to feel car driving is frequently unjustified

[Clairetree1]

Having sat in a traffic jam yesterday, in which I counted 10 buses being held up by around 45 cars, many of which only had one person in.

So say 60 people in cars holding up 600 people in buses....

just as a snapshot, throughout the whole journey, each person in a car seems to hold up 10 people in a bus, and if the cars were not there, those car travelers could easily fit on the buses, and everyone would be moving at least 3x as fast,

and I can't really see how this is allowed, or can be justified.

If you are in a city, or in another area with an adequate bus route, and are physically able to use the bus, how do you justify to yourself the danger, inconvenience and lethal pollution you subject everyone else to? Not to mention the further damage to the environment caused by concreting over parking spaces, car manufacture, etc.

I know some people are going to say they need the time, but if cars were banned from our cities and more people on public transport, everyone would be moving faster.

I know some people are going to say they are disabled, or have too much to carry, but some people who are disabled or have a lot to carry do use buses, they often have no choice! it doesn't automatically preclude you.

I know some people are just going to say they have a right to, but really, do you? Pollution is killing thousands of people a year in the UK, not to mention those killed in car crashes, the environmental damage done including global warming, and the sheer inconvenience to everybody else.

I know a couple of cities are planning on banning private cars, and I know petrol cars are on their way out, so things might well improve, but I just don't understand how we reached this position in the first place, so much death and destruction and time taken away by an entitled privileged few with such a selfish habit I can't understand how they justify to themselves.

I don't expect many people to agree with me, I think this privilege is so deeply ingrained in our culture that people genuinely feel they have a right to drive cars, when perfectly adequate public transport exist.

I don't think there is any moral right at all though, I think it is morally wrong in every way

I kind of agree, especially in the city, but for me I need to start driving. I do take the bus and have managed to survive almost 30 yrs without driving - but for what is a 10 minute drive to work from home, it takes me 1 hour 30 mins to get to work including dropping DS off, same on the way home. 4 miles of that is walking because the bus routes don't go near my office and the time tables are shite even if the buses were on time. I lose 3 hours a day travelling, 2 of which I lose with my DS and pay out to a childminder. And because I'm on a county border - I live in one and work the other - it costs me double to buy a bus pass, in fact, I'd spend less on petrol if I drove than what I do on bus fair.

City living it could work in, more companies putting no driving or car pool policies in place, but in the towns/villages, buses aren't anywhere near convenient

Take your camping example. We've just been camping. By taking a car (a big one) we could take bikes, canoes, kettle bbq, fridge, boogie boards, decent tent, quilts, pillows etc we had a great holiday. I'm not sure how much stuff you could carry on public transport but wouldn't be much more than a tent and sleeping bags probably. Totally different holiday.

yes, if you have a car option, I can see why you would take it! But the point I was making was that it doesn't have to be an assumption it can be done without.

However, yes, in city centres where the public transport is decent, yes, I would like a ban on public cars. Pedestrianised centres are nicer anyway

exactly - I am not saying no one should ever ever use a car,

I am saying most journeys are self indulgent and unnecessary, and we have an ingrained culture of accepting this as normal when it shouldn't be, and we really need to change this.

There are times when it is clearly justified to drive, but when it isn't, it shouldn't be the go-to option purely for personal convenience, disregarding the devastating impact on every body else.

OP, how do you think that trebling the price of petrol would help workers who live in areas where there is no public transport? People would lose their jobs! You really haven't thought this through at all, have you?

It would take me nearly two hours to go by public transport what takes me 20 mins by car. That's just one way. I'd need to do the same on an evening, not including any extras I need to do. Living in a city, I think I'd find public transport easier than driving but I don't live in a city. I'm far from rural but public transport leaves a lot to be desired.

OP, stay off the subject until you have lived rurally and understand at least some of the issues

I grew up in a very rural farming community - I do understand the issues

but there are other times when shift workers can perfectly easily use public transport, I commute in the mornings with night shifters on their way home!

I’m pleased for them.
If I worked my 12-16 hour shift and then needed to get a 55 min bus + work another 20 minutes I wouldn’t be in for my next shift.

OP, how can you justify having children? You won't answer this.

mummyoflittledravon l agree with you and l salute your 'get on with it' attitude to your daily struggles doing things most of us take for granted if you don't mind me saying.
My son has MS but imbetween 'episodes' he cycles to his work in finance which is around 13 mile round trip. On bad days/weeks when he loses sensation in his hands so obviously wouldn't be safe gripping handlebars, then he drives.
Yes that's right a young suited up handsome male driver driving alone in his potentially five seater car into the city who would be a prime target for judgey pants like yourself if you saw him.
I think we'll have to consider taping his hands to the handles maybe on his symptomatic days ?
Oh and his wife is a district nurse so she has her own car too, shock horror.
I might just disown the selfish immoral pair of them!!

*walk another 20 minutes

Not the first time I've witnessed OP being a goady shit on a thread.

Public transport isn't always that great, particularly outside normal working hours.

Would you want to finish work at 9pm, wait an hour for the 10pm bus that doesn't even take you all the way home (that route stopped at 6.30), get off the bus at 11pm to find you've missed your last bus from there home and have to get a taxi. Oh and it's a Friday or Saturday night, so you have to wait another hour for the taxi.

