Posted on 07/07/2018 7:15:06 PM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
How did Americans develop their love affair with driving?
Visit the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in Washington and the transportation exhibit “America on the Move” will sell you on the commonly held theory that when Henry Ford made cars affordable, Americans loved them and demanded more and more highways.
Of course, that exhibit is sponsored by General Motors, which donated millions to put its name on the collection.
But University of Virginia history professor Peter Norton, author of “Fighting Traffic: The Dawn of the Motor Age in American cities” contends that’s a myth. Just as outgoing President Dwight Eisenhower warned us of the military industrial complex, Norton says an automotive-construction complex took over our country, paving from coast to coast.
Sure, Americans like their cars. But it was a conspiracy of economic interests that turned us into a car culture. Where cities once enjoyed a network of cheap, fast streetcars, GM, Firestone and oil companies bought and wiped them out, replacing them with buses and cars.
“This country destroyed and rebuilt its cities in the 20th century to serve automobiles,” Norton says.
And those same interest groups are alive and well in Connecticut.
Groups like “Move CT Forward” aren’t pro-transportation as much as they are pro jobs — in construction. The groups have spent a lot of money lobbying in Hartford to keep their members, the unions and contractors busy. While I’m happy they’re promoting transportation, their motives are hardly altruistic.
This is nothing new, Norton says. The original interstate highways built in the 1950s used Portland Cement because that company lobbied so hard for its product over cheaper asphalt. Now that rusting rebar and crumbling cement is costing us a fortune.
Another myth from that era was that Eisenhower built the interstates to move troops quickly for national defense. That may have been the pitch to Congress, but the real reason for the highways was to evacuate civilians from the big cities in the event of nuclear war. Luckily, we never had to test that idea.
When Hurricane Harvey hit Houston — the most urbanized highway city in the country —authorities last summer didn’t even try to evacuate people because they knew more would die on congested roads than in the storm.
Who pays for all this road building? You do, in the form of income taxes and, yes, gasoline taxes. But Norton says gas taxes are hardly a fair way to pay for everything.
Why does the motorist driving on a dirt road pay the same gas tax as one driving Interstate 95? The costs they place on road maintenance, the environment and our stress levels are grossly different, so why isn’t the cost?
“It would be like having Best Buy selling everything by the pound. People would flock to the electronics (our crowded interstates) instead of the towels,” he notes. I’m not sure Best Buy even sells towels, but I take his point.
He reminds us that before the interstates, the nation’s first “super highways” like the Pennsylvania and New Jersey turnpikes were built as toll roads — not freeways — and remain that way today.
Driving may seem to be free, but it isn’t. Until we ask drivers to pay for its real cost, there is no incentive to do anything but drive (and pave) more.
Jim Cameron is a longtime commuter advocate based in Fairfield County
Interesting - thank you!
They just paint a yellow line down middle my road. Not cool
GM, Firestone and oil companies bought out streetcars??? I didn't know that General Streetcar had even been for sale. This guy has been drinking his own dishwater...or worse.
bump
My former colleague at the U of Dayton, John Heitmann, may have a different interpretation. He is a car guy, and is the best scholar on autos out there.
“The Automobile and American Life”
https://www.amazon.com/Automobile-American-Life-John-Heitmann/dp/147666935X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1531056964&sr=8-2&keywords=John+Heitmann
His latest is “Stealing Cars”
https://www.amazon.com/Stealing-Cars-Technology-Society-Torino/dp/1421412977/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1531056964&sr=8-1&keywords=John+Heitmann
But there is no question the left hates the auto because it is freedom of movement that, for the most part, they cannot control.
And not just cars in general, but “muscle cars” which are the epitome of maleness.
Streetcars are buses stuck on rails. Buses are better as they can go anywhere.
Christianity and personal property rights (land, vehicles, firearms, etc.) are the bane of Leftists. THEY HATE THEM - FOR “YOU” ANYWAY.
Mark this down: Cloned meat. No, I’m not joking. Cloned meat will become the newest Leftist ploy to try to ban firearms.
“YOU DONT NEED TO HUNT ANYMORE, JUST CLONE SOME (DEER, MOOSE, ETC.) MEAT! SUBMIT YOUR GUNS NOW!!!”
Watch.
“...land, vehicles, firearms,...”
Because EACH of those is a way to say “NO” to them.
And firearms especially are not only “NO”, but “NO, and GFYourself”.
A firearm in your hand is a great, big, giant, Old-Fashioned American “GFYourself” Middle Finger to Liberals.
Never give them up.
Lots of good replies on this thread, good info from everyone. Thanks guys.
Let me add my two cents from a slightly different direction.
When I was a young man there was the Greyhound bus company and just about every town with a population of 1K or over had a Greyhound bus stop. Heck, many a bus stop was out in the middle of nowhere (reference the movie North by Northwest. The crop duster scene, that bus stop Carey Grant was at was the real deal. Those things were everywhere.)
A young man just out of high school, looking for work and willing to gamble a little could for well under $75, go anywhere in the country he wanted. It was simply a matter of presenting himself at the local stop with the cash to by the ticket from the driver. No car was needed.
I regret the loss of that.
Thumbs Up!
The Second Amendment is the only reason why there’s a “Western Civilization” left.
The writer is correct that the urban and inter-urban rail systems which served well into and after WWII were deliberately eliminated by, well, not exactly the auto companies but more by the rubber companies seeking to sell everyone tires four at a time. That development was an exercise in corruption, but so what-- it's water long since gone under the bridge.
Eisenhower developed the interstate system with the idea in mind we might need it to move troops and tanks at some future time...
Also for:
1) Evacuation of cities in case of nuclear attack.
2) Emergency airstrips.
Thanks for sharing those books.
Another myth from that era was that Eisenhower built the interstates to move troops quickly for national defense. That may have been the pitch to Congress, but the real reason for the highways was to evacuate civilians from the big cities in the event of nuclear war.
Because that has nothing to do with national defense, eh liar? Partisan media shill on a global warming hoax smear campaign.
And General Hospital.
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