I also wanted to comment on how relying less on cars, as a society, would help non-drivers such as senior citizens. Our population is aging rapidly. Thus, providing suitable transportation for senior citizens who can no longer drive is a significant problem which must be addressed. In fact, there is a growing organization called the Independent Transportation Network (ITN), http://www.itnamerica.org/ which addresses this problem, still focusing on the centrality of the automobile. In fact, ITN argues that because the automobile is so central to mobility in our society, we must ensure that senior citizens continue to have access to automobile transportation even if they will be doing so as a passenger. This organizations’ literature points out that senior citizens who cannot drive and either do not have public transportation options or do not use public transportation due to lack of mobility or inconvenience, become unnecessarily isolated and inactive. Thus, ITN implements a system in which senior citizens can schedule rides by making a reservation with their transportation service which uses a combination of paid and volunteer drivers.

Making a paradigm shift in which our society becomes less “car centric” would address environmental concerns as well as the needs of our growing senior citizen population and other segments of our population who either cannot or do not wish to drive.

Check out Walk Score. It’s a very cool new website that allows users to punch in any address in the US and it will calculate the “walkability” of that location. It uses Google Maps data so it doesn’t capture everything, but it is a good start for people and businesses when they are thinking about relocating.

Several websites have lists of most walkable communities. PBS put out a list of America’s Most Walkable Communities. RunthePlanet has their own Most Walkable Cities list. All of them have their shortcomings (for example, Raleigh NC is a walkable city?!!), but they are a good starting place.

As for communities that are doing very intentional planning, check out the book by Spenser Havlick and Will Toor that I mentioned in the post, especially for examples of higher ed communities. Other than that, somebody else is going to have to help out on that one.

Also, I should be clear that I never said we wouldn’t need roads. Roads are necessary for the transport of freight and the delivery of many services. However, we would need a lot less lanes and a lot less surface parking if our cities were planned in such a way that non-freight transportation could be accomplished by walking, biking or using mass transit. That takes land-use planning and government budgeting that doesn’t assume “everyone drives.”

It also involves cancelling our AAA memberships. AAA is one of the most avid lobbies for paving the planet.