Or you can drive and be home at 10pm.

Or perhaps you need to be in at 10am on a Sunday and public transport where you live doesn't start until 2pm?

I don't get the bus because it runs 3 times a day in one direction at 07:00, 10:00 and 13:00, and then 3 returns from late afternoon. It goes to only one of the closest cities here. It runs only monday to friday. It doesn't go to my work, it doesn't go anywhere I want to go.

On bad days/weeks when he loses sensation in his hands so obviously wouldn't be safe gripping handlebars, then he drives... I think we'll have to consider taping his hands to the handles maybe on his symptomatic days?

I mean... driving doesn't sound particularly safe either?

And she still refuses to address the argument about children!

if you want a discussion about the rights and wrongs of having children, fine, go ahead and start one, on a thread about the rights and wrongs of having children.

This thread is about car use.

And, not that its remotely relevant, but my children are adopted

@Timeisslippingaway I'm trying to fathom how the OP's attitude chimes with her wanting to go to Chernobyl as a tourist and how much it would cost. Not easy to do via public transport I would have thought, and such a trip is totally unnecessary, contributes to pollution, and can't be justified.

If I worked my 12-16 hour shift and then needed to get a 55 min bus + work another 20 minutes I wouldn’t be in for my next shift.

sorry, don't get this normal days work and relatively short commute? can't see an issue

I drive my car because I get a huge amount of pleasure from it.
Sometimes I drive to the coast just for a nice drive and don't even get out and drive home again.
My dc walk to secondary school or catch a bus to college. My dh drives himself to work and I get my shopping delivered so I probably could live easily without my car but I absolutely adore it.
I just love driving it and I'm forever offering people lifts to the shops or doctors & hospital appointments just so I can drive it.
At least I'm helping people for free so they don't have to rely on buses which are often late or full or don't go where they are going at the time my friends, family & neighbours need to be there by.

@clairetree you also seem to not want to address the fact that poor people living in poor countries have cars ....I guess because it doesn't fit your line of arguement 🙄

I have a car but walk/use public transport quite a lot too. I have to drive to work as I do night shift and theres no buses where and when I finish work. Today we've taken a train to a nearby city as its quicker and less stressful as I don't have to worry about parking/traffic jams. It would be great to have a lot more investment in public transport and making cities/towns more pedestrianised so as to make walking/cycling more enticing.

As some posters above prove by examples, sometimes it IS more convenient to take the car (eg for camping, or if you live far from the major bus routes). But the OP's opening post still stands - the MAJORITY of car users do noy have a GOOD reason not to use public transport, and are doing it because they convinced themselves that the car is the only reasonable option. Looking around MN will show you that there is a prevailing culture of "it is impossible to get around without a car". I read a charming opinion once that "it's impossible to have a steady job if you don't drive", "it's impossible to be a responsible parent if you don't drive", "you'll see when you have children", etc.

This is fortunately changing. Millennials (who are now the you g parents) seem to drive less, as 1) it's no longer a sign of being a grown up to get a car at 18; 2) most of them can't afford it.

I'm getting by just fine with public transport a bike, and an occasional taxi, and honestly find it quite hypocritical when polluting, jam-creating, selfish car ownera try to spin it as if though I'm not a proper adult because I'm not yet fully contributing to global warming at a level currently accepted in our society.

I would have to give up my current job without a car. I work hours to suit my SEN DS and public transport would take around four hours (I’d need to get a train INTO London, then another back out on another line, then a bus) and I only work 5 hours on an average day...... not to mention the cost and I wouldn’t be at home for when my son leaves and gets home.....

I live in a village just outside Plymouth.
I drive to work in London/ sometimes I get the train from Taunton and park there.

Once I get to the Home Counties, you’re right I’ve got loads of decent public transport and there is a shit ton of traffic that I’m sat in.

But I can’t afford to both park and take public transport and to get the train all the way to London I would first have to get to Plymouth - I would have to drive and be on the train that gets me in an hour and a half late.

Even though I’m driving through London 8am my journey didn’t start then and I didn’t have access to decent public transport.

I do think we need less cars and better public transport though

NickNacky - I'd suggest walking at 3am. You'll get the benefits of the fresh air (few cars killing you with their emissions) plus, assuming you've not been mugged/raped/stabbed/murdered, by the time you're about three quarters of the way home you'll be able to catch a bus and start a lovely long trip changing buses every ten mins. Then a little walk from that very conveniently-sited bus stop half a mile from your front door and you'll be home! If you're quick you'll have time for a snack as well as a shower before you have to start the fun in reverse to get back there again ready for another shift. I can't see the problem myself!

I'm trying to fathom how the OP's attitude chimes with her wanting to go to Chernobyl as a tourist and how much it would cost. Not easy to do via public transport I would have thought

I would love to go to Chernobyl, it wouldn't occur t me to go any other way other than public transport though, so I really can't see what the point of this comment is!

Completely agree op for city dwellers - Public transport or cycling. It's the future. Oslo and Madrid have already gone car free I believe. Private car ownership will become less and less common