Anons argue in comments
this post was submitted on 23 Feb 2025
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Cars are the ultimate symbol of freedom because you just get in and go wherever to do whatever.
Pick nanna up? sure. Go buy her groceries? Sure. In the pouring rain? Ok. Pick up her dog from the vet? Yep. Drop by the garden store and grab 50kg of fertilizer? You bet.
You can do all of those things with out any planning or notice. You just get in and go wherever the day takes you.
I'm a bit bonkers about bikes. I have a cargo e-bike. It absolutely could do all of these things in separate trips. Doing all of them together would be a challenge but I am 100% here for that so long as nanna is. The main difference is planning. You need different gear, like a bike trailer for example. You're also probably going to pick the right time of day, like early before it gets too hot or too windy, provided that it's not raining.
That freedom comes at quite a cost. Both to the driver and society. Riding a bike puts the "free" in freedom
Taking a vacation road trip from Florida to the Grand Canyon with three kids with only bikes also comes at quite the cost. Bikes are great, but in many practical scenarios they are slow. Not all of us live in Manhattan, or a dense city, or even a well connected and safe to traverse suburb.
Bikes cost time.
It is much easier to take a bike with you on a train than it is a car.
Sure there are situations where bikes aren't suitable.
Bikes cost time. You have to think of the time it has cost you to earn the money to buy, run, and maintain a car.
I'm doing that anyway. I have a fixed work schedule and can't be like "Eh, I have enough money, I'm just going to work 35 hours this week." It would be amazing if I could, but I don't know many people who have that option. So since I pretty much get the choice of working 40 hours a week or not working, I'd like to maximize my other time.
If you were to say, ride a bike from Washington D.C. to Portland Oregon, they money saved on gas, maintenance, insurance, and lease payments, would amount to three times the hours of work to pay, assuming a median U.S income.
This is a ridiculous example, but, frankly, saying our main mode of transit should be cars because we might want to take a long road trip once a year is absurd. It’s an outlier use case that could be addressed with other systems more effectively.
In such case most freedom has form of freight train.
Or passenger train. One that can go long distances, isn't limited by your physical ability, and can remain climate controlled so my ice cream doesn't melt on a 20 minute bike ride in the summer. Also time, if I'm at a party and we need more drinks or whatever, being gone for an hour to bike there and back isn't the best.