Comments on: The Freedom to Not Drive

By: Fran Taylor

Fran Taylor — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 02:38:33 +0000

Update on that odious Mercedes-Benz ad:

Dear Iris Biblowitz and Fran Taylor,

Thank you for your email concerning Woody Guthrie, and for your concern regarding his words and legacy. Also, thank you for taking the trouble to send the ad; we received it this morning, and sent it along to TRO (The Richmond Organization) as they are the publishers of “This Land Is Your Land.”

It is really nice to know that there are people like you who care, and we really appreciate it. Tomorrow is Woody’s 98th birthday, and thanks to folks like you, he’s still going strong.

All the best,
Lowry Hamner
Woody Guthrie Publications, Inc.
125-131 East Main Street
Mt. Kisco, NY 10549

By: Alon Levy

Alon Levy — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 20:05:20 +0000

Rob, it’s very disingenuous to say “there are questions.” More honest would be, “Randall O’Toole, who’s gotten gobs of money from oil- and auto-industry funded thinktanks, opposes the plan.”

By: Knut Bøe

Knut Bøe — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 10:46:15 +0000

Freedom should certainly be spoken for more often, in my view. I speak often of freedom in my work; (http://trafikklogistikk.com) “Trafficlogistics” a system of giving priority to other traffoc groups than commuters. Freedom from traffic pollution, noise and area waste, for example.
Knut

By: maaaty

maaaty — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 04:13:21 +0000

The song was copyrighted in 1956, the same year that Eisenhower’s Highway Act passed. 41,000 miles of Shell/McDonald’s mousetrap corridor was laid. (To Rob’s utter chagrin, I’m sure, the then-largest public works project in U.S. history predated the EPA and the CEQA.)

Never again could someone write:

As I was walking a ribbon of highway
I saw above me an endless skyway
I saw below me a golden valley
This land was made for you and me

By: Doug Carlson

Doug Carlson — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 03:47:56 +0000

Thanks for linking to Yes2Rail. A spike in my visitor count usually can be traced to Streetsblog. Even with the transmittal of the FEIS to the governor, the fight goes on here, and we don’t anticipate any movement from that office until someone else occupies it. Fortunately, that’s just five months away, and we have good reason to believe Honolulu rail will break ground early in 2011.

Speaking of energy use, as one of your commentators did, the FEIS says both energy use and air pollution will be lower with rail than without it. No place in the USA has a more pressing need to get off oil than Hawaii. Honolulu rail will help move the population in that direction.

By: zach

zach — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 02:46:03 +0000

“Freedom from having to drive” is too convoluted.

“Freedom from congestion” is more direct.

Joe American hates being trapped, hates being stuck, hates the lack of freedom of being caught in congestion. (On the other hand, he couldn’t give a rat’s ass about global warming or pollution or foreign wars.)

Freedom from congestion. America can get behind that.

By: Bolwerk

Bolwerk — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 01:21:52 +0000

@Fran: Sadly, I doubt they have standing to sue. Woody Guthrie liked to put his songs and recordings in the public domain.

By: ZA

ZA — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 22:57:33 +0000

I think the song’s chorus goes, “they paved paradise and put up a parking lot.”

With nearly a million people shuffling between Kapolei, Waipio, Kailua, and Honolulu every day, the interstate with private automobiles clearly isn’t keeping up.

A train is the perennial proposal, and has a lot of merit. On the other hand, a bus-rapid transit might be just as effective & cheaper, so long as it could get segregated space…a real premium on Oahu.

Equally worth recognizing the patches of bicycling that have sprung up in great numbers in flat & dense parts of Honolulu.

By: poncho

poncho — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 21:46:10 +0000

W.K. Lis, Livable Communities advocates could really play that up to the Millennial Generation since they almost all can relate to growing up trapped in car dependent suburbia. As one myself, I think its fair to say my generation does not view the car as freedom (thats a different story for old people who fetishize cars). But for Gen Y, a car is seen as a tool and little more.

By: free transit

free transit — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 20:36:23 +0000

Good post. We would like freedom from oil wars. Freedom from trillions in fossil-fuel subsidy. Freedom from autosprawl subsidy. Freedom for the young, old, poor, sick, disabled, and unemployed to travel easily. In Hasselt, one of the benefits of free transit was that people in the hospital received more visitors.