[eloisius]

There's a difference between personal vehicles and special purpose vehicles like ambulances and delivery trucks. I don't think anyone in this thread is saying all automobiles are bad, but car-centric development is definitely bad. You don't have to theorize from first principles about this. There are many places around the world that aren't as locked into the personal car as the US is, and they are still functioning societies where you can receive food, packages, medicine, workers maintain infrastructure, etc.

[lossyalgo]

In fact, the cities which are repeatedly rated as having the highest quality of life are almost all not car-centric.

[tpmoney]

But is that a function of the cars or a function of the urban density? One imagines that the suburban and rural areas that are rated highest quality of life are almost all car-centric

[lossyalgo]

Cities have existed for much longer than automobiles have and have somehow prospered since millenia. I don't think the recent invention of automobiles has anything to do with proper functioning of cities.

[tpmoney]

I agree, so it's a good thing I wasn't arguing anything of the sort. Just pushing back on the idea that just because "cities" with the highest quality of life ratings are non-car-centric that we can infer anything useful about whether cars in general and personal autos in particular are generally good or bad. It seems entirely possible that cars could be a net good up to a certain population density.

[TaupeRanger]

People travel to ALL of the jobs you just described in...wait for it...personal vehicles. And sure...there are places in the US that are not as car dependent, and places around the world that are just as car dependent as many US cities. The post I replied to said that other peoples' cars are "unequivocally" making their life worse, which, as I pointed out, is complete nonsense.