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This is a story about two men with a dream… CHARLES & DAVID KOCH…and that dream was that everyone in the world would own a car, and buy their oil… and our neighborhoods would look like this:
We would all drive cars, and our commutes would look like this (while the planet melts):
The KOCH political machine wanted us in cars so badly they gave $127 million to FIGHT public transportation (Nashville, Little Rock, unsuccessfully in Phoenix) & DENY climate science: https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2019/08/27/prop-105-phoenix-election-results-future-light-rail-where-to-vote/2088650001/
You know who else has this dream? Exxon Mobil… MBS, Saudi Arabia… Russia… the GOP. They WANT us in a world like this:
But a lot of people want to live like this:
And we want to be with our families in a place like this:
But BAD ACTORS force car ownership on us to ENRICH themselves, yet we agree to it. We've all fallen for an EPIC LIE, told to us by known liars: oil companies, petro-states, the Koch Bros. The lie? That our lives and our cities should be filled with cars:
They TRICKED us into believing that cars = freedom… that parking is a “human right”… that busses are to be avoided at all costs, bicycles are a menace… that apartments buildings are an eyesore and highways are somehow “beautiful.”
…But there’s HOPE. Across the world, people are realizing we’ve been duped—and they are fighting back with a new VISION:
NYC is embracing bikes & bus lanes (WOW @CoreyinNYC !) Cities are making cars pay to come in (congestion pricing in London), removing parking (Oslo=85 spots left), & closing streets to cars altogether (Barcelona Superblocks) to replace traffic with literally children playing:
When you remove cars & replace them with bike lanes, here’s what you get: an END to traffic/pollution/noise/accidents; better health, gov savings, more shoppers, and happier people:
And people love to bike – right? Remember being a kid? Remember your last bike ride? It’s fun!
Bikes are cool:
As a society, we WANT people to bike, but our bike lanes are dangerous & deadly. How useful is a sidewalk if in the middle you have to DASH ACROSS A FREEWAY? Not useful at all. Safe bike lanes are ridiculously cheap, just politically hard.
Cars are expensive- a minimum $7,000+ per year FROM working families TO oil companies & SUV manufacturers. Thanks to the GOP & their donors, tax payers SUBSIDIZE drivers (who skew higher income), while we CHARGE transit riders (who skew lower income). https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/loans/total-cost-owning-car/
When it comes to driving, we're blind to the laws of cause & effect-- for climate & traffic deaths. Compare the urgency and activism to these public health crises:
Opioid deaths per year: 47,000
Gun deaths per year: 40,000
Car accident deaths per year: 40,000
Opioid deaths per year: 47,000
Gun deaths per year: 40,000
Car accident deaths per year: 40,000
From an EQUITY point of view: 80% of Manhattan residents don’t own a car; but NYC gives away millions of FREE parking spaces for private car storage for the most affluent residents: car owners.
Every parking space is 200 sq feet, equal to a small studio apt. Imagine the things we could use a parking space for:
What if charging drivers could make transit free/close to free:
If millions could move to car-free neighborhoods, millions of people no longer driving… imagine the impact on the planet, happiness, health, people’s pocket books.
We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to change. We need to build 7.4 million affordable homes. By definition, affordable housing=apt. housing. Microunits are naturally affordable (can rent for <$800/mo) + awesome + mom&pop builders can build them without public dollars.
Instead of just building new apartment buildings, we can build NEW STREETS designed for walking and biking & NO cars:
And even better... if car-free neighborhoods were an anti-poverty program – it would be a transfer of wealth FROM oil companies TO low income families worth $7,000/year, costing the government nothing and open to anyone.
Car free streets that replace forced car ownership is a progressive public policy for climate, income support, affordable housing… if we can just take the Red Pill and see that we’ve been duped.
Progressive MAYORS could solve climate change & address poverty simply by zoning for car-free streets. It costs cities NOTHING because the free market will build the housing/grocery stores/coffee shops… and if you build it people will come. End.
Why cars are in many ways the source of our housing crisis: https://abundanthousingla.org/do-we-really-need-all-these-cars/
I talk about this Thread on the Podcast @biketalkpfk -- https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bike-talk/id1317606843?i=1000491070842
