Would you take a vacation without a car?
It is doable. At least that's what one Redditor set out to prove on not one but two entirely car-free trips in the United States.
As they described in a post on the r/f***cars subreddit, they visited a city over eight hours away with a friend and didn't set foot in a car once. They made it work using just public transportation and their own two feet, as they walked about a mile to and from train stations.
After such a successful go of it, they decided to take another carless trip, this time with their father. The pair got from their homes in Colorado all the way to Seattle for the MLB All-Star Game, again without paying a single road toll.
"[My dad] absolutely LOVED the community seating in the dining car," they wrote, explaining how he was socially isolated in retirement.
It might seem like more of a hassle to travel this way and not even call a cab to get to the train. But that attitude is why highways dominate the U.S., the original poster argued.
"My point is that the problem is partly cultural. Americans don't like walking, and because they don't do it very often they struggle with it," they wrote.
Plus, after living in Japan for a year, where people frequently use a hyperconnected system of trains and buses, they realized just how possible it is for society to embrace public transit.
We're missing out on this kind of infrastructure stateside — yet people often aren't willing to put in the effort to use the systems that we do have. Meanwhile, access to train lines, bus routes, and bike lanes is improving in many American cities.
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Cost 💵 As those who have tried the no-car life can attest, taking public transit is an easy way to make any kind of travel cheaper and calmer, as you can skip both the gas pump and traffic jams. It also gives you more chances for daily exercise — which is shown to increase our lifespans — and keep planet-warming car pollution out of the atmosphere.
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"I NEVER get tired of hearing the 'You WALKED' that someone gives me when I show up on foot," one commenter explained.
"I traveled across the US without a car," another wrote. "I regret nothing. I had no real problems."
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