6 ms·

They still produce traffic noise, air pollution due to their tires and brakes, and ugly urban landscapes dominated by roads and car parking. I would rather foc

They still produce traffic noise, air pollution due to their tires and brakes, and ugly urban landscapes dominated by roads and car parking. I would rather focus our efforts on improved density so that most people will choose walking, transit or bicycles as means of transport. These ways to move around our towns are also "better for the environment".

biehl 3y ago
It seems possible to do both. Both encourage the shift from fossil cars to EVs and to encourage more cycling and public transport.
- david-gpu 3y ago
  Sure, we should do both in the same sense that we should floss twice a day and we should stop kicking children. One of them is more urgent and makes a bigger difference, so efforts should be focused on that one.
  - IanCal 3y ago
    That seems like a good example because I can't see how resources are being kept away from "stop child kicking" in order to promote flossing. Doing both is entirely reasonable.
    - david-gpu 3y ago
      The resource that is in conflict is political attention. The more politicians and voters focus on EVs, the less is done to improve the walkability and public transit in our cities. EVs distract us from the real enemy: traffic.
      - biehl 3y ago
        Traffic is bad, but fossil traffic is strictly worse than EV traffic. So again, it seems possible to advocate both less traffic and that the remaining traffic should be better.
  - infecto 3y ago
    Perfect is the enemy of good. Even the Bay Area cannot get together and make meaningful improvements to non-car commuting infrastructure. I recall how many years it took just to get the dang bus lane from Richmond district to downtown. I will take any incremental positive changes I can get.
- heresie-dabord 3y ago
  We can do both, of course. But making a sufficiently global change to our ecological dystopian future involves some sociologically hard problems: Human population, the sociology of capitalism, industrialised consumerism, the unscalability of communities problem (both established structural debt and newer dysfunctional debt) and the consumerist voting fallacy ("I will vote with my money"). If there were fewer people, if there were less industrial-scale consumerism, if communities were scalable, if consumers were in fact globally engaged as purchasers and voting citizens... I have heard an environmental scientist say that the order of responsible choices from worst to best is: = buy an ICE vehicle = buy a zero-emission EV = DO NOT buy a vehicle Of all the difficult sociological challenges that could certainly bring change, it seems that those likeliest to change are the human population (fewer) and zero-emission vehicles (more).
zecg 3y ago
Air pollution is not on the same order of magnitude for the average electric vs internal combustion vehicle, though.
bluGill 3y ago
Before improving density we need to provide more transit options so people think they can live without a car. Suburbs can support great transit for less cost than a car for everyone, but they cannot support the bad transit they get as people can afford to drive.
rco8786 3y ago
Not mutually exclusive things, at all. Most (all?) metros in the US are currently on a "density" kick also and I hope it continues...it's also a multi-generational problem where electric cars will probably go from niche thing to majority of cars on the road within a single gen
c00lio 3y ago
Improved density is worse for people and the environment. One should leave sufficient greens within a city for people and wildlife, and a row of trees or bushes can also easily shield traffic noise. Traffic noise which transit also produces in copious amounts. Maybe increased density is relevant for some US cities, but European ones should definitely lower their density considerably. Most European cities are dead zones for anything but rats and pigeons, and people fare similarly badly.
- throw0101b 3y ago
  > Improved density is worse for people and the environment. The higher the density the less actual Nature needs to be bulldozed over for development. See: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO6txCZpbsQ&t=9m28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO6txCZpbsQ&t=9m28s Fifteen minutes pedalling in one direction is downtown, fifteen minutes in the other is farm land. By have more people in a given land area, the remaining land area can be left alone.
  - c00lio 3y ago
    Which might be ok for the surrounding land, but isn't fine for the inhabitants of the city.
    - AstralStorm 3y ago
      Depending on how the outskirts of the city are managed, it can be fine for inhabitants. Too small living quarters are the problem, not the density.
      - c00lio 3y ago
        Nonsense. The inner city being a concrete hellscape isn't being helped by nicer parts on the outskirts. How would you improve density if you aren't shrinking the space people live in?
        throw0101b 3y ago
PretzelPirate 3y ago
