| Comment | Trouble is, an individual's unbridled freedom to travel by car sounds fine until you realise that many many different individuals choosing to do the same makes life worse for everyone. Drivers included.
It's a classic 'Tragedy of the Commons' effect, where what makes sense and can be an extremely positive choice in many respects for an individual, becomes a disaster for society at large if everyone does it.
Put simply, the more people driving, the worse everything is. More congestion, more traffic, more delays for drivers, more localised air pollution. Less viable bus services, less pleasant walking or cycling options. The effect is *everyone's* freedom is greatly limited.
We're about 80 years into an experiment of designing our cities around car use, at cost to everything else. We're now thankfully beginning to revise some of this.
It's not about stopping people from travelling by car. But about empowering people to take other options. Whether by trading existing road space for public transit (protected bus lanes) or reducing pollution so pedestrians aren't put off walking around their neighbourhoods or the city centre itself. |
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