> Older people in the UK already have free bus passes and various other substantial concessions regarding public transport.

Which is fine if you live somewhere where there is public transport.

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jodrellblank 10 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

The only solution to people driving is viable alternatives to driving.

Under the previous Conservative government, half of UK bus routes ( ~8,000 ) were cancelled[1]. HS2 high speed train route phase 2 the extensions from Birmingham to Manchester and Leeds - which would move freight as well as people, freeing up space on local train lines for better passenger transport - was cancelled[2]. Phase 1 of it was due to be opened in 2026-2033 timeframe but was bungled now has no planned opening time, and Reform are calling to scrap that, too. Local council budgets were reduced[3] under the austerity measures, including one consequence of 40% less transport spending. The West Coast mainline was sold from VirginRail to Italy's TrenItalia in 2019[4] (Deutsche Bahn, French SNCF and Dutch Nederlandse Spoorwegen own most of the other UK railways) although this government is bringing Rail them back into public ownership.

And Reform are promising to remove bike lanes, and scrap Low Traffic Neighbourhoods to let cars use residental roads as through-roads again[5][6].

The UK doesn't have it as bad as the USA - but that's not for lack of trying to make car the only way to move.

[1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/map-bus-route...

[2] https://www.railfuture.org.uk/article1904-HS2-Phase-2-cancel...

[3] https://ifs.org.uk/news/core-funding-english-councils-still-...

[4] https://www.forbes.com/sites/davekeating/2019/08/15/almost-a...

[5] https://road.cc/content/news/reform-council-conduct-review-s...

[6] https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/lifestyle/reform-councils-...

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tonyedgecombe 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You have to be pretty remote to have no public transport in the UK.

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gib444 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

And not very remote at all for it to be practically non existent and unreliable

Every passing year non-city/big town buses get cut and cut and cut because councils are bankrupt

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graemep an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

To have none at all, yes, it would have to be very remote.

To have very limited public transport, then lots of places outside big cities.

I just dropped by daughter off at a friend's house. 4 minutes by car, 40 minutes by bus. Busses here are infrequent and unreliable. You need to take a bus to get to a train if you are going a longer distance.

This is in a town with a population of about 20 thousand in Cheshire.

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chmod775 an hour ago | parent [-]

> I just dropped by daughter off at a friend's house. 4 minutes by car

In most urban areas that equates to about 20 minutes on foot. Why bother to even get into a car/bus for that?

Edit: I checked your weather. Definitely wouldn't want to wait at a bus stop.

	▲	tialaramex 26 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Car drivers are always like this, everywhere. Even when I was a little kid, last century, it's a village school, every pupil lives in the same mile or so radius and yet loads of them get picked up in a car. I now live in a big city but when I walk to the office it's just before school starts, so I see that yeah at first I'm passing kids happily walking with parents but just outside the school it's a jam of idiots who "just quickly" are here to drop the child from a car. The contrast in a few weeks when school is closed will be dramatic, that street is dead, but I bet every one of those parents thinks of it as a "busy road, they ought to do something about that" while not remembering that it's busy because of them.

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bell-cot 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

True, though maybe that's covered by OP's "The practical details of implementing this are important...".

Then there's the fine detail of affording to live somewhere with public transport. :(

	▲	9rx 4 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		The good news is that, generally, the places most affordable are the places that have public transportation. Affordability is gained through density, and density is also conducive to public transpiration.