this post was submitted on 24 Apr 2026
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They will really do anything before investing in public transit
Automobile-centric infrastructure was such a colossal societal fuck-up.
Bad for personal health, physical safety, household finances, and the environment. Automobiles are not a symbol of freedom, they are a symbol of dependence.
While I agree about automobile centric structure, when rural living automobiles are absolutely the ticket to freedom. It's a shame more populace areas get designed around maintaining dependence on cars.
I think the point is choice. Even those living in suburban and urban areas have a difficult time opting out of car-dependence.
If you choose to live rural, I would say that automobiles are part and parcel to that decision. It's just the nature of low population density.
Except there is absolutely no reason it has to be like that in rural areas. Period. At all. Even a little. Look at China (or if you still believe the NED puts out legitimate stories, Denmark or Sweden or Norway) which has public transit to nearly all rural areas at least a couple times a week, and inter-village public transit in pretty much all villages that have more than a dozen people.
Busses are more efficient than independent vehicle ownership in all settings. All of them.
More efficient, sure, but their argument was about freedom, which is just a different dimension. In an extreme example, private jets provide more freedom than public transportation does, even though it's obvious which one is worse for the environment, more expensive, more intrusive, etc.
Except that's not freedom.
It is not freedom to have a, and this really isn't an exaggeration, more than 10,000x personal cost for transportation. It's freedom for the rich, but the rich aren't a part of society and cannot be generalized into society.
It is not freedom to have to personally rely on the US to do the right thing.
It is not freedom to take on the massive legal and financial risk that is driving a death machine.
It is only freedom in the most infantile, 'Anarkiddie' sense of the word freedom. The 'Hurr durr we'd all be more free if we had less laws' kind of idiocracy most humans abandon by the age of 15 when they learn about the concept of government.
Yup, drunkards in a tram are annoying but they almost never kill people and cause tens of thousands in damage.
thank you for that almost. jackasses like me see words like always and never as challenges and this is not one i want to take