In response to my previous rant, Susanna thoughtfully commented on the additional time and effort required by a car-free lifestyle:

I was car-free for 3 months year before last, and took the train or bus everywhere. I discovered that, for me, there was a major issue of time. ...

I grew up in eastern Kentucky far from any buses, trains or hints of public transportation; people sometimes still rode a horse to the nearby grocery store. I remember with longing the slow lazy summer days; I hope to be back to some semblance of that again some day. But using public transportation consistently isn't similar to that kind of slowing down, and requires basically a restructuring of your life. Not many people who've grown up in other contexts (i.e. Nashville) are likely to embrace it.

Good point. I commuted across the city periodically using public transportation when I was in DC, and it was somewhat more inconvient then driving. This was mostly because the place I was going to wasn't very well served, and there were multiple transfers involved. To really make it work, I think you probably have to make a concious decision to live where you have very good transportation access, and you have to work somewhere well-served by public transportation. Even if I were to move to a city that had excellent transportation, I'm not sure I'd entirely give up my vehicle. But I would certainly make use of the added flexibility provided by the better transit.

Part of the problem (I think) is that even cities with excellent transit systems are afflicted by sprawl and poor urban design. If planners and architects design with cars in mind rather than pedestrians, then people will tend to use cars. It takes a concious effort to build in such a way that walking and public transit alternatives are actually MORE convienient. That's why I got so fed up a few years ago when I heard that folks were opposing a dense new-urbanist apartment/retail building next to a Metro station near where my parents live. People were upset by the "density" and "lack of space for parking lots" inherent in building in the urban location, and concerned that the buildings would reduce green space. The thinking seemed to be "Well, there's all sorts of land out in East Bumblefuck, why can't they build out there and leave my neighborhood alone?" People missed the whole point -- that putting dense residential and commercial development right next to a train station is a great idea. It allows people to easily use the train rather than a car, thereby reducing traffic and pollution. It cuts down on new development in the countryside, reducing sprawl and saving more true greenspace. And it helps create the sort of vibrant urban community where many people like to live.

Building a pedestrian-friendly city with good transportation requires a leap of faith. You have to build the infrastructure first, and do it in such a way that it will tend to encourage more better-planned and more pedestrian-friendly development. It's not going to happen overnight. but just as Krusty Burger joints and Exxons tend to cluster around Interstate exits, walkable communities will tend to cluster around rail stations.