Making the case for a global ban on privately-owned personal transport cars and two-wheelers

[jamahir]

It isn't, and I tell this because I know how it works.

So you created a sizable, scaled-down prototype like the CycloTech one, tested it in open air and then it was disappointing so you say this ?

 

[VCheng]

Silly thread. Privately-owned vehicles are the best idea.

Not a single cyclorotorooter in sight!

 

[jamahir]

Silly thread. Privately-owned vehicles are the best idea.

Not a single cyclorotorooter in sight!

Wait a few years and you will have them in sight.

 

[ALShill]

Wait a few years and you will have them in sight.

Excellent post I've said this months ago if you check my posts. Personal Cars are ultimately a waste of money for the middle class. You are right. Govt should invest in public transit to the point where it is both luxurious and more convenient for the average person. The massive amount of consumer spending in cars is rather pointless and it would be better to simply tax them and use that money for public transit. I visited Tokyo some time ago its an excellent place for what you're talking about. Using a car is in fact for cumbersome than just biking and taking the bus or train. There are many bike rental spots and places where people can park their bike securely. Most roads are pretty narrow meaning that people prefer to bike and walk rather than use their cars. India could definitely have Tokyo type urban planning. Its in my opinion better than the tower in a park urban planning I've seen in China. To be fair Chinese cities have more open parks and space for people to walk around in than Tokyo but still I prefer Japanese urban planning.

Delusional and non realistic imaginations. Its a dumb idea that will do more harm then good.
Can u imagine the sheer size of public transport required for a country like india if u ban private owned vehicles? The manufacturing and operations of such a massive fleet wont affect environment? Also what about 24/7 service and what about far flung areas? Commies are mostly delusional and no wonder they failed miserably.

How's it commie? Typical kneejerk reaction. What percentage of Indian households even own a car? it makes much more sense to design and build transit everyone can use. Hong Kong is pretty wealthy buts its per capita vehicle ownership is pretty low compared to other high income countries. If you design a city around cars people with drive cars. If you design a city around public transit people will use public transit

 

[ALShill]

Govts not just have to buy public buses but will have to build paved roads to every small village and settlement. Additional expanses of running, maintaining them because they will have to work 24/7.

65-70% of South Asia population lives in villages. Unlike cities they don't have to commute to work or attend universities/colleges everyday. Their kids are already settled in cities for work or education. So these buses will travel empty most of the time.

Making this idea work in Saudia is a different thing considering $$

This is wrong people will start moving from rural to urban areas once industrializations starts growing in India. I used Toronto's bus system. Its excellent and it runs 24/7. Buses run empty at night buts not important. Transit should be available wherever and whenever you want.

 

[Wood]

Personal transport is a necessity, not a luxury! I foresee a future where private ownership of cars give way to autonomous taxis. But I do not see government funded public transport becoming the only option.

 

[ALShill]

I'd rather not sit with strangers in a car or bus these days. But when things are settled public transport should be encouraged without any radical ideas like "BAN". Or we can talk about decongesting cities. We don't need more metro rails and buses, we need more cities.
In India up North, there are hardly many cities that could absorb the population and the result is we have congested and polluted Delhi. There are no Major cities in Bihar, West Bengal and UP despite the population. All cities are around NCR if any. At least a Chandigarh model planned city is viable in UP.

Why shouldn't India ban cars in most major cities? The biggest thing that effects standard of living in cities are cars. They are loud, take up a huge amount of space and pollute everywhere hurting people's lungs. If it was not for cars cities would be peaceful and nice. This is ideal.

You should see the latest plans for Berlin. Heres a proposed plan on a car ban in Berlin compared to NYC.

Isn't it ironic that communist ideals always create a select cadre of elites exempt from what they impose on the proletariat?

Because making DHA phases accessible only to the elite in gated communities is just much better. No to mention only a small number of pakistanis own cars why not build transportation for everyone instead of the rich and privleged?

 

[jamahir]

Excellent post

Thank you.

