- Is the recent increase in hurricane activity caused by burning too much fossil fuel?
- Should the government allow the Keystone Pipeline to be built across North Dakota?
- Will drilling be allowed in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge?
- What mileage standards will the government enforce on new cars?
- Will internal combustion cars eventually be banned (or severely limited) in favor of electric cars?
And I am sure there are many more. The government, at both federal and state level, is hell-bent on passing legislation designed to minimize pollution created mainly by the engines in the cars and trucks we drive.
Meanwhile, everywhere you look, governments keep laying down more pavement. Pave, baby, pave! Your tax dollars at work.
The underlying justification for the unending effort to pave the entire continent goes something like this: If we lay down enough pavement, then traffic congestion will no longer be a problem.
The term for this is "biggering", as coined by Dr. Seuss in his classic tale of The Lorax. Oh, the road is too small? Well then, tear it down and bigger it!
I hate to be the messenger of bad news, but biggering all the roads, streets, and highways all across this once-beautiful country of ours will not end traffic congestion. Why? Because if you build it, they will come. The more roads the government paves, then the longer and further people will drive. (It's like adding more closets to your house so your existing closets won't be so crowded; but in the long run, it just encourages you to keep more stuff.)
The more cars and trucks you put on the road, and the longer and further people drive, the more carbon dioxide and other toxic pollutants get released into the air. Am I the only person who gets this simple concept?!?
When it comes right down to it, the cold hard facts are that the private automobile - and the cargo truck - are terrible modes of transporting people and freight. They are expensive, dangerous, dirty, and require vast quantities of pavement for driving and parking. A typical private auto consumes about 90 square feet, and that does not include the space you need to leave between it and the other vehicles. Most contain only a single person. Multiply that times the millions and millions of people commuting to work and driving their kids to soccer and such, and you get … an awful, awful lot of pavement. And an awful, awful amount of fossil fuel getting burnt.
So if trying to pave away congestion, what are the alternatives? Well first off, there's mass transit, which moves a lot more people using a lot less space and fuel. But of course it's easier to teach a pig to sing than to convince most people to give up the love of their life - their car! - to ride mass transit. However, the government is not helping us ease our addiction to cars when their transportation motto is: Pave, Baby, Pave!
Am I saying that the government should stop taxing us to pave roads, and instead tax us for mass transit? Um, no, that is not what I am saying at all. What I am saying is that the problem of how to transport people and cargo should be solved the same way that computers and smart phones were created: let the market figure it out.
The amazing thing about free enterprise is that, if people really want something and are willing to pay for it, then some enterprising entrepreneur will figure out a way to provide it - for a profit. Do people want food? Yes. Do people want computers and smart phones? Yes. Do people want cruise ships, skyscrapers, factories, shopping malls, amusement parks, and passenger jets? Yes. (And may I point out that those things don't come cheap, yet the market figures out a way to pay for them.)
And do people want and need transportation? Indeed they do. The same entrepreneurial drive and spirit that gave us smart phones and skyscrapers can figure out a way to move people and cargo, safely and inexpensively.
So how do we get from the manmade disaster of vehicular congestion and pollution to something better? Step one is: tell government to stop all the paving.
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