Car-dependency harms your health.
Multimodal transportation promotes active lifestyles.
Driving involves nothing but sitting
Driving, most simply, sitting in a seat while using another source of energy to move you. Unlike walking or biking, driving leads to sedentary lifestyles with less movement and exercise. Research shows that driving is correlated with low physical activity, obesity, and even poor sleep and mental health. This has been demonstrated many, many, many times. This has lead to Americans dying younger than almost every other developed country.
It is, of course, possible to maintain physical activity such as by paying for gym memberships, but this limits physical activity to wealthier individuals. Additionally, poorer individuals usually live farther away from their jobs, and longer commute times eat into exercise time. Even for those who choose to go to the gym, it takes proactive effort to schedule time and travel to one, making it less likely for people to work out.
Cars pollute your personal environment
Cars aren’t just bad for climate change, they directly pollute our neigborhoods. Cars cause excessive noise pollution which increases stress. This is disproportionately worse for lower-income households, and noise pollution will not be solved by electric vehicles.
Cars also create particulate pollution from tire dust, which is filled with toxic and carcinogenic materials that are several thousand times more dangerous than engine exhaust. Tire dust is responsible for 78% of ocean microplastics, and tire pollution is worse with electric vehicles since they are heavier and create more tire wear. All of this can even cause higher pollution inside a car, directly harming the passengers.
Driving is stressful and deadly
Driving is not just bad for our health, it’s bad for our wellbeing. It has been known for a long time that driving is extremely stressful. By contrast, bicyclists are the happiest commuters, in part because it keeps people healthy, exercising outdoors, and connected to nature. Likewise, taking transit improves mental and physical health. Walking is also better for mental health, and there’s even evidence that bicyclists are better people than drivers.
Commuting by a means other than driving is not just a mental health luxury, it’s a matter of life and death. Worldwide, cars are the leading cause of death for people under 30, and in some years, it is the single most common cause of death in the entire United States. Many, many, many, many organizations have called driving a “public health crisis”. More than 40,000 Americans die each year from cars, making cars akin to genocide.
Cars are even increasingly used as intentional weapons, accounting for half of all terrorism-related deaths in 2016, as they are far too easily accessible and allow a single violent individual to mow down dozens of pedestrians. Vehicle ramming is now a defined category of terrorist incident being monitored by the FBI and DHS.
Multimodal transit increases physical activity and mental wellbeing
Whereas cars cause nothing but stress and death, active transportation improves quality of life. People who walk, bike, or take transit have a reduced likelihood of breast cancer, better cardiovascular health, and reduced obesity. Moreover, active transportation is equally as effective as structured exercise, and saves money from future healthcare costs, creating a “green dividend”.
Further more, active transportation results in improved mental health, reduced childhood obesity, and a greater likelihood of reaching fitness guidelines. People who take transit use the time typically devoted to paying attention to the road as “me time,” improving their mental health. During the pandemic, when commuting was abrogated, public transit users, bicyclists, and pedestrians all reported missing their commutes more than drivers.
An interesting thought identified by Jason Slaughter is that active transportation may have a free-time dividend. If it takes you 40 minutes to bike to and from work each day and only 20 minutes by car, you might think that cycling takes longer and leaves you with less time. However, doctors recommend at least 30 minutes of physical activity a day. Some may do this in a gym, but bicycling counts as both exercise and transportation. If 30 minutes would have already been spent exercising, then of the 40-minute commute, only 10 minutes would be taken by bicycle transportation. By contrast, driving involves no physical activity whatsoever, so the 20 minute car ride would actually take 50 minutes when the extra half-hour of exercise is appended. As such, not only does active transportation keep you healthy, it may even be faster. Watch more of Jason’s video here: