How about: We need fewer cars. Full stop.
1. Some Politician: We need to invest in public transportation.
2. Planning Commission: Okay but it's geographically infeasible to blanket the city in busses, the only thing that is going to work is a rail system to cover the long distances and have busses to cover the last mile.
3. Sounds great! Let's put together a proposal.
4. Politician: Hahahahahahahaha we can't afford that. Also people will riot if we eminent domain literally thousands of homes.
5. Politician: What if we just added really annoying bike lanes to like 3 roads that will sit there empty because a dedicated lane wasn't what was stopping people from riding their bikes?
6. Planning Commission: But that won't actually he....
7. Politician: LOOK AT HOW WE'RE INVESTING IN PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION!!1 MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. GREEN. ENVIRONMENT.
Like good lord if they would actually commit to more than just some symbolic non-solutions I would volunteer to swing a hammer to lay tracks.
Three dedicated lanes won't be what was stopping people from riding bikes (in most cases) but a network of them sure would increase ridership.
2) Childbearing couples seem to function just fine in relatively dense European urban housing. The idea that we somehow need space to spread out is largely confined to the Anglosphere, which is why land management problems are so much worse in the Anglosphere.
I hate dealing with crowds of people.
I hate waiting for whatever conveyence I'm going to ride on.
I hate feeling like I need a full bath after riding on said conveyence.
I hate dealing with the inevitable schizos, drug addicts, mental illness, and other malcontents that will undoubtedly pan handle or beg. And no, it isn't my problem to care or deal with them.
Once I got enough money to ride in my own car to and from work, I stopped public transit and never looked back. If I somehow become stupid rich(doubt), I would charter private jets for the same reason.
I see you're from Italy and will concede that European public transit is better when it comes to frequency so there's less waiting but that's about it. Still have the drug addict schizos and cleanliness problems.
I still owned a car when I lived in Europe and if I do it again I'll be owning another, especially now with kids.
1. It has to take me directly from the front of my (rural) house to directly in front of my destination. My vehicle does this.
2. It has to do this as fast as or faster than my vehicle.
3. It has to be available in the time that it takes to find my vehicle's keys.
4. It has to be as comfortable as my vehicle.
5. It has to smell as nice and be as clean as my vehicle.
6. It has to not put me in more contact with crazy people than my vehicle does.
7. It has to be as cheap or cheaper per mile than my vehicle.
8. It has to be able to haul my belongings when I need to move them, with at least the capacity of my vehicle.
A few alternative to cars can check a few of those boxes, but nobody gets them all:
Walking and Bicycles: 1, 3, 7
Busses: 7 (maybe)
Trains: 2, 7 (if long distance)
Taxis: 2
Rideshare: 1, 2, 4 (maybe), 5 (maybe), 6 (maybe)
Car/Truck rental: 2, 6, 8
Most of the journeys I take on my bike would take twice as long in a car, including time to find parking, walking to/from where car is parked etc., so a bike easily wins on 2.
But sure, on 4. it loses out in rainy/cold weather. Otherwise the physical pleasure of riding a bike far exceeds that of driving a car.
I'm curious why you come across so many crazy people riding bikes, or why your bike would smell so bad...
EDIT: on my commute to the office I managed to think of at least 4 other reasons people prefer driving over riding: prestige, safety, theft risk and restrictions around suitable clothing (particularly when there's a lack of end-of-trip facilities).
Personally, I think a big part of the issue is the size of vehicles that have been mandated by regulatory agencies. Why don't we move towards micromobility?, something between a E-bike and a super light weight car. that would require far less lithium, and far less oil.
Edit: Unironically, something like the P45 (https://topgear.fandom.com/wiki/P45), but maybe with a bubble instead of my arms out.
Like, a e-scooter/motorcycle? I see hundereds of them during my daily commute. Costs around $3000, and about $20 in monthly charge costs.
the ones that are electric are usually limited to 28mph or just a little more than that. also, very few if any are 4 seaters.
You are not going to be happy to learn where the $128 billion for California's high speed rail and other mass transit infrastructure goes: concrete, asphalt, steel, and lots and lots of dirty fuel for the mining equipment and earth movers. Salaries for high-paid consultants on the project may be spent on air travel or other luxuries.
Car usage will only decrease when someone invents something better.
That isn't to say more public transport investment is bad, but there are other alternatives. For example, make ebikes cheap and make inner cities be ebikes only. In places like NY or Boston, everyone on ebikes would likely result in faster trip times.
They do: walking. Even ebikes keeps you dependent on electricity. Bicycles keep you dependent on consumables for maintenance (oil, etc.) and spare parts suppliers.
I bicycle as my primary transportation, and I have to admit that I've been increasingly irritated by ebikes. They drive on the bike paths (even though that's not legal here), and when doing so they drive far too fast and don't even try to warn others using the path that they're passing.
I've seen a half dozen cases of ebikes slamming into pedestrians and bicyclists in the last few months.
I think the people advocating ebikes need to start educating people driving them about how to do so without endangering people, or this is going to turn into yet another flash point between groups who should be on the same side.
The problematic ebikes are already breaking the law by driving on bike paths where motorized vehicles are prohibited. All they'd really have to do to both be legal and to avoid endangering and angering other users of the path is to not use the motor while on them.
Since they don't, I don't think they'd care anything about speed limits, either.
Yes, which is why it is a tragedy that we have built an environment in which it is straight up dangerous to walk or bike because of cars.
And yet we effectively force most people to drive private cars largely on basis of how our cities are laid out and how we invest in infrastructure.
I'd also suggest that in many countries with high PT usage (Japan etc.), very few people feel "forced" to take it. Many services operate with very little taxpayer funding (certainly no more than goes into building & maintaining roads etc.)
If you think owning a car makes you less dependent, I've got a bridge to sell you. Between gas, insurance, oil changes, brake and strut replacement, tires, and various fluids, you are arguably MORE dependent with a car than without one. And that's not counting the dependence on other drivers not acting the fool with several tons at high speeds.
"Independence" due to car ownership is a sales tactic, not a real thing. Folks in New York City aren't inherently more "dependent" than you are for their transportation needs.
Right now people just love to hate on it cause "it's over budget, and road projects never go over budget."
This, people need to get out from behind the wheel and walk, bike. In the long term it will greatly benefit them.
The funny thing is, with auto prices so high, many people cannot buy new, and quite a few cannot afford even used. So maybe a trend is starting.