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People have no idea how much cars benefited the lower and created the middle class. Instead of having an hour commute to move a few miles, you could have a hal

People have no idea how much cars benefited the lower and created the middle class. Instead of having an hour commute to move a few miles, you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles. This made land ownership possible for this group of people. Low value land that was too far from work was now usable for those same jobs. Whenever I see propositions of removing lanes from freeways, I think how that benefits only rich people and landlords. I can afford to live near my company because I'm well-off, but I know plenty of people making 40-60k/yr that have plots of land 30-60 minutes from their jobs. They would otherwise be renting apartments 1/3 of the size of their home.

piva00 1y ago
I don't see how having a decent public transportation network is any different. I live in a suburb of Stockholm, 15km away from the city centre but it takes me only some 35 min to get to the central station on the metro, I have the option to take a 10 min bus to the nearest rail station that connects me to a different part of the city so if I need to go there I can choose the commuter train. Not only that but I do get local trains taking me to different towns southwards, also a direct connection to the airport and other towns northwards, and a connection to the long distance rail that can take me to the other coast, or south to Malmö/Copenhagen. My suburb only exists because the metro station was built here, around the station there's a small centre with shops for daily needs, all of that was designed prior the existence of residential buildings to support the city's expansion, around the station are the higher-density buildings with apartments while I live some 5-10 min away in a townhouse; and this suburb is considered a poorer area of the Stockholm metropolitan region, not requiring a car was a must.
squircle 1y ago
> Instead of having an hour commute to move a few miles, you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles. Traveling faster than what the human body is capable of on its own feels like time travel to me. Horse, buggy, car, whatever... like stepping into or activating a warp bubble where your consciousness arrives at a place faster than humanly possible. Similarly, having access to information or experience (different manners of vehicles) is potentially a huge advantage or major pitfall. (Perhaps why some ancient maps indicate, "here be dragons!") Inversely, moving slow when others are traveling fast allows you to witness where those paths lead without having to go down proverbial rabbit holes.
xnx 1y ago
This is true. The rich would like to relegate the poors to public transportation to keep the roads clear and keep undesirables out of their neighborhoods.
- coldtea 1y ago
  The "that's an advantage for the rich" has an easy fix: ban all city traffic except commercial vehicles for delivery of goods, ambulances, etc. A good public transport is a boon to the poor and even middle class. In Europe, in cities where it's available, even the rich (the top 10%-5%, not the top 0.01%) routinely take it.
  - TeMPOraL 1y ago
    We do need to do something about the "holiday conundrum", for lack of a better name. That it, there are times during the year, most notably around Christmas, where suddenly everyone in the city gets time off and wants to travel to visit their family out in the middle of nowhere - and that also includes the operators of public and commercial transportation networks. You have a sudden influx of commuters at the same time as transport service capacity drops to a fraction of the normal. Not sure how to handle this short of abolishing holidays entirely (Not necessarily a bad idea - too many things in society already run in synch where they shouldn't; see e.g. most people working 9-5, including services all those people need, so there's e.g. no good time to go to a dentist or visit a bank without taking a day off at work.)
    - coldtea 1y ago
      >Not sure how to handle this short of abolishing holidays entirely Giving people more time off around the year.
- jobs_throwaway 1y ago
  I am rich and I want to be able to take public transit to work
  - 1y ago
prmoustache 1y ago
There is no need for a car to do that. I've lived 40km from my office, commuting by bicycle (there was an highway and a railway available as well). I was super fit at the time. I've lived 100km from my office, taking a mix of train + bicycle. Despite being a wee bit slower than using a car, I could do something ( or sleep/nap) in the train, so that was better time spent. Anyway you look at it, even when it is faster, using a car in an area that has decent public transport is a time that is not well spent over different modes of transportation and you don't really gain time if you think of it thorously.
- nkrisc 1y ago
  You biked 50km after 8+ hours of physical labor?
  - prmoustache 1y ago
    That was a typo, it was actually 40km but yes, and I enjoyed it. It was basically free 2h40 of fitness every day.
    - nkrisc 1y ago
      What kind of work did you do? I would personally not look forward to a 2h40m bike ride after doing physical labor all day. Impressive.
      - piva00 1y ago
        40km is more like a 1h20m-1h40m ride on a slightly above average pace (25km/h-30km/h), it shouldn't take 2h40m to ride 40km even on a very slow pace (15km/h).
        deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
        prmoustache 1y ago
        40km was one way. I was doing 80km a day, so around 2h40 a day when I didn't decide to extend the ride back.
coldtea 1y ago
>This made land ownership possible for this group of people. Low value land that was too far from work was now usable for those same jobs. The same is the case with public transport where available and where the city is built to support it. Which is what the poor people and rising middle class used -- especially as they didn't afford a car until the 1930s (and in places like New York not even then, though they still managed to turn from piss poor Italian, Jewish, Greek, Bulgarian, Irish, etc immigrants to middle class).
suddenlybananas 1y ago
You can take suburban trains in Paris to well over 50 km outside of the city center.
- prmoustache 1y ago
  There are people taking the high speed train from places such as Dijon every day to go to Paris. That is a +300km commute in 1h40 that would take around 3h30 to 4h by car with no traffic jam.
SideburnsOfDoom 1y ago
> People have no idea how much cars benefited the lower and created the middle class. Yes, and with reference to London, one of the cities discussed, cars are now literally poisoning us. > The most economically disadvantaged are often those worst affected by air pollution, particularly because they often live in less desirable locations, such as near busy roads. But they are conversely least likely to own a car or use them as much and therefore emit the least pollution. https://trustforlondon.org.uk/news/london-inequalities-infect-the-air-we-breathe https://trustforlondon.org.uk/news/london-inequalities-infec... https://www.london.gov.uk/press-releases/mayoral/bame-and-poorer-londoners-face-air-quality-risk https://www.london.gov.uk/press-releases/mayoral/bame-and-po... If cars are so great all around, ever think why "near busy roads" are "less desirable locations" ?
lm28469 1y ago
It benefited business owners more than anything... wasting hours of your life in a fucking cage you probably pay a loan and interests on because without it you wouldn't even be honoured to slave your life away isn't anywhere close to "benefiting the lower class". Car is freedom, war is peace... people can't even tell how brainwashed they are by the car industry.
inglor_cz 1y ago
"you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles." Well unless half a million people try to commute along you during the same rush hour, with their commute ending in the wider centre of an old city which cannot absorb all the cars. In Prague it is quite common to spend half an hour to cross the outer 25 miles of your journey and spend another half an hour in the traffic jam of the last 5 miles. If it wasn't for the suburban trains and buses which alleviate the pressure, that last 5 miles would be one huge gridlock moving at the speed of a slow walk.
jobs_throwaway 1y ago
> you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles only by ignoring the externalities of traffic and highways. If everyone tries to do this, it doesn't work. Hence the need for public transit
pjc50 1y ago
> a half hour commute to move 30 miles. This is one of those things that works up to a point, and then scaling goes in reverse once everybody starts doing it. You can't maintain 60mph commute. In London the average speed is more like 10mph. There's no way to move enough people in and out on a daily basis without everyone packing into trains. Occasionally it gets completely out of hand: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_National_Highway_110_traffic_jam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_National_Highway_110_tra...

