[mitthrowaway2]

There's a lot that can be done outside of cities too. The main thing that makes it scary and inconvenient to take an e-bike eight miles to buy groceries is... sharing a road with cars! A bike path is much cheaper to build and maintain than a motorway, and especially cheap in rural areas where the rights-of-way can be purchased more cheaply.

It's also possible to have rural areas accessible by transit. If you ever visit Japan or Switzerland, you'll find a robust and convenient bus and train network that will take you all the way into very small towns.

The world outside cities is inaccessible without a car only because we've built it that way. It doesn't have to be built that way! It's not a law of nature. There are other ways to build it!

[wakawaka28]

>The main thing that makes it scary and inconvenient to take an e-bike eight miles to buy groceries is... sharing a road with cars!

If the cars weren't there, gangs of bandits would be. Bandits were a common threat to people living outside cities. If you didn't carry a gun or a sword out in the country, you were practically on your own against a possibly large number of criminals.

[mitthrowaway2]

I see bandits with Toyota trucks in Africa, but no bandits on bicycles in the Netherlands. What you're describing is entirely orthogonal to modes of travel.

[wakawaka28]

It is not orthogonal to modes of travel. A person in a car is much less vulnerable to attack than a person on foot, on a bicycle, etc. Also it's funny that you pick a low trust country and a high trust country to confound the issue. To be clear, the vulnerability is roughly the same no matter where you are located. The frequency of crime is a separate issue, and one that evolves according to opportunity. If more people are vulnerable to attack, that may be enough to inspire a crime wave even in a country we consider safe (compared to Africa).

[mitthrowaway2]

I'm not really confounding the issue. Banditry is entirely a function of social trust and how well the state maintains its monopoly on the use of violence. It's not a question of having armed escorts, bulletproof glass, a sidearm, a kevlar vest, and a faster transport than the bandits.

In a lower trust country, cars are the preferred target of bandit attack. Check out Russian dashcam videos to see how it's done.

And when push comes to shove, a good bandit worth their salt will disable cars in the wilderness by using spike strips.

[wakawaka28]

>Banditry is entirely a function of social trust and how well the state maintains its monopoly on the use of violence.

The fact you claim that opportunity does not matter shows that you don't understand the issue. No state on the planet is able to 100% guarantee your safety. Choosing to make yourself more vulnerable by traveling on foot is asking for trouble.

>In a lower trust country, cars are the preferred target of bandit attack. Check out Russian dashcam videos to see how it's done.

Cars are prevalent in Russia. The Russians live in a harsh environment and live more or less distributed, rather than packed like sardines. If you live in a city, motorcycles are the preferred vehicle for bandits. Two guys on a beat up motorcycle should make you take notice.

>And when push comes to shove, a good bandit worth their salt will disable cars in the wilderness by using spike strips.

If you live in such a place, you'll travel in a convoy and arm yourself to the teeth. This is not common anywhere in the West (thankfully). Bandits tend to not be well-equipped, especially in Western countries where that kind of advanced tier organized crime is not tolerated. If you live in a place where such crime is common, your home will also have to be built like a fortress and constantly monitored.

What I'm saying is that travelling by bicycle or on foot exposes you to even the least capable bandits. Have you never had to walk through a bad neighborhood? Wouldn't driving through it be more appealing and obviously safer? For some reason you've chosen to ignore this obvious reality, throwing out weird contingencies to muddle the issue.

[mitthrowaway2]

No, I feel much safer going through a bad neighbourhood on a bicycle than in a car. Cars are faster in a straight line but much less manoeuvrable; it's easy to get boxed in, or have someone approach you when you're stuck at a red light. When you stop your vehicle you're a sitting duck. The vehicle itself is also expensive, so your threat window grows; you need to protect the car itself, so you can be threatened with a mere key held in the hand. And cars are a sign of wealth so you're more likely to be targeted. On a bicycle you always have escape routes; you can swerve and turn more easily, go between lanes, or even ride on a sidewalk or into a narrow alley. If someone is chasing you on foot, you can outrun them; if they're chasing you in a car, you can outmaneuver them like you're Joseph Gordon-Levitt in Premium Rush. But for the most part, people in bad neighbourhoods will never hassle you on a bicycle because they see you as one of their own.