6 ms·

How could it happen that we haven't thought of these problems before we turned everything into car infrastructure?

kfarr 4y ago
Sometimes I think of cars as a classic prisoner's dilemma. If everyone has cars, everyone is worse off than if we all agreed not to have them. But individuals in isolation will always choose to have a car if they even slightly benefit. In most first-world countries now anyone of nearly any socioeconomic status can get access to a car, so we've hit maximum saturation which decreases quality of life for everyone. The negativity of car infra was very slow to appear and for a long time cars appeared to be a miracle. For some it's obvious in retrospect that we've over-invested in motor vehicle infrastructure, but for many the negative externalities are still not clear and/or ignored by the training of societal norms.
- oezi 4y ago
  > But individuals in isolation will always choose to have a car if they even slightly benefit. Car ownership is a terrible economic decision in many, many cases. It is just metal rusting motionless most of the time. They are a perfect example of irrational behavior. Many people would be financially better off to rent cars for long trips and rely on public transport otherwise (most rural settings aside).
  - kfarr 4y ago
    Yes it is a fact for most people when you run the numbers all inclusive (not just car payments but insurance, gas, tolls, tickets, repairs, parking, oil changes, etc) they just don't pencil out. In fact Uber and Lyft knew this and part of their "success" was in leveraging sunk cost fallacy that car owners want to "make extra money" with an underwater asset whose depreciation from making said "extra money" is not included in the calculation of most drivers.
    - gruez 4y ago
      >Yes it is a fact for most people when you run the numbers all inclusive (not just car payments but insurance, gas, tolls, tickets, repairs, parking, oil changes, etc) they just don't pencil out. Can you define what "pencil out" exactly means? I searched around and it looks like the TCO for a car ranges around $1000-$1100/month if you're buying used. At average US hourly earnings[3] of $33.03/hour, that works out to a break-even of 31.8 hours/month. If you're single and don't do anything other than commute to work (30 min each way), I agree that this doesn't "pencil out", but as soon as you have kids or a partner (twice the amount of errands to run!), it easily becomes worth it. [1] https://www.caranddriver.com/auto-loans/a41545320/average-cost-of-owning-a-car/ https://www.caranddriver.com/auto-loans/a41545320/average-co... [2] https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/total-cost-owning-car https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/total-co... [3] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t19.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t19.htm
  - blowski 4y ago
    This argument works less well for families living in less urban areas.
- hbrn 4y ago
  A slightly more accurate name for it is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons
dangoor 4y ago
Not Just Bikes has a good series on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJp5q-R0lZ0_FCUbeVWK6OGLN69ehUTVa https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJp5q-R0lZ0_FCUbeVWK6... It ties into the whole suburban experiment. Lots of single family detached homes on their own pieces of land spread things out, raising the need for cars to get anywhere. Those homes were sold as "the American Dream". Of course, once people are in those homes, they not only need to drive to stores to buy stuff but also to work or to other activities happening in the city proper, thus requiring more roads to build up to get there. Plus the whole stroad thing rose up as well to meet the demands of people in suburbia. Not Just Bikes also covers interesting bits about how this whole thing is also on financially shaky footing given how much the infrastructure costs to get services out to spread out hoomes.
bena 4y ago
I imagine it's a problem of creep as well. In 40 years, we've added a touch over 3 billion people to the planet. That's nearly double the population in under one lifetime. Everyone alive then and born within the next 24 years of 1983 are all old enough to own and operate a motor vehicle today. Roughly 2/3 of the population is 16+. Just assuming that holds throughout history (and it probably doesn't, but for argument's sake let's pretend), there were about 3 billion potential vehicles then and 5 billion now. (Using 4.5b and 7.5b for the population counts for easier math. The real totals are a bit over). We've nearly doubled the number of potential cars on the road. But we didn't do that overnight. We did that over 40 years. And every 5 years or so, it may seem reasonable to make a few more adjustments for car infrastructure. Until we're here, today. And it's not until we look back that we see how much we've given over to car infrastructure at the expense of everything else.
jeffbee 4y ago
[flagged]
- groby_b 4y ago
  14% of Americans are black. Without debating that the US is full of systemic racism: Do you really think anybody believed "well, with 14% less cars, this works"? And this isn't even accounting for the fact that white people buy significantly more cars. We can add that 34% of black people use public transit, and only 14% of white people do. The problem really isn't black people having cars, or the missing assumption of black people having cars.
