For once, LA should be proud to be #4.
Los Angeles drivers were shocked to learn this week that they are, according to Autovantage, not the rudest people in the United States. Turns out, that honor belongs to the drivers in Miami. LA nabbed the fourth spot in the telephone survey, behind second-placed Phoenix, and the bronze medal winner of New York.
Sadly, fewer Californians read the even more shocking story about how we drive yesterday. A piece in the British daily The Observer by Paul Harris, declared that the car culture in the United States was, get this, intentionally developed by automobile companies!
Harris begins by retelling his experience renting a car in the States. When met the teller behind the counter, he was told that he could upgrade to a SUV for the same price as the compact car that he'd reserved. The teller was literally offended when Harris said "No, thank you," preferring the easier to park and cheaper to fuel compact car.
Harris then observes how central the automobile is to American life.
Whether the nation's rudest or not, drivers rule Los Angeles and most of the rest of California. As all of us struggle with higher gas prices, it's worth remembering what Paul Harris eloquently wrote this week, that the automobile industry very methodically built car culture into what we have today. And there is a better way. Well-designed, efficient, and convenient mass transit used to be the way of LA. And people were even more polite back then. Let's work to make LA and all of California #1 in polite, powerful mass transit.
Los Angeles drivers were shocked to learn this week that they are, according to Autovantage, not the rudest people in the United States. Turns out, that honor belongs to the drivers in Miami. LA nabbed the fourth spot in the telephone survey, behind second-placed Phoenix, and the bronze medal winner of New York.
Sadly, fewer Californians read the even more shocking story about how we drive yesterday. A piece in the British daily The Observer by Paul Harris, declared that the car culture in the United States was, get this, intentionally developed by automobile companies!
Harris begins by retelling his experience renting a car in the States. When met the teller behind the counter, he was told that he could upgrade to a SUV for the same price as the compact car that he'd reserved. The teller was literally offended when Harris said "No, thank you," preferring the easier to park and cheaper to fuel compact car.
Harris then observes how central the automobile is to American life.
"...drive - and it will have to be a drive - through most major US cities today (and particularly LA) and you see a different world. Downtowns lie abandoned to office blocks, gridlock rules on city freeways that have destroyed old urban neighbourhoods and suburbia sprawls out across miles upon mile of territory that only a generation or two ago was rural farmland."
Whether the nation's rudest or not, drivers rule Los Angeles and most of the rest of California. As all of us struggle with higher gas prices, it's worth remembering what Paul Harris eloquently wrote this week, that the automobile industry very methodically built car culture into what we have today. And there is a better way. Well-designed, efficient, and convenient mass transit used to be the way of LA. And people were even more polite back then. Let's work to make LA and all of California #1 in polite, powerful mass transit.
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