“It would be a massive cultural and behavioural shift to radically recast the automobile as a symbol not of freedom, but of restriction.”
Good luck with that, because the automobile is not only a symbol of freedom, it is a tool that actually gives individual people freedom to go where they want to go, when they want to go there. They have the freedom to live in one area, and work, shop, recreate, and visit their friends and families in others areas far away with the greatest convenience. I’ve seen older people lose their driver’s lisence because of their infirmities, and it was basically like putting their first foot in the grave. It’s hard for them to stroll to the bus stop blocks away and then walk around some shopping area, not to mention dragging home their groceries. If they have their food delivered, they don’t see anybody. An automobile is true freedom to them just as it is for everyone else.
I’m a frequent public transit rider, but mostly I travel by bicycle. I’m very happy with the mass transit system in my city, and I love riding my bike, but when the weather is cold and wet like it is now, they both suck. And when you live and/or work far from your transit stops, then it sucks all the time, and that is enough of a reason for people to drive their cars instead. Public transportation can and eventually will overcome this problem by using autonomous wheeled conveyances for personalized, door to door service. It would be stupid for public transportation not to go that way, because they can go that way. Companies are getting ready to do it now. When I see diesel smoke spewing articulated buses go by empty at 9 PM and later I just want to weep. It’s a waste that on order autonmous vehicles would eliminate, and people would still be able to freely travel at will with the added benefits of not worrying about parking or owning a car.
As far as pre-planned walkable shopping areas go, do some research into the history of urban pedestrian malls in the USA. They were popular in the 1960s, and 1970s, but the vast majority of them were a complete failure and were turned back into roads and parking. There was one near where I live in the East End of Pittsburgh that turned the commercial district into a dangerous abandoned ghost town. It’s been back open to regular car traffic longer than it was a mall, and now is pretty nice. There is a very successful urban pedestrian mall near UVA in Charlottesville VA, and its success can be attributed to two things; tourists and rich people. Without either or both of those, they don’t work. Again, people don’t want to stroll around outside when the weather is shitty, and when they’re not strolling around they are not spending money. When giant indoor shopping malls were popular, what stopped people from forming some kind of community within those large, dry, climate controlled spaces full of potted trees and fountains? Nothing, except for the fact that they just went there to shop, not to meet strangers or to engage in whatever. Now those malls are closing too.
As I mentioned, I live in a city, and on any given weekend there has to be hundreds of events where anyone can go out and meet other people in the community, and also enjoy doing something specific that they want to do. Throw in the churches and bars and it becomes thousands. A car gives you the freedom to go to any one of them, and socialize with the people there. Forcing people to only interact, socialize, and even go on dates with the people that live near them is not even remotely freedom, and in fact it is the very opposite. They called it the “Iron Curtain” because people’s ability to travel was highly restricted, and yes the commies had crappy autombiles and not many of them. They didn’t have any freedom either.
