To wonder why is Mumsnet so anti-car?

[Ticketsto]

There is at least one thread a week on here demonizing cars! What is with all the hate? I know they cause pollution and can kill people however they’ve revolutionized the way we live! Not all of us are fortunate enough to live somewhere with good public transport.

More the opposite I’d say. You’re seen as a sub standard human if you can’t drive on here it seems to really offend ppl. Never seen it in real life. Mumsnet can be weird sometimes.

What makes me miserable is now anti many MNetters are to the changes that would allow more people to live rich happy lives, car—free!
Netherlands and UK have about the same rate of car ownership, it’s just that Dutch people prefer non car options in many cases because they are genuinely better/cheaper/quicker/more fun/more sociable etc etc.
it is THAT that I want across the UK - for there to be real options. There aren’t, at the moment. No-car living in much of the UK limits people so much that a car is top of the must-have list.
That could change, and all our lives would be so much better if it did!

That's because of the "safety" features now required by law such as enhanced side impact protection which often requires strengthening bars in the doors - if you don't widen the door, you can't fit in the strengthening required, so if you don't widen the car, you reduce the interior space. People, generally, are getting bigger/wider so many want cars with wider seats, so again that leads to wider cars!

So true!

Single track country roads were designed for smaller vehicles, often evolving from a horse and cart track. They are from an era where cars were narrower, so a car could pass a horse, pedestrian or cyclist with enough clearance (at slow speed of course). Nowadays, on some of the single track roads around our village, no, an SUV can't pass pedestrians, cyclists or horses with adequate clearance, but they do it anyway! That's what makes such country lanes unsafe.

You're thinking only of the driver, i.e. higher position, etc., which is for THEIR benefit, not other road users. There's a particular road that I cycle or walk on, and in places, it's literally impossible to pass an SUV - they're already brushing the hedges on each side, so for them to pass, I'd have to literally climb into the hedge myself! I also drive on it myself occasionally, I have an old Citroen C3 (a narrow, small car) and surprise, surprise, I'm not brushing the hedge when I drive along it and I can pass pedestrians and cyclists (at a snail's pace) without them having to dive into a hedge! Same with parking spaces, sometimes I amaze myself at how I can park in tiny parking spaces and still be able to get in and out (usually happens in car parks where there's an SUV parked in each of the adjacent spaces, usually right up to the dividing line!

Motorists aren't "anti" changes. We want the changes to happen. Trouble is that the "anti car" brigade are the ones with options, i.e. good public transport, integrated transport links, etc.

People living in the bigger cities with good public transport really can't even begin to imagine living on a bus route with a bus every 2 hours on a single route, where there's no buses after 6pm and none at all on a Sunday! They can't imagine not having a bus that can take you to the nearest railway station without 2 changes and taking a couple of hours. And no, I'm not living in a remote hamlet, I live in a large village of 8,000 inhabitants (more of a small town), in the centre of a triangle with a city and 2 other larger towns, just 5 miles in each direction. The road to the city is a narrow country road, almost all national speed limit, with no pavement, no cycle lanes, etc so completely unsafe for walkers or cyclists. The other option is a canal towpath (unlit), which isn't a direct route and meanders through other villages before reaching the city, so roughly an 8-9 mile journey. As I say, unlit, so unsuitable for cycling in winter when it's dark at each end of the working day. The towpath isn't tarmacked and especially in winter is hard to cycle due to the wet muddy/swampy ground.

I'd love to cycle more, to take the train more, to use the bus more, but in reality, it's not possible for lots of journeys. Not only does our bus run only every 2 hours, it goes nowhere near a train station, (which is nowhere near the bus station), so you need to change buses to get one to the train station.

When I worked in our next nearest city, just 20 miles away, I could do the journey in 25 minutes by car, but it would take 2 hours by bus/train, and was impossible to get to work at 9am - it would be nearer 10 arrival time, as there was no earlier option due to the poor bus/train service, same coming home at night where the earliest I'd get home train/bus would be just after 7pm - remember this is just 20 miles away! Needless to say, I drove!

All that does is make drivers of SUVs (and vans) feel safer & driver faster.... until they hit someone something.

People living in the bigger cities with good public transport really can't even begin to imagine living on a bus route with a bus every 2 hours on a single route, where there's no buses after 6pm and none at all on a Sunday!

Well, as a non-driver, I have to make a sensible decision about living where there IS reasonable public transport. This restricts where I can choose to live, and generally also costs me more. In the past, it's restricted the jobs I've applied for.

You have a choice @Badbadbunny No-one is stopping you living where there is good public transport. We all have these choices.

The difference is, I own my choices, and take responsibility for them.

Difference is that there WAS a good public transport service when I moved here 25 years ago. It was around 2005 that the bus service was drastically reduced.

