A lot of US cities still have parking minimums. If you want to build a store that has capacity for X you need to have Y parking. And the cheapest way to do that

A lot of US cities still have parking minimums. If you want to build a store that has capacity for X you need to have Y parking. And the cheapest way to do that is a lot by far. This has the effect of spreading everything out because you need all this space for parking which then makes it more necessary to drive everywhere because everything is so spread out and it's a vicious cycle that encourages car usage.