Making cars 2x as expensive would massively improve safety simply by reducing the number of cars. And it would make cities much nicer places to exist in general.

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kelnos an hour ago | parent | next [-]

The problem with these sorts of things is that they discriminate against lower-income folks. In cities with good public transit and affordable housing (such that people can live near their jobs) this is maybe not such a problem, but that unfortunately describes precious little of the US. I bet it could work in many places in the EU, though.

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9dev an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

A better solution would be to make taxes and parking cost relative to vehicle size/weight. Want a big SUV? Pay 4x the taxes and hefty parking fees. Drive a small, electric commuter vehicle? Half the tax, reduced parking.

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lbreakjai 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Why not just ban cars in the cities instead? The problem is those who need cars the most are those who can't afford to live in the city centers, so it often ends up being an extra tax in the less affluent.

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mrweasel an hour ago | parent | next [-]

For some reason we decided to put a great deal of jobs in the city centers. Commuting to the edge of a city and then taking public transport to office doesn't really work, unless massive amounts of money are pumped into trains, busses and trams.

There's this weird perception that Europe has excellent public transport, while in reality it only works, sort of, in a few larger cities. Everywhere else functioning in society really requires a car or assumes that you're living within biking distance of work and daycare.

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iso1631 an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

People that need cars don't tend to have large cars, unless there's some tax benefits (someone in the village has one of those 5 seater dumper trucks because they can write it off as a business expense but can't write off a Toyota Aygo or Citroen C1 which would far more sensible)

	▲	lbreakjai 28 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		That doesn't align with my experience. I grew up in Belgium, in a place where you'd be lucky to have a bus an hour. The closest place to get groceries, by foot, was half an hour away, most of it 5% uphill on the way back. If you need a car, then you need it for everything. You need to be able to fit the two kids you picked at school, the gear for the sport activity you'll drop them at, the mom you picked at the train station after work, and the weekly groceries you picked from the supermarket on your way back. From experience, you aren't doing all of that in a Hyundai i10. Now I live in the Randstad. Groceries get delivered, mom rides the bus for 8 minutes to come back home, and I pick the kid by bike. The car is optional and pure convenience, so I can get away with a small one.