Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

economist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 835 posts

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#131

Post by mcv »

ryukafalz wrote: post #81
runako wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gentle reminder that a significant portion of society is not able to carry out trips on bikes due to infirmity, disability, or needing to convey someone who cannot bike (e.g. small children).

A significant portion of society is also not able to drive for similar reasons, but they mostly go ignored in our car-centric society. Nobody's saying that we should completely eliminate the ability to drive, certainly some people will need to, but we need to also provide viable options for those who can't. Additionally, bike infrastructure works great for mobility scooters too: https://youtu.be/xSGx3HSjKDo

This exactly. Different people have different needs and abilities, and we all get better options if more options become available. This is why investing in more bike infrastructure is ultimately good for everybody, even for the people who absolutely need a car; more people in public transit or on bikes means less cars on the load, less stress on infrastructure, less traffic jams, etc.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#132

Post by david-gpu »

GiorgioG wrote: post #108
david-gpu wrote: post #84

Some of us don't want to impose the externalities of car ownership on others. The suburbanite who drives a car barely feels these inconveniences, but everybody else does. Cars are dangerous to both pedestrians and cyclists. They make our streets noisy, our air polluted -- even electric cars shed particulates from their tires and their brakes. Cars require extensive amounts of parking, which is ugly dead space which c…

Mass transit isn't without its own inconveniences: "In 2017, the average amount of time people spend commuting with public transit in Toronto, for example to and from work, on a weekday is 96 minutes. 34% of public transit riders ride for more than two hours every day. The average amount of time people wait at a stop or station for public transit is 14 minutes, while 10% of riders wait for over twenty minutes on aver…

Proving my point, because something like 80% of the land in Toronto is zoned for single-family housing. The Toronto metropolitan area is one massive sprawling suburb.

How would these numbers look like if we had more dense walkable neighborhoods? No need to speculate, simply look at similar statistics from places like Montreal.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#133

Post by nicbou »

JustARandomGuy wrote: post #3

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,…

The feeling of freedom is only relative to the isolation of being a suburban teen without a car.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#134

Post by michaelt »

galangalalgol wrote: post #11

The article specifies rich, maybe beacuse, at least in the US, only the rich can afford to live in places where cars aren't strictly necessary? Some choose to live elsewhere anyway, for scenery or privacy, but the poor or even median 60% can't choose an area with a 15 minute walk to necessities. The Seattle walkability map on hn recently highlighted that fairly well I think? I also wonder if it is truly cars or just…

> The article specifies rich, maybe beacuse, at least in the US, only the rich can afford to live in places where cars aren't strictly necessary?

I assumed it was because countries like India and China are following different trends - lower initial car ownership rates, more two-wheelers on the road, but a growing middle class.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#135

Post by robertlagrant »

Retric wrote: post #97
Ekaros wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is optimal situation. But it does breakdown or be worse with slightly more complicated routes. Like I used to travel from smaller city to bigger city to other big city. And in the end public transport was probably 50% if not longer in time. First 15-20 minutes to station, then 45 minutes with local train. Wait for intercity, ~2 hours and 30 minutes or get lift to destination. Compared to straight 2 hours from do…

Swapping trains can take a while, but until self driving works you can’t do much while driving. And even with self driving simply getting up and stretching, grabbing a bite to eat, or even just going to the bathroom requires you to stop making progress for a while. Driving has several advantages, but getting stuck in traffic is extremely unpleasant in ways that similar delays on other forms of travel don’t really rep…

> getting stuck in traffic is extremely unpleasant in ways that similar delays on other forms of travel don’t really replicate

But you also don't have to take a 3 hour coach ride because the driver or other staff's union is striking. It's just you and your car.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#136

Post by afunctionof »

BizarreByte wrote: post #71
PartiallyTyped wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think that car ownership is related to poverty or absence of disposable income. In fact, a well off person in a well functioning city has little if any reason to own a car and can get away without one. Subreddits like r/solarpunk, r/fuckcars, r/notjustbikes, along with the push for 15 minute cities are a testament that young people dont want to be in the grip of petrol companies or owning a car as they are no…

> In fact, a well off person in a well functioning city has little if any reason to own a car and can get away without one. You can get away without one, that is if you don’t mind sharing transit with violent junkies in any North American city. Transit can be down right terrifying to use these days.

I would be interested in seeing a graph comparing the rate of automobile fatalities to the rate of public transit fatalities.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#137

Post by mcv »

seydor wrote: post #41
wffurr wrote: post #10

There's 138 trains per day between Amsterdam and The Hague. It's faster to take the train than to drive on that trip. Driving in either city in an exercise in frustration. Why would anyone in a rich country with a high functioning rail system like The Netherlands want to drive? I don't know how many rich countries that describes, but I lived happily for years in Boston in the USA without a car. I have one now but onl…

Why would so many people need to move between Amsterdam and Hague in the first place

They're both important cities. Sometimes people need to be in a specific city.

But you're absolutely right that it's better to work in the same city where you live, so you can simply ride a bike to work.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#139

Post by hgomersall »

GiorgioG wrote: post #108
david-gpu wrote: post #84

Some of us don't want to impose the externalities of car ownership on others. The suburbanite who drives a car barely feels these inconveniences, but everybody else does. Cars are dangerous to both pedestrians and cyclists. They make our streets noisy, our air polluted -- even electric cars shed particulates from their tires and their brakes. Cars require extensive amounts of parking, which is ugly dead space which c…

Mass transit isn't without its own inconveniences: "In 2017, the average amount of time people spend commuting with public transit in Toronto, for example to and from work, on a weekday is 96 minutes. 34% of public transit riders ride for more than two hours every day. The average amount of time people wait at a stop or station for public transit is 14 minutes, while 10% of riders wait for over twenty minutes on aver…

None of those are externalities. Public transport clearly does have externalities, but they're dwarfed by private car usage.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#140

Post by vanilla_nut »

CalRobert wrote: post #115
kensai wrote: post #27

I really wished this demonisation of the car stopped. Modern cars are way more climate friendly than merely 10-20 years ago and many climate-conscious persons do pool to commute. But we need to understand. There are cases where the car is a must. Unavoidable. Imagine having toddlers, having to do heavy groceries, and living in a place with difficult landscape or challenging weather. Imagine having a neurological dise…

You're right, we should imagine having young children. I want my children to ride a bike to school and not die.

I grew up essentially a prisoner in a rural US community before I could drive.

Kids need to be able to explore independently! Thank you for understanding this.

Post reply on HN