We can all be a superhero. Saving the world from smog. All you have to do is get rid of your car. Sounds impossible, but there are many advantages of limiting car usage. Once you have found another way to go about your day without a car, you might see that your life will improve, along with the Earth.

In Vauban, Germany there are many participators, "70 percent of... families do not own cars, and 57 percent sold a car to move [there]"(source 1). With the statisics of the greenhouse gas emissions in Europe and United States caused by passenger cars are so shocking, you can see why it is so important to current efforts to drastically reduce emissions from tailpipes. With "12 percent... [in] Europe and 50 percents in some car-intensive areas in the United States"(source 1), it should not come to a surprise to people that we need to look further to invest time to promotioning a no car life-style.

Although, the United States percentage is so high, a lot of people are also participating in a car-free life, with the internet allowing people to feel more connected they will not need to drive to meet friends. Also "cellphones and car-pooling apps has facilitated more flexible commuting arrangements"(source 4), along with "shared van services for getting to work"(source 4) being seen as a way people "organize their summer jobs and social life around where they can walk or take public transportation or car-pool with friends"(source 4). With this evolution accuring "there has been a large drop in the percentage of 16- to 39-year-olds getting license"(source 4). America is on the right track with fewer cars being bought, less drivers, and fewer licenses as the years go by; it can still improve.

Some ways that it could improve would be to take some ideas from other countries, such as Paris and Colombia. Where in Paris they have enforced partial driving bans on Mondays that "motorists with even-numbered license plates are are ordered to leave their cars at home or suffer a 22-euro fine"(source 2). This establishment helped a great deal leaving "congestion...down 60 percent...after five-days of intensifying smog"(source 2). Although critics argue that "delivery companies complained of lost revenue...public transit was free of charge from Friday to Monay"(source 2). Also in Bogota, Colombia there is a program that "[promotes] alternative transportationg and reduce smog", a day without cars where "cars [they are ban] with only buses and taxis permitted" (source 3). The violators of this programed were charged a $25 fine.

These programs would defiantly improve the surburbs, leaving them denser, better for walking and "more accessible to public transportation"(source 1). With these changes "stores are placed a walk away, on a main street, rather than in malls alongs some distant highway"(source 1). The world would become more for the living and less for the machine if we create a trend for a no car zone in all of our daily lifes.