It’s just US implementing proper public transportation via contemporary means. I’ve always thought US has the advantage of a genuine need for robotaxis compared to other advanced economies where public transport already works well.
Despite all the complaining, Western society seems to generally be accepting of the space inefficiency of cars as it currently stands. And computer modelling has shown that, all other things being equal, autonomous vehicles are expected to increase the capacity of existing roadways.
Also, don't forget that a lot of people want to get around in a car, regardless of bus/train availability, despite what your personal feelings on the subject might be. However, don't get me wrong here, a lot of people also want to get around on foot, by bike, and by bus. Admittedly these options are lacking in most Western urban environments. We should also be building up these options for the people who want to use them. Transportation doesn't have to be a winner-take-all, one-solution-for-everyone fight. Different people want different things, and there's no reason that transportation options shouldn't reflect this.
- less space efficient means less fuel efficient which means heavier carbon footprint
- less space efficient means more vehicles which means heavier carbon footprint
- less space efficient encourages suburban sprawl which means lower city service efficiency which means heavier carbon footprint
- less space efficient encourages suburban sprawl which means more efficient alternatives like public transit are more costly and less convenient which means heavier carbon footprint
You say transportation doesn't have to be a winner-take-all fight but that completely ignores market/political forces shaped by city planning. You handwave it away by saying "admittedly these options are lacking in most Western urban environments" but why do you think that is? It's a consequence of American city space-inefficiency which makes efficient public transit worse and favors inefficient cars. It doesn't have to be winner-take-all, winner-take-most is enough to change climate change outcomes significantly.
Carbon footprints can be offset. It just needs to be done honestly. Specifically, an "honest offset" is an offset that has already occurred prior to purchase of the offset, and prior to the production of the carbon being offset. If vehicular use was required to be honestly offset, your global warming concerns completely evaporate. It really is that simple. The one downside is that you don't get the emotional satisfaction of "sticking it" to car users.
If your sincere and sole goal is to fight global warming, you have to remember that most people simply do not care. If your proposed solution is to take comfortable things away from people that want those comfortable things, you are simply going to lose.
If vehicular use was required to be honestly offset, the comfortable thing that is the modern car and suburban sprawl would no longer be affordable.
I don't doubt that most people don't care, it's why we're in this mess in the first place. It's also why humanity is on track to lose a lot to the damage from climate change. I find myself wondering whether I care either, I appreciate the reminder that I'm simply going to lose even if I do.
This was never claimed, and is irrelevant anyway. Fundamental or not, a large segment of Western society wants to use cars. Quibbling over whether or not this behavior is learned, intrinsic, or a mix does not help anyone on timescales that matter. Accept this reality and move on.
> Public transit can be comfortable.
For you maybe. Not everyone is you. I've experienced public transit in a variety of European cities known for their excellent transit systems. I simply am not comfortable on public transit, as I hate not having personal space.
> If vehicular use was required to be honestly offset, the comfortable thing that is the modern car and suburban sprawl would no longer be affordable.
This isn't true, but let's pretend it is. Towards your goal of mitigating global warming through reducing car usage, wouldn't this be a better approach than directly prohibiting car usage? People are easily misled by layers of indirection. Market forces pushing people away from "unaffordable" car usage is more palatable than "fuck your way of life, you now have to ride a bus or three".
> I find myself wondering whether I care either, I appreciate the reminder that I'm simply going to lose even if I do.
It's a tough pill to swallow, but you can choose to work with the people you don't like and advocate for solutions that are amenable to them as well. Hostility to their way of life will not get you very far. There is enough solar energy reaching our planet to power our entire civilization at the energy usage of a typical American, and to start unwinding our past century of carbon emission. Most people would simply be apathetic about working towards such a goal. Try to take away their comforts, and most will actively work against you.
The US and Canada have built cities in a way where only driving is fast, therefore people want to drive.
Conversely, buses usually go mostly empty except during rush hour.
Finally, small on-demand robocars should be a great way to conveniently connect to a local train station and then to your ultimate destination, raising demand for complementary mass transit.
When most people think of "public transit", they only picture busses, trains and multi-billion dollar corruption-laden mass transit projects. However, in many cases, it is far far cheaper to (as a municipal government) purchase and operate fleets of self-driving electric vehicles. Don't get me wrong, there are still cases where dedicated rights-of-way for trains make more sense, but we should be using the optimal solution for each given situation, and the optimal solution is not always "trains and busses".
"Public transit" can also be "publicly owned electric self-driving vehicles, making use of the roads that already exist". However, a lot of people have an entrenched opinion of "CAR BAD NO MATTER WHAT", with no objective basis of what "bad" is.
Buses, on the other hand, maybe.
The main people who want fully driverless systems are politicians who hope that no drivers == no strikes and lower salaries. Though honestly that would just move the labour power to the control room operators, even if there were a good financial case for the upgrade (which there isn't).
But the city I actually live in (the one whose residents recognise its name) is only a couple hundred thousand people, and it has good enough public transport that I lived here for almost thirty years now with no desire to own a car. Have I gone in somebody else's car to an event? Yeah, maybe a few times per year. But day-to-day and week-to-week I don't need a car. I have a license, I own a car parking space, I could easily afford a car, but it makes no sense to buy one, so I don't.