Effects of the automobile on societies
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Over the course of the 20th century, the automobile rapidly developed from an expensive toy for the rich into the de facto standard for passenger transport[1]. The development of the automobile built upon the transport revolution started by railways, and like the railways, introduced sweeping changes in infrastructure, manufacturing and legislation. The wide reaching effects of automobiles on everyday life have been a subject of much controversy. Proponents on one end of the spectrum claim the car is a marvel of technology that has brought about unprecedented prosperity, while opponents on the other end claim it lead to a mode of urban and suburban planning that discourages walking and human interaction, uses large amounts of polluting fuel, and drains urban centers of their populations leading to wide-spread urban decay and the neglect of once proud and efficient cities.[2]
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[edit] Economic changes
The development of the automobile has caused changes in city planning, as well as changing the roles of horses and railroads.
[edit] Industry restructuring
Huge industries devoted only to the automobile were created. Others were expanded from once trivial insignificance to eminent importance. Before the internal-combustion engine was developed, gasoline was a waste product, often discarded. Once the automobile became commonplace, the production of gasoline blossomed into a matter of such importance that national governments took action to secure the steady flow of oil. The steel industry was already established, but the coming of the automobile created huge amounts of business for it. The chemical, rubber, and petroleum industries were remade to suit the needs of the automobile and industries sprang up, such as service stations, motels, and automobile insurance, that were completely reliant upon the automobile for their livelihood.
As automobiles began to travel at higher and higher speeds, the sign industry began building larger and larger signs and billboards to draw the attention of drivers. Some urban areas remain pedestrian friendly with many stores, cafes, and other attractions, yet still have a great deal of motor traffic passing through, and hence billboards atop many business buildings. A pedestrian in these areas is likely not even to notice the billboards, because a pedestrian's attention tends to be focused on the objects in the immediate vicinity.
[edit] Infrastructure
Aside from industries, one of the most visible effects the automobile has had on the world is the huge increase in the amount of surfaced roads. For example, between 1921 and 1941, the United States spent US$40 billion on roads, increasing the amount of surfaced road from 387,000 miles (619,000 kilometers) to over 1,000,000 miles (1.6 million kilometers) which doesn't even take into account road widening.[2]
With increased road-building came loss of habitat for wildlife on a massive scale. Loss of rural areas and agricultural land to pavement has also been extensive. The quality of roads was also improved. Roads were paved with asphalt, and roads with more than one lane on each side became commonplace.
In addition to federal, state, and local dollars for roadway construction, car use was also encouraged through new zoning laws that required that any new business construct a certain amount of parking based on the size and type of facility. The effect of this was to create a massive quantity of free parking spaces and to push businesses further back from the road, making it dangerous, if not nearly impossible, for anyone to visit these businesses using means other than a car. Many shopping centers and suburbs abandon sidewalks altogether. This had the effect of encouraging people to drive, even for short trips that might have been walkable, thus increasing and solidifying American auto-dependency.[3] As a result of this change, employment opportunities for people who were not wealthy enough to own a car and for people who could not drive, due to age or physical disabilities, became severely limited.
[edit] Technological changes
[edit] Production
The assembly line and other methods of mass production were developed when American businessmen began seeking ways to build more automobiles at a lower price. The idea of using many small identical parts that could be exchanged for each other was engendered by the president of the Cadillac Automobile Company, Henry M. Leland. Once other automobile makers realized the value of small identical parts that were interchangeable, they hired many small machine shops to make identical parts that were then put together at assembly plants. Because of this, replacement parts could easily be sent to car owners. This greatly prolonged the life of the automobile, making it even more attractive to consumers.
Ransom E. Olds took the first step towards assembly line production when he had the framework of each automobile pushed on a wooden platform supported by rolling casters. Henry Ford built on this when he used conveyor belts to pull along the bare frame of an automobile while workmen added parts to it that were brought to them by other conveyor belts. Ford's utilization of the conveyor belt in the factory was inspired by the Chicago Packing Association's disassembly line, where workers dressed beef pulled along by an overhead trolley.
[edit] Cultural changes
Prior to the appearance of the automobile, horses, walking, streetcars and bicycles were the major modes of transportation within cities. Horses require a large amount of care, and were therefore kept in public facilities that were usually far from residences. The manure they left on the streets also created a sanitation problem[citation needed]. The automobile had neither of those disadvantages.
