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Comment by harha | Hacker News Reader

I think they’re also a bit blind towards what potential market they’re losing, even if it’s just step by step.

My peer group would probably have been a great target 10 years ago. Now I hardly know anyone at my level with a car, and if, it’s an old one or cheaper brand. I think this is a luxury product in decline, other options just keep getting better. If I like to pay a lot, I’ll just Uber everywhere. Public transport is becoming less shitty (eg with contactless payments in a lot of places, and google maps to find the routes), cycling is safer (and showers in offices) etc. Why deal with this nonsense, and insurance and fines and parking and repairs?

I think they’re looking at these revenue streams as a way to save themselves because it might increase revenue per customer, without seeing that it might actually reduce their market share even further.

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Your experience with this will vary hugely with where you are.

If I live in London, then almost everyone I see regularly will be living car-free. If I live in Weasenham in Norfolk, probably far fewer of my friends and neighbours will have a car-free lifestyle.

This sounds right for someone that lives in a city and doesn't have kids. If you have a family then the options you laid out above don't work very well and if you live in the suburbs then constant uber/biking/public transport are not long term options.

I have a family in a city. Judging by the cars around here, I’d say this is more likely to be BMWs market than most of the countryside. And I also think I would have had a car 10 years ago, now it’s just not anything I’d really consider without massive amounts of persuasion.

> If you have a family then the options you laid out above don't work very well

Genuine question: Why is it that whenever someone on a forum mentions the phrase "public transit", inevitably someone comes along under ten minutes later to tell them how they're obviously wrong?

I am in my 50s. My wife and I have raised children in a city. Many years ago, before transit got much better, we hauled them up into the high-stair buses and strapped their strollers into wheelchair spaces. Trips to the mountains were an annual affair, at best, on poorly-documented shuttle buses. These days, my kids routinely go hiking in the Gorge or out to the Peninsula on nothing but a transit card and a day pack.

My children are now adults and none of them have learned to drive nor have any interest in doing so. Almost our entire friends group is the same, even through the pandemic. The most common reason to be an exception and having been required to learn how to drive is because they got priced out of where they live.

Perhaps it is time for the auto-responders to transit posts to adjust to a wider view of society?

Which city?

The tube in London isn’t really even suitable for suitcases, let alone push chairs. Nor is the New York subway. Anyone that puts stairs in a transit hub needs to have a good long think about what they’ve done.

Perhaps Hong Kong, Seoul or Tokyo I could see this being the case though.

I'm not sure why the swift backlash - you lived in a city. As I wrote "This sounds right for someone that lives in a city AND doesn't have kids." At the very least, that's an important "AND"

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