“Giving people more viable alternatives to driving means more people will choose not to drive, so there will be fewer cars on the road, reducing traffic for drivers.”
Concise, easy to understand, and accurate. I have used it at least a dozen times and it is remarkable how well it works.
Also—
“A bus is about twice as long as a car so it only needs to have four to six passengers on board to be more efficient than two cars.”
“A bus is only helpful when it actually runs regularly. And by ‘regularly’ I don’t mean one each morning and another one each afternoon”.
I don’t know what it’s like in other places but I tend to find that in cities with an actual dedicated serious transportation agency, busses run every hour at minimum. Even regional busses in the small city where I attended university ran 6-8 times a day per line for three very similar routes. Local busses ran every 20-40 minutes depending on time of day. That’s shocking good for a city of 50,000 in America.
It might surprise you, but there are people living outside of large cities.
The point seems kinda moot outside of cities.
Are you expecting a bus stop outside every farmhouse? Who’s going to ride it, cows?
Or in a small town where everything is reachable on foot within fifteen minutes anyway and the road has like 2 cars per minute? Regional bus service that takes you to nearby towns that comes a few times a day is probably as good as it gets.
Regional bus service that takes you to nearby towns that comes a few times a day is probably as good as it gets.
And exactly that makes people drive in cars into the cities.
You’re coming at this from a perspective that suggests people should have alternatives to cars, or maybe even that people deserve alternatives to cars. And that’s fundamentally not how a shocking number of people think. Heaven help you if you suggest things like low cost fares for the poor or even free access to public transit.
Most people I have found care relatively little about the topic. They drive and think in terms of driving only because that is the context they have been exposed to their entire lives, and there’s not really their fault.
If someone really is that deep into the rabbit hole then nothing you say will change their mind, so don’t waste your time.
One of my coworkers believes bicycles cause car congestion. All car congestion, even the stuff on highways.
I don’t understand why people are so married to the thought of driving to and from work every day. You just worked 9 hours, and you want to drive through rush hour?
So you don’t have to work, and therefore no need to commute? Lucky you. Normal people still have to work for a living.
And here it is. The only other option you can think of is to be unemployed. You’re so tied to the thought of a driving commute you can’t even imagine anything else.
You’re so tied to the thought of a driving commute you can’t even imagine anything else.
I am not tied to a driving commute. The point is that for a lot of people, a commute by public transport or bike simply is no viable alternative. As long as you dwell in the city center 99% of your life, you will not encounter this, but outside the city, public transport is a joke.
Then you agree we should change that?
Indeed. If you have a miracle cure to fix that, feel free to apply it.
Not acting like it’s impossible would be the first step. Advocate for it at every level.
They want to either live in walking/biking distance of work, have a mass transit system that gets them to work, or work remotely.
Normal countries don’t require every person drive to get to work.
Normal countries don’t require every person drive to get to work.
There are a lot of jobs - the majority, even - where WFH is not an option. A baker is not making the bread at home. And those people are often forced to change employments for a number of reasons. And they simply cannot just chose where to live due to financial constraints.
All this “fuck cars, use bikes and public transport” is just a dream of a wealthy white collar society who has lost the touch with reality.
I’m not against bikes and public transports. On the contrary. But unless those two options are actually viable, condemning cars is just a stupid idea. You cannot expect people to up their commute from 30 minutes one way to 3+ hours, just because the city dwellers don’t like their cars.
All this “fuck cars, use bikes and public transport” is just a dream of a wealthy white collar society who has lost the touch with reality.
Do you think ~90% of the 30 million people in Shanghai are all white collars who lost touch with society? What about 99% of Singapore?
You cannot expect people to up their commute from 30 minutes one way to 3+ hours, just because the city dwellers don’t like their cars.
These places public transit, including intercity, is far, far superior to driving, so people use it. In America, our public transit is garbage, so people don’t use it.
Do you think ~90% of the 30 million people in Shanghai are all white collars who lost touch with society? What about 99% of Singapore?
Those places are so densely populated that they can afford a good public transport system. But look at other cities in the world - or, more precisely, their environment - and you will soon see a serious lack of public transport once you leave the cities. Yes, people are living there.
These places public transit, including intercity, is far, far superior to driving, so people use it.
That is totally fine. I was not talking about city dwellers, they do have access to public transport in most cases. I’m especially talking about the people not living in the city centers.
That’s not actually true. Our decentralized system of roads and cars is actually more expensive than a robust rail and bus system. And I’ve been to other places, in Europe and South America. They all have better developed mass transit. You don’t need to be South Korea. You just have to be willing.
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Not in my experience. They mostly want to take public transportation away because of taxes. Of course they don’t realize that cars cost them way more in taxes between gas subsidies, needing wider and more roads, needing more police to deal with traffic, property damage, and deaths rather than real crime, etc… Not to mention higher insurance rates as traffic increases and maintenance costs.
A lot of people choose not to live in the city with good transit because housing is too expensive, so they live in the 'burbs. All that extra money means they can get a fancy new car lease. They drive into the city and because cars are allowed everywhere 24/7 there is no reason for them to look for alternatives in high traffic zones.
That’s the old way. There’s no real difference in pricing now until you move into the exurbs. For more and more people it’s better to pay a bit more and not have to commute while having easy access to the city’s amenities.
A “bit” more? Have you seen rent levels in the last few decades?
Rent must be incredibly affordable in the US from what I’m reading here.
I live in Melbourne, Australia - and I couldn’t afford anything within an hours drive of the city.
Have you ever considered that for many people not living in the city this “extra money” simply does not exist?
I’m convinced that everyone else on Lemmy is so poor that purchasing the device they use to access this site was one of the worst financial decisions available to them.
The median house price in the US is >$400,000. Rent around here for a 2bd is 2500, and I don’t even live in a place with mass transit.
Unless you’re buying a new phone every month, it’s not affecting your ability to buy a house or rent an apartment in a city.
Maybe don’t make up names to call us, that would help us listen to you a bit.
Maybe don’t identify with the demographic the term applies to since it’s entirely by choice and such a stupid thing to base your identity around.
As a carbrain myself, I like the name. I would enjoy the irony of a bumper sticker with it.
On topic though, I can’t imagine a valid argument AGAINST better public transportation. Everything about it would make us carbrains’ driving experience safer and just…better.