> I would rather focus our efforts on improved density There are many places in the Midwestern US where there will never be density and the people there don't want it. In those places, people drive everywhere. Shouldn't we try and make their transportation less damaging to the environment? Public transportation isn't practical there due to the size of the area and the lack of density (which won't change). It's easier to give people better tools than it is to try and change how they live their entire lives.
- snapplebobapple 3y ago
  The short answer to that is: No. The long answer to that is: Change zoning so that people can actually respond to a carbon tax that is high enough to capture the externalities of using gasoline and people will make choices that are better for the environment, while being the best for their particular needs, all on their own (You don't need to make the current thing illegal and you don't need to leave this with the NIMBY captured city government either, you can push allowances at higher levels of government that are not as NIMBY captured). The extremely inelastic demand for gasoline is largely driven by the geography of cities, which is directly dictated by zoning and building codes that force extremely low density, large dwellings. Change the zoning, change the cost of petrol and people will demand smaller and denser, which makes public transit and maintained bicycle infrastructure feasible, which increases elasticity of gasoline demand and in turn lowers the carbon tax needed to drive lower usage. It's a vicious or beautiful cycle all driven by what is allowed and not allowed in your zoning and building codes.
dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago
> I would rather focus our efforts on improved density We can and should do both. When density increases smaller electrical vehicles, some entirely charged by solar on their roof, become practical. They are much lighter, use a lot less resources than a standard car, travel somewhat slower and generally ameliorate car problems, while being just as practical: usable in all weather, having cargo carrying capacity. Bikes and walking will always have these sorts of limitations.
MrPatan 3y ago
I used to think the inevitable "but the tire pollution!" commenter was just run of the mill hn pedantry, but it's been so consistent over so many years... I hope the pay is good, at least.
jillesvangurp 3y ago
You are not wrong. But the sub title of the article is: "Experts say that across the board, EVs are a win compared to similar gas-powered vehicles." Whether you look at manufacturing, sourcing of battery materials (which get recycled), energy production needed to power the vehicles, it all boils down to EVs being far better than gas powered vehicles. Why is that? Kwh for kwh, EVs are just far more frugal with the energy. Petrol contains lots of energy, most of that is converted into vibrations, heat, noise, etc. And a little of it propels the vehicle forward. EVs produce a bit of heat, very little noise (tire friction mostly), and convert most of their power into forward motion and can actually recover some of the energy when you slow down through regenerative breaking. Even if you use brown coal, which is a nasty fuel, to power an electricity plant, about half of it turns into energy and most of that ends up being used for useful things by the car. It gets more miles per kwh worth of CO2 emitted relative to ice vehicles. If you add the emissions needed to produce the vehicle (which you'd also have to do for an ICE car), it boils down to any difference being eliminated by this within 1 or 2 years of the vehicle hitting the road. Even if it is a bit more co2 emissions to produce the vehicle (which is debatable), the difference is wiped out early in the life of the vehicle by it just being more efficient. After that every year the vehicle manages to not break down, which as it turns out is mostly quite long, it just gets better. Why is this important? One of the many myths that people keep rehashing, is that EVs are more polluting than gas guzzlers. This article attempts to rectify that. Of course, there's a lot of good work being done in the EV industry to improve things further. Cheaper batteries with less exotic metals, more efficient motors without rare earths, recycled materials, using renewables to power rapid chargers, etc. But even without all that, EVs are already cleaner.
heresie-dabord 3y ago
Given that there is no easy transition to be made from the debt of dystopian infrastructure, it is clear that zero-emission per trip is the best way to address pollution in the local community. How we get there will be a combination of public transit, elecctric transportation, shared vehicles, and bicycles. But the US has more than 278 million vehicles on the road and trucks are the most popular type of vehicle.[1] The change to a zero-emission strategy will take more than one generational cycle.[2] [1] _ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insurance/car-ownership-statistics/ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insurance/car-ownership-s... [2] _ https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/tailpipe-greenhouse-gas-emissions-typical-passenger-vehicle#typical-passenger https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/tailpipe-greenhouse-gas-em...

