Mastodawn

Cory Doctorow Jun 26, 2024

EVs won't save the planet. Ultimately, the material bill for billions of individual vehicles and the unavoidable geometry of more cars-more traffic-more roads-greater distances-more cars dictate that the future of our cities and planet requires public transit - *lots* of it.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/26/unplanned-obsolescence/#better-micetraps

Pluralistic: Cleantech has an enshittification problem (26 Jun 2024) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

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Peter Brown Jun 26, 2024

@pluralistic two unintended consequences of the move towards electric vehicles is that they are at their best on short journeys, not travelling transcontinental.
And they are also at their best at speeds under 40 miles an hour, becoming very greedy over 60.

Both of these factors will help modal shift to mass transit across longer distances and should help to reduce average traffic speeds.

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ferricoxide Jun 26, 2024

@peterbrown @pluralistic

What percentage of people making transcontinental trips are driving rather than already using mass transit? Feels like you'd be looking at a very small win if even 100% of such travelers opted for other than personal cars? That fraction not already traveling by plane, train or even bus, also seem the least likely to trade in their ICE for EVs, even if you corrected the charging-network deficit. I mean, one of the huge reasons for slow EV uptake is acquisition cost and cost is often a significant factor in the "do I fly or do I drive" calculus.

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Peter Brown

@ferricoxide @pluralistic I understand that it is a big issue in the USA.