The automobile made regular medium-distance travel more convenient and affordable, also in areas without railways. Because automobiles did not require rest, and were faster than horse-drawn conveyances, people were routinely able to travel farther than in earlier times. Historically, most people never travelled more than a few dozen kilometres from their birthplace in their entire lives[citation needed]; the advent of the automobile began the transformation of society in such a way that those who had never travelled that distance were only a tiny minority. Some experts suggest that many of these changes began during the Golden age of the bicycle, the preceding era from 1880—1915.[4]
[edit] Changes to urban society
Beginning in the 1940s, most urban environments in United States lost their streetcars, Cable cars, and other forms of light rail, to be replaced by diesel-burning motor coaches or buses. Many of these have never returned, though some urban communities eventually installed subways.
Another change brought about by the automobile is that modern urban pedestrians must be more alert than their ancestors. In the past, a pedestrian had to worry about relatively slow-moving streetcars, or other obstacles of travel. With the proliferation of the automobile, a pedestrian has to worry about being hit by automobiles at high speeds, and breathing noxious exhaust fumes. The Futurama exhibit at the 1939 New York World's Fair showed a City of the Future in which pedestrian and automobile traffic was fully grade-separated. However, for cost reasons, this vision has never come to pass outside of small-scale skyways in a few downtowns.
The loss of pedestrian-scale villages has also disconnected communities. People have less contact with their neighbors and rarely walk unless they place a high value on exercise.[5] Also, drivers lose time stuck in traffic jams, and today people rarely get the recommended amount of exercise to stay healthy. In fact, since the 1980s, obesity has reached epidemic proportions in the United States.
In areas with high crime rates[citation needed], people who do exercise usually prefer to do so in the safety of their home or in subscriber-only fitness clubs (which they drive to and from).
[edit] Advent of suburban society
Because of the automobile, the outward growth of cities accelerated, and the development of suburbs in automobile intensive cultures was intensified. Until the advent of the automobile, factory workers lived either close to the factory or in high density communities further away, connected to the factory by streetcar or rail. The automobile and the federal subsides for roads and suburban development that supported car culture allowed people to live in low density communities far from the city center and integrated city neighborhoods. The developing suburbs created few local jobs, due to single use zoning. Hence, residents commuted longer distances to work each day as the suburbs expanded.[2]
Shopping centers were built in or near suburbs to save residents trips to the city. The shopping centers provided goods and services further reducing the need for suburban residents to visit the city.
Finally, as the service economy gained importance, business parks appeared, allowing suburb dwellers to work in the suburbs. The automobile caused the decentralisation of cities, segregating land use and ethnicities, while increasing the ecological footprint of their residents.
[edit] Car culture
The car had a significant effect on the culture of the middle class. Automobiles were incorporated into all parts of life from music to books to movies. Between 1905 and 1908, more than 120 songs were written in which the automobile was the subject. The automotive themes of these songs reflected the general culture of the automotive industry: sexual adventure, liberation from social control, and masculine power. Books centered on motor boys who liberated themselves from the average, normal, middle class life, to travel and seek adventure in the exotic. Car ownership came to be associated with independence, freedom, and increased status.
[edit] Changes to individual lifestyle in America
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At the end of the 19th century, Americans put a great deal of emphasis on personal freedom and individual mobility[citation needed]. The automobile encompassed both of these ideals. Individuality was increased for the automobile owner[citation needed]. This individual zeal didn’t apply to everyone.
Conservative critics felt that the automobile decreased church attendance, increased sexual activity, and weakened family unity. A popular religious[citation needed] magazine of the day, the Independent, argued that it took away from even more important things. It argued, for example, that middle class men were prone to delay marriage in order to buy an automobile. It then argued that the automobile led to an augmented divorce rate, due to an increased stress rate over car payments. Others felt that couples delayed having children or even had fewer children, owing to the expense[citation needed].
[edit] Social status
The automobile signifies much more to many than simply a mode of transportation. Henri Lefebvre called the automobile "the epitome of possessions". In the early years, when the first automobiles were imported to America from France for the bourgeois and elite, the car served as a mark of distinction above all others. The automobile rapidly became a symbol of social status, and in some cases, a fashion item. The automobile, more than almost any other possession, allowed people to flaunt wealth. Not only was the ownership of an automobile demonstrative of a certain level of income and prestige (and still is, especially in poorer nations where the automobile isn't ubiquitous), it is also highly visible.
