All the Ways Car Dependency Is Wrecking Us

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Worth pointing out that all cities were car-free until about 100 years ago. None of this is a radical idea, if anything it’s highly traditionalist and conservative. What we’ve done to ourselves in a few generations is crazy. You genuinely can’t get a single loaf of bread without a 4,000lb $35,000 machine to carry you to the 1 acre store surrounded by 55 acres of asphalt.

Oh the Urbanity did a good job of pointing out that conversations around safety statistics for a city typically only focus on crime and omit traffic deaths/injuries when the traffic deaths/injuries are typically much higher especially in the US.

Living in Japan, the idea that you can't bring your bag into a store is crazy to me. Everyone here walks or bikes around with backpacks on and it is totally normal to use one's backpack as a grocery bag.

Car culture is so baked in to our behavior that suggesting a one-mile walk or 3-mile bike ride is a shock. The number of people who drive their car to the local train station is astounding since many are within walking/biking distance. However, it is a labor to bike without bike lanes or paths separated from car traffic. I guess I was just spoiled after living for a few years in the Netherlands, but even they took decades to reform their behavior and infrastructure.

My ridiculous WalMart story - I rode my bike there recently and when I arrived, searched high and low for a place to lock it up. There were no bike racks, no poles, just shopping carts. I scratched my head. No way was I going to leave it outside unlocked, unattended. This is LA, after all. So when an employee walked outside, I wrangled him and asked where I could lock my bike up. He acted like I was asking him to take me to the moon. Together we traversed the entirety of the front of the store. He suggested a light pole in the middle of the parking lot, amongst the cars. I laughed and said, "really?" In the end, we both gave up and I cycled to Trader Joe's. TJ's gets us.

This comes after a tragic crash in San Francisco in which a driver crashed into a family of four waiting for the bus, killing all of them including an infant and toddler. This in a dense urban area with lots of transit, yet many great urbanist cities still have sections designed around cars and single family homes. These kinds of tragedies are reminders of why the work of City Nerd and the advocacy groups are so important.

As an American who moved to a suburb of Paris, I can say that not owning a car for the past year and a half has been awesome! I walk so much more using the public transit, and I lost some of that weight I couldn't shake in Florida. Also not paying car insurance, car payments, car repairs, gas, etc is awesome. While the place I am could be more pedestrian friendly like the city of Paris itself, I love being able to actually walk places from my home. It's nice going to local shops like pharmacy, bakery, bar, restaurants, and you get to know the owners and they remember you. Back home even to go get my prescription was very hard without driving or potentially getting run over. Most cities in the US give no alternative to those that do not (or are unable) to drive...

Just imagine how great your life could be without a car loan, insurance, maintenance, and gas. If you save that money and invest all of it, you could retire.

Australian here: a few years ago I visited a friend in Florida. At one stage my wife and I just wanted to go for a walk to get a few groceries like people do back home. The suspicious looks we got from both motorists and residents was surprising to even concerning. I'm sure at one stage we were followed by a police car - just creepy.

CityNerd is really slipping in his content these days: I saw exactly zero visual references to Cheesecake Factory.

Touched on but not stressed in this video is that large numbers of roads and impervious parking lots are huge contributors to urban flooding especially when they are built in historic floodplains. Water that would have been absorbed become runoff with nowhere to go.

I'm surprised there was no mention of global wars/proxy wars/imperialism. Control over oil resources is directly linked to car dependence and is a primary factor in nearly all geopolitical conflicts.

Car dependency is such a huge part of the US economy as well, it's a huge industry and all the spin-off industry that goes along with it. And powerful politicians are not going to want to mess with it all that much, especially if their state is a part of that industry. The American car culture runs deep, and that can't be overstated enough. Americans love their cars and I doubt if many even think about the negative side of owning a car. They want to drive whatever they choose to drive without the government telling them. And Hollywood has always sort of romanticized the automobile, and that great American road trip.

Today I learned that someone I know (knew) was killed this past weekend riding his bicycle, in a collision with a car. He was pronounced dead at the scene. And yes he was wearing a helmet. It is killing us.

Ya know, not too long ago I was feeling pretty down, and wondered if I might be suffering from clinical depression . Then, I discovered this channel. Now I DEFINITELY have depression.

One high-capacity train line can move as much people as seven car lanes in one direction

Seeing the photos of the busy 1920s Kansas City Union Train Station really bummed me out because it's restaurants, merchandise & a single Amtrak station today. The Auto industry really took a lot from us

Thank you for mentioning light pollution and parking lots. The parking lot in my apartment complex is overlighted. I'm ready to swear it is harming the quality of my sleep and my ability to get deep sleep.

Enviro consultant here. Another indirect habitat impact from roads and other impervious surfaces is making water runoff from rain more “flashy” by causing higher high flows when all that water suddenly hits a stream during the rainfall, when it would naturally take longer and hit the stream more gradually. These high flows have a negative impact on the habitat, destroying features like spawning gravel, and fish hiding places like undercut stream banks. Also causes more soil erosion which increases the sediment load, which can directly harm fish and also smother fish eggs etc. Salt in freshwater streams is a really huge issue in many places. Eg in ON Canada there are marine shrimp that can survive in some streams because they’re becoming more saline. Salt doesn’t get broken down by anything so it stays in the environment. Can get into groundwater used for drinking water too. Great video!