[meme] Why do people only seem to mean cars when they talk about electric and/or autonomous vehicles?

my area doesnt even have sidewalks

US rah rah

Autonomous vehicles work better on rails. Also without having to deal with pedestrians.

And when space efficient enough to allow for a livable city.
Except that they have much lower rolling resistance and much longer lifespans of both the road and the tires.
- Are you trying to argue seriously that cars are more efficient than trains?

Because to them, 'car' and 'vehicle' mean the same thing.

I find these discussions seem to be dominated by young urbanites. People who don't need a car to get around as opposed to the huge number of people who live in areas that require a car to function. They are also physically able to bike many miles every day in any weather.

I took public transportation when I lived in a big city and was glad to have it but anytime I needed to go beyond a limited area in the city I needed a car. Now I live in an area with very limited public transportation and very very little is in walking distance and biking for my needs is not an alternative. Frequently using 100% public transportation routes would increase your travel time by a large amount, time you may not have or want to sacrifice. If you live in country like France it seems like the transit unions have a stranglehold on the nation as they can shut down everyone at will, if you have a car you at least have an alternative. There are also breakdown issues, maintenance shutdowns, etc. You also run into the last mile issue a lot. Where you need to go is frequently not a reasonable distance from the stop. I usually needed a car to get to the train stations for instance.

huge number of people who live in areas that require a car to function
That is exactly the problem. Areas that require a car to function shouldn't exist. That's what those "young urbanites" are arguing for.
- And there are a lot of great point there about mixed zoning, but nuance is important. Should small towns with nearly nothing available locally, where you have to travel outside of town for most things just not exist? Even if they do have train connections (as they often do where I live, in Europe), you usually only have one train every 1-2 hours unless there's some specific significance to your town.
  Improving things is a nice goal, but it often feels like here that people just want to eliminate anything that doesn't conform to their ideals of how the world should be like.
- So vast swaths of the earth should be depopulated? Hold on while they open the camps...
I would have to drive about 45 minutes to get to any form of public transport that isn't a school bus.
- Wow, that sucks. We should definitely build some transit near you so you aren't so isolated. You need some freedom.
yeah I think its aimed to help fix the high traffic areas, for me when I was able to take the train from near my home to near my work it was amazing, it went pretty much parallel to the highways so you could drive and maybe get there a little faster but riding the train made it so you had time to play game boy or read a book instead of staring at the bumper in front of you in traffic. more trains and public transportation for commuting and cars for leisure like going on a road trip to go camping
- All we honestly need is a few community shared self driving cars in each neighborhood to fix the last mile issue with mass transit, but the fuck cars absolutists often would rather have trains built to every houses doorstep than admit cars could still hold a purpose.
Young people often have the tendency to be both ageist and ableist at times.
- Hi, I'm disabled and I can't drive. Stop fucking calling the transit and walkability movement ableist. The transit and walkability movement has been life-saving to people like me.
Yep if you've been around for several decades, and traveled around a diverse selection of urban and rural areas, you will likely reach the obvious conclusion that cars are a significant magnifier of personal freedom. If you don't have a car, you can't just leave your home and get in the vehicle and go anywhere you want. But when you do have a car, you can immediately travel, and go anywhere that roads do. And with certain vehicles, you don't even need roads and you can go anywhere the terrain doesn't physically block your path.
If you get a referral to a specialist, you cannot reach them with public transpo from my town. And our bus circuit encompasses three small towns and the nearby military base.
You have to have your own transportation to make it to either of the metro centers 30-45 minutes away.
Couldn't agree more. Being single in my twenties presented very different needs and capabilities than being a pregnant mother, or an aging single mom taking care of even more aging parents.
There are few topics that reveal privilege and ignorance faster than this one. It's a hallmark of immaturity to think there's a simple answer to ANY social problem.
I'm too disabled to drive, I don't live in a city, and I only bike between 0.5 and 1 km per day. I don't have the slightest need for a car and I can still do whatever I want.
Be nice if we had trams tho
I'm flattered that you think I am young or an urbanite.

Because then they keep the "freedom" of driving, but without the guilt of pollution. That and, I mean, the community is called "fuck cars." Obviously someone not taking a closer look at the true root of what this community wants (city planning that isn't car-centric) would just think "but electric cars ain't bad."

Bicycles are one of the most energy-efficient ways to travel, and electric ones even more so. But absolutely no one refers to them as "vehicles"...

