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Comment by xyst | Hacker News Reader

Do you live in the USA? We don’t “prefer” cars. Cars are the only way to get around in this country. There are no options for a majority of people.

It’s not a preference. It’s a choice shoved down our throats by decades of destroying urban cores, bulldozing poor communities/neighborhoods in favor of massive highway projects, and removing bustling streets of human activity with useles parking lots.

The suburban experiment is a massive failure on all levels. It’s not scalable. It’s incredibly wasteful. Federal/state/local governments dump trillions of dollars on maintenance of this fucking mess.

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I prefer a car to any mode of public transport. I don't like sharing a cabin with the public.

I prefer to listen to music without headphones and not be subjected to the sights and smells of septa. I wasn't brainwashed. It's much better.

Traffic sucks, but I still prefer to leave when I'm ready, go directly to my destination, and bring cargo when needed. I wince when I hear people making drastic compromises to hand carry groceries; I also prefer Costco.

I believe that take is ahistorical. The other options withered away because most people prefer cars and the associated lifestyle. Dense city cores are still there for the taking, if you can handle the crime.

This take is very historical.

The government heavily subsidized highway construction, set requirements for massive amounts of available parking, and through the FHA, provided affordable mortgages to white families to move to the suburbs - these new suburbs often had covenants prohibiting black residents. (The new highways were also often built through black neighborhoods, which were often seen as a "blight", were cheaper to acquire through eminent domain, and whose residents didn't have the political or economic power to put up much resistance.)

Traffic policies were set up to maximize traffic flow, which often meant more roads, and wide roads, enabling faster speed. But these make it more dangerous to do anything except drive places.

Restrictive zoning laws resulting in purely residential areas with no corner shop, so even something as simple getting some milk requires driving to the store.

Certainly some people prefer that lifestyle. But the historical truth is that much of it was deliberate top-down policy to encourage people towards that specific lifestyle, and now it's pretty well locked in.

Take for example how residential areas were often designed around cul-de-sacs. The idea was to have quiet streets where kids could safely play. However, once the kids get a bit older, what do they do? They can't drive, so can't even do a simple errand like pick up milk. Instead, one of the parents ends up as a private chauffeur, eg, a "soccer mom". Often this means the family must be a two car family as there is no other solution.

How many of these soccer moms would prefer having a good bus system so their 12-year-old can go to practice and come home on their own?

Even if people do have a preference for single-family housing with a lawn, parking, etc. why should we continue to subsidize that preference? It costs money to provide water, sewer, roads, and power, as well as emergency services and schools, and much of those are fixed costs. For the most part, wealth suburbs are subsidized by poor residents - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nw6qyyrTeI .

You've been brainwashed to think there are only two options. There are more than car-dependent suburbia and "dense city cores". That's probably all that you know about, because the planning process for generations in the US has prohibited mid-rise building and multi-family homes.

It does not need to be that way. You can have suburbs without being car-dependent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0

In https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mV6ZENGko1I a European compare a US suburb to one in Leipzig. The latter is denser, yes, but not the city core. There are restaurants and schools within walking distance, as well as tram service.

> The government heavily subsidized highway construction, set requirements for massive amounts of available parking, and through the FHA, provided affordable mortgages to white families to move to the suburbs

Why do you think the government did this? I will posit that it is because voters wanted it to happen. It's not some grand conspiracy by evil fossil fuel overlords.

> Why do you think the government did this?

You can't seriously disentangle the different factors. Clearly white supremacy was one factor that went into the overall vision. From https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/21/syracuse-new... :

"The construction of I-81, along with the rest of America’s highway system, was a part of the federally funded program in the 1950s called “urban renewal”, which targeted formerly redlined, urban Black neighborhoods, labeled “slums’’, for removal. The former 15th ward neighborhood of Syracuse, once a thriving Black community, was the chosen location to build I-81. As a result, dozens of Black homes and businesses were bulldozed."

"These infrastructure projects prioritized the needs of (largely white) commuters in the suburbs over the lives of poor Black residents in cities. It wasn’t limited to Syracuse or New York state; across the country, federal estimates show about 1.2 million Americans were displaced by urban renewal. That legacy lives on today: in Portland, Oregon, Black residents call part of the Interstate 5 highway that runs from Washington to California their “Robert E Lee statue”. In New Orleans, the Claiborne Expressway has been dubbed a “racist monument”."

> I will posit that it is because voters wanted it to happen.

While you can posit that, bear in mind that racial discrimination was official government policy when the interstate highway system was planned and construction started in the 1950s.

