this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2023
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Fuck Cars

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A place to discuss problems of car centric infrastructure or how it hurts us all. Let's explore the bad world of Cars!

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[–] [email protected] 129 points 10 months ago (8 children)

They don't address car dependancy

Some people got convinced that banning thermal personal vehicles was incompatible with the bigger picture goals. You can develop a 15min city and a public transport system while also banning thermal personal vehicles.

I don't know what's driving this misinformation campaign about electric vehicles "polluting more" or "polluting just as much" when it takes 5 minutes of googling to find 6 reputable sources disputing both these claims

Banning the sale of new thermal cars, motorcycles, vespas does help with climate change in the long run

Some people have taken it upon themselves to refuse some incremental improvements and it's only leading to doing nothing

[–] [email protected] 46 points 10 months ago (3 children)

I agree with you here. This meme says "address" climate change like "EVs aren't a perfect solution to climate change" as if that's some big gotcha. They're a meaningful, incremental improvement away from ICE vehicles.

Public transit and bikes are better, but electrifying everything is also a good thing.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago (1 children)

An internal combustion engine (ICE) car, or in other terms one that burns fuel to generate motion.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago

OP should just say that then, no one fucking says “thermal car”

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[–] [email protected] 85 points 10 months ago (23 children)

Don't let perfect be the enemy of good.

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[–] [email protected] 82 points 10 months ago (8 children)

They are the better alternative compared to combustion considering the carbon dioxide footprint.

Yet, of course, to really address climate change and the destruction of our planet we need to get away from cars.

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[–] [email protected] 58 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Let's think then of electric VEHICLES. you know buses, trucks included.

Being against electric cars, at this moment, is being for combustion cars.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago (3 children)

The cool thing about electric city busses: you wouldn't even need to have them on batteries. They could be attached to electric wires

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (3 children)

My city has been stuck trying to expand its tram system for decades at this point, but whenever I mention that we could introduc trolley buses instead people look at me like I'm crazy!

They just make so much sense for our use case. We're a hilly city, so the rubber tyres are more suitable than steel on steel, the routes they want to build on don't really have the space for separated infrastructure, so having buses that can run on the roads will be less disruptive, and by not having to install rails they're a lot cheaper too.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (2 children)

That's a stupid idea. You'd need extremely long cables that would keep getting tangled up around the city. They would have to be disconnected and the bus would have to connect to closest socket to continue on the route. They would also need to have huge spools of cable, and soon the city would be drowning in cables. You'd have to keep rebuilding all the buildings on top of cables. Again and again. Then at some point, the city would be so high there wouldn't be enough air for people to breathe. Do this everywhere, and you may even considerably slow down Earth's rotation.

/j

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (3 children)

This is more or less why I voted for Biden.

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[–] [email protected] 55 points 10 months ago (29 children)

They certainly improve noise and air pollution gigantically, Christ knows how fecked I am having to grow up around cars.

Obviously nothings perfect, but I'll take a world of EVs over a world of combustion vehicles.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 10 months ago (1 children)

yeah, OP's shit-take is moronic. EV's propulsion can be entirely carbon offset, not something you can do with a car that has an engine spewing co2.

NOW, if you want to talk about tires/plastic particles, that's a whole other story where EV's do not have an edge - yet.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Battery powered EVs also have a greater environmental impact to manufacture than equivalent ICE vehicles, but the greater efficiency in energy conversion and the lack of emissions offsets this in less than five years of use on average. Ideally, it will continue to improve as battery technology advances as well.

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[–] [email protected] 53 points 10 months ago (41 children)

While they don't address it directly, they do provide a route to address it. The issue is a lot of governments are pushing electric cars, and washing their hands of the rest.

There are 3 issues with electric cars.

  • They are cars - Obvious to most here, but better public transport can vastly improve the situation, regardless of how the car is powered.

  • Batteries - Electric car batteries are far from perfect. Their range is reduced and they are heavier. There is also the issue of lithium, and/or other chemicals used in the batteries.

  • Power source - An electric car is only as clean as its energy supply. Powering it from a coal power station is far worse than using renewables.

Counter to these however.

  • Cars will still be needed, to some extent. Electric are the least worst option we have NOW. We no longer have time to wait for a better option, or find a perfect solution.