piva00 1y ago

I don't see how having a decent public transportation network is any different. I live in a suburb of Stockholm, 15km away from the city centre but it takes me only some 35 min to get to the central station on the metro, I have the option to take a 10 min bus to the nearest rail station that connects me to a different part of the city so if I need to go there I can choose the commuter train. Not only that but I do get local trains taking me to different towns southwards, also a direct connection to the airport and other towns northwards, and a connection to the long distance rail that can take me to the other coast, or south to Malmö/Copenhagen. My suburb only exists because the metro station was built here, around the station there's a small centre with shops for daily needs, all of that was designed prior the existence of residential buildings to support the city's expansion, around the station are the higher-density buildings with apartments while I live some 5-10 min away in a townhouse; and this suburb is considered a poorer area of the Stockholm metropolitan region, not requiring a car was a must.

squircle 1y ago

> Instead of having an hour commute to move a few miles, you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles. Traveling faster than what the human body is capable of on its own feels like time travel to me. Horse, buggy, car, whatever... like stepping into or activating a warp bubble where your consciousness arrives at a place faster than humanly possible. Similarly, having access to information or experience (different manners of vehicles) is potentially a huge advantage or major pitfall. (Perhaps why some ancient maps indicate, "here be dragons!") Inversely, moving slow when others are traveling fast allows you to witness where those paths lead without having to go down proverbial rabbit holes.

xnx 1y ago

This is true. The rich would like to relegate the poors to public transportation to keep the roads clear and keep undesirables out of their neighborhoods.