I've said this months ago if you check my posts.

That's wonderful.

Govt should invest in public transit to the point where it is both luxurious and more convenient for the average person.

Absolutely. That is why I said that the coming cyclorotor aircraft taxis can be expanded to be 30-passenger buses which can have comfortable seating and the inter-city version can have a toilet and a small kitchen. I have mentioned that I have watched a report on a current inter-city bus service in Pakistan which has a kitchen and toilet. The intra-city bus service can be free as well.

If you design a city around cars people with drive cars. If you design a city around public transit people will use public transit

Fantastic point.

What percentage of Indian households even own a car?

Unfortunately it is estimated that there are about 300 million cars in India, which is somewhat less than the entire population of USA. And add hundreds of millions of two-wheelers as well to the cars.

I used Toronto's bus system. Its excellent and it runs 24/7. Buses run empty at night buts not important. Transit should be available wherever and whenever you want.

Absolutely ! The bus system should be run by the government which shouldn't care if the buses run empty at night or half-empty at non-peak hours. Governments should exist to provide service to the citizens and not to make profits or do war mongering.

Personal transport is a necessity

Why ?

I foresee a future where private ownership of cars give way to autonomous taxis. But I do not see government funded public transport becoming the only option.

Taxis can be run by private companies but buses should be run by the governance system as ALShill and I said, and the intra-city bus service should ideally be for free.

They are loud, take up a huge amount of space and pollute everywhere hurting people's lungs. If it was not for cars cities would be peaceful and nice. This is ideal.

Indeed. And add to that that personal transport cars ( and two-wheelers ) enable accidents, crime, pollution, chaos and general disharmony.

---

Greta Thunberg is playing an inside/outside game at COP26

David Knowles
·Senior Editor
Tue, November 2, 2021, 10:50 PM·5 min read

GLASGOW, Scotland — At this year's United Nations Climate Change Conference, few world leaders and celebrities are commanding more attention than 18-year-old Swedish activist Greta Thunberg.

Though not officially invited to attend the conference, Thunberg was mobbed by fans when she arrived by train in Glasgow.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1454535170107879435

"I think that many people might be scared that if they invite too many radical young people, then that might make them look bad," she told the BBC.

Perhaps the most recognizable face of all the world's climate activists, Thunberg took part in a demonstration Monday on the banks of the River Clyde, just outside the convention hall.
"Inside COP, they are just politicians and people in power pretending to take our future seriously, pretending to take the present seriously of the people who are being affected already today by the climate crisis," she told reporters and fans. "Change is not going to come from in there."

"No more blah, blah, blah, no more whatever the f*** they are doing inside there," she concluded.

Greta Thunberg alongside fellow climate activists during a demonstration at Festival Park, Glasgow, on Monday. (Andrew Milligan/PA Images via Getty Images)

Yet Thunberg herself, along with Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate, had already been inside the convention hall when she spoke those words. The two young climate activists, who are both affiliated with the youth movement Fridays for Future, were photographed speaking with Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1455133186359500806

On Tuesday, Thunberg was scheduled to return to the venue for a meeting with U.N. Secretary General António Guterres. Other speakers from the previous day's rally could be spotted inside the conference on Tuesday.

The fact is that Thunberg's opinions matter to many world leaders. Her platform and fearless criticism make her a force in the global climate movement, and most delegates at COP26 share her concerns that the world is not moving quickly enough to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

In 2019, Thunberg was typically blunt when she addressed Guterres, dozens of world leaders and company executives at the U.N.'s Climate Action Summit.

"You are failing us," she told her audience. "But the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you, and if you choose to fail us, I say, we will never forgive you."

It's the message that has been echoed by delegates from developing nations in Glasgow.

"This crisis isn't being treated like a crisis. That has to change here in Glasgow," Sonam Wangdi, secretary of the National Environment Commission for the Royal Government of Bhutan, who serves as chairman of the group Least Developed Countries, said in a statement.

