Reply To: Wealth of Nations, and Economics of Abundance

[Rematog]

Mass transit can be used, and useful, only where large numbers of people travel, in predictable directions and times.

Only during the early 80’s have I worked where this was remotely possible. And then, the local bus system was a joke.

Where traffic, etc. makes it useful, such as New York, Washington, etc, real mass transit systems (trains/subways) are good. But most American cities have only an underfunded bus system. The city I live in (a state capital, but relatively small in size) has a bus system that was recently criticized in the local paper as taking 1 to 1.5 hours to cross town. This is a trip requiring about 15-20 minutes by car, 30 minutes at the worst of traffic conditions. If you can get where your going at all, and still may have to walk 1/2 a mile or more to a bus stop, possibly in the rain, etc. (in summer, it rains many afternoons around 3-4 pm).

I’ve worked outside of town most of my life (power plants are the post child of NIMBY). If I can’t drive to work…I’d have to walk, or bicycle, 35 miles, each way. And on country roads, with no shoulders, a bicycle would be a death sentence, especially at 6:30 in the morning, in winter, when it’s dark, possibly foggy… you get my point.

So yes, I get my dander up when someone seems to imply that I should give up my car. You’ll take the steering wheel from my cold dead fingers….(or, maybe, I should be buried in my car, nah…it’s been done).