coldtea 1y ago
The "that's an advantage for the rich" has an easy fix: ban all city traffic except commercial vehicles for delivery of goods, ambulances, etc. A good public transport is a boon to the poor and even middle class. In Europe, in cities where it's available, even the rich (the top 10%-5%, not the top 0.01%) routinely take it.
- TeMPOraL 1y ago
  We do need to do something about the "holiday conundrum", for lack of a better name. That it, there are times during the year, most notably around Christmas, where suddenly everyone in the city gets time off and wants to travel to visit their family out in the middle of nowhere - and that also includes the operators of public and commercial transportation networks. You have a sudden influx of commuters at the same time as transport service capacity drops to a fraction of the normal. Not sure how to handle this short of abolishing holidays entirely (Not necessarily a bad idea - too many things in society already run in synch where they shouldn't; see e.g. most people working 9-5, including services all those people need, so there's e.g. no good time to go to a dentist or visit a bank without taking a day off at work.)
  - coldtea 1y ago
    >Not sure how to handle this short of abolishing holidays entirely Giving people more time off around the year.
jobs_throwaway 1y ago
I am rich and I want to be able to take public transit to work
- 1y ago

prmoustache 1y ago

There is no need for a car to do that. I've lived 40km from my office, commuting by bicycle (there was an highway and a railway available as well). I was super fit at the time. I've lived 100km from my office, taking a mix of train + bicycle. Despite being a wee bit slower than using a car, I could do something ( or sleep/nap) in the train, so that was better time spent. Anyway you look at it, even when it is faster, using a car in an area that has decent public transport is a time that is not well spent over different modes of transportation and you don't really gain time if you think of it thorously.

nkrisc 1y ago
You biked 50km after 8+ hours of physical labor?
- prmoustache 1y ago
  That was a typo, it was actually 40km but yes, and I enjoyed it. It was basically free 2h40 of fitness every day.
  - nkrisc 1y ago
    What kind of work did you do? I would personally not look forward to a 2h40m bike ride after doing physical labor all day. Impressive.
    - piva00 1y ago
      40km is more like a 1h20m-1h40m ride on a slightly above average pace (25km/h-30km/h), it shouldn't take 2h40m to ride 40km even on a very slow pace (15km/h).
      - deleted 1y ago
        [deleted]
      - prmoustache 1y ago
        40km was one way. I was doing 80km a day, so around 2h40 a day when I didn't decide to extend the ride back.

coldtea 1y ago

>This made land ownership possible for this group of people. Low value land that was too far from work was now usable for those same jobs. The same is the case with public transport where available and where the city is built to support it. Which is what the poor people and rising middle class used -- especially as they didn't afford a car until the 1930s (and in places like New York not even then, though they still managed to turn from piss poor Italian, Jewish, Greek, Bulgarian, Irish, etc immigrants to middle class).

suddenlybananas 1y ago

You can take suburban trains in Paris to well over 50 km outside of the city center.

prmoustache 1y ago
There are people taking the high speed train from places such as Dijon every day to go to Paris. That is a +300km commute in 1h40 that would take around 3h30 to 4h by car with no traffic jam.

SideburnsOfDoom 1y ago

> People have no idea how much cars benefited the lower and created the middle class. Yes, and with reference to London, one of the cities discussed, cars are now literally poisoning us. > The most economically disadvantaged are often those worst affected by air pollution, particularly because they often live in less desirable locations, such as near busy roads. But they are conversely least likely to own a car or use them as much and therefore emit the least pollution. https://trustforlondon.org.uk/news/london-inequalities-infect-the-air-we-breathe https://trustforlondon.org.uk/news/london-inequalities-infec... https://www.london.gov.uk/press-releases/mayoral/bame-and-poorer-londoners-face-air-quality-risk https://www.london.gov.uk/press-releases/mayoral/bame-and-po... If cars are so great all around, ever think why "near busy roads" are "less desirable locations" ?

lm28469 1y ago

It benefited business owners more than anything... wasting hours of your life in a fucking cage you probably pay a loan and interests on because without it you wouldn't even be honoured to slave your life away isn't anywhere close to "benefiting the lower class". Car is freedom, war is peace... people can't even tell how brainwashed they are by the car industry.

inglor_cz 1y ago

"you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles." Well unless half a million people try to commute along you during the same rush hour, with their commute ending in the wider centre of an old city which cannot absorb all the cars. In Prague it is quite common to spend half an hour to cross the outer 25 miles of your journey and spend another half an hour in the traffic jam of the last 5 miles. If it wasn't for the suburban trains and buses which alleviate the pressure, that last 5 miles would be one huge gridlock moving at the speed of a slow walk.

jobs_throwaway 1y ago

> you could have a half hour commute to move 30 miles only by ignoring the externalities of traffic and highways. If everyone tries to do this, it doesn't work. Hence the need for public transit

pjc50 1y ago

> a half hour commute to move 30 miles. This is one of those things that works up to a point, and then scaling goes in reverse once everybody starts doing it. You can't maintain 60mph commute. In London the average speed is more like 10mph. There's no way to move enough people in and out on a daily basis without everyone packing into trains. Occasionally it gets completely out of hand: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_National_Highway_110_traffic_jam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_National_Highway_110_tra...