From a sunday drive to a cross country road trip, automobiles play an important role in how we get around. However in recent years more studies have been developed showing the negative about cars: how they affect the environment. Some people believe automoblies are almost single-handedly destroying the Earth we so despirately cherish. Perhaps we should all take into consideration how our car usage is affecting the environment around us. I believe that automobiles are a detriment to our society and we should pay attention to how much we use them.

Smog has become a huge problem especially in highly populated areas where there are lots of cars running at the same time. An interesting solution arised to reduce the amount of polution from cars in Bogota, Colombia as talked about in Source 3. The article tells of a government made holiday that bans car usage in order to reduce the amount of pollution; the government even took it so far as to fine the people not participating in their "Day Without Cars." I think this is a marvelous idea because people need a little encouragement to do the right thing and it helps reduce the issue we are facing. Another example of an idea to reduce car pollution is shown in Source 2, this time being in France. It talks about how Paris typically has a higher pollution rate than most cities and the government felt a need to change this. They were willing to ban all gas operated cars for as long as it took to clean up the air. There were exceptions to this rule though in the case of car-pooling more than 3 people, driving a hybrid or electric car, or public transportation vehicles in order to still have everyone get where they were going. It is refreshing to see that some places in the world are taking a stand in resolving the issue we find ourselves right in the middle of.

For a while now cars have been the king of transportation, it seems about time to change things up a little. In source 1 it talks about an experimental german community that forbids the use of cars. By making everything more accessable to the public in nullifies the use for cars. It seems that the main problem with our settlements is we built them around cars rather than building them for people. Another part in source 1 tells about the effort put out by the United States to promote "car reduced" communities. They are planning on doing this by making a bigger portion of the federal transportation bill focus on public transportation than on highways. I believe we are heading in the right direction to reduce our usage of cars and focus on alternate forms of transportation.

In the end it can be said that limited car use is a matter we need to pay very close attention to.