I used to be a huge enthusiast of electric cars. Mostly because I was terrified of the consequences of peak oil. In time I got over this infatuation as I realized that electric cars are only marginally better than fossil cars in terms of resource sustainability and 100% as traffic jam inducing and socially isolating as the dinosaur juice counterparts.
The way forward is to ditch the idea of ubiquitous driving for every errand and to focus on building truly sustainable habitats on a scale that makes them places comfortable for people and not for cars. Because it's an either or situation. You can make a city comfortable for people or one comfortable for cars but you can't accomplish both in the same time.
For that reason I'm ultimately no longer interested whether electric propulsion in personal cars catches on or not. There are more important things to address in terms of true sustainability.
lifestyleguru · 22h ago
It takes enormous concidence for bicycles to succeed to the extend they do in e.g. Dutch cities, or Copenhagen. It takes flatish land, infrastructure, mentality, achieving certain critical mass. In many places bicycle is used as a status symbol the same as a car ie. people drive their super sport carbon bicycle during days off, while during work days prefer to be stuck in traffic in their expensive car.
Walking only will never be feasible in any largish city. Metro system is an order of magnitude more complex, only low hundreds of cities globally can afford it.
Gud · 17h ago
I live in Zürich and rich and poor both take public transport. Mostly trams.
foxyv · 13h ago
Flat land isn't necessary. Take Switzerland for an example.
Mostly you just have to pry your country out of the car lobby's cold dead hands.
My mum came back to britain with her mother when the family farm went south in Basutoland in the 30s. They were the "poor cousins" to a wealthier family who had an electric estate car.
She used to mention to us how nice it was to ride in. And, if cars hadn't been invented, London would have drowned in horse shit, which was a massive problem at scale because of the volume of working horses, and the capacity to produce more shit. All those mews houses, now bijou $m residences used to house horses, then moved to cars, now people.
almosthere · 1d ago
apparently climate change agenda died
metalman · 21h ago
fast charging, ultra long range, the ability to charge at home, and power a home durring an outage are the features that will keep elecrification going, throw in roof solar and grid balancing and the possibility to drasticly reduce over all energy costs becomes a cant say no situation for most people
I am a fairly serious gear head, though I have taken my house off grid, and will continue to electrify as the equipment and technologys mature....which is happening quickly
The way forward is to ditch the idea of ubiquitous driving for every errand and to focus on building truly sustainable habitats on a scale that makes them places comfortable for people and not for cars. Because it's an either or situation. You can make a city comfortable for people or one comfortable for cars but you can't accomplish both in the same time.
For that reason I'm ultimately no longer interested whether electric propulsion in personal cars catches on or not. There are more important things to address in terms of true sustainability.
Walking only will never be feasible in any largish city. Metro system is an order of magnitude more complex, only low hundreds of cities globally can afford it.
Mostly you just have to pry your country out of the car lobby's cold dead hands.
She used to mention to us how nice it was to ride in. And, if cars hadn't been invented, London would have drowned in horse shit, which was a massive problem at scale because of the volume of working horses, and the capacity to produce more shit. All those mews houses, now bijou $m residences used to house horses, then moved to cars, now people.