If I were a U.S. Congressman, I would propose the following for no other reason than to cause a paranoid frenzy on the right. Then I’d point and laugh:
Helsinki, the capital of Finland, has a a plan that might make car ownership a thing of the past.
Which is not to say it would eliminate the need for riding in cars. Rather, Helsinki’s plan is to provide its residents with a smartphone app that can knit together all the different transportation options in the city — subways, buses, taxis, ferries, car sharing services, bike sharing services, etc — into one complete trip from Point A to Point B. Users would input an origin and a destination, and the app would plot out their trip, along with which modes of transportation they’d use, according to their preferences, their available time, the weather, and other variables. Payments could be structured in different ways — by the kilometer, by the trip, or as a monthly fee, for instance — but in every instance the user would be making one single payment via the app rather than paying for each mode of transport individually.
Essentially, it would be a one-stop-shop marketplace for transportation — similar to what Obamacare is trying to achieve for health insurance with its exchanges.
As a former urban dweller, of course I love this idea. Even today, I am quite accustomed to driving my car to the train station and taking the train to a subway and then taking a taxi or ferry to my final destination. In the process, I must buy gas, pay tolls, and pay for several fares. Why not make it one-stop shopping on my smart phone?
But, naturally, nothing could be less manly or red-blooded American than giving up my car and taking ferries (rhymes with fairies).
I await the Finnish invasion, and the inevitable right-wing emotional collapse in response.
“ferries (rhymes with fairies)”
??????
Ferry — FEH-ree, like “merry”
Fairy — FAIR-ree, like “Mary”
Not for you? You folks talk weird, says the New Englander.
yeah for me too, those two words are pronounced exactly the same
Bike sharing and car sharing services are all the rage in Dublin, where car parking spaces are at a premium. The car sharing service estimate that each of their cars take some 15-20 cars off the road – previously owned by people who only v. occasionally used them, but they used up car parking all the same. Savings are estimated at €2K vs. 8K p.a. for users. Same goes for bikes – which had a tendency to get stolen.
Ireland imports all its cars, so the service reduces imports as well as reducing waste more generally.
I think Switzerland has the most complete system to date, especially their ferries. If Finland wants to take them over as leader, I say huzzah. Can’t we have an “arms race” in this context?
Atlanta shows the American way forward:
One car. One man. One hour. One way.
For no other reason? I like watching Republican heads explode too, but there’s also the fact that we desperately need to change our entire approach to transportation and energy. This really isn’t optional, much as we’d like to pretend otherwise.
Hooked on apps?
Not exactly sure what problem(s) this solves. Do the people of Helsinki not know how to get around the city? Is it a real burden to pay separate fares considering that this app doesn’t claim that a single payment, via a smart phone, for the various carriers one would use for a single trip wouldn’t be cheaper. Could be more expensive if the payment processors charge a fee.
Isn’t the problem for most of us a lack of public transportation options? And that’s why we end up with cars that sit idle most of the time.
It’s ideas like this that make ordinary people dismiss liberal ideas.
What do you mean? That this idea doesn’t actually make things less complicated?
The general public wants a better life. They want a decent house, decent food, decent schools, and a decent job with decent pay. They perceive liberals as lotus-eaters divorced from reality that are consumed with schemes to benefit someone other than themselves or with total power over their lives. Much of this is driven by right wing radio and fox news. Talking about taking away private cars feeds right into it. People over 40 remember freezing or sweating on corners waiting for stinking buses and/or cabs smelling of last night’s puke fest. They want a car, one that’s reliable and comfortable and affordable (pick any two).
They may reconsider that dismissal when it’s 130 degrees in Cleveland (located several miles south of Erie Creek) and NY and LA are under water (never mind Florida.) Of course by then it’ll be much, much, much too late.
I dount if we will have election then.
I would imagine this involves the government tracking your movements via your smartphone, which would be sure to set off a bunch of whining from privacy freaks.
Sorry there heads would not explode. They would all just say that out infrastructure is too tore up from lack of maintenance to carry the heavy loads. Then refuse to fund either fixing the roads or the needed transportation support changes.