From: kevin@nuchat.sccsi.com (Kevin Brown)
Subject: Re: Clinton, Gore, and the End of the Automobile Age
Organization: I can't see any in the immediate vicinity...
Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1992 01:42:24 GMT

In article <BruItw.9BD@quake.sylmar.ca.us> brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:
>In article <1992Jul22.005849.16417@s1.gov> lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich) writes:
>>In article <BrrBLr.n1n@quake.sylmar.ca.us> brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:
>>>You never cease to amaze me.  You really think people have a better quality of life when they 
>>>life when they cannot drive where they want to go?  Tell me, do YOU own a car?
>
>>	I don't own one, but I might acquire one over the next year or
>>so, because of the difficulty of getting around Livermore without one.
>>I intend to get a small one if I ever do get one.
>
>Well, I have never been in Liverpool, but I find it difficult to believe that
>riding a train is as convenient as having a car.  What if you want to go somewhere
>the train doesn't go?  What if you want to do it at a time the train isn't
>running?  What if you buy more than you can carry in your hands?
>
>If cars are so inconvenient, then why is it that when people have an equal
>choice, they generally take the car?

Good question.

People seem to use whatever they happen to find meets thier combined needs the
best.  For Loren, that is obviously the public transit system, and I commend
him for using it.

For others, it is some form of private transport, e.g. the automobile or, in
some rare cases, a bicycle.  I tend to use the latter two, but mainly because
I don't trust large groups of strangers and because the public transit system
around here is annoying to use, slow, and limited in both destination selection
and time of operation.

>By the way, why do you want a small one?  Wouldn't a bigger one be more 
>comfortable and useful?  I guess big cars don't go over so well in the
>sack cloth and ashes crowd, eh?

There's a tradeoff to be made between the size of the car and various operating
costs, e.g. gasoline usage.  Additionally, different people place different
values on things like environmental damage.  Loren apparently places quite a
bit of value on it, and so may be willing to make some sacrifices of things
like convenience in order to reduce to some degree the damage he does.

>>	And why does one have to drive if one has good public transit.
>
>"Good" public transit?  I have seen some "better" than others (say, 
>Washington DC vs. New York), but I would never trade even the best one for my 
>car.

Apparently some places, e.g. Vancouver, have very good public transit systems,
at least for some areas of the city.  Never having been there, however, I
cannot assess how good they are compared to those in places like New York
or Los Angeles.

>>I've acquired a lot of info about Bay Area public transit so I have no
>>trouble getting to San Francisco or Berkeley or wherever I might want
>>to go.
>
>I guess that depends on whether you want to go where the train goes, doesn't it?

Yes and no.  It also depends on how far you're willing to walk.  Or perhaps
bicycle, if the train allows you to carry your bicycle with you.  That would
actually be damned convenient.  You can go quite a distance in a reasonable
amount of time on a bicycle...

>>	And is a car really that convenient if you can't find a place
>>to park it? 
>
>I generally don't have a problem with that.  By the way, you ceen to have a
>certain urban-centric viewpoint.  You are not trying to imply that suburban
>and rural folks have the same problems and needs are you?

Different people have different needs and wants.  And thus their choices tend
to differ.  Who are we to fault them for the choices they make when we are
not in their shoes?  As long as they're not making choices for us, why should
we worry?

Of course, the problems occur when others *are* making our choices for us.

>You should also remember that the US is a very large country with lots of 
>open space.  I think that for most places a mix of private cars and 
>airliners are the best personal travel system available.

Given the choices that most people tend to make, this seems to be true.

>>It is fortunate that BART (for example) has
>>park-and-rides, and I wish they were more common, since I am
>>discovering that long-distance driving is not my most favorite activity.
>
>I guess that depends on how you define "long distance".  I usually fly when
>I want to go a "long distance" (more than about a three or four hour drive).
>
>Park-n-rides are fine if the train is going where you want it to go, but what 
>if you need a car on the other end?  Hail a cab?  What a mess.  Simply driving
>to where you want to be is much more simple, direct, convenient, and comfortable.

Agreed in my case, although this will clearly differ from individual to
individual.

>>>Why don't you stop being a hypocrite and practice what you preach rather 
>>>than trying to dictate to the rest of us what you think we ought to do?  What
>>>makes you such an expert on what would make ME happier?  The evidence that has
>>>appeared so far indicates that your knowledge on this subject is quite weak, as  is
>>>your grasp of the concept of individual rights.
>
>>	As the saying goes, your rights stop where my nose begins.
>
>So what have I done beyond your nose?  I am annoyed by the folks around LA
>who insist that I pay for a train system I hope I never have to use.  Such
>people are overstepping my "nose boundary".  If some people want to build
>a train and charge people to ride on it that's fine with me, but I don't want
>to have anything to do with such a waste of money, time, and resources.

I can't agree more.

If sufficient numbers of people want a good public transit system, they'll be
willing to *pay* for it, won't they?  And how much they pay for it will be a
good reflector of how much they have available for the project and how much
they're willing to pay for it.

Similarly, if there aren't sufficient numbers of people who want such a thing
(or, more accurately, if there isn't sufficient money that people are willing
to make available), then it won't happen except through some form of coercion.

Unfortunately, there seem to be a lot of people in the "coercion" crowd, who
seem willing to enforce the building of public transit, presumably because
it will be "better" for us in the "long run", when the real reason for such
willingness is probably simply that they want a good public transit system
and don't give a damn how much it will cost as long as *they* don't have to
foot most of the bill.

There has been considerable argument over whether or not the current
automotive transit system is in some way subsidized from sources that are
not automobile-related.  If the grand-total income from automobile-related
sources (and this includes things like gas taxes, taxes on the automobile
industry, automobile sales taxes, taxes on sales of automobile parts, fees,
violation fees, etc.) is greater than the grand-total outlay (for construction
and maintenance of *all* roads, highway patrol, administration, etc.) then
it is meaningless to say that the automotive transit system is subsidized.
From what I've seen so far, the argument that the automotive transit system
is *not* subsidized seems much stronger than the argument that it is.

If in fact the automotive transit system *is* subsidized, then I think that
it should stop.  Any costs of an activity should be paid for by those who
engage in or favor (in the case of activities that are not yet possible and
that require money to make them possible) that activity AND NOBODY ELSE.  That
goes for the automotive transportation system, the air travel system, and
mass-transit.

>--Brian


-- 
				Kevin Brown

			    kevin@nuchat.sccsi.com
			    kevin@taronga.taronga.com
Newsgroups: sci.environment