I haven’t owned a car for most of my adult life, and things start to get really difficult in winter with snow (insufficient bus routes in a given area, and sidewalks/bike lanes covered in snow and not able to be transversed).
When job-hunting I had to exclude a lot of places because of how impossible it’d be to do the commute in winter. Given how expensive rent is, plenty of people are forced to live with relatives or live in certain cheaper areas long past when they’d prefer to leave, which means if the roof over your head is in an area without sidewalks/bike lanes/public transit, you rely hardcore on a car to get to work and back. And if you don’t have that car, you basically lose your job. Maybe you can sustain it over the summer, but once winter snow kicks in you’re pretty fucked the first hard snow or ice that comes through. If you’re lucky, it’s close enough to walk–but not everyone is lucky like that. Also, if your job has mandatory overtime and you’re doing 50-60 hour weeks, walking 2-3 hours one way to work is a no-go.
I say this as someone who regularly biked/used public transit in Chicago winters. Not having a car shaped my life in ways that effectively made me poorer/deeper in poverty.
I’m talking the machines themselves. A car costs 10x what an e-bike does. Yes, infrastructure sucks in many places. That doesn’t change the fact that a car is objectively a luxury compared to a bicycle. You live in an area that has made getting around in a luxury vehicle the only practical option. That doesn’t mean cars aren’t luxury vehicles. People who live in areas that mandate that the all homes must be at least 10,000 ft^2 don’t automatically become poor.
Cars are a luxury, while bicycles are utility. We just build our cities with classism in mind. We build our cities to require expensive luxury travel modes, all in some misguided attempt to keep the poors out.
Not true.
I haven’t owned a car for most of my adult life, and things start to get really difficult in winter with snow (insufficient bus routes in a given area, and sidewalks/bike lanes covered in snow and not able to be transversed).
When job-hunting I had to exclude a lot of places because of how impossible it’d be to do the commute in winter. Given how expensive rent is, plenty of people are forced to live with relatives or live in certain cheaper areas long past when they’d prefer to leave, which means if the roof over your head is in an area without sidewalks/bike lanes/public transit, you rely hardcore on a car to get to work and back. And if you don’t have that car, you basically lose your job. Maybe you can sustain it over the summer, but once winter snow kicks in you’re pretty fucked the first hard snow or ice that comes through. If you’re lucky, it’s close enough to walk–but not everyone is lucky like that. Also, if your job has mandatory overtime and you’re doing 50-60 hour weeks, walking 2-3 hours one way to work is a no-go.
I say this as someone who regularly biked/used public transit in Chicago winters. Not having a car shaped my life in ways that effectively made me poorer/deeper in poverty.
I’m talking the machines themselves. A car costs 10x what an e-bike does. Yes, infrastructure sucks in many places. That doesn’t change the fact that a car is objectively a luxury compared to a bicycle. You live in an area that has made getting around in a luxury vehicle the only practical option. That doesn’t mean cars aren’t luxury vehicles. People who live in areas that mandate that the all homes must be at least 10,000 ft^2 don’t automatically become poor.
Cars are a luxury, while bicycles are utility. We just build our cities with classism in mind. We build our cities to require expensive luxury travel modes, all in some misguided attempt to keep the poors out.