Yes, I could move to a city centre with good bus services, but what happens if everyone does that? Where will they all live? How will the infrastructure cope with hoards of people moving into the cities? I thought city dwellers already struggled with schools, GP surgeries, finding a dentist etc?

A much better solution is to make public transport more accessible to everyone to spread out the population rather than concentration into just a few major towns/cities.

A much better solution is to make public transport more accessible to everyone to spread out the population rather than concentration into just a few major towns/cities.

Totally agree @Badbadbunny - but that's a different argument.

Not really. Those with good public transport will generally be the "anti car" lobby. Those without will generally be the "pro car" lobby. Both for obvious reasons.

Its not about being anti or pro car, we need cars... they are essential but we can use them a bit less with a bit of effort and there is also no need for many drivers to be so aggressive toward non car road uses (and that works both ways too)

I recent saw a reel on FB where a car driver deliberately ran over a cyclist, almost crushing his leg... the comments were incredible ...with the vast majority (of the 1000+ comments) saying he deserved it.

Appreciate its hardly scientific but you get it on all forms of social media as i also do when out out on my bike... most rides will involve someone either deliberately or unknowingly doing something very stupid.... however vast majority of drivers do give room, even if they rarely if ever slow down.

By the same token, some cyclists behave terribly towards walkers.

At the end of the day, some people are arrogant and selfish, whether they're driving a car, riding a bike or even just jogging/walking. You can't categorise people just by their mode of transport.

I'd bet that your arrogant motorist is also an arrogant cyclist and an arrogant jogger/walker too. Many people use multiple forms of "transport"!

Except, the roads are dominated by cars, not cyclists

Badbunny, when you say people in cities don't understand the issues of transport outside cities, you have to remember how many people have moved to cities from rural areas. They are not clueless

I live in a city, but I commute rurally. I need to drive to do it. I never really get the impression from MN that many people think I shouldn't be using my car and nor do I think that the approximately 100 people nationwide who live down a mud track don't really amount to much of a traffic problem. So they can drive tanks for all I care. The problem is urban (large) car ownership and (short trip) use. I think most people understand that cars are essential to many people be it through disability or circumstances

I’m anti cars being used when there are very viable alternatives- statistically so many journeys are very very short and could be walked, benefiting health.

Onetime, exactly but these discussions always get taken up by people defending their individual car use, then not giving any solutions or looking at the bigger picture

*onetc

The OneT does actually mean One Time 😅

😅

I think a lot of that is for jobs, as most decent jobs are concentrated in a few large cities these days. Hence why children usually don't return to their home towns after Uni. There are many reasons for the movement from rural areas to major cities, but yes, public transport may be part of that. Although most people in rural areas learn to drive as soon as they can, so I'm not too sure that many people will choose to relocate to a city "just because" of public transport, I'm sure the main reasons will be jobs and relationships, with better public transport being a secondary factor.

Badbunny - I wasn't talking about the reasons for the move to cities, I was just pointing out that alot of folk in cities are from rural areas. There seems to be this misconception that city dwellers have no idea what goes on outside cities

I've long advocated for "localism" as it would solve a lot of problems. There should be shops, amenities, jobs, etc within a reasonable distance of where people live so that they don't need any form of transport, whether cars or buses, or whatever. It's only a few decades ago where we had exactly that.

Centralisation is the main problem, i.e. concentration of shops onto retail parks which caused closure of thousands of small shops. Concentration of decent jobs into London and other big cities - we used to have a network of regional offices, town centre offices, etc for the bigger firms like banks and insurance companies where local people could get decent jobs with prospects. Even concentration of medical services into huge centralised hospitals which led to the closure of smaller/local hospitals. Our village used to have a GP surgery which opened 6 days per week - it was taken over by the GP group in our nearest town and now only opens a couple of mornings per week - as a result, the pharmacy which was next door has now also closed as they can't survive on prescriptions issued just two mornings per week and most patients go to the town centre surgeries and pick up prescriptions from the chemist next door to those instead!

People can only walk to the shops if there are shops to walk to! Likewise people can only walk to walk if there are shops/businesses within walking distance. It's what we used to have, or at least, decent bus services to get you to town to shop or work. I'd campaign for "localism", i.e. incentives (tax or otherwise) for businesses/shops etc to relocate into rural and run down areas or to open branches in such areas. Reverse the decline of villages and small towns is the way to go in my opinion.

That's not what I mean at all. But, I'm not sure that city dwellers know exactly how bad things have become in a lot of areas outside their cities. We see it on MN a lot with people glibly saying "walk to work" or "get a bus" or whatever, which is probably feasible for them, and maybe if they have relocated, it may have been feasible when they lived outside the cities, but things are getting worse every year outside the cities.