Weeks before this year's conference, Thunberg said she would theoretically be open to meeting with world leaders such as President Biden.

"I guess that will depend on the situation," she said. "I don’t see why these people want to meet with me, but yeah."

Yet in September, she mocked Biden's Build Back Better plan, saying it amounted to too little, too late.

"As we move out of the pandemic, many are talking about using this as an opportunity for a green sustainable recovery, whatever that means," Thunberg said. “And world leaders are talking about 'building back better,' promising green investments and setting vague and distant climate targets in order to say that they are taking climate action."

Thunberg has also leveled criticism at Biden's climate envoy, John Kerry, over his statements on the need for new inventions to meet emissions targets.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1393974674867036164

But at COP26, Biden and Kerry have sought to mobilize the world to move faster to keep global temperatures from rising by more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, rallying nations on climate financing for the developing world, protecting forests and the oceans, and signing on to pledges to slash methane emissions. While Thunberg's criticisms of the pair have some merit, the U.S. has sought to restore its role as a world leader on climate change, and its efforts at COP26 stand in stark contrast to the relative lack of initiative being put forth by nations like China.

Yet while Thunberg may not have found herself on the official list of delegates at this year's conference, her role as an agitator has seen her work up the crowd outside the venue, while lobbying support from the dignitaries inside, whether they like it or not.

 

[Chhatrapati]

Why shouldn't India ban cars in most major cities? The biggest thing that effects standard of living in cities are cars. They are loud, take up a huge amount of space and pollute everywhere hurting people's lungs. If it was not for cars cities would be peaceful and nice. This is ideal.

Because you have to go to places that's miles away and you can't get to places without it. This is a dumb topic to begin with, you can't take vehicles out of the city to make the city beautiful. That's why I said we need more cities to decongest major cities. Treating the symptom will not work, neither going nuclear.

 

[jamahir]

Because you have to go to places that's miles away and you can't get to places without it.

*God help me with patience*

Am I talking about walking or cycling ? The OP itself mentioned bus and taxi, ideally in a few years of the cyclorotor flying types.

This is a dumb topic to begin with, you can't take vehicles out of the city to make the city beautiful.

Not only to make it beautiful but also drastically reduce crime, accidents, pollution, disharmony and chaos. Imagine an India without its almost 300 million cars ( discounting the taxis ) and the many more two-wheelers.

That's why I said we need more cities to decongest major cities. Treating the symptom will not work, neither going nuclear.

1. I am not treating the symptom but the problem at system-level. If an actually simplifying ban is going nuclear then so be it.

2. I agree that more cities are needed and this too I have been posting on the forum for some years. Please read post# 43.

 

[Chhatrapati]

God help me with patience*

Am I talking about walking or cycling ? The OP itself mentioned bus and taxi, ideally in a few years of the cyclorotor flying types.

My son is having an asthma attack. *Me getting my cycle ready to see a doc*

God help people with common sense and intelligence.*

Not only to make it beautiful but also drastically reduce crime, accidents, pollution, disharmony and chaos. Imagine an India without its almost 300 million cars ( discounting the taxis ) and the many more two-wheelers.

For arguments sake let's say we take out 300 million cars and replace with cycle and bus. Welcome to North Korea (in the 7th largest country) maybe in a few years you will start glorifying Kim Jong Uns model of governance.

I can't imagine a situation where cars are banned and I have to take my bicycle to go buy grocery. Maybe it would have been better if we all replace it with Bullock carts or horse carts. We all ride horses. Save environment.

1. I am not treating the symptom but the problem at system-level. If an actually simplifying ban is going nuclear then so be it.

2. I agree that more cities are needed and this too I have been posting on the forum for some years. Please read post# 43.

The only valid point is creating more cities. Especially moving the cities away from NCR to further East towards Orissa. Coastal cities are good.

 

[jamahir]

My son is having an asthma attack. *Me getting my cycle ready to see a doc*

God help people with common sense and intelligence.*

*God help me with some more patience*

What part of this did you not understand ?