biehl 3y ago

It seems possible to do both. Both encourage the shift from fossil cars to EVs and to encourage more cycling and public transport.

david-gpu 3y ago
Sure, we should do both in the same sense that we should floss twice a day and we should stop kicking children. One of them is more urgent and makes a bigger difference, so efforts should be focused on that one.
- IanCal 3y ago
  That seems like a good example because I can't see how resources are being kept away from "stop child kicking" in order to promote flossing. Doing both is entirely reasonable.
  - david-gpu 3y ago
    The resource that is in conflict is political attention. The more politicians and voters focus on EVs, the less is done to improve the walkability and public transit in our cities. EVs distract us from the real enemy: traffic.
    - biehl 3y ago
      Traffic is bad, but fossil traffic is strictly worse than EV traffic. So again, it seems possible to advocate both less traffic and that the remaining traffic should be better.
- infecto 3y ago
  Perfect is the enemy of good. Even the Bay Area cannot get together and make meaningful improvements to non-car commuting infrastructure. I recall how many years it took just to get the dang bus lane from Richmond district to downtown. I will take any incremental positive changes I can get.
heresie-dabord 3y ago
We can do both, of course. But making a sufficiently global change to our ecological dystopian future involves some sociologically hard problems: Human population, the sociology of capitalism, industrialised consumerism, the unscalability of communities problem (both established structural debt and newer dysfunctional debt) and the consumerist voting fallacy ("I will vote with my money"). If there were fewer people, if there were less industrial-scale consumerism, if communities were scalable, if consumers were in fact globally engaged as purchasers and voting citizens... I have heard an environmental scientist say that the order of responsible choices from worst to best is: = buy an ICE vehicle = buy a zero-emission EV = DO NOT buy a vehicle Of all the difficult sociological challenges that could certainly bring change, it seems that those likeliest to change are the human population (fewer) and zero-emission vehicles (more).

zecg 3y ago

Air pollution is not on the same order of magnitude for the average electric vs internal combustion vehicle, though.

bluGill 3y ago

Before improving density we need to provide more transit options so people think they can live without a car. Suburbs can support great transit for less cost than a car for everyone, but they cannot support the bad transit they get as people can afford to drive.

rco8786 3y ago

Not mutually exclusive things, at all. Most (all?) metros in the US are currently on a "density" kick also and I hope it continues...it's also a multi-generational problem where electric cars will probably go from niche thing to majority of cars on the road within a single gen

c00lio 3y ago

Improved density is worse for people and the environment. One should leave sufficient greens within a city for people and wildlife, and a row of trees or bushes can also easily shield traffic noise. Traffic noise which transit also produces in copious amounts. Maybe increased density is relevant for some US cities, but European ones should definitely lower their density considerably. Most European cities are dead zones for anything but rats and pigeons, and people fare similarly badly.

throw0101b 3y ago
> Improved density is worse for people and the environment. The higher the density the less actual Nature needs to be bulldozed over for development. See: * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO6txCZpbsQ&t=9m28s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO6txCZpbsQ&t=9m28s Fifteen minutes pedalling in one direction is downtown, fifteen minutes in the other is farm land. By have more people in a given land area, the remaining land area can be left alone.
- c00lio 3y ago
  Which might be ok for the surrounding land, but isn't fine for the inhabitants of the city.
  - AstralStorm 3y ago
    Depending on how the outskirts of the city are managed, it can be fine for inhabitants. Too small living quarters are the problem, not the density.
    - c00lio 3y ago
      Nonsense. The inner city being a concrete hellscape isn't being helped by nicer parts on the outskirts. How would you improve density if you aren't shrinking the space people live in?
      - throw0101b 3y ago