- Perhaps it would be more accurate to say nobody refers to vehicles as bikes

Because a train isn't going to drive me from home to anywhere that's not a train station.

- For planning future communities, sure. It does not make sense to try to shoehorn trains into many parts of the cities we have today.
- Works for cities, doesn't work outside cities or for small countries.
So because the infrastructure doesn't exist at this moment, it can't ever exist?
- Are you arguing trains will one day stop wherever they want because those are called trams not trains
It seems a lot of this argument comes from an idea that trains need tracks but cars can go anywhere. This is patently untrue.
Are roads cheaper than tracks? I don't think so, but I would love to hear what evidence others have.
- I mean, trains -do- need tracks. When they don't, they become cars/buses, for all intents and purposes.
  As to prices, from a quick search, tracks are more expensive per mile, but I didn't see anything talking about maintenance cost. Hopefully these sources are reliable:
  3-4 million USD per mile (~2020 prices) for train tracks, assuming flat rural terrain - https://www.freightwaves.com/news/commentary-do-you-want-to-build-a-freight-railroad
  ~2 million USD per mile (2014 prices) for highway, assuming flat rural terrain - https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2020/1/27/how-much-does-a-mile-of-road-actually-cost
- As someone who works in rail infrastructure management, answer is yes, roads are cheaper than railway network. Hell yes actually, by a factor of at least 10 for electrified railway. A poorly maintained road is uncomfortable and you might damage your car, a poorly maintained railway means derailment and fatalities.
- I don't think that's the right metric, tbh. Even if you swapped out every paved road with a train track, they would not have anywhere near the same utility as trains. Trains have much higher capacity and efficiency but much lower granularity than cars, they fit into a different part of the problem domain of logistics. And while yes, using cars as a one size fits all solution sucks, the same is true for trains -- hell, at least while inefficient AF, cars do actually function in this environment, while trains are flat out incapable of addressing our modern day logistical needs.
  Also, fairly sure dirt roads are hella cheap.
  My point isn't that we shouldn't reduce cars, it's that reduce and eliminate are different things. And as long as cars exist, it's hella stupid to object any improvement in them. (The self-driving thing is in fact stupid though, but that's because it's proven to be a ridiculously hard problem that we do not yet have adequate solutions for, not because it's not something that would be helpful if we managed to crack it.)
You've got legs, and if you can afford a few hundred dollars you've got wheels. By all rights, anywhere you need to go ought to be walking distance from a train station. The reason it's not anymore, is that Americans demolished their cities to build parking, and now everything's too far away.
- European here. This is so ridiculously wrong and dismissive.
  For one, no, even a country with far higher population density than the US doesn't cover everything with rail. That's a highly privileged city-dweller take (and I do live in cities and feel kinda uncomfortable in rural towns because it feels like there's nothing to do). Because yes, in a large city you do have a ton of options within easy walking distance from subways and light rails, but that's not even close to the case for everything else. Once you leave the big city everything is also too far away in Europe, for more mainstream things you're stuck with lower quality local establishments (or you luck out and have one of the best ones nearby in your proverbial backyard, but it doesn't apply for everyone) and for more niche things, everything is just prohibitively far away.
  For two, "anywhere you need to go"? How do you decide that? Like do you not have friends or relatives who live a little further away, or in a logistically hard to reach place? Do you not have hobbies for which the locations are just hella hard to reach by public transport? Hell, with the design those networks can get sometimes even nearby places can be super far away -- for example, here in Budapest lines for getting into the inner city and out are very well built out (although, minor nitpick, they're often buses, not trams or trains), but moving laterally along the outskirts of the city is next to impossible. There's a pretty good supermarket near me with many different options that I'd need about 1.5 hours to get to, one way. It's about 15 minutes by car.
  And speaking of, for three, you fail to account for time constraints. Scheduling is a major issue, I have literally never faced a situation where going by car wouldn't have been nearly twice as fast as it is with public transport. I'm lucky enough to only be a single train ride away from my workplace, no transfers necessary, but my commute is still an hour one way, while it could be 30 minutes by car. That's an hour every office day (thankfully we're hybrid) that I'm never gonna get back. Similarly, while yes, you can get nearly everywhere by some form of public transport (very unlikely that you get literally everything covered by rail though, unless you live in a large city), there are a lot of places that take a ridiculously long time to get to, and the further out you live from the city center the more you're exposed to that effect.
  Trains are awesome, but they're not a one size fits all solution.