Quoting now from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight#United_States :

"In the United States during the 1940s, the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, low-cost mortgages through the G.I. Bill, and residential redlining enabled white families to abandon inner cities in favor of suburban living and prevent ethnic minorities from doing the same. The result was severe urban decay that, by the 1960s, resulted in crumbling "ghettos"."

If you use the narrow lens that something is justified because the majority of voters want it, then you end up also justifying racial discrimination during the 1950s.

If the majority of voters want the poorest 25% of the population to subsidize suburban living, is that fair? Because that's what we have, and tyranny of the majority is a failure mode for majority rule. (Even more so given how black adults are dis-proportionally disenfranchised.)

Who is arguing "evil fossil fuel overlords"? That would be ahistorical.

> residential redlining enabled white families to abandon inner cities

aka it allowed people to do what they were wanting to do. Those people weren't forced to leave the cities, they were given opportunity to do so and chose to do it.

Nobody here is currently debating whether this was "fair" or "good" or that it wasn't subsidized or enabled by the government, just pointing out that things are the way they are because that's what the people wanted. None of your post goes against that idea, you're just pointing out racial disparity of the actions.

People chose to move to the suburbs. They weren't forced. People continue to choose to live there. Have you actually talked to a lot of suburbanites? Most that I know would say they prefer that way of life. Tons actively fight against densification/urbanization. As the old suburbs get denser and more urban, they continue to flee outwards, buying bigger and bigger lots and houses each move. They specifically don't want to live in dense urban areas. If they wanted to, they would, but they at least think they don't want to make those tradeoffs.

Do you think the vast majority of people living in the suburbs just like wake up every day thinking "man I really hate living here, welp, guess I'll do nothing about it!" Do you think the people shopping for a 3,000sqft house on a 1 acre lot deep down really want a 900sqft apartment?

> Those people weren't forced to leave the cities, they were given opportunity to do so and chose to do it.

Let's go back to xyst's comment at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37951319 . "It’s a choice shoved down our throats by decades of destroying urban cores, bulldozing poor communities/neighborhoods in favor of massive highway projects, and removing bustling streets of human activity with useless parking lots."

xyst never said there wasn't a choice. Instead, the thumb was pressed down on scale, hard, to encourage people to make a specific choice.

You said that was a-historical.

It was not.

> People continue to choose to live there.

What choice do they have? The US zoning system for decades has mandated either high-rises or single-family car-dependent suburbia.

If someone wants to live in a mixed-use area with walking distance from school, restaurant, parks, and restaurants, with mass-transit options ... where do you suggest they live?

> They weren't forced.

Yes, they were. Who do you think enforces zoning requirements? Answer: the police force.

Zoning restrictions are the reason why most places are only single-family homes. The duplexes and short-rises of the immediate post-war suburb I grew up in are no longer allowed.

> Do you think the vast majority of people living in the suburbs just like wake up every day thinking

Now you're just being silly - of course not!

So let's back back to the actual issue. You said xyst's comment at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37951319 was a-historical, but have yet to show why it's historically inaccurate.

Do you think the vast majority of people have a choice of living somewhere which isn't car dependent?

If they don't have the choice, is there really a choice? Can you really say people "prefer" a car if they have no choice without a car?

> Instead, the thumb was pressed down on scale

The thumb of faceless non-human things? No. The thumb of the people elected, time and time again, for several decades. Doing the policies the people wanted.

> You said that was a-historical.

I have not used that term once in this thread. I do largely agree that arguing practically nobody chose suburbs is a-historical though. Suburbs exist and continue to exist because that's what people choose.

> Who do you think enforces zoning requirements? Answer: the police force.

So what, the the police just come up with zoning rules on their own?

They do have a choice, they vote for their local city councils. Those are the people which make the zoning laws. Those are the people that made the suburbs the way they are. Those are the people which keep growing the suburbs as they are.

> If someone wants to live in a mixed-use area with walking distance from school, restaurant, parks, and restaurants, with mass-transit options ... where do you suggest they live?

Richardson, TX? Plano, TX? I used to live with a friend in Plano, it was like a block from an elementary school, just a few blocks away from the middle school and high school. It was walking distance to over a dozen restaurants. Its quite a nice place to live.

> Do you think the vast majority of people have a choice of living somewhere which isn't car dependent?

I do agree there are a lot of people which for a variety of factors cannot make that choice. But they have the opportunity to vote for city council members who will change that. But they largely don't vote for those people. You can tell that because they often don't seem to win elections.

I do agree there's probably a lot of people who would prefer to live in denser urban areas. I wouldn't argue they're the majority of the people who live in suburbs though. Because, if they were, more suburban towns would have elected people changing those zoning laws to allow it. If they're doing stuff the majority of people living there don't want, why do they get re-elected?

> of course not!

