed to work - I only have a tiny amount of control over where I'm allowed to live (most of it prices us out, despite being above-average income) - even if I do exercise some control, it can be changed or stripped from me by others at any time. (You may get laid off and have to find a new office. Or your office may move away from you -- when you are hired, the office might only have been 12 miles away, but later they moved the office so it's now 25 miles away) - You may not always be allowed to move in response to those changes (you might not be able to afford to move your whole house every two years, when job situations for you/your spouse change. And if you have kids, doing this super disrupts any chance they may have at a social life via school) - You may not even be allowed to change home or school locations. (Divorced people exist, shared-custody children exist and are in some places, the most common form of parenting in 2023, you might not be allowed to relocate your kids schools ever) A lot of anti-transportation "15 minute city" idealists like to handwave away how incredibly complicated it is, to magically get your entire life to line up such that you don't ever have to travel medium-sized distances. That is an extreme luxury that most people will never have.
- bluGill 4y ago
  The 15 minute city isn't one you never leave, it is one where basic tasks of life are within 15 minutes. Most people will leave it for work, but they will stop and play within 15 minutes of home. Otherwise you are spot on. If your company moves offices within the same city's MSA they assume you can get there. If they move office to a different city they will pay to move you.
  - balfirevic 4y ago
    > Most people will leave it for work, but they will stop and play within 15 minutes of home. Even that assumes you don't have relatively specific hobbies. Which I guess is true for many people, but it's highly unlikely that (for example) my preferred martial arts instructor and my preferred dance instructor are going to be within 15 minutes of where I live. And of course, your girlfriend/boyfriend, if you don't live together.
WeylandYutani 4y ago
The average in the Netherlands is 20 kilometers if anyone is wondering. I think public transport is pretty good if you live in the Den Haag-Rotterdam-Amsterdam area. Which in America would be considered a single metro area. Something like 5 million people.
- aenis 4y ago
  Ebikes also tend to change the equation. I live 37km from where I work. By bike its 1hr20 when its not too windy. By ebike its 1hr flat (ok, its a speed pedalec, requires a license). By car its 45 min. By train its 1hr10. Despite having the means to own a car I sold it a few years ago and never looked back. I rent one every few weeks I need one.
throwaway894345 4y ago
I lived 5 miles away from my downtown office in Chicago. My apartment was 5 minutes from the train and my office was 1 minute on the other side. There were no connections, so this is an ideal public transit situation. It still took 40+ minutes each way versus 20 minutes by car during rush hour or ~10-15 outside of rush hour. This is the third largest US city and one with comparably few major thoroughfares (compared to many other large US cities). It seems that it’s just really hard for public transit to beat cars at any distance. Moreover, lots of people are constrained on where they can work and live. I think a lot of the anti-car rhetoric in America seems to assume everyone is a healthy, childless, young urban professional who aspires to live in the densest habitat he can find, and this is a very unrealistic portrait of Americans.
- hgomersall 4y ago
  In truth, an environment built for people over cars is better for everyone. Including those that can't drive (which is all children, and many with disabilities) or can't afford to drive. Your case sounds like a perfect situation where a bike with proper cycling infrastructure would be the best option.
  - throwaway894345 4y ago
    Not really. Chicago is pretty damn cold in the winter and hot in the summer and very wet in between. Of course, a Sufficiently Committed Cyclist can and will cope, but that's an unrealistic expectation for the majority of the population. Moreover, my example was an idyllic case for public transit (or as idyllic as it gets in the US). Most places are far less dense than Chicago and traveling by car is easier. To be clear though, I would like to see more walkable places, and while "people over cars" is hopelessly vague and verging on ideology, I probably agree with some of what people envision when they make this statement. I think it would be great if our urban and semiurban environments had more, smaller shops and more safe infrastructure for bikes and cars. More separation of fast moving car traffic from side streets. Etc. But we have a loooong way to go before bikes or public transit are more practical than cars, and as others have pointed out even the most bike-friendly countries in the world still have high (and growing) rates of car ownership. Cars are undeniably handy for all but some people in the densest environments, but we still need to take care not to overfit to cars.