> Another similar thing that I hate are countries that require bicycles to have pedals and be power-assist only.
This is fair I think. In Europe, to be classified as a bicycle, you have power/speed limits and assist requirement. However you get to ride on paths that are designed for bicycle speeds (often adjacent or mixed with pedestrians), don't require any license or training, can go against traffic in many one way streets etc. It makes sense to limit the use of all that stuff to bicycle like vehicles.
However you can have other types of electric bikes, they just aren't bicycles by law any more, which makes sense in my opinion. Want to go scooter/motorcycle speeds and twist throttle and all that stuff, you also need the correct license, insurance and have to drive on the road that is designed for higher speeds.
Granted, one could argue about the specifics of the distinction, but in my opinion there definitely needs to be a distinction in the law and you have to draw the line somewhere.
- It makes sense to have requirements on maximum size, weight and speed to go in the bike lane. But having rules about the design or operation of the vehicle is just unnecessary bureaucracy. In the Netherlands you can't even ride an electric skateboard.

Just an add here ... Pedestrian fatalities are up, largely due to huge vehicles in general. But EVs tend to be very heavy because of the batteries. So collisions tend to be very unpleasant.

Can confirm. Rode a 1000w electric bike to work every day and couldn't wait to get a car after all the near-misses I had. It's even more dangerous than a pedal bike cause no one expects a bicycle to be going almost 30 MPH. Almost got hit at least 3-4 time from people turning right cause they didn't expect me to be inside the intersection so soon.
They're a lot of fun for recreation but not as a daily driver, unless you have a suicide wish.
- Had a friend die doing 60mph on a pedal bike down a hill. He got hit by a car, people blamed the car but he was on the wrong side of the road around the bend and the car was only doing 15mph. I just want to live, we are all headed underground. Just a different speeds.
- It's almost as of going 50kph with a bicycle isnt a good idea to begin with
- Plus I heard there have been a lot of battery fires.
  I feel like the EV business got ahead of itself, cars, bikes, trucks. Some of these companies that went public are heading for bankruptcy.
  Then there's the usual disrespect for bike riders. I ride mostly off-road. But I've been nearly run over by both cars and horses.
Larger physical body - that has a higher impact point on a human - has a much greater chance to kill someone, than if it was a lower impact point.
Not to mention the reduction in visibility.
Sauce: https://twitter.com/FreckleEars/status/1624137853872574475/photo/1
- The line of sight numbers are telling. Thank you for providing this information.

See and I get the opposite problem.

I wanted to buy an electric motorcycle since I use my old gas bike to make the same trip for work two times a month. The trip is 215 km and only goes though one town (about 45 km from one end). This is easy with most gas motorcycles and I thought that an EV version of a hwy cruiser should have no issue with say a 250 km range (since I stay the night I can charge from a slow plug).

Well let me tell you how frustrating "city" brain is about EVs. I mostly got e-bikes (like a bicycle) tossed at me, and the few that make the cut (Damon HyperSport, for example) are geared like a rocket and all the stats are based on city riding. 200 km max speed and no hwy gearing is stupid, but hey CITY CITY CITY! Where are the non insane vehicles? I don't want to ride a 0-60 in <3 second monster, I don't want to be curled up for 3 hours on a crotch rocket, and I don't want to deal with an app just to charge. We don't all live in your cities, some that do need to leave said cities, and until a normal non toy like EV vehicle hits the market the wider world will lump it all in the same bullshit pile.

I don't have the option for a public transit, hell they killed the trains and buses off even if I wanted to do the milk run.