Of course not, because...get this...they enjoy living in the suburbs!

> The thumb of the people elected, time and time again, for several decades.

I feel like you haven't bothered to read or understand what I've written.

There are innumerable books on the topic, which go into depth about exactly who the people were, and the reasons they wanted to build highways, including the explicit racism.

If the people want racism, and vote in racists to enforce racism - which these highways did - then I am not going to pretend that what they wanted is something that I want, nor something that should be continued to be supported.

> I have not used that term once in this thread.

I apologize. I didn't see that you took up the exchange after baggy_trough made that comment. Your two viewpoints were very similar.

> So what, the the police just come up with zoning rules on their own?

No. You asked what forces people to make that choice. Zoning laws, enforced by the police, prevent people from having the full range of choice. People choose from the options that exist.

> Richardson, TX? Plano, TX?

I looked around Richardson using Google Street View. It does not look like a place where it is easy to live comfortably without a car. It looks like standard R1 residential with most businesses on stroads meant primarily for cars.

Let's take 414 Salem Dr, which is for-sale, according to Zillo, and near the geographic center of the city. There is an elementary school in walking distance, and a grocery store a mile away on W. Campbell.

If after dinner you realize you need milk for the next morning, only the most dedicated of walkers will do the 40 minutes round-trip walk to pick them up vs. driving.

How do you visit the library? My local library has events for parents with newborns, and for young children. The nearest library to that address is the Richardson Public Library. It estimates 52 minutes walk time, or 47 minutes by bus (of which 35 minutes are walking). How many parents are going to do that walk instead of drive?

If on Saturday your 12-year-old wants to meet up with friends at the library "to work on a school project" (but really just to hang out), do you let the kid walk nearly an hour to the Richardson Public Library, along Campbell road and under I-75? There is no bus service for Saturdays.

This is a car-dependent neighborhood.

The fact that you think otherwise mostly shows you don't know what's missing.

> who would prefer to live in denser urban areas

Again, you are missing the point. There are people who want to live in denser suburban areas.

I pointed you to a video comparing two suburban areas, one in the US and one in Germany.

The fact that you think the only alternatives are single-family suburbs or dense urban is because that's the only two choices in most of the US.

>> of course not!

No. I mean that when I bought a house in a suburb even I wasn't all "wake up every day thinking "man I really hate living here, welp, guess I'll do nothing about it!"". Since I wasn't that way, why should I think others are? Your strawman position seems put out just to be silly, not meaningful.

> they enjoy living in the suburbs!

And how much should they be subsidized for their expensive choice which sucks tax dollars from poorer neighborhoods?

Ok yeah, if you look at a single location and ignore the multitude of other neighborhoods that aren't like that, you'll find that experience. For note though, normally the library is at Arapaho just outside the neighborhood, so an easy and pretty safe bike ride for a 12 year old. It's at a temporary location due to a fire at City Hall leading to a lot of renovations.

You're just completely ignoring all the stuff at Cityline. Walking distance to a grocer there. Right on the light rail. A few bus lines. That 12 year old could ride down to Arapaho station and hop on the bus to go to where the library usually is. Or living near Richardson Terrace. Or near Cottonwood Park. Or Glenville Park. Just because there's not a listing there today, this second, doesn't mean there won't be one there in a week or a month.

Picking the right place to live, it's entirely possible to live car-free. I know what it's like and what's possible, as I did it for a bit.

And once again you bring up zoning laws and just completely forget how those exist. Once again you're essentially arguing nobody has any control over zoning laws, they just appear from the ether ruining everyone's lives with everyone powerless to change them. It's too bad nobody could ever do anything about zoning laws, those were just written in stone 70 years ago by the gods and cannot possibly be changed by the people there.

The suburbs ultimately are the way they are today because people keep voting for people who choose to not change the zoning laws. Our towns could be different if people wanted to change the laws, but the majority don't. You can point to all kinds of history (history I do know) as the reasons why they were originally built, but ultimately they're still there because that's what the majority of people living there choose.

Ultimately, suburbs exist because that's what the majority of people choose. I'm not arguing it's right or wrong here, I'm just arguing against this concept that nobody really wants to live in the suburbs, they're only forced to. Some people are, sure, but not the majority.

Don't get me wrong, I do want there to be more choice in housing. I'm happy places like Cityline and others exist. I vote for more transit, denser zoning, better bike infrastructure, etc. But I go to City Hall, I watch the streams for planning meetings. I talk to neighbors and friends. They way more often than not like the more car dependent suburbia. I'm often seen as a nut for choosing to take transit when I've got a perfectly good car. They wonder why I choose to bike places. So don't think I'm someone who is arguing against housing choice overall, I'm very much for it. But you can't change it if you don't acknowledge reality. And the reality is, most people currently living in suburbia want suburbia.