Am I talking about walking or cycling ?

I clearly said bus and taxi.

And instead of you going to the doctor get someone from the neighborhood large clinic to come to you. That someone can be a doctor who can come on a single-person cyclorotor ( or a jeep in the current circumstance driven by his or her driver ).

I can't imagine a situation where cars are banned and I have to take my bicycle to go buy grocery.

Aren't you living in the present where the monthly groceries are delivered by van by Big Basket and other such companies with the groceries ordered online ?

For other items like eggs, bread, half-cooked chapati, milk, biscuits ( when the bulk order is finished ), Maggi, chicken etc I go by walk to nearby stores.

Unfortunately for vegetables the system is for multiple pushcart vendors to bring the vegetables through the neighborhood, adding to the chaos, instead of forming a cooperative and collectively selling in a shop in every neighborhood. Though there is a government vegetable shop and a private vegetable shop from where I purchase occasionally.

So what did I miss ?

And stop being the propagandist of that misguided and Capitalist person Henry Ford with his mass-produced personal transport cars instead of mass-producing taxis and buses and seemed to be no different in the oppression of workers than the useless Indian IT / ITES industry :

Ford was adamantly against labor unions.

To forestall union activity, Ford promoted Harry Bennett, a former Navy boxer, to head the Service Department. Bennett employed various intimidation tactics to quash union organizing. On March 7, 1932, during the Great Depression, unemployed Detroit auto workers staged the Ford Hunger March to the Ford River Rouge Complex to present 14 demands to Henry Ford. The Dearborn police department and Ford security guards opened fire on workers leading to over sixty injuries and five deaths. On May 26, 1937, Bennett's security men beat members of the United Automobile Workers (UAW), including Walter Reuther, with clubs. While Bennett's men were beating the UAW representatives, the supervising police chief on the scene was Carl Brooks, an alumnus of Bennett's Service Department, and [Brooks] "did not give orders to intervene". The following day photographs of the injured UAW members appeared in newspapers, later becoming known as The Battle of the Overpass.

The only valid point is creating more cities. Especially moving the cities away from NCR to further East towards Orissa. Coastal cities are good

1. Read post# 43. That long section was my reply to you about how a new harmonious township should be set up.

2. Point# 1 previously was very valid.

Welcome to North Korea (in the 7th largest country) maybe in a few years you will start glorifying Kim Jong Uns model of governance.

Though dynastic succession and one-party rule is not quite Communism and I would like DPRK to be really democratic by adopting the Jamahiriya direct democracy system from pre-2011 Libya which has also been adapted to Venezuela, I am certain that North Korean farmers do not commit suicide en masse for socio-economic reasons nor do North Koreans die of disease just because they don't have money, unlike in India.

 

[Chhatrapati]

*God help me with some more patience*

What part of this did you not understand ?

The part where you ban Cars.

I clearly said bus and taxi.

Let's say your wife is pregnant and her water just broke. You can wait for a taxi or ambulance or walk her to a bus stop and wait for a bus. If you're lucky she'll make it to a hospital or you become a temp gynac.

No emergencies, I want to go out and buy some grocery I take a bus and carry all the stuff, or get a taxi that would cost me extra. On the way, I want to meet a friend, so I drop at his house unload the groceries and wait for next taxi, load all of the items to the next taxi cursing the ahole who banned private vehicles day in day out. Yeah no.

Aren't you living in the present where the monthly groceries are delivered by van by Big Basket and other such companies with the groceries ordered online ?

For other items like eggs, bread, half-cooked chapati, milk, biscuits ( when the bulk order is finished ), Maggi, chicken etc I go by walk to nearby stores.

Unfortunately for vegetables the system is for multiple pushcart vendors to bring the vegetables through the neighborhood, adding to the chaos, instead of forming a cooperative and collectively selling in a shop in every neighborhood. Though there is a government vegetable shop and a private vegetable shop from where I purchase occasionally.

So what did I miss ?