I think the question that anyone that rejects cars would ask is "why do you choose to live 60km from your work?".

davidMC1982 4y ago

Because his partner works 60km in the opposite direction?

mcv 4y ago
It's generally better to live close to one person's workplace than right in between the two.
- HardlyCurious 4y ago
  Why?
  - mcv 4y ago
    So only one person instead of two has to suffer through a dreadful commute, you need only one car instead of two, one parent works close to where the kids go to school, etc. If you live in the middle, everything is far away for everybody. That doesn't mean it's not viable to live in the middle, but I think these are some pretty good arguments why it's often preferable to live close to at least one partner's workplace. Obviously it's not going to work for everybody, but if you're thinking about where to buy your house, this may be worth taking into consideration.
    - HardlyCurious 4y ago
      Would you volunteer to have twice the dreadful commute for the benefit of your partner, or do you see yourself being the beneficiary of this configuration?
      - mcv 4y ago
        My wife and I seem to disagree who is the beneficiary of this configuration. She seems to like driving. And she likes that I live close to home.
- iso1631 4y ago
  Modern advice is to move jobs every 2-3 years. You want to move house every 2-3 years? Move the kids schools every 2-3 years?
  - MarceColl 4y ago
    I've moved between jobs every 1-2 years for the past 10. I've never been more than an hour away (and that was one job that was particularly far away). In most cases, because we have a good public transit system, I'm within 10-15 minutes by subway or 30/40 minutes walking. I don't even consider it too much. Never moved house.
hgomersall 4y ago
I think you're missing the point... If you reject car ownership and the associated commute etc, you structure your life around that. You get a job and a house that are compatible with that philosophy. As a couple, neither of you would have a job that requires you to commute such distances.
- hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
  Couldn't think of a better argument for why most people do not reject cars. Restricting your employment options to a small, say cyclable area around where you live can be extremely limiting for your employment opportunities, especially if you have a partner that also works. Especially considering the point another commenter said that oftentimes central business districts where the best jobs are can be prohibitively expensive for housing. I'm not one to discount the cost of a long commute, and I'm hopeful that more remote and flexible work options will make it so people have less time commuting. But people like to own cars because in most cases they can be incredibly useful, and ignoring that fact won't help people transition off them.
  - hgomersall 4y ago
    But that's precisely the point. Many people (and arguably the young people in the OP), value life over "employment opportunities". That's the philosophy behind why many of us reject cars in our daily lives. Those hours of commuting I don't have to do I spend with my children. Equally, the commuting I do do is free exercise.
  - Aunche 4y ago
    >Restricting your employment options to a small, say cyclable area around where you live can be extremely limiting for your employment opportunities You're missing the forest for the trees. If you live in a mid-sized city in the Netherlands and want to limit yourself to a 1 hour commute by public transit, there are just as many, if not more opportunities than if you live in a mid sized city in the US like Richmond because the Netherlands is that much denser, and transit optimizes for commercial centers. The difference that in the Netherlands, you still have the option of commuting by car, whereas, in the US you'd have to move.

Tade0 4y ago

Perhaps because real estate/rent is simply too expensive anywhere closer.

hgomersall 4y ago
Whenever I've heard people make that argument, what they actually mean is "The huge house I want to live in I can afford if I spend an hour a day in the car, oh and people that live in the cities should not make it harder for me to pursue such a path by restricting car usage. Externalities be damned, won't someone think of my being unable to afford a 5 bedroom house with a big garden in the city".
- WarOnPrivacy 4y ago
  >> Perhaps because real estate/rent is simply too expensive anywhere closer. > Whenever I've heard people make that argument, what they actually mean is "The huge house I want to live in I can afford if I spend an hour a day in the car...." Or it's because it would require 3x-6x their income to afford to live anyplace closer. A major factor of employee shortages is exactly that. There are no homes within 50 mi (often much further) of that job that can be afforded with those wages. We live 45mi out from a (until recently, inexpensive) US metro area and we require 4 incomes to cover basic expenses.
- lotsofpulp 4y ago
  It is both the desire to not live in an apartment, but rather have a detached single family house with a garage and backyard, and also a desire to live away from people below your socioeconomic level and near people at or above your socioeconomic level (referred to as “good schools”). If Americans were okay with living in Tokyo sized abodes, then there would be sufficient density for sufficient housing and job opportunities to exist in a region that could support sufficient public transit.
  - johnwalkr 4y ago
    There’s plenty of detached houses in Tokyo (even in the 23 wards) and they cost 1/4 of what they cost in a major American city. Tokyo is denser than any American city but less dense than Paris, and greater Tokyo, which is even cheaper for housing, still has great transit/no need for a car for most people and has a density of only 1000/km^2. Also available in Tokyo is small apartments for single people. A minimum wage worker there will live in a small apartment, yes, but can survive without 5 roommates in a moldy basement suite. Americans would be okay living in “Tokyo sized abodes” if they knew what that actually meant and didn’t assume all of Tokyo looks like Shibuya. One thing I’ll grant is that garages are rare, because they count as finished space for property tax purposes. Tokyo is actually a great example of what a city without car-centric planning and free parking everywhere can be like and a perfect example of a “15 minute city”. It’s not only about transit, but what transit and walkability encourages. I lived there for 6 years in a very residential neighborhood, but I was still within 10 minutes walking of virtually any daily necessity, 5 or so grocery stores, dozens if not hundreds of restaurants, 3 public baths, one of which was a legit onsen, a few furniture stores, and even 2 aquarium shops. I’m trying to think of a counter example and I can only think of one thing that wasn’t a ten minute walk away: a movie theatre, although there were multiple within a 15 minute train ride.

