231–240 of 835 posts
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Bike sharing services are great in those situations. You don't even need to carry your bike in the train. There is also public transit like trams and buses.
I didn't see many bikes in Amsterdam capable of conveying luggage.
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Nobody is talking about taking away cars from people who live outside of cities. Yet this argument always comes up when problems with cars in densely populated areas are discussed.
This probably occurs because people and governments love one size fits all solutions. There’s a good chance any rules about cars made in the city will spill over and cause issues for people in the country, it happens all the time in regards to other things so why not this?
Alternatives such as public transport, walking and cycling have always been gimped in favour of car traffic, lest the car driving populace complain.
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The US anti-car narrative often refers to the Netherlands as some kind of beacon of proper public infrastructure, whilst not knowing a damn thing about it. First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country. We have 11 million cars on a population of 17 million. On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Public transport is rarely faster, not even in…
It's similar in Singapore which arguably, because of its size has amazing public transport. But what do a lot of people do if they can afford it? Buy a car, especially if you want to live away from the city center and have kids. They even pay the $100,000 fee for a 10 year permit to have a car, on top of 100% import tax. That's close to $175,000 just to own some tiny 3-cylinder car for 10 years.
Public transport took an hour to get to the office. A taxi was 20 minutes. I'd agree public transport isn't great by a long way. Riding a bike if I lived there permanently might have been better, even with the 32 degree heat.
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That is not a car country. São Paulo has more car than population, and has so many cars that their area summed is bigger than the area of all streets in the city. It is so many cars that sometimes walking 1 hour to your workplace is faster than a car route where you can spend 2, 3 hours to go to a neighborhood next to yours during rush hour. So many cars that the city became also the city with most helicopters, becau…
Does São Paulo have more cars than people even if you include children? Surely there must also be an underclass of very poor or homeless people who do not own cars. What accounts for the fact that there are more cars than people? Is it common for a household of four (mother, father, son, daughter) to own five or six cars?
Edit: Did some quick checking. According to the national institute of statistics, São Paulo's fleet is about 8.8 million (this includes over 1 million motorcycles, plus all the busses, tractors, trucks, etc. Regular cars are 6 million). Population is 12.3 million.
Millennial: same feeling here. When I talk to people of my parents generation they always talk about how cars let them roam about and give them freedom. I never felt the same way, and I think a large part of that is that I grew up with the Internet; I could always AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) my friends or use ICQ. I was always connected even during an era of dialup. With the always-on functionality of modern phones,…
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The US anti-car narrative often refers to the Netherlands as some kind of beacon of proper public infrastructure, whilst not knowing a damn thing about it. First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country. We have 11 million cars on a population of 17 million. On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Public transport is rarely faster, not even in…
>First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country...On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Anyone visiting a Dutch city can see what a distortion this comment is. The sheer volume of bike traffic on largely safe infrastructure is phenomenal. Imagine if even half of these people took to cars instead, it would be gridlock. Life may be good for Dut…
Having visited Amsterdam by chance after missing a flight to London due to NYC gridlock traffic, this was one of my first thoughts on arrival.
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I think the question that anyone that rejects cars would ask is "why do you choose to live 60km from your work?".
Because most people don't have the luxury of choosing those things. - I don't have any meaningful control over where I'm allowed to work - I don't have any meaningful control over where my spouse is allowed to work - I only have a tiny amount of control over where I'm allowed to live (most of it prices us out, despite being above-average income) - even if I do exercise some control, it can be changed or stripped from…
Otherwise you are spot on. If your company moves offices within the same city's MSA they assume you can get there. If they move office to a different city they will pay to move you.
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I'd also be curious to see an inflation adjusted cost of use+ownership model for the average car owner. Cars are getting more complicated, and manufacturers are almost forcing owners to take them to a dealership for any kind of service. I'm generally handy and usually perform my own maintenance on my vehicles. As such, I tend to drive 10-20 year old Japanese vehicles. I remember once when I confidently told my partne…
Maintenance difficulty varies a lot by make and model. Doing anything on a mini Cooper is an exercise in sheet frustration. A Honda Civic is a breeze. In fact, it should probably be no surprise that Toyota and Honda typically fill out the entire top end of the "easy to maintain" spectrum, and American and European brands the other end.
You don't wanna have to work on 10lb of shit in a 5lb sack no matter who's badge is on the grill.
I'm an aging millennial, but on a purely personal level, when I lived in a city with good public transit, I was a lot happier, most of the time. I really like stepping off the train and the bus and being on my own two feet, the walking exercise, not being chained to this thing I have to worry about. I hate driving, I hate parking, I hate owning a car--the maintenance, the ongoing cost of fuel and insurance, all of it…
> but even then, I don't get the emotional association of freedom that previous generations did. I don't know what's different, although I have some guesses. Money, I'm sure, but there's something that's nagging me about it. I'd argue it's a combination of money and aging infrastructure. Money is the big one (cars used to be a lot cheaper, both to buy and to maintain. Incomes for most used to be much higher). Infrast…
I'm an aging millennial, but on a purely personal level, when I lived in a city with good public transit, I was a lot happier, most of the time. I really like stepping off the train and the bus and being on my own two feet, the walking exercise, not being chained to this thing I have to worry about. I hate driving, I hate parking, I hate owning a car--the maintenance, the ongoing cost of fuel and insurance, all of it…
the maintenance, the ongoing cost of fuel and insurance, all of it. Not sure if rich people worry about this, which is what the article is about, rich people. Agree wit everything else you said though.