- throwawayacc5 4y ago
  "If you understand this delusional nonsense I just invented then it makes way more sense."
dav_Oz 4y ago
Well, one major player on shaping the streets was the emerging car industry itself. Not the only factor of course but nevertheless a very interesting story [0] to tell from that perspective where pedestrians not obeying the new strict rules began to be called jaywalkers. [0]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oOttvpjJvAo https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oOttvpjJvAo
jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
It made more sense to me watching historic footage of when freeway expansion was happening in the US in the 50s and 60s. Congestion was very low. If you're one of a small number of cars, where you never see traffic jams, there's always an empty parking space waiting for you, then it all looks quite pleasant. In other words, it was a luxury that couldn't scale to higher densities. And if you think like an anthropologist you see this same dynamic popping up in neighboring contexts. Why do we have houses with grassy yards? Because this echos the estates of aristocrats in centuries past, where only the wealthy could afford to have land maintained as purely aesthetic gardens rather than some practical agricultural purpose. Suburbia essentially offered everyone the chance to live like a royal of days past. Except because it doesn't scale, that offer ended up being a trap many places. Thinking of it like this, as status symbols that didn't scale, lots of things like the trend towards McMansions makes more straightforward sense. And to be clear, I'm not some sort of density zealot. I just think the options should be more diverse, rather than the current system in the US which prioritizes cars at the cost of everyone else, even in contexts where it clearly simply does not work.
u801e 4y ago
We never turned everything into car infrastructure. Other than controlled access highways like interstates that are restricted to motor vehicles that can maintain a minimum speed, all other roads are shared infrastructure that can be legally used by those who are walking or are using vehicles other than cars. The fact that some people think we need to separate different modes of transportation is the reason why people aren't trying alternative modes of transportation like cycling. Legally, there's a single set of rules of movement that apply to all vehicle drivers: 1. Keep to the right side of the road 2. Yield to through traffic before entering a roadway 3. Yield to oncoming traffic when making a left turn 4. Make right turns from as close as practicable to the right edge of the roadway 5. Make left turns from as close as practicable to the center of the roadway 6. The vehicle in front has the right of way over the vehicle behind (first come, first served). Follow those rules no matter what vehicle you're using and there really aren't any issues. I've ridden tens of thousands of miles over nearly 20 years on roads and never had a problem by riding in a predictable manner, signaling my intentions in advance, and following those rules.
- Johnny555 4y ago
  all other roads are shared infrastructure that can be legally used by those who are walking or are using vehicles other than cars. Try walking on the road in any business district and see how long it is until you get a ticket for jaywalking or illegally walking in the road. And while a rural highway with little to no shoulder may be legally open to pedestrians and bikes, it's practically inaccessible since sharing a road with 50 mph traffic (which means real-life 60+ mph speeds) is risky.
  - u801e 4y ago
    > Try walking on the road in any business district and see how long it is until you get a ticket for jaywalking or illegally walking in the road. What law are you referring to that makes it illegal for pedestrians to walk on the road facing traffic on a road in a business district. > since sharing a road with 50 mph traffic (which means real-life 60+ mph speeds) is risky. I've done it plenty of times and motorists simply change lanes to pass me. Most motorists are only comfortable going 60 mph of they're able to see at least 700 feet or more in front of them. That gives then at least 7 seconds to see a cyclist and the cyclist that much time to see them in their mirrors. That's enough time to tell whether the motorist is slowing down or changing lanes to pass. If they aren't, then you can ride off road to avoid a collision. In my years of experience riding on roads with 50 mph+ speeds, every motorist either changed lanes or slowed down well before they caught up with me based on what I could see in my mirrors.
seadan83 4y ago
It was the way it was sold: - the American identity, "freedom" - auto industry pushing propaganda videos - a president impressed with the autobahn and the military justification for roads (it did used to take a car a week or more to go cross country) - "white flight" - years of lobbying for favorable laws. It used to be you could walk in streets. Then "Jay walking" became a thing and all sorts of car friendly laws - years of auto friendly ordinances that subsidize car ownership (free parking, requirements to build parking) The list goes on, but as the saying goes, you don't miss it until it's gone

