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> What we need to focus on is infrastructure for walking, biking and public transportation And busses, light rail, intercity trains. But America associates on

> What we need to focus on is infrastructure for walking, biking and public transportation And busses, light rail, intercity trains. But America associates one-car-per-person with all kinds of twisted politics and self-esteem anxiety. We need a psyops program to wean people off cars, and it will take a decade or more. Just look at the anger in any HN thread that is critical of cars, it runs deep.

danny_codes 3y ago
> We need a psyops program to wean people off cars, and it will take a decade or more. Just look at the anger in any HN thread that is critical of cars, it runs deep. That 10 billion of car ad spend per year adds up.
coryrc 3y ago
Be willing to enforce civility in public. In Japan 7-year-old kids can ride the subway; here we have junkies burning fentanyl, vagrants with pitbulls, and "showtime". Gee, why wouldn't I want public transit to be an inseparable part of my life?
- demondemidi 3y ago
  You are conflating two vastly different issues as part of pro-car propaganda. There is a drug epidemic AND there is a homeless crisis. Those have nothing to do with investing in public transportation. Your agenda is showing, lay off the NewsMax, my friend.
  - coryrc 3y ago
    No, I lived this. I want to live where I can bicycle entirely (and mostly did, because transit is often dirty). I'm working toward spending a few years in Japan and later the Netherlands. But only because we can't have nice things in the USA. I'm not going to live where junkies own all public spaces and kids get stuck on needles and die.
    - demondemidi 3y ago
      HN rule require we take our peers' comments at face value. Assuming your anecdote is 100% absolutely positively true and not made up at all, and that you actually saw kids get stuck with needles and die, here's the rub: your anecdote doesn't matter. Your argument is literally: the solution to homeless and drug addiction is ... better manners? Do you expect people to take you seriously?
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
xyzelement 3y ago
// But America associates one-car-per-person with all kinds of twisted politics and self-esteem anxiety. America offers various lifestyles, from big cities like NYC, Boston, etc where a car is a liability, to near suburbs that are well served by transit (eg, NYC tri-state area) where you probably need a car but your daily commute doesn't involve it, to more spread-out and rural living where car is absolutely necessary. This speaks to a trade-off between density and car-dependence. People across the globe face similar trade-offs (eg: 50% of Dutch persons own a car, 86% of French households do...)
- rafram 3y ago
  But we can do better. 92% of Americans own a car, only slightly higher than the rate in France, but the average American drives twice as many miles in a year as the average French person does [1]. There are a lot of trips that will always need a car. Lots of people still want to own a car, even if they live somewhere with a good rail network. But they don’t need to drive it as much. It’s not that they’re being forced not to drive, it’s that rail is such a great option for getting around that there’s simply no need to use a car for most trips. That should be our goal in the US. [1] https://frontiergroup.org/resources/fact-file-americans-drive-most/ https://frontiergroup.org/resources/fact-file-americans-driv...
moffkalast 3y ago
> look at the anger in any HN thread that is critical of cars On the other hand: https://old.reddit.com/r/fuckcars https://old.reddit.com/r/fuckcars

danny_codes 3y ago

> We need a psyops program to wean people off cars, and it will take a decade or more. Just look at the anger in any HN thread that is critical of cars, it runs deep. That 10 billion of car ad spend per year adds up.

coryrc 3y ago

Be willing to enforce civility in public. In Japan 7-year-old kids can ride the subway; here we have junkies burning fentanyl, vagrants with pitbulls, and "showtime". Gee, why wouldn't I want public transit to be an inseparable part of my life?

demondemidi 3y ago
You are conflating two vastly different issues as part of pro-car propaganda. There is a drug epidemic AND there is a homeless crisis. Those have nothing to do with investing in public transportation. Your agenda is showing, lay off the NewsMax, my friend.
- coryrc 3y ago
  No, I lived this. I want to live where I can bicycle entirely (and mostly did, because transit is often dirty). I'm working toward spending a few years in Japan and later the Netherlands. But only because we can't have nice things in the USA. I'm not going to live where junkies own all public spaces and kids get stuck on needles and die.
  - demondemidi 3y ago
    HN rule require we take our peers' comments at face value. Assuming your anecdote is 100% absolutely positively true and not made up at all, and that you actually saw kids get stuck with needles and die, here's the rub: your anecdote doesn't matter. Your argument is literally: the solution to homeless and drug addiction is ... better manners? Do you expect people to take you seriously?
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

xyzelement 3y ago

// But America associates one-car-per-person with all kinds of twisted politics and self-esteem anxiety. America offers various lifestyles, from big cities like NYC, Boston, etc where a car is a liability, to near suburbs that are well served by transit (eg, NYC tri-state area) where you probably need a car but your daily commute doesn't involve it, to more spread-out and rural living where car is absolutely necessary. This speaks to a trade-off between density and car-dependence. People across the globe face similar trade-offs (eg: 50% of Dutch persons own a car, 86% of French households do...)

rafram 3y ago
But we can do better. 92% of Americans own a car, only slightly higher than the rate in France, but the average American drives twice as many miles in a year as the average French person does [1]. There are a lot of trips that will always need a car. Lots of people still want to own a car, even if they live somewhere with a good rail network. But they don’t need to drive it as much. It’s not that they’re being forced not to drive, it’s that rail is such a great option for getting around that there’s simply no need to use a car for most trips. That should be our goal in the US. [1] https://frontiergroup.org/resources/fact-file-americans-drive-most/ https://frontiergroup.org/resources/fact-file-americans-driv...

moffkalast 3y ago

> look at the anger in any HN thread that is critical of cars On the other hand: https://old.reddit.com/r/fuckcars https://old.reddit.com/r/fuckcars