People Hate the Idea of Car-Free Cities—Until They Live in One
People Hate the Idea of Car-Free Cities—Until They Live in One
Removing cars from urban areas means lower carbon emissions, less air pollution, and fewer road traffic accidents. So why are residents so resistant?
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To answer your question on why people are hesitant: they’re not worried about the cities per se, but about the mentality that will then turn its attention to the suburbs and rural areas. There are people who don’t want to live 10mins away from grocery stores because they don’t like grocery shops, or other crowdy places with people milling about. Some of us want to be hermits and live relatively secluded
All that said, I like car free cities. I don’t want denser suburbs tho
I don't want suburbs at all and public policy should make suburbs unaffordable.
Why don’t you want suburbs? Or I guess, the question is why don’t you want other people to have them?
Suburbs, are inherently higher carbon emitting that proper urban areas. For an extreme example, if everyone in the US lived in an area with similar characteristics to NYC, it would reduce the counties carbon emissions by 3/4.
Beyond that, they’re only really able to exist, as they do in the US, thanks to exploitative and predatory economic practices. Almost no one who lives there makes their money there, they work somewhere else, extracting value, and then bringing it back to the suburb to fund incredibly inefficient infrastructure.
I’m not saying ban them complete, I’m just saying, take away the massive amount of economic incentives and support that makes them possible. Build out housing in cities and ensure the value generated in them goes to funding their services, infrastructure and development of the cities.
Make the suburbs pay for them selves and they will nearly disappear very quickly.
Beyond that, they’re only really able to exist, as they do in the US, thanks to exploitative and predatory economic practices. Almost no one who lives there makes their money there, they work somewhere else, extracting value, and then bringing it back to the suburb to fund incredibly inefficient infrastructure.
I don’t think this is true with remote work. Also, there are businesses nearby which operate on location—architectural firms, dance studios, lawyers, accountants etc. So I think painting suburbs as “predatory” or “absent of economic activity” is an inaccurate and incomplete description.
Regarding the carbon footprint: yes, that can be improved by more commuter rails to the suburbs, and improved energy efficiency in older houses. Encouraging people to grow native plants in green spaces will also help as opposed to “manicured lawn culture”.
I think you’re undervaluing how much people want to live outside of busy spaces, so there will always be some support for suburban living. From my pov, I am more in favor of the rustic, idyllic spaces as opposed to the overpaved, McMansion scenarios that maybe you’re describing?
If you are willing to pay $100/gallon of gasoline, pay for all the roads, pay for the carbon externalities of both the cars and the roads, and pay for the water infrastructure and basically live in a Galt's Gulch, then sure, you can do whatever you want. But that isn't the case today.