Sometimes I think of cars as a classic prisoner's dilemma. If everyone has cars, everyone is worse off than if we all agreed not to have them. But individuals in isolation will always choose to have a car if they even slightly benefit. In most first-world countries now anyone of nearly any socioeconomic status can get access to a car, so we've hit maximum saturation which decreases quality of life for everyone. The negativity of car infra was very slow to appear and for a long time cars appeared to be a miracle. For some it's obvious in retrospect that we've over-invested in motor vehicle infrastructure, but for many the negative externalities are still not clear and/or ignored by the training of societal norms.

oezi 4y ago
> But individuals in isolation will always choose to have a car if they even slightly benefit. Car ownership is a terrible economic decision in many, many cases. It is just metal rusting motionless most of the time. They are a perfect example of irrational behavior. Many people would be financially better off to rent cars for long trips and rely on public transport otherwise (most rural settings aside).
- kfarr 4y ago
  Yes it is a fact for most people when you run the numbers all inclusive (not just car payments but insurance, gas, tolls, tickets, repairs, parking, oil changes, etc) they just don't pencil out. In fact Uber and Lyft knew this and part of their "success" was in leveraging sunk cost fallacy that car owners want to "make extra money" with an underwater asset whose depreciation from making said "extra money" is not included in the calculation of most drivers.
  - gruez 4y ago
    >Yes it is a fact for most people when you run the numbers all inclusive (not just car payments but insurance, gas, tolls, tickets, repairs, parking, oil changes, etc) they just don't pencil out. Can you define what "pencil out" exactly means? I searched around and it looks like the TCO for a car ranges around $1000-$1100/month if you're buying used. At average US hourly earnings[3] of $33.03/hour, that works out to a break-even of 31.8 hours/month. If you're single and don't do anything other than commute to work (30 min each way), I agree that this doesn't "pencil out", but as soon as you have kids or a partner (twice the amount of errands to run!), it easily becomes worth it. [1] https://www.caranddriver.com/auto-loans/a41545320/average-cost-of-owning-a-car/ https://www.caranddriver.com/auto-loans/a41545320/average-co... [2] https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/total-cost-owning-car https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/auto-loans/total-co... [3] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t19.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t19.htm
- blowski 4y ago
  This argument works less well for families living in less urban areas.
hbrn 4y ago
A slightly more accurate name for it is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

dangoor 4y ago

Not Just Bikes has a good series on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJp5q-R0lZ0_FCUbeVWK6OGLN69ehUTVa https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJp5q-R0lZ0_FCUbeVWK6... It ties into the whole suburban experiment. Lots of single family detached homes on their own pieces of land spread things out, raising the need for cars to get anywhere. Those homes were sold as "the American Dream". Of course, once people are in those homes, they not only need to drive to stores to buy stuff but also to work or to other activities happening in the city proper, thus requiring more roads to build up to get there. Plus the whole stroad thing rose up as well to meet the demands of people in suburbia. Not Just Bikes also covers interesting bits about how this whole thing is also on financially shaky footing given how much the infrastructure costs to get services out to spread out hoomes.

bena 4y ago

I imagine it's a problem of creep as well. In 40 years, we've added a touch over 3 billion people to the planet. That's nearly double the population in under one lifetime. Everyone alive then and born within the next 24 years of 1983 are all old enough to own and operate a motor vehicle today. Roughly 2/3 of the population is 16+. Just assuming that holds throughout history (and it probably doesn't, but for argument's sake let's pretend), there were about 3 billion potential vehicles then and 5 billion now. (Using 4.5b and 7.5b for the population counts for easier math. The real totals are a bit over). We've nearly doubled the number of potential cars on the road. But we didn't do that overnight. We did that over 40 years. And every 5 years or so, it may seem reasonable to make a few more adjustments for car infrastructure. Until we're here, today. And it's not until we look back that we see how much we've given over to car infrastructure at the expense of everything else.

jeffbee 4y ago

[flagged]

groby_b 4y ago
14% of Americans are black. Without debating that the US is full of systemic racism: Do you really think anybody believed "well, with 14% less cars, this works"? And this isn't even accounting for the fact that white people buy significantly more cars. We can add that 34% of black people use public transit, and only 14% of white people do. The problem really isn't black people having cars, or the missing assumption of black people having cars.
throwawayacc5 4y ago
"If you understand this delusional nonsense I just invented then it makes way more sense."

