“Henry Ford made cars affordable...Of course, that exhibit is sponsored by General Motors”
And as we all know, General Motors was the auto company formed by Henry Ford.
/s
A commuter Advocate?! No...not exactly. A government control freak. The motor car and paved roads give freedom and efficiency to the individual. Control Freaks hate freedom.
So what’s the point this guy is trying to make? If his is a long time advocate what is he advocating?
Goofy covered much of this in a cartoon he started in about driving.
“Of course, that exhibit is sponsored by General Motors”
One of the Generals of the famed military-industrial complex, other joint Chiefs being General Electric and General Dynamics.
What an idiot. I guess the writer has never been in daily traffic jams. The road builders can not even make signs to get you through the spaghetti of roads.
Cheap for whom? Construction and maintenance of a fairly permanent infrastructure in a dynamic environment is not cheap.
That's why buses make more sense. All a bus requires is a series of benches, some in road cutouts. With streetcars you have to dig up up the street along the entire route, and then when changing demographics or moving industry requires a change in the route, you have to dig it all up again.
With buses all you have to do is pop in a few benches.
Network, my ass. Sometimes you would have to walk a mile to reach a part of the network.
Fast, my ass again. I rode the Boston MTA half my life. I wasted hours of commute time every day.
Don't get me going about sanitation. One sneeze in the trolley boxcar would put scores of passengers at risk of illness.
And you have to deal with farts, stupid conversations, and groping.
The author is an academic, a learned idiot.
If you like being stuck in traffic come to Connecticut.
Banana oil! Americans like their cars because they can use them to go where they want to and when they want to.
The paving of America— with “interstate” highways— was a project begun by Eisenhower during the Cold War. These were supposed to be “MILITARY” highways for Civil Defense. Not as “throughways”. Whenever possible, try to take time to take the “old” roads— if one can have the time. Real America was bypassed by these gigantic public projects in service to the Mil-Industrial complex. The autobahn came to the US via Eisenhower even as he warned against the complex.
In 1916, a Model T with a 2 speed transmission cost $440. A Chevy with a 3 speed transmission cost $490. Yes, the Ford was cheaper, but the Chevy offered more. (And, for another $60 you could get the Chevy with an electric starter and lights - no more hand cranking.)
If he's arguing "dirt roads cost less" he's comparing apples to raisins.
Lyndon Johnson made sure less than 1% of Texans "drive on dirt roads" so over 99% of gas taxes are paid by people driving on paved roads.
I lived in Texas 30 years and currently own three 4 wheel drive vehicles and can count the times I've driven on a public "dirt road" on one hand. Private land or a road to a boy scout, sure, public roads, almost never.
Automobiles enabled the birth and development of the suburb, where ordinary working class families could own a single family home on a lot with a front and a back yard and a garage. Today, those people are called Republicans and the Democrats are working every day to get rid of them.
That sounds like Occupy Wall Street propaganda to me.
Leftists hate the idea of cars (at least for other people). Cars allow people freedom to go where they want, anytime they want. Can’t have that.
The writer conveniently forgot to mention that trucks carry a helluva lot of American-made products/farm produce directly into cities and towns who otherwise would not have enough food to eat. (Trains can only carry so much and then still have to be “trucked” to supermarkets.
Streetcars were great in their day (I rode them in the 50’s and 60’s. A snowstorm stopped the last one I road on in 1962. A similar storm also stopped our transit bus on the way home. Had to walk a mile to a major bus stop which was functioning).
Asphalt roads, WHEN BUILT CORRECTLY, are great. The stupids who now pave-over the old underlying asphalt/cement are only putting on an 1-1/2 to 2” surface which lasts about a month. It has to be a minimum of 3 inches thick or more to survive the weather and pounding of the cars (which create vibration cracks in the thin overlay repaving. I’ve seen this for years in the DC area).
I remember when Rhode Island once had signs on their major highway that said “Use at own risk”. They finally fixed it years later (1995 to 2004).
Something has happened to the people of New England. A form of Marxist stupidity has set in. Must be due to the water and their colleges. Can’t be do to “common sense”.
A dirt road might carry 4 cars a day, while I-95 carries hundreds of thousands. If the dirt road requires maintenance every few years, I would would wager that the cost per mile driven for the dirt road is a good deal more than for I-95.
This whole article is stupid from a mathematical and engineering point of view. It is just emotion-based nonsense. That is not to say that the conclusions are necessarily wrong. There just seems to be no rational basis for them.
There are many good points being made here by FReepers - especially those referring to the economic and other freedoms, opportunities, and benefits our roads, including our Interstate Highway system give us.
Aside from “freedom”, for economic reasons (mostly) China has been building a modern road system at an incredible pace, and they are no fools.
Has the author considered that publicly funded roads are a boon to modest income folks who must “transport” a lot outside of public mass transit? Does he really think most people would be better off on dirt roads? (Lord knows, we have plenty of dirt and / or gravel roads around here, and any significant amount of driving on them is both a PITA and sometimes downright dangerous to both car and driver / passengers, no matter how cautious one is, unless walking speed is the “limit” one accepts.)
Then the author claims the Interstate Highways were built to evacuate people from cities in the event of a nuclear war, which is just an absurd idea, as he goes to show in the next paragraph. I might not like Ike on all points, but, he was not THAT crazy.
I’d also point out that the Interstate Highway System has been a great aid in tying the people of this very large and diverse nation together.
Author is lame. Claiming it unfair for farmers etc who drive on dirt roads having to pay, via taxes for interstate rds means folks without kids in school should not have to pay any taxes slotted for public education.