If you want people to abandon cars, make the alternatives better. Unfortunately I never see that happening, I only see attempts to make car travel worse. I hate public transport with a passion, because it is so bad. When I was commuting, it took an hour each way to go 13 miles, but if I tried to take public transport, it would have taken two hours each way, including 2 miles of walking on a state highway with no shoulder and no sidewalks. Would have had to take a bus to the light rail, and change trains at least once. This light rail shared the same road that cars use, so it was subject to all of the same traffic issues that cars suffered.
Designing for cars forces alternatives to become worse by physically shoving apart destinations in order to fit in parking lots and more lanes. Nobody wants to walk when they have to traverse shitty parking lots to get anywhere instead of nice places, after all.
The sort of argument you’re making is fundamentally dishonest because it’s based on the presumption that the status quo development pattern is somehow a level playing field when it is, in fact, very much unfairly catering to cars.
![[meme] Pedestrians shouldn't be relegated to the sidelines](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/6b416d86-6a93-45bc-9275-c7c1d7a52943.webp){kind=link}
If you want people to abandon cars, make the alternatives better. Unfortunately I never see that happening, I only see attempts to make car travel worse. I hate public transport with a passion, because it is so bad. When I was commuting, it took an hour each way to go 13 miles, but if I tried to take public transport, it would have taken two hours each way, including 2 miles of walking on a state highway with no shoulder and no sidewalks. Would have had to take a bus to the light rail, and change trains at least once. This light rail shared the same road that cars use, so it was subject to all of the same traffic issues that cars suffered.
Designing for cars forces alternatives to become worse by physically shoving apart destinations in order to fit in parking lots and more lanes. Nobody wants to walk when they have to traverse shitty parking lots to get anywhere instead of nice places, after all.
The sort of argument you’re making is fundamentally dishonest because it’s based on the presumption that the status quo development pattern is somehow a level playing field when it is, in fact, very much unfairly catering to cars.
See also: The Arrogance of Space