Europe is edging towards making post-car cities a reality
I’m personally not a huge fan of driving everywhere. But I wonder whether HN’s view on this isn’t out of touch with the average middle class American’s. The average American commute is 48 minutes round trip, significantly shorter than France (71 minutes), Italy (65 minutes), or Spain (61 minutes): <a href="https://www.oecd.org/els/family/LMF2_6_Time_spent_travelling_to_and_from_work.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.oecd.org/els/family/LMF2_6_Time_spent_travelling...</a><p>That’s mainly because Europe has higher public transit use, and public transit is slow. Parisians who work and commute by public transit spend an average of 116 minutes a day on public transit: <a href="https://www.thelocal.fr/20160418/parisians-spend-23-days-a-year-on-public-transport" rel="nofollow">https://www.thelocal.fr/20160418/parisians-spend-23-days-a-y...</a>.<p>Viewed from a different perspective, a country where most people can spend 48 minutes a day commuting, because it’s rich enough for everyone to afford a car,[1] might be considered better than one where many people have to endure two-hour public transit commutes. Maybe utopia isn’t Paris, with rich people living in beautiful walkable downtowns, but rather Houston, where middle class people can afford big houses with a pool and a short, direct commute.<p>[1] The median disposable income per US household is a staggering 50% higher than for a French household.