PretzelPirate 3y ago

> I would rather focus our efforts on improved density There are many places in the Midwestern US where there will never be density and the people there don't want it. In those places, people drive everywhere. Shouldn't we try and make their transportation less damaging to the environment? Public transportation isn't practical there due to the size of the area and the lack of density (which won't change). It's easier to give people better tools than it is to try and change how they live their entire lives.

snapplebobapple 3y ago
The short answer to that is: No. The long answer to that is: Change zoning so that people can actually respond to a carbon tax that is high enough to capture the externalities of using gasoline and people will make choices that are better for the environment, while being the best for their particular needs, all on their own (You don't need to make the current thing illegal and you don't need to leave this with the NIMBY captured city government either, you can push allowances at higher levels of government that are not as NIMBY captured). The extremely inelastic demand for gasoline is largely driven by the geography of cities, which is directly dictated by zoning and building codes that force extremely low density, large dwellings. Change the zoning, change the cost of petrol and people will demand smaller and denser, which makes public transit and maintained bicycle infrastructure feasible, which increases elasticity of gasoline demand and in turn lowers the carbon tax needed to drive lower usage. It's a vicious or beautiful cycle all driven by what is allowed and not allowed in your zoning and building codes.

dkjaudyeqooe 3y ago

> I would rather focus our efforts on improved density We can and should do both. When density increases smaller electrical vehicles, some entirely charged by solar on their roof, become practical. They are much lighter, use a lot less resources than a standard car, travel somewhat slower and generally ameliorate car problems, while being just as practical: usable in all weather, having cargo carrying capacity. Bikes and walking will always have these sorts of limitations.

MrPatan 3y ago

I used to think the inevitable "but the tire pollution!" commenter was just run of the mill hn pedantry, but it's been so consistent over so many years... I hope the pay is good, at least.

jillesvangurp 3y ago

You are not wrong. But the sub title of the article is: "Experts say that across the board, EVs are a win compared to similar gas-powered vehicles." Whether you look at manufacturing, sourcing of battery materials (which get recycled), energy production needed to power the vehicles, it all boils down to EVs being far better than gas powered vehicles. Why is that? Kwh for kwh, EVs are just far more frugal with the energy. Petrol contains lots of energy, most of that is converted into vibrations, heat, noise, etc. And a little of it propels the vehicle forward. EVs produce a bit of heat, very little noise (tire friction mostly), and convert most of their power into forward motion and can actually recover some of the energy when you slow down through regenerative breaking. Even if you use brown coal, which is a nasty fuel, to power an electricity plant, about half of it turns into energy and most of that ends up being used for useful things by the car. It gets more miles per kwh worth of CO2 emitted relative to ice vehicles. If you add the emissions needed to produce the vehicle (which you'd also have to do for an ICE car), it boils down to any difference being eliminated by this within 1 or 2 years of the vehicle hitting the road. Even if it is a bit more co2 emissions to produce the vehicle (which is debatable), the difference is wiped out early in the life of the vehicle by it just being more efficient. After that every year the vehicle manages to not break down, which as it turns out is mostly quite long, it just gets better. Why is this important? One of the many myths that people keep rehashing, is that EVs are more polluting than gas guzzlers. This article attempts to rectify that. Of course, there's a lot of good work being done in the EV industry to improve things further. Cheaper batteries with less exotic metals, more efficient motors without rare earths, recycled materials, using renewables to power rapid chargers, etc. But even without all that, EVs are already cleaner.

heresie-dabord 3y ago

Given that there is no easy transition to be made from the debt of dystopian infrastructure, it is clear that zero-emission per trip is the best way to address pollution in the local community. How we get there will be a combination of public transit, elecctric transportation, shared vehicles, and bicycles. But the US has more than 278 million vehicles on the road and trucks are the most popular type of vehicle.[1] The change to a zero-emission strategy will take more than one generational cycle.[2] [1] _ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insurance/car-ownership-statistics/ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insurance/car-ownership-s... [2] _ https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/tailpipe-greenhouse-gas-emissions-typical-passenger-vehicle#typical-passenger https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/tailpipe-greenhouse-gas-em...