[akgerber]

One of the major subsidies for auto drivers is deeply hidden in land use policies requiring huge amounts of free parking at all new construction, rather than the amount the developer desires at the price that the market will bear.

Auto-oriented land-use regulations (single-family-only neighborhood zoning, minimum parking regulations that can only be cheaply satisfied by surface lots, minimum setbacks, minimum lot sizes, building-height limitations, etc) also cause buildings to be built so far apart, with seas of parking in between and a road network that's inhospitable to walking due to poor pedestrian connectivity and the danger of high-speed traffic, that it isn't possible for pedestrianism to offer meaningful competition to automobiles in much new construction in the US. And since most transit trips begin & end with a walking trip, transit (publicly- or privately-provided) likewise becomes uncompetitive. And this is essentially all due to government policy, often at the local level but also sometimes essentially federally mandated due to FHA mortgage requirements and the like.