I have these noodley appendages attached to my body below my waist. If I place one in front of the other repeatedly I can perform an ambulatory action called walking. Amazingly I can use this action to move between locations without mechanical assistance from a car. I would strongly recommend you try it sometime.
I live in a city with very few car parks, and lots of closely packed homes, shops, parks and paths. I haven’t needed a car for grocery shopping in the past 5 years, I didn’t even have easy access to car until summer 2021.
>I'LL TELL you this, but you'll have to promise that it will go no further. Not long after we moved here we had the people next door round for dinner and - I swear this is true - they drove.
This tiny thread of comments is a great microcosm of a fundamentally stupid exchange that crushes any hope of a good-faith exchange of ideas or views.
Cars are objectively not just a "huge waste of space", but offer clear benefits along with a high social, environmental, and economic cost. People obviously do not teleport, but that doesn't mean that cars are the only method of transport and that we can't totally legitimately complain about the negative effects. And yes, we all know how to walk – but your little sliver of experience contributes nothing except to tell us all that some people live in areas where they don't have to drive.
I clicked on these comments expecting some interesting contributions that I didn't necessarily get from the article, and instead we all get exposed to this dumb pettiness and learn nothing about a really interesting and challenging topic. Lame.
But walking is so slow! If only there was a machine that could amplify the output of your noodley appendages enabling you to perhaps "ride" the machine and go faster while using the same amount of effort and no additional fuel.
i live in a rural area with zero public transportation and would have a very hard time doing anything in nearby town if there was nowhere to park my car.
In UK cities few people own cars. Cycling, running and buses are all valid transports. Cars are really for the too-rich-to-travel-alone and the disabled who can't use public transport for one reason or another.
It's more complicated than that. In many cases, those in the cities that have decent public transport might not have parking spaces so they are forced into the decision rather than it being a choice.
In places where car ownership is possible, most people will have a car even if they use public transport for work. Why? Families are spread out, shops are in many different places, public transport tends to favour centralised areas like city centres and not other cross-city journeys and even a half mile walk to a bus stop or metro station is signficant if every journey is made that way. Children are often part of a club or whatever and in many cases, getting between all of these things is much quicker in a car than waiting for buses that don't turn up.
I like the idea of low-carbon environmentally friendly transport but it is a choice that in many cases is too big an ask, otherwise everyone would just do it. My car journey to work is 30 minutes. Doing the same journey on public transport would take at least 3 buses and probably 2 hours. Not happening.
Also, a lot of public transport seems expensive but I don't just want to jump on the "why is it so expensive in the UK and not elsewhere" because I don't think the economics are well understood.
Which UK cities?
A London year travel pass costs £2,568, so public transport is hardly cheaper either, plus it’s a whole lot less convenient. Unless you enjoy spending all of your time in an urban group think bubble with the only option is to use public transport to travel to more of the same.
avianlyric|4 years ago
I live in a city with very few car parks, and lots of closely packed homes, shops, parks and paths. I haven’t needed a car for grocery shopping in the past 5 years, I didn’t even have easy access to car until summer 2021.
bcraven|4 years ago
>I'LL TELL you this, but you'll have to promise that it will go no further. Not long after we moved here we had the people next door round for dinner and - I swear this is true - they drove.
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/bryson-s-am...
matthewmacleod|4 years ago
Cars are objectively not just a "huge waste of space", but offer clear benefits along with a high social, environmental, and economic cost. People obviously do not teleport, but that doesn't mean that cars are the only method of transport and that we can't totally legitimately complain about the negative effects. And yes, we all know how to walk – but your little sliver of experience contributes nothing except to tell us all that some people live in areas where they don't have to drive.
I clicked on these comments expecting some interesting contributions that I didn't necessarily get from the article, and instead we all get exposed to this dumb pettiness and learn nothing about a really interesting and challenging topic. Lame.
globular-toast|4 years ago
refurb|4 years ago
aronpye|4 years ago
[deleted]
bsza|4 years ago
em-bee|4 years ago
but i didn't. i made sure that i lived somewhere with a direct bus to work and it turned out to be fine. same in los angeles later. also auckland, nz.
with that experience i concluded that i won't need a car, ever. it is all about arranging how you live.
Aldqueath|4 years ago
FpUser|4 years ago
moritonal|4 years ago
lbriner|4 years ago
In places where car ownership is possible, most people will have a car even if they use public transport for work. Why? Families are spread out, shops are in many different places, public transport tends to favour centralised areas like city centres and not other cross-city journeys and even a half mile walk to a bus stop or metro station is signficant if every journey is made that way. Children are often part of a club or whatever and in many cases, getting between all of these things is much quicker in a car than waiting for buses that don't turn up.
I like the idea of low-carbon environmentally friendly transport but it is a choice that in many cases is too big an ask, otherwise everyone would just do it. My car journey to work is 30 minutes. Doing the same journey on public transport would take at least 3 buses and probably 2 hours. Not happening.
Also, a lot of public transport seems expensive but I don't just want to jump on the "why is it so expensive in the UK and not elsewhere" because I don't think the economics are well understood.
iso1631|4 years ago
aronpye|4 years ago