This made me curious; but I feel like there’s two issues.
One, the whole demographic for motorcycles is lugnuts revving their engine. Generally, they’re not all that practical, and more of a personality/lifestyle choice. The closest thing in other countries is scooters, which are a cheap and common option but not viable for highways.
The second is fuel density. Electric cars can slip battery into all the hidden corners, but bikes have less room.
It doesn’t seem like an impossible problem to solve, but it might come slowly just because of the first one.
- I was avoiding cars as the OP was talking everything but. EVs in that market are just as bad for silly issues. I would like to see a basic as shit EV but the market seems to be the other way (Hummers and Model Xs etc). I was also more angry that all the EV motorcycles lie about range as they are set up for city (geared low for that EV power but can not maintain Hwy speeds).
  I used a motorcycle for many years as my only transportation and in many places in the world it still is a mainstay. I think we agree that the EVs now are built for as you put it "lugnuts". The density issue is a red herring as a EV Motorcycle is just a motor bolted to a massive battery (other then the rider there is no wasted weight). But the issue is they are made with no gearing and a over sized motor. The gas burning 37 year old Honda I ride now had when new 42hp and is more then fast enough for modern roads whereas the EVs now are all over 100hp without gearing, its annoying to see range charts like this:
  City: 187 miles (301 km) Highway: 55 mph (89 km/h) 114 miles (183 km) — Combined: 142 miles (229 km) Highway, 70 mph (113 km/h): 93 miles (150 km) — Combined: 124 miles (200 km)
  This is for a Zero SR/F and they advertise 301 km range. The real world range is 150km.
  I would love to say take the train, but my destination does not have FM radio let alone any options not on a road.
  I am thinking I will have to do a conversion of something if I ever move to EV and that sucks!

I can't wait for the REM (bottom left picture) to open, it's in less than a week!! After so many years, at last.

I just bought an electric motorbike, design is like a Vespa. I love it. Top speed kinda sucks but I love it. I'd love to take a train or bus instead but there is literally no line between my work and home that doesn't involve a longer walk than the ride itself.

Care to share the one you've bought? 🧐 I'm also considering one
- I bought a Segway/ninebot e300se. It has a range of wltc ~85km (or ~130 with a 3rd battery) and a top speed of 100km/h and it cost as much as an high end electric bicycle.
  https://eu-en.segway.com/products/segway-escooter-e300se
  Note, apparently, that former US brand doesn't sell in the US. .

This video explains really well exactly why transit is better than cars: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=j4s9WDDRE2A

This one too: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=WiI1AcsJlYU

I also like to point to this graphic:
Cars are just an insanely inefficient way to move people around in cities.
- I would like to provide this XKCD in case the last graphic was too helpful.
- I take issue with this graphic. It is disingenuous to imply that foot traffic isn't the highest density form of transit. You can't load a train with other trains. People have to walk.

But you can't disrupt an industry without cars! The shareholders won't like that! /s

To everyone reading this comment. Remember that all “disrupting” ever meant was using venture capitalist's money to undercut the prices of existing services with a crappy mobile app tacked on. No “disrupting” startup has proven to be sustainable or profitable in the long term. That's one of the factors in the most recent wave of tech massive layoffs. AirBnB, Uber, the millions of food delivery apps, even Netflix, their value proposition dies when they have to charge for the actual costs of operation.

Wait, what about autonomous bicycles?

are you actually seriously addicted to hard drugs ?
→→ \s ←←
- Sometimes people try to make jokes.
- Accusing people who said something you didn't like of drug addiction isn't very poggers

What I mean when i say I want a subway system

I see nothing wrong with a complex subway map and it is absolutely not a disadvantage. Try comparing it to a map of the roads maybe? A 2D space served by 1D lines necessitate a mesh-like network to do well, has nothing to do with transit or cars, a comprehensive system will always look like this.
And you memorize literally all the stations and their order if you take transit regularly.
- I don't think they were complaining. More like the opposite.
- Im not in disagreement. I actually prefer being a sardine in a can than driving.

It's what having a carbrain does to you.

For me it's because I want an electric car and don't really care about other modes of transit. I don't want to be in a dense city, and a car is far more practical outside of one.

How do you have time to do anything when you're stuck in traffic all day?
- I'm not. I largely work from home, but when I am out I don't go into the city because I'm not a big fan of being around people.

Because I don't want to stay in the city all the time?

What is the advantage of autonomous trains over regular? It seems to me that when driving a train is your job, the autonomy just takes it away.

If we didn't have capitalism, people wouldn't need jobs. We could automate jobs away and instead of starving, people would just have more free time
- theres countless mountains of actual work to be done that couldn't be automated.
- Some people enjoy driving trains.
- Ok, name a system better than capitalism then

I just want the vehicles from Minority Report, is that so much to ask for?

