When talking about climate change, Jean Marc Jancovici (our local Al Gore) never fails to mention urban architecture takes time to reorganize. Given your petrol

When talking about climate change, Jean Marc Jancovici (our local Al Gore) never fails to mention urban architecture takes time to reorganize. Given your petrol is so cheap (low tax and high foreign... let's not say it), US builds cities accordingly. In France, taxes more than double the petrol price [1], so you only see suburban designs in very rich places (namely, Sophia-Antipolis). Those areas where cars are mandatory are not kind to lower-income people, and the voting is accordingly very right-wing. So the first step we should take for climate change is to organize our cities so that public transport is useful, where we can walk to work. In this matter, US has no chance of improving if they keep low taxes per gallon. [1] http://www.connaissancedesenergies.org/fiche-pedagogique/structuration-des-prix-de-l-essence-et-du-gazole-france http://www.connaissancedesenergies.org/fiche-pedagogique/str... (French, with charts)