[Mgs] The End of Car Culture

[David Breneman]

 From: David Ambrose <stargazer1 at cox.net>


> 
>T his feels like one of those
articles where New York wants to pretend 
> the rest of the world is just like
New York.
> 

Those are the only kind of articles the New York Times
publishes,
aren't they?  The "Death of the Car Culture" has been predicted
for
four decades that I can remember.  My 8th grade Social Studies
teacher told us
(this would have been 1972) that by the time we
graduated high school we
wouldn't be able to afford cars because
gas would be $10 a gallon.  Remember
"peak oil"?  The Arab
oil embargoes also marked the end of car culture, as did
the
benighted reign or terror of NHTSA head Joan Claybrook.  When gas
hit $2 a
gallon it was the end of car culture.  When it hit $3 a
gallon it was likewise
the end of car culture.  Global warming 
will bring the end of car culture. 
Cheap, efficient, ubiquitous
mass transit will bring the end of car culture. 
Dih-Dah, Did-Dah,
Dih-Dah.  Hasn't happened yet.  It's human nature to embrace
the
freedom that private car ownership provides.  "Car culture" is
freedom
culture.