fleddr 4y ago

Because I can't afford to move to the city where I work. Because even if I could, work is unstable, I can't keep moving. Because I have a girlfriend, any move closer to work is further away for her. Because my family and friends are here, and I need to take care of my parents.

maxsilver 4y ago

Because most people don't have the luxury of choosing those things. - I don't have any meaningful control over where I'm allowed to work - I don't have any meaningful control over where my spouse is allowed to work - I only have a tiny amount of control over where I'm allowed to live (most of it prices us out, despite being above-average income) - even if I do exercise some control, it can be changed or stripped from me by others at any time. (You may get laid off and have to find a new office. Or your office may move away from you -- when you are hired, the office might only have been 12 miles away, but later they moved the office so it's now 25 miles away) - You may not always be allowed to move in response to those changes (you might not be able to afford to move your whole house every two years, when job situations for you/your spouse change. And if you have kids, doing this super disrupts any chance they may have at a social life via school) - You may not even be allowed to change home or school locations. (Divorced people exist, shared-custody children exist and are in some places, the most common form of parenting in 2023, you might not be allowed to relocate your kids schools ever) A lot of anti-transportation "15 minute city" idealists like to handwave away how incredibly complicated it is, to magically get your entire life to line up such that you don't ever have to travel medium-sized distances. That is an extreme luxury that most people will never have.

bluGill 4y ago
The 15 minute city isn't one you never leave, it is one where basic tasks of life are within 15 minutes. Most people will leave it for work, but they will stop and play within 15 minutes of home. Otherwise you are spot on. If your company moves offices within the same city's MSA they assume you can get there. If they move office to a different city they will pay to move you.
- balfirevic 4y ago
  > Most people will leave it for work, but they will stop and play within 15 minutes of home. Even that assumes you don't have relatively specific hobbies. Which I guess is true for many people, but it's highly unlikely that (for example) my preferred martial arts instructor and my preferred dance instructor are going to be within 15 minutes of where I live. And of course, your girlfriend/boyfriend, if you don't live together.

WeylandYutani 4y ago

The average in the Netherlands is 20 kilometers if anyone is wondering. I think public transport is pretty good if you live in the Den Haag-Rotterdam-Amsterdam area. Which in America would be considered a single metro area. Something like 5 million people.

aenis 4y ago
Ebikes also tend to change the equation. I live 37km from where I work. By bike its 1hr20 when its not too windy. By ebike its 1hr flat (ok, its a speed pedalec, requires a license). By car its 45 min. By train its 1hr10. Despite having the means to own a car I sold it a few years ago and never looked back. I rent one every few weeks I need one.

throwaway894345 4y ago

I lived 5 miles away from my downtown office in Chicago. My apartment was 5 minutes from the train and my office was 1 minute on the other side. There were no connections, so this is an ideal public transit situation. It still took 40+ minutes each way versus 20 minutes by car during rush hour or ~10-15 outside of rush hour. This is the third largest US city and one with comparably few major thoroughfares (compared to many other large US cities). It seems that it’s just really hard for public transit to beat cars at any distance. Moreover, lots of people are constrained on where they can work and live. I think a lot of the anti-car rhetoric in America seems to assume everyone is a healthy, childless, young urban professional who aspires to live in the densest habitat he can find, and this is a very unrealistic portrait of Americans.

hgomersall 4y ago
In truth, an environment built for people over cars is better for everyone. Including those that can't drive (which is all children, and many with disabilities) or can't afford to drive. Your case sounds like a perfect situation where a bike with proper cycling infrastructure would be the best option.
- throwaway894345 4y ago
  Not really. Chicago is pretty damn cold in the winter and hot in the summer and very wet in between. Of course, a Sufficiently Committed Cyclist can and will cope, but that's an unrealistic expectation for the majority of the population. Moreover, my example was an idyllic case for public transit (or as idyllic as it gets in the US). Most places are far less dense than Chicago and traveling by car is easier. To be clear though, I would like to see more walkable places, and while "people over cars" is hopelessly vague and verging on ideology, I probably agree with some of what people envision when they make this statement. I think it would be great if our urban and semiurban environments had more, smaller shops and more safe infrastructure for bikes and cars. More separation of fast moving car traffic from side streets. Etc. But we have a loooong way to go before bikes or public transit are more practical than cars, and as others have pointed out even the most bike-friendly countries in the world still have high (and growing) rates of car ownership. Cars are undeniably handy for all but some people in the densest environments, but we still need to take care not to overfit to cars.