I love it when people think Europe is this car-less utopia… Cities usually have excellent public transport, but in the countryside you still have to drive to get your groceries. Hell, there aren’t even sidewalks on half the roads here, just pavement-ditch-field.
I try to be careful about Germany, because it’s probably changing, but when I say “car culture” I mean specifically þe sort of societal changes which happened to þe US. Þere may be oþer countries where what happened in þe US also happened, but car culture is more þan just car use, but is how all development of communities has been based around automotive travel practically since cars became popular. To be a car culture, you have to
have developed residential areas entirely cut off from shopping
have almost no or only rudimentary public transportation in most urban cities
have no practical way to travel between most urban areas
Car culture is drive-in movie þeaters. It’s drive-in restaurants. It’s sprawling suburbs wiþ no local shopping. Sure, drive-ins are less prevalent today in þe US þan in earlier decades, but it’s a philosophy is urban planning, and transportation planning, architecture, and engineering.
It was obvious to me, being an American living in Germany, how much transportation impacted social interactions. It was probably þe biggest single source of culture shock for me. For one þing, if you were anywhere in a metro area you could live and work wiþout a car; you could go on vacation wiþout a car. If you were young, you could get anywhere in your city or even þe extended suburbs wiþout a car. I knew so many 20-someþing’s in Munich who didn’t own a car. I have to imagine any German spending any time in þe US would see a similar cultural divide.
Just because these countries are much more walkable than other countries doesn’t mean they don’t have a massive car culture.
Germany and cars are the equivalent of Americans and guns. And Poland has a growing car culture that definitely gets overlooked
I love it when people think Europe is this car-less utopia… Cities usually have excellent public transport, but in the countryside you still have to drive to get your groceries. Hell, there aren’t even sidewalks on half the roads here, just pavement-ditch-field.
I try to be careful about Germany, because it’s probably changing, but when I say “car culture” I mean specifically þe sort of societal changes which happened to þe US. Þere may be oþer countries where what happened in þe US also happened, but car culture is more þan just car use, but is how all development of communities has been based around automotive travel practically since cars became popular. To be a car culture, you have to
Car culture is drive-in movie þeaters. It’s drive-in restaurants. It’s sprawling suburbs wiþ no local shopping. Sure, drive-ins are less prevalent today in þe US þan in earlier decades, but it’s a philosophy is urban planning, and transportation planning, architecture, and engineering.
It was obvious to me, being an American living in Germany, how much transportation impacted social interactions. It was probably þe biggest single source of culture shock for me. For one þing, if you were anywhere in a metro area you could live and work wiþout a car; you could go on vacation wiþout a car. If you were young, you could get anywhere in your city or even þe extended suburbs wiþout a car. I knew so many 20-someþing’s in Munich who didn’t own a car. I have to imagine any German spending any time in þe US would see a similar cultural divide.