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Comment by cscurmudgeon | Hacker News Reader

Well said. Another angle is the race angle. Most people advocating for lesser cars are young, healthy, rich and white. Healthy enough to not use cars and rich enough to live near work.

https://theconversation.com/the-unbearable-whiteness-of-cycl...

The group that talks about systemic racism is perpetuating it.

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That is an incredibly poor take on top of a serious allegation, and sorry-not-sorry, it's clear you don't really care about poverty, racial disparities or ill health.

It takes very little empathy to realise that driving a car is a huge technical barrier compared to a wheelchair/scooter/just walking slower. There is no reason you need to be healthy to avoid car use... except one. That motorists will kill you if you don't quickly get of out their way. I've seen large parts of my local area become completely inaccessible to the less-abled because of fast roads, so can it with the "I'm thinking or the sick!". You're not.

Or to just go look at which cities are not color-coded into mansions and slums, and notice those cities are ones where the poor do not need to maintain their own expensive machinery for basic tasks. Because ... again, I don't believe I need to explain that. It's a deliberate choice you're making to not understand it.

"Healthy enough not to use cars" - man, that's a good one. I'll remember it next time my half-senile father in law has no other choice but to drive somewhere because there's no way around his car dependent neighbourhood - oh wait, that's every day.

If he is senile he should not be driving anywhere

That's exactly what kspacewalk2 is saying. He _should_ not.

The city around him is only built for driving, doubly so his completely car-dependent neighbourhood. He'll be doing this until he either cannot possibly pull it off, or gets in a serious accident. This is a fact of life for millions of seniors in North America, and saying "oh no they shouldn't" won't change squat.

That's your job to take the keys away and get rid of the car. It's a sad situation but hardly unique

It's a sad situation made worse by stupid urban planning that prioritizes cars.

No it's not "my job". It'll be his kids' job when he's fully senile, but until then he's an adult human being with rights, and he wants to be independent and "age in place". At some point he'll cross the threshold into having his decision-making powers taken away. Let's hope no one gets hurt in the meantime.

That article is about cycling as a sport. I'd bet if you look at cycling as a method of regular transportation, it would skew heavily non-white and lower income. Owning a car is expensive.

Take a hypothetical scenario (not dissimilar to war breaking out in WW2, and not dissimilar to the 2020 global pandemic upending our lives) – where the private motor vehicle is gone.

Society (cities) would quickly re-orientate themselves so work wasn't so far away from home. So shops weren't on the outskirts of town.

Your argument is predicated on cars existing. On cars causing the problem you suggest they solve.

Cars are expensive. The old, the unhealthy, the poor -- all of these people can benefit from infrastructure that allows people to get around without using a car. Because cars are expensive.

You do know that poor countries overwhelmingly don't use cars, right?

The standard social hierarchy is: walk everywhere -> bike everywhere -> go by motorbike everywhere -> drive a car everywhere.

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