cute! I love informative comics like this.

people always jump to assuming creating an infrastructure that requires less reliance on cars means a flat out ban on cars when really we just desperately need more alternatives to being stuck on the car-only model. of course, rural areas and disabilities and such will mean that cars are sometimes necessary, but there's so much that a fully functional public transit system can do!!

One addition to this is also winter upkeep, which is very relevant in Finland.

People like to talk about "winter cycling", because it's somehow so much different from "every other season cycling". Mainly it comes down to winter upkeep; snow plowing and such. Then some people complain how nobody rides in the winter and they shouldn't use too much budget for it.

It would be fun to see people talk about "winter driving". How much we actually spend making driving possible during the winter.

How does a theoretical case of not having insurance companies make a car non-driveable?

"Cars aren't a symbol of freedom. They are a symbol of dependence in places designed to be prisons without them."

Paraphrased from a book I read (sorry, it was 10+ years ago)

Ain't that true. As a car mechanic(in asia), i used to not think about it for a long time, but lately the cost of owning a car seems to bug me to no end. Often in busy day, someone will come in with a breakdown which might take a few hours to do because of the workload, and the reply i get from them is "can you do mine first? I'm in a hurry and i need the car, without it i can't get anywhere". Or someone came in with a badly maintained car, where they have to delay a lot of simple but crucial repair because they're short on money. Or ignore an oil leak while topping up oil constantly because they have no time to get it fixed, which sometimes cost even more in total.

I just paid nearly 1/4 of my monthly salary to fix my 20 years old car, and that's only for the part. Can't get a used car because i need the cash, can't get a new car because i don't wanna have more mortgage. It's crippling if you're poor. It's simply bullshit when people use the poor to justify car-centric development.

Can confirm.

My car has been "on loan" to my parents for a year. I'm lucky to live in an area with decent public trans, but my sense of freedom is definitely vastly diminished.

I grew up with great public transit, and having access to a bicycle, (NYC.) In my 20s I realized that attempting to own and maintain a car would be so expensive that I would not be able to save money for the future. I ride my bike everywhere. If I want to go somewhere more than 50 miles away, or where transit doesn't go, I rent a car. I rent a car maybe 2x a year tops. Depending on how long I'm renting the car I probably spend $400 a year on rentals + insurance. My last bike I had for 20 years. Cost me $1400 brand new, spread that cost out over 20 years, owning the bike cost me $70 a year. It was easy to repair myself, and the tools to repair it were inexpensive to purchase. Fuck cars indeed.

Owning or renting a home has the same requirements of dependency on multiple companies. Sure, in a city or large town or even some.small towns we could live without cars if we built the infrastructure.

But there will always be rural areas where cars make sense. Insurance would be a lot cheaper without all the city folk driving...

...i have slight beef with that.

1. We made cars more complicated than they need to be due to electronic systems and all that. I don't say that we should simply go back, that's dumb. But I cannot help but wonder if a line of simple, less advanced ICE cars promoted on their ease of maintenance wouldn't get popular with, for example, rural folks. After all, being able to fix the beast yourself would lover your costs a lot.
2. Walkable cities are great, I know cause I live in one. My city (or town?) has around 7 km length (at least the parts that matter). Distance an average person can go in ~70, maybe 80 minutes by foot. But if I wanted to hit the relatively nearby lake or beach, getting there by foot is another story. And yeah, bikes exists and make it easier but if I need to hit another city that is 60km from here...yeah.
3. Author also forgot that these companies won't fail, because these are not "one and only" of each in the world. Each contry, hell, each county has multiple of them. It's highly unrealistic for them to all fail at the same time.

true but America hates public transportation

This doesn't make any sense. The only way to move around without depending on other companies is by walking, and there's no way that can replace cars, trains, buses, bicycles, etc.

Not depending on anyone else is not a sensible goal. We live in a society.

Thank you for wording it so eloquently.

I learned quickly the car took away my freedom. I needed a car to get a job.

I was suddenly forced to have a job to pay an auto loan. By the time I paid the loan I needed a new car as the first broke down.

Then I needed my job to pay for the 2nd car. If I lived closer to the city with public transport I likely would have never gotten a car in the first place.

Also, people younger than the legal age for driving are unable to get around safely and independently if they live somewhere car-dependent. I know this from personal experience (although where I live car dependency is not the only problem of course)

How do I get to and then around Michigan’s Upper Peninsula? I don’t want to go be in cities like at all? What’s the plan for that?

With a car, you can fix it yourself if you are determined enough. However, if you're using public transport, the same arguments apply + now things are enirely out of your control. There's no way in hell the public transport company will let you tinker with their broken stuff. The insurance company can pull out of them at any time for any reason. The company can go bankrupt, etc.

i feel like independance and not having to rely on someone would work better as an argument for the car.