dav_Oz 4y ago

Well, one major player on shaping the streets was the emerging car industry itself. Not the only factor of course but nevertheless a very interesting story [0] to tell from that perspective where pedestrians not obeying the new strict rules began to be called jaywalkers. [0]https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oOttvpjJvAo https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oOttvpjJvAo

jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago

It made more sense to me watching historic footage of when freeway expansion was happening in the US in the 50s and 60s. Congestion was very low. If you're one of a small number of cars, where you never see traffic jams, there's always an empty parking space waiting for you, then it all looks quite pleasant. In other words, it was a luxury that couldn't scale to higher densities. And if you think like an anthropologist you see this same dynamic popping up in neighboring contexts. Why do we have houses with grassy yards? Because this echos the estates of aristocrats in centuries past, where only the wealthy could afford to have land maintained as purely aesthetic gardens rather than some practical agricultural purpose. Suburbia essentially offered everyone the chance to live like a royal of days past. Except because it doesn't scale, that offer ended up being a trap many places. Thinking of it like this, as status symbols that didn't scale, lots of things like the trend towards McMansions makes more straightforward sense. And to be clear, I'm not some sort of density zealot. I just think the options should be more diverse, rather than the current system in the US which prioritizes cars at the cost of everyone else, even in contexts where it clearly simply does not work.

u801e 4y ago

We never turned everything into car infrastructure. Other than controlled access highways like interstates that are restricted to motor vehicles that can maintain a minimum speed, all other roads are shared infrastructure that can be legally used by those who are walking or are using vehicles other than cars. The fact that some people think we need to separate different modes of transportation is the reason why people aren't trying alternative modes of transportation like cycling. Legally, there's a single set of rules of movement that apply to all vehicle drivers: 1. Keep to the right side of the road 2. Yield to through traffic before entering a roadway 3. Yield to oncoming traffic when making a left turn 4. Make right turns from as close as practicable to the right edge of the roadway 5. Make left turns from as close as practicable to the center of the roadway 6. The vehicle in front has the right of way over the vehicle behind (first come, first served). Follow those rules no matter what vehicle you're using and there really aren't any issues. I've ridden tens of thousands of miles over nearly 20 years on roads and never had a problem by riding in a predictable manner, signaling my intentions in advance, and following those rules.

Johnny555 4y ago
all other roads are shared infrastructure that can be legally used by those who are walking or are using vehicles other than cars. Try walking on the road in any business district and see how long it is until you get a ticket for jaywalking or illegally walking in the road. And while a rural highway with little to no shoulder may be legally open to pedestrians and bikes, it's practically inaccessible since sharing a road with 50 mph traffic (which means real-life 60+ mph speeds) is risky.
- u801e 4y ago
  > Try walking on the road in any business district and see how long it is until you get a ticket for jaywalking or illegally walking in the road. What law are you referring to that makes it illegal for pedestrians to walk on the road facing traffic on a road in a business district. > since sharing a road with 50 mph traffic (which means real-life 60+ mph speeds) is risky. I've done it plenty of times and motorists simply change lanes to pass me. Most motorists are only comfortable going 60 mph of they're able to see at least 700 feet or more in front of them. That gives then at least 7 seconds to see a cyclist and the cyclist that much time to see them in their mirrors. That's enough time to tell whether the motorist is slowing down or changing lanes to pass. If they aren't, then you can ride off road to avoid a collision. In my years of experience riding on roads with 50 mph+ speeds, every motorist either changed lanes or slowed down well before they caught up with me based on what I could see in my mirrors.

seadan83 4y ago

It was the way it was sold: - the American identity, "freedom" - auto industry pushing propaganda videos - a president impressed with the autobahn and the military justification for roads (it did used to take a car a week or more to go cross country) - "white flight" - years of lobbying for favorable laws. It used to be you could walk in streets. Then "Jay walking" became a thing and all sorts of car friendly laws - years of auto friendly ordinances that subsidize car ownership (free parking, requirements to build parking) The list goes on, but as the saying goes, you don't miss it until it's gone