Go read up about the Plano Tomorrow plan and all the local politics around that, then tell me nobody chooses the suburbs. Some planning for more density and suddenly city hall is packed with people ready to fight against it. I see this kind of stuff all over the country.

https://www.dmagazine.com/frontburner/2021/09/what-comes-aft...

https://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/commentary/2019/07/23/her...

> if you look at a single location and ignore the multitude of other neighborhoods that aren't like that, you'll find that experience.

You specified a city, not a neighborhood, of a place I've never been.

There were plenty of worse places I could have picked in the city.

So, looking at Cityline Dr. Hah! Are you talking about the 'Residences at CityLine'? That's new construction clearly not following the traditional R1 requirements for setback that dominates much of US suburbia.

And at $600K+ it's far outside what most people can afford.

> Picking the right place to live, it's entirely possible to live car-free.

Sure. Streetcar suburbs like Oak Park, IL are a classic example of a suburb where people can live car free. Problems are 1) nearly all of them are too expensive for most people to have the choice to move there, and 2) zoning laws prohibit new construction.

And note that I said "easy to live comfortably without a car."

Give me an address in Richardson, then think about where the local preschool, playground, elementary school, pediatrician, library, grocery store, restaurants, green space, sports practice, doctor's office, dentist, optician, and hospital are.

Bonus points if you can meet up with friends at a bar, drink, and walk home at 11pm feeling safe. (Walk because you've had a few beers and don't want to risk a DUI.)

How long does it take to walk or use mass transit to get there?

And how much does it cost to buy a house there.

> And once again you bring up zoning laws and just completely forget how those exist.

Did you forget my discussion of how racism was an intrinsic component in American suburbia?

The laws about minimum lot sizes and preventing building apartment complexes in single-family neighborhoods was a direct response to keep black (and poor) people out.

> Our towns could be different if people wanted to change the laws, but the majority don't.

Isn't Texas one of the places that requires a supermajority to allow zoning changes? My research suggests a 3/4ths vote is needed - hardly a majority. (NC appears to require a 4/5ths supermajority?!)

Which means a town can't change its zoning even if a simple majority of the people want to change.

In any case, generations of bad urban planning policies based in no small part on racism mean most people think the only two options are "single-family suburbia" and "dense urban".

You yourself made that mistake.

> most people currently living in suburbia want suburbia.

Great! I don't want to change that! Suburbia is fine!

What I don't like that most people don't have a choice to live in a suburbia which isn't car-dependent.

I propose changing the laws to get rid of parking minima, and changing them to allow multi-family homes in R1-zoned area -- just like the suburb where I grew up.

For example, the Biden administration's Build Back Better Agenda is looking at using the same monetary tools that pushed the scale to the traditional post-war American suburb - federal funding - to remove restrictive zoning. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases...

If you approve of the democratic principles which lead the FHA to promote R1-zone suburbs in the 1950s and 1960s then you should approve of the same principles being used now to get rid of exclusive zoning.

> and suddenly city hall is packed with people ready to fight against it.

And only 25% of population can decide the future of city zoning. How do you know that represents the majority viewpoint?

I'll acknowledge, none will be as walkable as your example or other places. But I gave you a few neighborhoods, you looked at the most expensive and criticized it for it's cost for owning a luxury townhouse while ignoring the more affordable rental options. Lots aren't necessarily walkable, but definitely very bikeable. All the bus and light rail lines have bike racks so transit + bike really opens up the city. Lots of bike paths separated from the main roads connect through. I should know, I lived it for a while. And I wasn't living in a $600k house. I'd ride my bike from my decently affordable apartment to my software job and college classes, ride my bike to restaurants and shops in the neighborhood, connect with transit to Deep Ellum, Uptown, and Downtown Plano.

I have not been against your suggestion, I've said I'm for things like that. I totally agree parking minimums need to go away. I agree zoning should make it easy to add multi-family housing, and I wish there were more apartments/condos to own instead of just rentals. I like the DART is expanding and I hope to continue to see better service over time.

However, if you really think only 25% of the people in the suburbs want them this way, you're not talking to the people living there. And they don't just want suburbs because they're racists, which I feel like you're implying by constantly bringing it up. FWIW, Richardson is less white than the national average.

I cannot live in an urban setting. It is way too unhealthy for me. My recreation preferences also necessitate long distance or remote driving.

If we start to see 500+ mi ranges on an SUV-sized vehicle, that will be very tempting. I used to have an HEV sedan which got that kind of range and loved it - no great on unpaved roads, though.

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