The Right to Own a Car

[bandit]

if it'll take assholes off the road, I'm all for it

I agree...that makes more driving room for me to speed and no traffic. Get all them slow bitches out of my way..

[station82o]

The unfortunate thing about major cities like LA and the one I'm in, Houston, for example is that city/community planners have constructed suburbs and neighborhoods in far off outskirts. The neighborhood I live in for example, is surrounded by nothing but farmlands and ancilllary neighborhoods. You have to drive for a couple minutes just to hit the nearest highway, and the city limit of Houston itself is 20-25 minutes away by car. Buses do not run out here and this being Texas, oil country, you'd be hard pressed to see any passenger train or lightrail system running out this far (let alone in the city itself, there is a small one but it only runs for like 15 miles or so).

Cities like New York had a definite amount of space that they could build in, thus they had to build more 'upwards' due to the inability to expand outwards. Public transportation implementation isn't too big of a challenge in a limited space like that. In cities like Houston, where there was nothing but expandable barren land all around the original city limit of Houston, they expanded without checks or controls. Instead of gradually building next to the city limit, they frog leapt 15-20 miles and started building subdivions in the middle of nowhere. Obviously the ownership of cars facilitated this - and the idea of a quiet "country" suburb was appealing. However, in times of gas price hikes, everyone's feeling the pinch. You can't live in a suburb like this and NOT have a car, you wont be able to get to work, a grocery store or anything at all.

While I dont think it should be a constitutional right to have a car, alot of people are in situations (of their own making) where a car is a lifeline so to speak. What I would really love to see, despite it being a radical change, would be some kind of mandatory implementation of a public light rail system in major cities, and perhaps even rails that connected city to city.

My parents told me about cities in Austrailia that have that system, and of course I've seen pics of the types of rails they have in tokyo - they can take you pretty much anywhere. I'd like to live in a place where cars weren't needed... man am I in the wrong state. I also think that maybe the addition of a city wide public transport system such as rail (fuck buses, too slow) would be benificial to most Americans health. My dad was in Paris some years ago for business and told me that hardly anyone used cars, you either got on a subway or transit, or you did what most people did and walked to whereever you needed to go. The city is in such a way that most things are within walking distance, or the public transport station is within walking distance. Most people he saw there were healthy looking (IE not overweight).

I guess what I'm trying to say is that perhaps its the way our cities are built here that makes car usage a must have thing for nearly everyone, especially where I live. Its not a coincidence that Houston and LA are the two most polluted cities in the nation. Its a result of poorly planned expansion and no thought to public transportation. It seems like its too late to change this place now.


*sorry about all the typos, I'm a bit hazy today*

[Yoshi]

People who are abnormally likely to endanger others in a car should not be driving, but everyone else should have the right to drive if they choose to.

Yeah, but the feminists would never let us take cars away from women.

[Diff-chan]

The thing we must consider though is the harmful effects of the car, especially with regards to city design. Or lack thereof. Living in Los Angeles for 3 years, I can clearly see the problem with the car as a social instrument. Pretty much every city west of the Mississippi has major issues with sprawl (except for San Francisco). Cities east of it have great PT systems, and while yea its more liberating to own a car, its also very expensive and inefficient, and if youre careful you'd never need a car.

I'd be totally lost without a car, especially since I live in the subburbs.

Did it ever cross your mind that suburbs exist because of the car?

[Stone]

See, this is exactly why we need an amendment protecting the right of citizens to own a car.

I agree with what you're saying DiffX - Hugmuffin, like I said in my first post, I live in a city, I walk everywhere, etc. There are a number of good reasons why people don't need cars - they create pollution, they kill people, etc. However, the liberating power of the car is so important that it should overwhelm the importance of all of the car's negatives. It is specifically because of those negatives, though, that the right needs to be protected.

I think making new city planning decisions to lessen the importance of the car is a good idea, although public transportation does not seem to work without large subsidies.

[Scourge]

I agree with Melf. Puerto Rican's cars should be taken away from them.

[Bacon McShig]

I think the oil indistry needs to be K'd the fuck O and serious research and implementation of alternate energy sources needs to happen. Hybrids need to be pushed much more into becoming the standard than they have.

Barring that (or if that happens and things still get worse), implement size restrictions on cars owned by people within the city. There's no reason you need a Hummer, SUV, or big pickup truck in the city... and those coming in from outside the city with those vehicles should face an extra toll to discourage them from bringing them in and taking up valuable space.

[Diff-chan]

Dont get me wrong - I know exactly what having a car is about. I lived in Los Angeles for 2 years without one, and it was so constricting I was basically forced into getting one. Ive driven across the country on two seperate occasions and am about to do it a third time.

Do I think its a right to have a car, though? I can see that.

[lithium]

I think the oil indistry needs to be K'd the fuck O and serious research and implementation of alternate energy sources needs to happen. Hybrids need to be pushed much more into becoming the standard than they have.

I just love the taxbreaks on cars now. Hybrids are, what, $3000 taxbreaks and then big, honking, 8mpg trucks are like $30,000 taxbreaks.

I think if the government instituted a taxbreak based on EPA mileage, that'd help a lot. I was hoping since my car's EPA is 36, that I'd get something, but nope since it's not hybrid.

Dont get me wrong - I know exactly what having a car is about. I lived in Los Angeles for 2 years without one, and it was so constricting I was basically forced into getting one.

I've never really been to LA. Is the city's public transportation really that worthless?

[Diff-chan]

I've never really been to LA. Is the city's public transportation really that worthless?

Yes and no. No, because you can get where you need to go with enough creativity. Yes, because it ends really early, service is questionable to places youd actually want to take a bus to (like the Sunset Strip on a Friday night), and because service ends often earlier than scheduled and the buses just stop coming. One time I went out with someone and we ended up having to walk home because the bus just never came. Also, the city is so huge and rich that you miss out on so much treasures because of the lack of a car. It really is a driver's town.