We really need to eliminate car dependence in our cities.
A substantial portion of my childhood is 20-40 minute car rides punctuating every excursion, every new experience. Maybe it’s family time, but mostly I was on my Nintendo DS or GameBoy Color (or reading and getting carsick) and ignoring legs made restless from lack of use. Freedom has its price.
I'm not saying this is the primary reason to have cars and live in the suburbs, but not being forced to share space with every random person in your vicinity is no small thing.
Also, the plenty of people get killed in cars.
It's also true that people very, very commonly move to the suburbs once they have children, and it's not because those people are all morons.
It’s true that progressives are wild about transit, but I wish more conservatives resisted the urge to view cars as the natural political opposite.
I don't really disagree with your overall stance, but those two do often go hand in hand. Perhaps that's why progress is slow on that front.
Then there is the whole issue that local city transportation is pretty lousy, even in Europe.
Sure big cities have it good on the innermost district, live a bit more on the outskirts or in a smaller town and taxi becomes the only option for those not willing to wait between 1-2h for each bus into each direction plus additional commute.
A 30m drive quickly turns into 2h.
There are cars specially tailored for people with disabilities, and electric wheelchairs are only practicable in sunny weather.
In the Netherlands, at least, electric wheelchairs are out in all weather.
You can wear a coat and rain trousers if you feel like it.
For example, in my city, for distances inside the urban core, bicycle is usually the fastest mode of transport, public transport is about 1.5x - 2x the bicycle (fine if you are feeling lazy), and car is 1.5x - 3x the bicycle depending on time of day and associated traffic levels.
Sure, if the weather is horrible and I am feeling lazy, I might use my car instead of jumping on the bike, but often after reaching my destination I'll realize that it wasn't really worth taking the car.
Or you could walk or take a bicycle (e.g., Amsterdam/Netherlands).
Of course they still own two cars and drive to work despite it being "only" a 15 minute bike ride. They are both MDs.
Yeah, I always marvel at Americans who think that Europeans walk, cycle, or take public transit everywhere. Some do, especially students and retirees. However, for working people, car is still king.
First: one doesn't have to cycle all the time. If the weather is bad, or if you just don't feel like it, then one can certainly just not cycle. Feel free to take transit or your car/taxi/uber.
But by designing 'human scale' neighbourhoods this gives people the option of choosing their mode of transportation, instead of being forced to own/operate an expensive piece of equipment that sits idle and depreciates most of the time.
That being said, as someone who cycled in the Before Times to work in Toronto for ~9 months out of year,† I've found the risk of rain was more of a deterrent than actual rain. The number of times I was actually commuting in the rain as quite small over the course of a year.
When I started cycling I would look at the weather forecast, and not take my bicycle if there was a decent chance of rain. And most times it ended up not raining anyway. So at some point I bought rain gear and stuck it in a pannier: I no longer bothered looking at the forecast.
Of course one doesn't need to go for all the funny looking clothing. A simple poncho folded away can be sufficient:
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLM_mTUuHlc
† Often the road conditions were garbage in January and February because a lack of decent practices in snow clearing. Those were the months I generally skipped: I often cycled into December (when it was still 'dry') and often re-started in (mid-)March.