WASHINGTON—In a trend that is reducing the nation’s dependence on fossil fuels by curtailing the total number of cars on the road, a study released Thursday by the Transportation Department found that more Americans than ever are commuting to work splattered on the grill of a Ford F-150. “Increasingly, U.S.…
@ajsadauskas @heatofignition @mondoman712
Saying alternatives *need* to be in place *before* you can discourage car ownership is a lot different than asking policymakers to coordinate transportation changes.
@ajsadauskas @heatofignition @mondoman712
Its an important distinction because people have a delusional perception of what’s already available. Every city has a bus system. People can use 20 minute bus service! And I guarantee if middle class folks start riding those buses, the service will improve.
And additionally there are places that will never have transit. We can’t hope people will eventually just stop living in rural areas and then after that, finally, we’ll raise fuel taxes.
@owen @heatofignition @mondoman712 I think we’re broadly on the same page. It’s definitely not a hard line in the sand at my end.
I tend to view transport and urban planning policy as being deeply connected. There’s a number of tools in that policy toolkit that should ideally be used together to reduce car dependency. And pricing is one of them.
And I get the impression that for a number of pragmatic reasons, there might be some differences in what good policy looks like in the US versus Australia.
As an aside, country areas are an interesting side case. I think in many country areas, it is possible to get much better services than currently exist, but that’s a different discussion.