So essentially you want me to just walk to work, go home let some delivery service do things for me. Not happening. I like my freedom to choose, and if pollusion is the issue a reasonable solution is to ban IC engines.

Banning cars is not difficult and there would be no reaction because only 9 percent households own cars in Pakistan if 91 percent can live without cars 9 percent can also live. I think only benefit of banning cars is reduction in current account deficit which is biggest problem of Pakistan

Loss will be millions of jobs and tax revenue for the government.

 

[jamahir]

Banning cars is not difficult and there would be no reaction because only 9 percent households own cars in Pakistan if 91 percent can live without cars 9 percent can also live. I think only benefit of banning cars is reduction in current account deficit which is biggest problem of Pakistan

There are about 300 million cars in India, majority of them for personal transport. And there must be about 500 million two-wheelers. These are among the main reasons why India is among the top three polluters in the world, the others being China and USA. Banning privately-owned personal transport cars and two-wheelers in India, China and USA would immediately reduce a huge pollution level in the world. Huge. Remember those lockdown days from last year when the skies cleared in many cities of the world and people could see long distances and wild animals came onto the roads ? Any Indian like @Chhatrapati making excuses upon excuses in being against such a ban is being selfish and non-contributory to the world like unfortunately almost all of India's middle class is. The world is seeing climate change mainly because of the middle class and aspiring middle class in India and China. In fact the Indian government shamelessly declared just a few days ago that the developed world had its development all these decades and polluted and thus India should now have its share of "development" so no one should question India on this. So according to the government "development" means 1400 cars and cell phones and high rises and idiotic education and employment systems ? So what if it leads to more global pollution ?

And like I said before, other than pollution the privately-owned personal transport cars and two-wheelers enable crime, unnecessary accidents, disharmony and general chaos, especially in India. Imagine how much of this will be removed just by a simplifying ban of these vehicles.

Chhatrapati, I spoke right in the OP about the planned Saudia city of NEOM which won't have personal cars and I also mentioned a new district in Shanghai called Net City which again won't have cars. Do you think with the ridiculous example you gave, will these two places have 100 percent pregnancy deaths and no groceries purchases because they won't have cars ? I will ask @ALShill if he knows of European cities or in Canada where pregnancies are aborted and grocery purchases not done because at least some people there don't use cars.

Loss will be millions of jobs and tax revenue for the government.

1. If there are losses in the multiple idiotic car and two-wheeler companies then you should have asked the governments that after banning these vehicles there should have been re-training of the workers for other industries. Say Vertical Farming and general Urban Farming. Is that so difficult ? You are giving the same argument as those unthinking people in India who, for making an excuse, ask if the harmful firecrackers industry in India is shutdown what will become of the workers in those industries. So you want these kinds of harmful industries to remain for the next 100 years, giving excuse upon excuse ?

2. About loss of tax revenue for the government, you should ask the governments in India over the decades that with all those unnecessary taxes they collected what facilities have they actually provided to the public ? A citizen has to pay to get housing, to get basic food, to get water, electricity, healthcare, education etc etc. There is even something stupid called Road Tax despite India having the most number of road accidents in the world ! About 450,000 annually ! Isn't this just ridiculous ?

The money which is being spent on imported cars and oil would be spent on something Pakistan made which would create jobs car mechanics koi aur job karlain ga

Exactly !

 

[RangeMaster]

This is wrong people will start moving from rural to urban areas once industrializations starts growing in India.

I used Toronto's bus system. Its excellent and it runs 24/7. Buses run empty at night buts not important. Transit should be available wherever and whenever you want.

Yes.... Exactly that... it will be feasible at that time i.e developed economy/heavily industrialized country/high per capita income.

It's feasible in Toronto/NA/EU doesn't mean it will be feasible in India/South Asia. There is hell of a difference between population, govt expenditure per capita and priorities between two regions.

For now......
1-Electric vehicles
2-Less coal
3-More hydral/solar/nuclear
4-More trees/less concrete