I'd encourage everyone to guesstimate how much distance could be taken out of their commute or drive to the city by removing parking lots, huge highways and tens-of-foodball-fields interchanges, large set-backs and front lawns to keep people away from unpleasant roads, and so on, then check whether they could bike that distance in what it takes to drive.
When I encountered the idea that cars being common causes them to lose all benefit for most people while also causing them to become necessary, I initially thought it overblown. Then I ran the numbers. Well. Crap.
[EDIT] and don't forget to factor in minutes or hours per day spent working to pay for car+maintenance+gas.
There’s the concept of “effective speed” that encapsulates that idea. Here’s (1) a sample calculation that someone did for himself and under his assumptions, the effective speed for him using a car is about 2km/h. That’s about half as fast as walking.
On top of the distance taken out of commutes, think about the space taken up in terms of real estate. In Munich, which is a fairly dense city, the estimated share of parking space of the city area is about 12.5%. If you include space for moving vehicles, that estimate approaches 50%. That’s a substantial driver of real estate prices and rents.
When I encountered the idea that cars being common causes them to lose all benefit for most people while also causing them to become necessary, I initially thought it overblown. Then I ran the numbers. Well. Crap.
[EDIT] and don't forget to factor in minutes or hours per day spent working to pay for car+maintenance+gas.