pod education: war on cars
Persuasion is useless, it is the cities' responsibility to reduce car dependency and promote mobility alternatives.
That is one takeaway among many others I learned from the podcast “The War on Cars.”
I've been binge listening to this show since early February starting from the archives in 2018 to the present day, adding up to 87 played episodes. Topics spanned various micro mobility options, how to make getting around a city of more comfortable and accessible for women, how walking can be a body-based meditation practice, how and why individual guests on the podcast bike, & how a city can create a better bus system.
I learned so much, but would like to talk about four episodes here starting off with an episode about how America originally came to have a “love affair” with cars.
This expression takes off in the late 1950s as part of an informercial titled, “Merrily We Roll Along.” The infomercial was attempting to sell driving, not a specific car. During this period, there was an effort to modernize the American highway system, resulting in a number of anti-car protests in the country. One protest in 1958 headed by Jane Jacobs author of "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" occurred two weeks before the infomercial.
So at the time there were two philosophies competing against each other. Much like the individual who is critical of modern technology is labeled a “Luddite” by the media, the car critic was painted as the urban elite, out of touch with the majority of Americans. Of course, this has always been the case for people holding an alternative viewpoint.
The first automobiles were seen as the new girl in town, according to “Merrily We Roll Along,” offering dangerous escapism from small town values. This was exactly what the young people in the 1950s were aching for. An escape from the 19th century Victorian world, no matter how loud, how polluting, how dangerous to the flourishing of their communities!
After this moment, streets and cities were no longer places for people. America had now become an asphalt nation.
Halfway through the show, the hosts of the podcast interviewed Peter Norton, the author of “Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in the American City.” He talked about how the “love affair” expression in the ‘70s became so common that even critics used it. The fact that critics used it furthered the assumption that if people buy cars and drive a lot, they prefer that mode of transport.
But there’s no possibility of that being true. Our choices were systematically deprived from us.
We were given only one choice. The motor vehicle. Because in most American cities, the infrastructure is conveniently set up for it.
Another episode I enjoyed featured the podcaster Kara Swisher. She believes that cities and regulators are really the ones who need to make change happen and that a car free future is inevitable, not a matter of choice. Using the example of Disney and Disney Plus, she makes the argument that it’s still content but that the medium of distribution is different. The same can be said for the future of the car. Don't just look at Silicon Valley, she says, look at the car industry which will need to innovate. It’s going to happen eventually.
In a solo episode, the host discussed walking and public space, asking the question: "What do we lose when we can't walk in our communities ?" The ability to walk is what truly defines us as humans according to the author interviewed in this episode, paleoanthropologist Jeremy de Silva. The guest in this episode was Antonia Malchik, author of "A Walking Life: Reclaiming Our Health And Freedom One Step At A Time”. This book is now on my TBR list. The aim of her book, she explained, is to reestablish the notion that you can't sever yourself from a relationship with nature and with your community.
One of the main means to accomplish this reconstruction of understanding is with the use of common space & public space. Unfortunately, more common spaces are disappearing under the automobile’s influence. And this would solve many of our urban problems.
Last but not least, the episode that I want to end with features fashion icon & ‘urban ranconteur’ George Hahn. He lived in downtown Cleveland for 3 years and never owned a car. Doin the math, he admitted to the host that it would have been cheaper to do Lyft and Uber everyday instead of owning a car. He does not wear any specialized clothes for biking, just a suit and tie to the office (for my commute to work, I also just wear my work clothes). In the same way that Hahn likes disrupting the idea of masculinity, he also disrupts the idea of “motordom” and auto-centric thinking.
I continue to remove myself from this auto-centric thinking. Starting in 2022, I followed my tiny interest in taking transit, riding a Lime scooter, walking to work from the streetcar station, and renting a scooter. It’s a pleasure to liberate myself even more, becoming closer to my community & to my chosen city.