It's a perfect analogy, because we pointlessly reshaped our world around automobiles before realizing that no, in fact, most of us didn't need one, and we would have been better off had we not created a society in which everyone has to have one in order to exist.
There was a lot of horse shit everywhere before cars.
You could go back to bicycles but that's not great when you have a family of groceries and kitty litter to carry home in the rain.
Or when need a trip to the hospital or any other emergency.
So yes, many people need a car, and it enables personal freedom.
I live in a small town you can walk end to end in 15 minutes, it has everything you need in a small area, but a car still makes life easier and more fun.
How do you propose we structure society where you don't need cars?
Not having cars doesn't mean not having motorized transport, it just means restructuring our priorities around much more efficient forms of mass transportation, ranging from increased walkability and cycling infrastructure on a local scale, to buses, trams and trains on a larger scale, with specialised vehicles like ambulances and cargo-taxis for those rare cases where you really do need a whole motorized vehicle to yourself.
So what does society look like where you can still have ambulances and taxis but not a car for yourself?
Don't you still need roads for those? So just normal civilians can't have them?
And I won't hold my breath for local politicians to improve public transportation.
I'd love better public transportation, in addition to cars.
-- I hit some sort of post limit, replying to below --
Civilians are still allowed to have and drive their own cars, even in Europe.
I'm all for better designed cities in America though, but it's not a car problem, and especially not a universal issue (towns are perfect).
Instead of hating on cars I think a more useful approach would be to contact your local politicians that are in charge of zoning and public transportation.
Horses release methane. The scale of horses you would need would certainly be worse. It was a problem in the past at a much smaller scale. Plus with shit you have disease and rats, which means more disease.
I have, and there are bicycles littered everywhere and huge amounts of traffic on them.
And no it doesn't solve the problems I listed. Those things are still difficult.
If I'm feeling sick I guess my wife can hook a wagon to the bike and pull me.
Don't get me wrong I bike around town all the time, but some days are really hot, some are really rainy, some days I need to carry more stuff than is possible on a bike, some days I'm not feeling well enough to bike.
Bikes, (non humiliating) public transport, and more compact city design all have to work together.
I think cars in small towns are pretty sweet - but they suck for everyone in big cities. They take up huge amounts of space during rush hour, and move very few people compared to any form of transit you like
There are very few people for who cycling is not possible; there are so many options to make it accessible for almost everyone. Here is an example for people in a wheelchair: https://www.roam.nl/runner-handbike-20/a3535 , it basically hooks up to their existing wheelchair and turns it into a hand-operated tricycle.
I don’t understand the point you’re trying to make. Because you can make up some edge case for whom cycling is not feasible the 99.999% for which it is shouldn’t either?
> No, people are able to drive long after they can bike.
Like hell they are.
> The only thing that basically stops you from being able to drive is your vision, which will impact biking as well.
Looking at some studies, vision is not a major factor in accidents caused by the elderly. The reasons are mainly mental: reduced reaction speed, reduced ability to quickly grasp complex situations in traffic. Physical reasons are mostly around reduced motor functions: reduced muscle strength and fine motor skills.
Biking is impacted a lot less by these cognitive changes since you don’t go 130 km/h on a bike. Elderly are more likely to get hurt in a cycling accident, as they are more frail, but they are less likely to cause an accident.
> Handicap and elderly people are not edge cases.
Are you saying the majority of people are either elderly or handicapped ?
> We adapt our society to fit the disabled everywhere, as we should.
And we do. There are many options for both the elderly and disabled people to cycle, as I have shown in my earlier posts. None of those are exceptional, I regularly encounter those ‘in the wild’.
> Bikes do not work for many, many people and situations. It's not an edge case problem, it's a fundamental problem.
Cars do not work for many, many people and situations. Lots of places are simply not reachable by car. What do you think is easier for an elderly person: driving their bike right up to a store and walking 5 meters or driving their car to the edge of the city center and then having to walk a kilometer or more to get to the store they need to go to?
Hard disagree. I love the freedom of going anywhere I want in the country on a whim. I love suburban and rural living that would be very hard without extensive roads. I could go on and on about the benefits of cars over public transit.
Of course you're imagining the world we have now with all the cars simply removed, instead of one that had developed without cars in the first place. A lot of competing infrastructure was deleted, or never made in the first place, because of cars.
