>Nope. History has taught us --many times and across many cultures-- that this is a truly bad idea.
I don't think there's any valid argument for protectionism without accountability or in the very least any form of return from the car industry. Currently, there's very little of that.
>> we could reduce the relevance of the car market entirely by transitioning towards a transportation system that is not focused on automobiles, favouring trains
>Nope. If we are talking about the US, this is impossible. It would require a complete re-engineering of not only our society but every single town and city. We have enough problems that we fail to address to add another pipe dream to the list. Look at the disaster that is the high speed train project in California. Now imagine that multiplied by a thousand, or ten thousand.
China has built arguably the most expansive HSR network basically from scratch in 10 years - what essentially entails a complete re-engineering. Decarbonizing will be a complete re-engineering. Hell, building out the road network was arguably also a complete re-engineering.
Quit making excuses and start delivering results, there's no valid argument for the west adopting a position of patheticism given our past.
>> and bicycles <snip>.
>C'mon.
Not exactly what I would call a compelling argument.
>> This also helps with the energy consumption issue since these modes of transportation are vastly more energy efficient.
>Given reality, this is irrelevant.
Yikes.