From Uberization to Enhanced Public Mobility for All
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- Published on Thursday, 05 December 2019 01:46
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1949 ... December 5, 2019
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From Uberization to Enhanced Public Mobility for All
Sean Sweeney and John Treat
We have shown that the defense, improvement and expansion of public transport is essential if we are to help control and then reduce transport-related emissions. We have also shown how the current neoliberal policy framework must be rejected in order for public transport is to fulfill its true potential. This applies to both transport policy specifically (and the obvious shortcomings of the public-private partnership approach, alongside pressures to privatize part or all of public transport systems) and it applies at the level of macroeconomic management. The neoliberal framework has failed to impede the rise of emissions and will continue to do so until it is completely rescinded.
We have also shown how the rapid proliferation of small, individually owned EVs is by no means guaranteed to take place at the speed and scale necessary to make a major contribution toward decarbonization. The disproportionate attention given by policy makers reflects a car-centered approach to transport policy, and this approach is seldom influenced... by the lived reality of enormous numbers of people around the world, who face increasingly burdensome travel in order simply to get to work (often involving long, stressful, and energy-sapping commutes), or to carry out other daily tasks (shopping, accessing healthcare or education, etc.).
Here it is important to keep in mind that the vast majority of these workers are statistically more likely to be killed or injured by a car than they are likely to own one. And the lack of accessible public mobility has made car ownership a necessity for millions of others. The "Yellow Vest" protests in France that broke out in late 2018 -- reported to involve large numbers of people from outside urban areas, who have been pushed ever further from city centers -- was described in the New York Times as revealing "a crisis of mobility in all its forms." The real lives of billions of ordinary people are often rendered invisible by the "me-focused" narrative promoted by large car corporations who cater almost exclusively to the world’s more affluent people and "emerging markets." Meanwhile, the idea of healthy and vibrant communities connected by modern and comfortable public transport networks has no place in this profoundly anti-social discourse.