  • Lithium can be recycled; we currently don't, due to the small amounts, but this will change as economics adjust . Also, we are not actually that short of it, it's just not be economically valuable enough to mine on a larger scale. Range can be adjusted as tech improves. We can also change how we operate. E.g. Combining out of town parking and charging with public transport options is an excellent way to get people using public transport on a large scale again, in an organic manner.

  • Power wise, it's easy to shift an electric car from fossil fuel to renewables. It's very difficult to shift an ICE car. This is also something we should be doing far more anyhow (but no-one seems to be interested in improving the grid!). On a side note, even accounting for various losses. The sheer efficiency factor of a power station means it's still better to burn oil to run an electric car, than to run the car directly on the oil.

Don't get me wrong, the fixation on electric cars is dangerous, but they are still required as part of the solution. We just need to actually work on that solution. While the right, in politics, has a tendency to "circle the wagons" which causes a significant number of problems. The left has a tendency towards "circular firing squads". We should all be careful not to help kill ideas and projects that pull in vaguely the right direction, even if it's not exactly what we want.

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[–] [email protected] 32 points 10 months ago (1 children)

No matter what we do or suggest, troglodytes are going to look at the step up or downstream from that and claim that nothing matters because nothing is "as good" so why bother.

Reject nihilism.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 10 months ago (10 children)

they definitely address it, they just are definitely not the ultimate solution.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago (4 children)

I have a sustainable vehicle powered by ramen and tofu. It's called a bicycle, and it's one of our best weapons against climate change.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Cars itself are actually only a small part of climate change. The major part of it is form construction, planes, and electricity. We can fix electricity with sustainable energy, fixing planes is a lot harder as of now. Fixing construction seems impossible for now.

We'll run out of time before we we hit zero. We are already too fast to break before the cliff. All we can hope for is a soft landing, and we need everything for that. Even nuclear energy (go 100% on nuclear!)

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (2 children)

EVs can also act as a battery for the home and a back up generator. A lot more useful than just a car. Now I know this sublulemmy is urbanist, but the sorts of people to buy a car don't live in a city.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

First step is REDUCE. Then RE-USE, then Recycle. Tesla cars do none of this. Muskrat is a capitalist who is exploiting the electric care concept.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (3 children)

There's no alternative to a working public transport. Period.

Ok bikes. 😁

[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago (30 children)

Bikes don't work well in places like where I live when you can easily get 1-2 feet of snow in the winter. Or very icy roads. They definitely should be used more, but they aren't a panacea.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Some nations that experience harsh winters have well maintained bicycle infrastructure year round. Access to effecient, maintained, and safe bicycle infrastructure is the biggest factor preventing or enabling cycling.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago (9 children)

Biking in sub-zero temperatures when it isn't even safe to be exposed outside for more than a few minutes (also happens here in the winter) is not a good idea either.

Again, I am all about bikes. I think bikes should be widely adopted. I would also never ride one in winter conditions here no matter how well the infrastructure is maintained. Have you ever seen a road plowed after there's been a huge snowfall? Keeping a bike lane clear is not especially reasonable an expectation for a snowplow.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (7 children)

https://youtu.be/Uhx-26GfCBU?si=xm6kjWjVBJnN-iz_

Most bike lanes get a differnet treatment creating a tightly packed snow surface to pedal on.

Safe bicycle infrastructure does not equal bicycle gutters. Bicycle gutters are unsafe on most roads even in the summer and were designed without winter maintaince as a consideration.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (11 children)

My family lives in a rural town of 1600, my wife works 800m from home and I commute 50km to the nearest city for work. Most days she walks to work for 7:30 or takes the ebike. I take our EV to arrive at 9am. My daughter takes the school bus , which arrives at my home at 8:17am.

There is a bus that comes to my town and goes to the city each day at 7AM and 8AM. Unfortunately, I cannot take the bus, or I would have to leave my daughter unattended. I don't think I need to explain why taking my bike 120km a day round trip by the bike path won't work.

By taking the EV, I make my life work and I save a good amount of CO2 in the process. My old hatchback would have burned 7.7l fuel to make the commute , or 7.7 * 19.6 lbs CO2 = 150lb CO2 per day. My EV gets 16kwh/100km generating between 3/4 lb and 5lb CO2 for the trip, based on local energy mix.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

yup. no one thing will.

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