Why isn't there much support for intercity rail? (lawsuit, better, cleaner)
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Please see my above stats about car ownership. Only 11% of people in Chicago are carless. I was trying to make the point that I am not completely clueless about urban life.
Actually, the stats you quoted are for people with ACCESS to cars, not car ownership. Access can also be having a friend with a car who gives you lifts, the means to rent a car at need or car share programs such as Zipcar.
Others have pointed out that much of the traffic in cities actually comes from people travelling in from the suburbs and that some of the areas you listed are car designed areas with limited public transportation, so of course then people have them as they have NO OPTIONS. There are plenty of places in surburbia where is is literally impossible to walk to a store to buy a gallon of milk. Everything is designed around the car.
I don't think it would be possible to just take away all the cars tomorrow because the last 70 years of public planning have been done around the car.
That does not mean it has to be that way. $10-$12 gallons in Europe encouraged them to focus on better planning, smaller cars and more efficient public transportation. People don't fly from Paris to the South of France, they take the high speed train. Just as they travel by train from London to Paris, or they travel around Amsterdam by bus, tram or bicycle.
$10 a gallon gas is going to force change in the US more than political will unfortunately.
No matter much you want it to happen, the majority of Americans are not willing to move into big cities and live on top of one another just so they can walk or take a train to work. If you want to that is your choice, but it's not mine. I will drive a hybrid and pay $15 a gallon for gas before I move, and many other people feel the same way.
Another case of just thinking about the issue only in the context of what it costs to fill the car's gas tank. When fuel is $15/gal., it will be impractical for middle class Americans to continue to live in sprawled auto-dependent suburbs. The distribution costs to get the food and other necessities to that sprawled environment will raise the cost of living beyond what a middle class person trying to live there can afford. How people "feel" about it will have no relevance. In the last Great Depression, people probably didn't "feel" great about eating beans and potatoes for their main meal several days a week, or having to consolidate households with friends or relatives, or having to take in boarders to make the rent or house payment, or forego a vacation any more than 50 miles from home, but those are exactly the things that a huge number of middle class Americans had to do to survive.
Oh yeah, driving a hybrid is a great idea--IF you can afford to pay cash or are able to borrow the money to buy one. Plenty of middle-class Americans can't do that right now--and the big economic crunch hasn't even hit yet.
Are you sure that's 11% of people instead of 11% of households? I have a hard time believing that the average family of four there would own four cars....
Quote:
Originally Posted by AnthonyB
Actually, the stats you quoted are for people with ACCESS to cars, not car ownership. Access can also be having a friend with a car who gives you lifts, the means to rent a car at need or car share programs such as Zipcar.
Others have pointed out that much of the traffic in cities actually comes from people travelling in from the suburbs and that some of the areas you listed are car designed areas with limited public transportation, so of course then people have them as they have NO OPTIONS. There are plenty of places in surburbia where is is literally impossible to walk to a store to buy a gallon of milk. Everything is designed around the car.
I don't think it would be possible to just take away all the cars tomorrow because the last 70 years of public planning have been done around the car.
That does not mean it has to be that way. $10-$12 gallons in Europe encouraged them to focus on better planning, smaller cars and more efficient public transportation. People don't fly from Paris to the South of France, they take the high speed train. Just as they travel by train from London to Paris, or they travel around Amsterdam by bus, tram or bicycle.
$10 a gallon gas is going to force change in the US more than political will unfortunately.
The article I quoted used "access" and also car ownership, so it's hard to know just what they are referring to. A small quote: While 8 percent of Americans overall live in a home without access to a car, Raphael and Berube say nine of the 10 cities with the highest percentage of residents with no car are on the East Coast. I believe they are using access as meaning someone in the household owns a car.
Anyone else is free to look up stats as well.
I don't know where you live AnthonyB or what your experience with suburbs is, but that is just not true. I live 1 1/4 miles from a full service supermarket. I can (and do sometimes) walk there. Every suburb I have ever lived in has been designed with grocery stores and other such amenities close at hand. In addition, the majority of big metro areas, including Denver where I live, have transit service to/from the suburbs. You need to get out to the burbs and take a look around.
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 04-27-2008 at 01:55 PM..
Reason: typo
If you want to see how people live without cars in todays society go to any decent sized town or city with an effective public transportation system. Surprisingly enough, lots of people in Chicago, New York, Boston, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and smaller towns and cities too numerous to mention manage to buy groceries, get their kids to school, garden and even furnish their homes without getting into a car.
I know what you mean. I spent a year living in Seattle and never owned a car. Public transportation, ride boards, and pounding the pavement got me everywhere I needed to go. I also spent six months living in Mill Valley just north of San Francisco. Same thing there, never had any need for a car. Public transportation met my needs very nicely and much less expensively than owning a car.
I am currently living in Grand Junction CO, a small town more than 200 miles from any big city. For all of my local activities, I could make do without a car if I had to. As it stands I drive it to and from work and not much more than that...about 80 miles a week. I have considered riding a bike instead, but I am concerned about the safety issue. Even here in bicycle mecca, many drivers have a huge resentment for cyclist using their roads.
Last edited by CosmicWizard; 04-27-2008 at 02:51 PM..
My point was not that flying is more efficient than train travel. My point is that train travel was not this effiecient transportation mode that everyone loved and for some reason the "evil government" decided to take it away. People voted with their pocketbooks to stop using it.
Bingo!
People voted with their pocketbooks to stop using it.
Here's my point. There does not seem to be a desire to force people to stop flying because in is extremely ungreen. That is a sacred cow that cannot be touched. However, there is a desire to force people into all kinds of other actions - heavy taxes on SUV's, the redesign of cities to eliminate suburbia, etc.
