Freedom of Individual Mobility

[Aberwulf]

many people equate carpooling and mass transit with "a decline in their personal standard of living. The freedom of mobility that comes with the use of a personal automobile is something we are very, very reluctant to give up as individuals,"

I feel like this perfectly articulates why people are glued to their cars so much. Yet it's completely different in cities, where everyone takes public transport. Why do you think that is?
-Aberwulf

[eugene]

Around here mass transit is a joke. I would have to drive to a bus stop, then stand in it waiting for the bus while people poisened my with nicotine and freeze in the winter and sweat in the summer. Then ride a bus 30 minutes into downtown, get off of it and get on another bus and ride it 30 minutes back out of down town to my office and since there is only one bus going to my office in the morning and evening if the first one was late I would miss the second and not make it to work that day. Then if I didn;t catch the 5:00 bus leaving work I would then have to find another way home. Then what if my wifes sugar gets too low during the day and she needs me to come home, I'm trapped until 5:00 when the bus comes.

[Alex]

Good mass transit is usually better than driving yourself. It is cheaper, easier, faster, and just better. Of course, a lot of the time, mass transit just isn't very good. This is the essential problem.

[eugene]

Then there is the fun of riding on mass transit. The last bus I was on someone sat in the seat in front of us with no deoderant and must not have showered in a week. My wife and I almost got sick from the smell. So there are a still a few issues that need to be worked out before mass transit will be vaible.

[jschessler]

Around here mass transit is a joke. I would have to drive to a bus stop, then stand in it waiting for the bus while people poisened my with nicotine and freeze in the winter and sweat in the summer. Then ride a bus 30 minutes into downtown, get off of it and get on another bus and ride it 30 minutes back out of down town to my office and since there is only one bus going to my office in the morning and evening if the first one was late I would miss the second and not make it to work that day. Then if I didn;t catch the 5:00 bus leaving work I would then have to find another way home. Then what if my wifes sugar gets too low during the day and she needs me to come home, I'm trapped until 5:00 when the bus comes.

Sounds just as great as around here! I don't dare take the bus for fear of missing one or being out too late so that I have to walk home. Before I moved to where I am now, I was in a very small town... no mass transit whatsoever. It's just not do-able in many, many places.

[Alex]

Sadly, American was designed around the car, whereas many other parts of the world were designed around mass transit or walking/ biking.

[eugene]

We really need to get on our city planners. They are designing huge areas with nothing but homes so you have to get in a car and drive 5 miles to a highway, then drive 5 more miles to a commercial zone then drive some more to work.
My office is situated outsde the city and I can see houses from here but they are three times the price of mine and I would have to cross a wide road with no sidewalks or cross walks at all. We have sidewalks around the office but they dead end so you don't really have anywhere to walk if you wanted to.

[Alex]

Yeah, I think that every road in the country should be re-divided with a bike lane and walking lane behind jersey barriers. This way, everyone could bike almost everywhere. Sadly, thats probably not going to happen though.

[JB]

Yeah, I think that every road in the country should be re-divided with a bike lane and walking lane behind jersey barriers. This way, everyone could bike almost everywhere. Sadly, thats probably not going to happen though.

Yeah, but the problem is, you go to all that expense, and then very few people use it. Los Angeles has a mass transit system.....so few people use it, that it costs taxpayers something like $7 every time someone rides.

America is just too spread out. Mass transit works in NYC because of the density...there's just no place to put a car! But in most other cities, the percentage of people using mass transit is small, even when it's available.

I laugh every time I read about the light rail that's proposed for where I live. They talk about how it will fix the traffic problem....but I think everyone's logic is that someone else will use mass transit, while I still take my car. It's stupid.

[MyDogRex]

My wife has been taking the bus that past 2 days while she has been on jury duty. It is a straight shot down town with no transfers and a fairly consistent schedule. When she has to take the bus to work occasionally she has to transfer busses and wait 10 minutes for her transfer, and taking the bus home is even worse. She was amazed at how much more enjoyable taking the bus could potentially be. I think that for mass transit to be successful you have to not only improve the transit system but change the way cities in America are planned.

[Jackalope]

sometimes I take the rain from encinitas to Irvine, but the ticket is 17 bucks each way! Plus when I get to the train station Im stranded, i have to drive my car to the station and have someone pick me up when I get to my destination. So there's still cars being driven this way, plus its inconvenient and cheaper for me to drive. If the ticket were subsizided and there were better or actual bus routes to and from the station I would actually take it more.

[Alida Cornelius]

What is funny to me is that it is illegal for bikes to ride in the wide berms of the highways and expressways when you could get on one and get off on the next one and really not interfer with cars at all when the berm is as wide as a tractor trailer.

That is just so wasteful to me why bikes cannot ride on the same expressways cars ride on.

A woman activist in one small rural town kept tryiing to get a law passed that every new road had a bike path on it and she got the ordinance passed. I thought to myself, "what a good deed she has done." (but then that is politics)

To be green, and to get things done, you almost HAVE to be political. And you can get things done better if you do it in groups and non-profit organizations.

Been there, done that.

[James]

We in the northeast are spoiled when it comes to transit. Most Amtrak lines go through a town once each direction, the NEC has almost 1 an hour. Commuter lines are well established and used. People out west had the opportunity to spread out, so they did.

Anyone who can owns a car around me. Two interstates pass through my town. But so does NJT. You would be a moron to try to drive into the city alone. But everyone wants the option.

[Alex]

If mass transit or bike paths are done right, they will be used. The problem is that the infrastructure doesn't exist, so we have no choice but to use a gas car. Another possible solution would be much smaller, all electric cars that take up a lot less space on the road. The problem with those is that right now, no one wants one, as they are unsafe with so many stupid utility vehicles out there.

[JiltedCitizen]

Driving a bike on the side of the highway is a death sentence and just dumb. There is a reason why it is illegal. There are plenty of buses where i live, i could take them to work i suppose, but it would make my commute from 10 minutes to probably an hour. Why would i do that? Now if they did a high speed rail to the other major towns, that are 75 some miles away, that would be neat and used.