What you're about to hear is a sample from the latest Patreon bonus episode of the War on
Cars, in which we talk about some recent research into how our auto-centric transportation system
makes us lonely, and how cars divide society.
It's one of the major themes of our forthcoming book, Life After Cars.
If you'd like to hear the rest of the episode, and get our take on David Byrne's subway take
on bicycle etiquette, find us on Patreon at patreon.com slash the War on Cars pod.
You'll get lots of other great benefits too.
I think it gets at something I talk about a lot, which is that the answer to our
problems is not to turn everything into Manhattan or Brownstone, Brooklyn or downtown San Francisco
or the Loop in Chicago.
It looks a little bit more like old-fashioned streetcar suburbs where you have main commercial
shopping districts and just behind that you have apartment buildings and then behind
that you have single-family homes so that you could walk to the grocery store.
It doesn't mean you wouldn't have a car necessarily, but the life satisfaction
that they're talking about in this study, where you wouldn't have to use a car
for more than 50% of your trips, that becomes a little more possible.
So, the study wasn't designed to get at the reasons for people's dissatisfaction with
this problem of having to drive everywhere, but the researchers did have some ideas.
So, Doug, you want to read this from The Guardian article.
So, the lead researcher said the results were surprising and could be the result
of a number of negative impacts as driving, such as the stress of continually navigating
roads and traffic, the loss of physical activity from not walking anywhere, reduced engagement
with other people, and the growing financial burden of owning and maintaining a vehicle.
Some people drive a lot and feel fine with it, but others feel a real burden, she said.
The study doesn't call for people to completely stop using cars, but the solution could
be in finding a balance.
For many people, driving isn't a choice, so diversifying choices is important.
Diversifying choices is important.
Well, this study got flagged right away because diversity was in there.
That's right.
You can say it to a British publication.
But, you know, so this idea that diversifying choices is important, which I think is one
of our main messages here, is like, we never say to people, like, we believe that you
should just throw away your car and that you should just somehow then be able to
get around.
Obviously, that's not possible, but imagine that you had a good bike lane infrastructure
in your suburb that allowed for, you know, e-cargo bikes to take the kids to sports
instead of having to get in the car every time.
Imagine, you know, the buses came frequently to take you to school or to the hospital
or wherever you have to go.
Those things would give you choices.
But in our country, despite all the talk of liberty, we're rapidly disinvesting in transit
and bike lanes and sidewalks, all the things that would give people choices.
It's really, to me, ironic that in a country that holds up the automobile as personal
liberty, you know, the way we build things actually takes personal liberty and choice
away and then we gaslight people about that and we tell them, what's the matter?
You've got a car like a car improves your quality of life.
Everybody knows that.
You can almost look at this study and the effect forced car dependence has on
individual happiness and sort of extrapolated out to the nation in that, you
know, there probably was a period, I don't want to make it too rosy, but
you could probably sort of make a case that like there was a use case for
cars where you fold them into your life for like the driveout to the country to
go do the big grocery shop or whatever it is, but that for the most part, you
had your kind of traditional main street and your town square and your park and
your school and those things were all in walking distance and you knew your
neighbor and then you get to let's say the 70s, 80s, 90s where the real
post-war suburbs start, you know, sprawl as we understand it today,
shopping centers, lifestyle centers, things like that.
And you can see that like not only is this bad for individual happiness, but
it's just bad for our well-being as a nation.
I mean, that's sort of the point we're making in the book too, is that like
there is a reason a lot of people out there hate their neighbors because
they're just in the way all the time.
They're just another obstacle to them finding parking, to them getting
home from work in the time that they're used to.
And this sort of century long experiment with car development, like we
have reached the more than 50% threshold that these authors are talking
about in their study and it's killing us.
And that actually leads right into the next study that I want to talk about.
This actually came out last summer.
It's from the Survey Center on American Life.
It's part of their 2024 American Social Capital Survey.
And the authors, Daniel Cox and Sam Pressler wrote up the findings
in a piece called Disconnected the Growing Class Divide in American Civic Life.
The study gets into how the way we've designed our communities specifically
are increasingly limited access to public spaces like parks and libraries,
even commercial spaces like coffee shops, restaurants, diners.
How that has eroded our social and civic structure.
The authors note a related decline in what they call associational life,
which is essentially organized communal life that includes marriage
and religious organizations and labor unions, among other things.
What they found by looking at the data is that the erosion of these
public spaces and of associational life has been profoundly inequitable.
And the analysis looks at that inequity as it's measured by the level
of educational achievement in communities and also racial disparities.
So maybe, Doug, you could read some of this.
I like that we were just joking about how you have the better voice.
And now I'm reading all of this stuff, but I will do it.
I'll take this one practice for reading.
OK, here we go.
Americans with a high school education or less are more likely
to live in civic deserts, lacking commercial places, for example,
coffee shops and public places like community centers, parks
and libraries that are the hubs of community connection.
Partly as a result, these Americans are less likely to participate
in associational life and more likely to be socially isolated.
As Timothy B.
Carney writes in Alienated America, Why Some Places Thrive While Others
Collapse, associational life has apparently become a high end good
that most people can't access.
So then there are some stats.
Less than half of Americans report that people in their community
can gather in restaurants or diners, 46 percent, coffee shops or cafes,
41 percent, gyms or fitness centers, 37 percent and local markets
or corner stores, 35 percent.
So already that sounds not great, but what's really not great
and what I think resonates when we look at the political divides
that we're seeing in our country is the way that some of these
assets in public life, some of these public goods,
the way it breaks down between communities that have majority
college educated population and those that don't
because you see a real difference here.
About this episode
Exploring how car-dependent transportation systems contribute to social isolation and community division, this discussion highlights recent research linking excessive driving to decreased life satisfaction. The conversation emphasizes the need for diversified transportation options like better bike lanes and transit to restore choice and liberty. It also delves into a study revealing how the erosion of public spaces disproportionately affects less-educated and minority communities, deepening social and civic divides. The episode connects urban design, social capital, and inequality, underscoring the broader societal impacts of car-centric development and the loss of communal gathering places.
In this bonus episode, Doug and I discuss a couple of recent studies that look at just how destructive cars are to the social fabric of our communities, how they decrease life satisfaction, and how walkable neighborhoods with public gathering places are an important resources for combating the loneliness epidemic.
As we often say, we have custom-built our communities for cars, in the name of convenience. That obviously sucks for those of us who don't want to drive. But the crazy thing is, as we have often pointed out, that it also sucks for people who do think that driving it's a terrific way to get around.
In the full bonus, we also give you our take on David Byrne's Subway Takes appearance—and his take about urban bike etiquette!