[edit] Recreation
The creation of good roads and dependable automobiles changed recreation and vacations. Before the automobile, resorts were predominantly found near the coast or a railroad. Once the automobile became abundant, resorts sprang up that were off the beaten path. Resorts appeared in scenic places, far away from the hectic life of the cities. In the United States, national parks became popular tourist attractions and developed designs with automobile travelers in mind.
[edit] Safety
Automobile accidents caused many deaths and injuries, especially before automobile safety laws were implemented. To this date, automobiles remain a major cause of accidental death and injury, not to mention emotional stress.
In comparison to pedestrians or users of mass transit, drivers of automobiles are not able to travel as quickly in inner-city urban cores. They are slightly less vulnerable to mugging, but are naturally vulnerable to crimes like carjacking, to torts like injuries sustained in car accidents, and to the inconvenience of vehicle breakdowns.
The automobile expanded the role, abilities and efficiency of the emergency services such as the response to emergency calls for firefighters or paramedics[citation needed].
[edit] Political changes
George Monbiot speculates that widespread car culture has shifted voter's preference to the right of the political spectrum.[6] He thinks that car culture has contributed to an increase in individualism and fewer social interactions between members of different socioeconomic classes. The growth of the suburbs is also considered an important factor. Suburbs dwellers are more likely to vote conservative than city dwellers.[citation needed]
Since the early days of the automobile, automobile manufactures successfully lobbied consecutive governments to build public roads.[2] Road building was sometimes also influenced by Keynesian-style political ideologies. In Europe, massive freeway building programs were initiated by a number of socialist governments after WW2, in an attempt to create jobs and make the automobile available to the working classes. From the 1970s onwards, promotion of the automobile increasingly became a trait of the conservative right. Margaret Thatcher talked of a "great car economy", and increased government spending on roads. Conservative parties often attempt to win votes by promising to defend motorists' rights.
[edit] Car-oriented convenience
Many aspects of daily life in the First World industrialized countries reflect an impulse to make life convenient for car users.
Without having to exit one's car, a resident of a typical large North American city may accomplish the following:
- Buy gasoline at a gas station (in the few areas where full service is still available)
- Have the car washed
- Obtain cash from an ATM
- Buy many different kinds of food and beverage
- Deposit mail for delivery by the postal service
- Drop off apparel for dry cleaning
- Pick up and pay for prescription drugs at a pharmacy
- Return library books, videotapes, or almost any other small object that is regularly lent to the public
[edit] Environmental changes
Automobiles are a major source of the carbon dioxide that is causing global climate change. The total number of cars and light vehicles (excluding heavy trucks) on the planet was about 600 million in 2006. This is increasing at the rate of about 50 million a year. The average car or light vehicle emits approximately 0.2 kilograms of carbon dioxide per kilometre - in terms of volume, that is about 1 cubic metre of carbon dioxide for every 10 kilometres travelled. For a large part of its development, no consideration was given to concerns such as air pollution, destruction caused by road-building, and the massively increased consumption of limited natural resources, most notably petroleum and land. Certain of these issues are now starting to be addressed in some parts of the world, particularly in parts of the European Union, where there is much scope for tackling these problems. For example almost all cities in Europe were developed during the era when pedestrians and mass transit were more common, before the rise of the automobile - and are ideal for bicycles and other human powered transport.
[edit] See also
- The carfree movement
- External costs
- Freeway and expressway revolts
- Mobility
- Pollution
- Social mobility
- Social status
- Systemics
- Traffic congestion
- Urban decay
- Urban sprawl
- New Pedestrianism
[edit] References
- ^ The ‘System’ of Automobility by John Urry. Theory, Culture & Society, Vol. 21, No. 4-5, 25-39 (2004)
- ^ a b c d Asphalt Nation: how the automobile took over America, and how we can take it back By Jane Holtz Kay Published 1998 ISBN 0520216202
- ^ Lots of Parking: Land Use in a Car Culture By John A. Jakle, Keith A. Sculle. 2004. ISBN 0813922666
- ^ Smith, Robert (1972). A Social History of the Bicycle, its Early Life and Times in America. American Heritage Press.
- ^ From Highway to Superhighway: The Sustainability, Symbolism and Situated Practices of Car Culture Graves-Brown. Social Analysis. Vol. 41, pp. 64-75. 1997.
- ^ [1]