So what is the problem with taxing airline travel to the max so people stop using this inefficient form of transportation? Use the taxes to improve intercity rail travel so we can travel much more eco friendly.
I don't know where you live AnthonyB or what your experience with suburbs is, but that is just not true. I live 1 1/4 miles from a full service supermarket. I can (and do sometimes) walk there. Every suburb I have ever lived in has been designed with grocery stores and other such amenities close at hand. In addition, the majority of big metro areas, including Denver where I live, have transit service to/from the suburbs. You need to get out to the burbs and take a look around.
I live in a suburb of New York. I lived in a suburb of Los Angeles. I've lived in a suburb of Philadelphia. I've lived in a couple of city centers in the Europe, plus a suburb of Edinburgh and a suburb of Glasgow.
I grew up in suburbs, lived in an urban environment as a young adult and currently live in another surburb. I would suggest that is quite a lot of experience. There are quite a few supermarkets within a 3 mile radius, and none of the roads leading to them have sidewalks, but do have a lot of fast moving traffic. One of the premiums in this area is a "walkable downtown" people here are willing to pay EXTRA just to be able to get out of their cars, the demand is that high, and yet planners put little effort into designing suburbs for pedestrians.
I would suggest that I have more than a little experience of suburbs. Rather than assume a lack of experience, perhaps you could address my actual points.
So what is the problem with taxing airline travel to the max so people stop using this inefficient form of transportation? Use the taxes to improve intercity rail travel so we can travel much more eco friendly.
That won't happen anytime soon. We'll be lucky if they don't get a hundred billion dollar bailout in addition to their regular subsidies.
That won't happen anytime soon. We'll be lucky if they don't get a hundred billion dollar bailout in addition to their regular subsidies.
About like throwing a bale of hay in front of a horse with four broken legs. It might make the horse feel a little better, but he's not going to be carrying you anyplace.
In Colorado, as in most of the western US, virtually all the suburbs have sidewalks. This dichotomy has been discussed before on City-Data. The eastern 'burbs don't have them, and the western burbs do. The dividing line seems to be around Chicago.
OK, here is one of your points:
Quote:
Others have pointed out that much of the traffic in cities actually comes from people travelling in from the suburbs and that some of the areas you listed are car designed areas with limited public transportation, so of course then people have them as they have NO OPTIONS.
I did address that point. Virtually every large metro area has a public transportation system. Some are better than others. Chicago's is certainly by all accounts one of the best. There are very few people living in anything remotely considered a metropolitan area who cannot get to an 8-5 M-F job on pubic transit.
However, I looked up all the cities you mentioned on their City-Data main page. It shows the usual means of transpotation used to get to work in the form of a pie chart. The charts did not give percentages, so I had to do a little interpretation. Here is what I found. Keep in mind these are percentages of city residents in these cities, exclucing suburbanites.
Chicago: Drove alone: 50%; carpooled: ~12%, total traveling by auto: 62%
Seattle: 57%; 10%; 67%
Portland: 67%; 8%; 75%
NYC: 25%; 10%; 35%
Boston: 37%; 13%; 50%
San Francisco: 40%; 10%; 50%
Plus, my home, Denver:65%; 15%, 80%
This is not car ownership, this is how many people use their cars to get to work. Except in NYC, at least 50% of the population uses a car to go to work, even in cities with supposedly excellent public transportation systems.
Another point:
Quote:
people in Chicago, New York, Boston, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and smaller towns and cities too numerous to mention manage to buy groceries, get their kids to school, garden and even furnish their homes without getting into a car.
Perhaps you can look up some school transportation statistics. It seems that most kids either take a bus or are driven/drive. I have been involved in local school issues for a long time and once participated in a survey of how kids get to school. At an elementary school with no busing (i.e everyone lived within the 1 1/2 mile cutoff for busing) most of the kids were driven, either individually (the majority) or in groups, which could have included sibling groups.
The article I quoted used "access" and also car ownership, so it's hard to know just what they are referring to. A small quote: While 8 percent of Americans overall live in a home without access to a car, Raphael and Berube say nine of the 10 cities with the highest percentage of residents with no car are on the East Coast. I believe they are using access as meaning someone in the household owns a car.
Anyone else is free to look up stats as well.
I don't know where you live AnthonyB or what your experience with suburbs is, but that is just not true. I live 1 1/4 miles from a full service supermarket. I can (and do sometimes) walk there. Every suburb I have ever lived in has been designed with grocery stores and other such amenities close at hand. In addition, the majority of big metro areas, including Denver where I live, have transit service to/from the suburbs. You need to get out to the burbs and take a look around.
Since living in Florida I have lived in three suburbs. Of the three one of them had a supermarket in a range of 1.5 miles (which is where I live now) and we walk to the store on occasion. The other places were anywhere from 3 to 5 miles to the nearest grocery. So while its great that you live near a grocery store this is not true of every suburb or even most. I have also lived in Texas, Euless to be exact and the nearest market to us was 5 or 6 miles.
I also lived in Long Island for a short while and the grocery was about 3 or 4 miles away. I have a relative that lives in Central Florida and they are about 5 miles from a market. I have another relative who lives in Nashville, the closet store to them is about 4 miles and no side walks ANYWHERE to even walk up to the market if you felt like it. In Naperville my friends home was about 6 miles from the store. So again, your statement is inaccurate.
*edit*
as for mass transit in these areas. In the area of nashville my relative lives it is not common to see a bus. The last time I went, I saw a bus but it was closer to the downtown, where as my relative lives way south of downtown. Euless had no mass transit when I lived there, this was back in 2000. Napervile in Il. didn't have much in the form of mass transit either and the same goes for the relative that lives in central florida
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