Let it be known that I do not want to attack you personally. But the notion of electric bikes being death traps is something I can't take seriously. I could go outside right now and film the street for an hour and watch 50% of bikes going by being electric, not to mention that you'd be hard pressed to find anyone wearing a helmet or protective gear.
Electric bikes here are generally limited to 25kmh (15mph) and the electric motor will stop the moment you go over that speed. Besides, most people generally don't reach that speed because the largest users of electric bikes here are the over 50.
In my personal experience the problem isn't so much the vehicle as the infrastructure being made for it. For context I live in the Netherlands in a smaller city (far from Amsterdam).
Here the trains and busses are both electric, and the buses charge with overhead chargers at the main bus station.
You don't need cars to travel small towns. People have been travelling small towns without cars for thousands of years.

that's an argument to talk about electric cars at least some of the time, not to exclusively talk about them at the expense of any other transportation option. According to US government statistics, people in rural areas make up about 15% of the population, why is their situation dictating the national conversation around clean transportation?
A great majority of people do live in cities or suburbs, which are great places for electric vehicles and autonomous railway systems.
As the other people mentioned. In North America, the percentage of urban populations is 85%, Latin America 81%, Europe 75%
Yes, rural areas are probably in need of private vehicles, but not everyone out of those 85-75% of people need a car. We've become too reliant on them.
- Those stats are a bit misleading. For example, I live in a "urban" environnement, aka a town, but the closest anything is still 15km away.
However, those who do live in those circumstances would find such things useful. It's okay for something to benefit less than 100% of the population.
But the vast majority do, and solving the problem for them is good enough. Who gives a shit about the exceptions? They aren't relevant.
"But muh rural special snowflake" is nothing but a bullshit derailment tactic and you know it.
- I'm not rural - hell, I live in a suburb of DC - but I couldn't survive without a car where I live. I'm 5 minutes from a grocery store by car, but 30-45 by bus, not counting waiting time for the bus to arrive.
  Should cars be phased out or otherwise forced to downsize? IMO, yes - over time. But do we also need to drastically overhaul our public transit and walk/bike infrastructure? Absolutely, and this should happen first.
Why does everyone think cars are practical for 100.00000% of commuters? My friend is a blind amputee that lives under the Indian Ocean in an air bubble. Ever tried navigating by car through 1000 feet of sea water with no arms when you can’t see the road?
Thus, let’s get rid of all cars. They’ll never work.
There is no place for logic on this sub!
Only endless complaining and pretending that everyone has the exact same situation. And god forbid we have choice too.
I'll take mass transit if it is convenient, I'll hop on my electric bike when I want, but I also will take a gasoline car or electric car if it makes more sense to do that or if I simply want to go cruise around for a bit.
- It sounds like you think the only solution is one that works for every situation. "We all must have helicopters because that is the only way into my volcano lair."
So nobody lived on that mountain before cars were invented?

Of all the subreddits we should've left on reddit.

This braindead circlejerk never should've come here. You are all completely disconnected from reality. Enjoy your larping.

I would argue that those who are disconnected from reality are those who believe in a system that essentially requires every single person to own and operate a 2+ ton piece of heavy machinery just to get groceries or go to school or work.
- In cities, yeah sure. But in rural areas? How is that gonna work without cars?
- Imagine thinking all people outside urban areas can exist with a bike and public transportation. Ignorance is bliss, eh?
We need both good public transit in cities and good car infrastructure in semi rural areas. Cars can be extremely useful.
It is possible to block communities on lemmy, if it is bothering you that much.
- First thing I did after seeing this post.
Why do you think it's braindead and disconnected from reality to want people to be able to live without a car?
Cars offer nothing but death and destruction under the guise of freedom. Those who can't see that are the ones disconnected from reality.
Personally I enjoy cleaner, quieter cities and safer streets, but I guess that's just nuts, right?
- "Cars offer nothing but death and destruction"
  Fucking lmao can you hear yourself?? Seriously?? That's the only thing that cars offer?? I wasn't going to reply further in this thread because this community is a fucking joke but your comment was so profoundly stupid I just couldn't help myself. I'd call it a braindead take but it's just so insubstantial and incorrect that I'm not even sure it qualifies as a "take".
  Are you an 18th century horse salesman? Carriage driver? Farrier? Or are you an edgy middle schooler who just found their first shitty internet opinion?
  You are so far gone from the real world I doubt you could ever make it back to planet earth.
  Pull your head out of your ass and pay attention to reality. Grow up.
- Pal, I live/work on a farm. There is no reason that fixing the issues with a car-centric society in urban areas should be an issue for my lifestyle.
sniffles WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
That's what you sound like
- Hilariously ironic, thank you for that.
Yeah this is ridiculous, I'm all for mass transit but good luck getting anything done outside of a city without a car. Idiots. Yeah let's just go back to horses.