[sagarm]

Society has made the choice so far to make owning a car as convenient and inexpensive as possible, while allocating almost no resources to other options. And no, usage fees including gas taxes don't cover the cost of roads -- let alone the land usage, externalities, and supporting infrastructure like drainage.

[landemva]

> Society has made

Big eu cities are expensive to park cars. Not inexpensive. Some cities such as Stockholm are banning commuter cars.

[michaelteter]

HN has a pretty strong majority of US readers, I think. And as I'm American, I recall that many other Americans have little idea what life is really like outside the country. (What goes on day to day, or how life works, in other countries is just not well understood.)

From the US-centric view, society (or rather, energy and automotive companies and their lobbying) has made the decision to put all the focus on cars, and to even put intentional negative spin against public transport.

It seems to be slowly changing in some states or a few cities within some states. And yes, it does seem to be very different depending on which way an area leans politically. The "red" (Republican) areas are vehemently against public transport and frame it as the government trying to take away people's rights to go where they want (in their own cars).

Unfortunately for the areas trying to put energy into public transport and non-car alternatives, there is a vast amount of corporate finance and influence that works against it at all levels of govenerment.