Why Does America Not Effectively Increase Bicycling Rates?

 

By Dom Nozzi

July 30, 2019

By far, the most effective way to increase bicycling rates is to make car travel more costly, more difficult, and slower. And to create more compact, mixed use land use patterns.

We also need to create more narrow streets, which involves revising the design of what today tend to be an overwhelming number of over-sized, high-speed roads (“stroads”).

Unfortunately — and not surprisingly — nearly all Americans (including nearly all who live in my home of Boulder Colorado) are vigorously opposed to such things, because nearly all Americans are forced to be motorists.

As people who live in a world where nearly every trip must be made by car, these bicycling promotion tactics are a dire threat to the lifestyle that nearly all Americans find themselves in. They are a dire threat because these tactics will make the only realistic way nearly all of us can travel more difficult and costly.

In a car-dependent world, this is intolerable.

Therefore, even though study after study shows that the tactics I mention above are extremely effective in growing the number of cyclists, nearly all Americans (even those who are supportive of travel choice, sustainability, and environmental conservation) must vigorously oppose them to, as they see it, protect their way of life.

In sum, the only effective ways to grow bicycle travel are to make car travel more costly and difficult and slow.

In other words, taking things away from motorists.

Given this, the only thing that most Americans have the political will to support are ineffective tactics (such as bike paths) that don’t affect motoring.

This is why cycling rates are so much higher in Europe than in the US. Europeans are willing to make motoring more difficult and costly.

 

The “Yellow Vest” Protests in France to Oppose Proposed Fuel Tax Increase

By Dom Nozzi

December 8, 2018

Here are my three big take-aways from the “yellow vest” riots/protests in France in recent weeks that forced the French Prime Minister (Macron) to withdraw his proposal to add a tax to diesel fuel.

First, almost always, it takes someone from the political right wing to propose something bold on environmental conservation – in this case, efforts to reduce excessive motor vehicle driving as a method of achieving climate change goals (I understand Macron is on the political right). Let us not forget that it was Richard Nixon who established the Environmental Protection Agency. Due to political dynamics, I firmly believe that it is far more likely that a Republican prez will adopt a carbon tax in the US than a Democratic prez.

Second, the extreme, violent opposition to the proposed tax happened in a nation that has far more development density, parking restrictions/costs, passenger rail, and high fuel costs than the US. Each of those factors should make it politically easier to adopt this form of carbon tax. The fact that, on the contrary, the tax was overwhelmingly opposed in a nation such as France shows that there is little or no chance that any nations on earth (particularly the US) will find the political will in our lifetimes to adopt meaningful climate change tactics.

Third, when we build a car-based world (as we have done for the past century), we lock ourselves into a self-perpetuating, long-term downward spiral that traps us in auto dependency. Even those who are strong environmentalists typically find it extremely difficult to live a car-free or even a car-light lifestyle. That means that it is nearly inevitable that there will be extreme, bi-partisan, nearly unanimous opposition to anything that adds costs or inconvenience to driving. A car-based world just makes it too impractical for all but the “lifestyle extremists” to avoid making nearly all trips by car.

We can scream and yell all we want regarding Republicans, morons, or nefarious individuals and groups who don’t believe in climate change, but when it comes to actually taking effective steps to address climate change, almost none of us has the stomach for accepting such tactics.

This state of affairs reminds me of a superb satire that Tom Toles did several years ago.