Owning a car in Singapore, one of the world’s most expensive countries, has always been something of a luxury. But costs have now soared to an all time high.
I’m not disagreeing with you. But the only people that get the right to travel in a car are the rich. Rather than it be based on a needs-based system or lottery system. The rich get the right, but normal people don’t. That’s the point he’s trying to make.
I think it’s a clever way to get rich people to pay high taxes. Singapore is just not a place suited for private cars for the able bodied. The same policy in other countries wouldn’t be fair, but I could probably see it work in Manhattan or in the canal district in Old Amsterdam.
The catch is you don’t need a car in Singapore. It’s less than half the size of London with an incredible public transit system.
The need isn’t really there and the costs of maintaining one is very high. You aren’t going to have many if any poor people who could afford a car to begin with.
You can travel in a car, Uber, Grab and taxis allow you that convenience if you really need to go by car. It’s not about rich and poor. Having lived in SG and in HK, the public transport systems are really good, but I never felt the need for a car, indeed in HK the cost of parking alone is way higher than to use public transport. I have friends that live in the smaller villages that cannot survive without a car, but all they use it for is to drive to a convenient public transport hub.
I’m a petrol head, I love cars and now I’m living somewhere that has almost no public transport, so I now have a car again and I enjoy the freedom and fun that I love about car ownership. But it doesn’t change my opinion about using public transport where it is the better option.
Again, I’m not disagreeing with you about the good of public transit. I’m simply stating that car ownership is determined by how much money you have. The rich are allowed cars. You are not. That in and of itself is an unjust system regardless of how good or abysmal the public transit it. They are two totally different things.
I’m hella anti car but I agree with you. Car ownership should not be gated behind a crazy one time fee preventing all but wealthy people from driving. Design your cities properly and make insurance expensive enough to cover the increased cost of infrastructure required to accommodate private vehicles. If someone wants to waste their money on a car when they can more easily take transit/active transportation then they should be able to.
I have no idea what you’re saying here …
It’s fairer to jack up insurance to not be affordable, than to make the car unaffordable to begin with?
Design your cities properly
They’re talking Singapore. It’s an island city with excellent transit, plus quite walkable. This is the poster child for “designing your cities properly”
US urban planning was centered around cars basically since the 50s, not without the help of lobbying and the funding of certain urban planning studies. It’s part of the notion of the “neighborhood” which also arose via similar means, where the ideal of the Yeoman Farmer/middle class, that’s been a fixture since the country was founded, is now contained in the single family detached home. You may not live off the land anymore or have any material connection to that lifestyle, but you CAN own a commodified form of it shaped by your consumer preferences! It’s ironic how the individualism behind all this produces such conformity.
The full-cab pavement princess pickup trucks that line the suburban streets and mid-upper class neighborhoods symbolizes this so well. It’s like bitch, I got a big fuck’n truck here, you see that truck? That’s America.
You don’t need a car in Singapore. Public transit is quite good and it isn’t that big of a city
I’m not disagreeing with you. But the only people that get the right to travel in a car are the rich. Rather than it be based on a needs-based system or lottery system. The rich get the right, but normal people don’t. That’s the point he’s trying to make.
I think it’s a clever way to get rich people to pay high taxes. Singapore is just not a place suited for private cars for the able bodied. The same policy in other countries wouldn’t be fair, but I could probably see it work in Manhattan or in the canal district in Old Amsterdam.
The catch is you don’t need a car in Singapore. It’s less than half the size of London with an incredible public transit system.
The need isn’t really there and the costs of maintaining one is very high. You aren’t going to have many if any poor people who could afford a car to begin with.
You can travel in a car, Uber, Grab and taxis allow you that convenience if you really need to go by car. It’s not about rich and poor. Having lived in SG and in HK, the public transport systems are really good, but I never felt the need for a car, indeed in HK the cost of parking alone is way higher than to use public transport. I have friends that live in the smaller villages that cannot survive without a car, but all they use it for is to drive to a convenient public transport hub.
I’m a petrol head, I love cars and now I’m living somewhere that has almost no public transport, so I now have a car again and I enjoy the freedom and fun that I love about car ownership. But it doesn’t change my opinion about using public transport where it is the better option.
Again, I’m not disagreeing with you about the good of public transit. I’m simply stating that car ownership is determined by how much money you have. The rich are allowed cars. You are not. That in and of itself is an unjust system regardless of how good or abysmal the public transit it. They are two totally different things.
I’m hella anti car but I agree with you. Car ownership should not be gated behind a crazy one time fee preventing all but wealthy people from driving. Design your cities properly and make insurance expensive enough to cover the increased cost of infrastructure required to accommodate private vehicles. If someone wants to waste their money on a car when they can more easily take transit/active transportation then they should be able to.
I have no idea what you’re saying here … It’s fairer to jack up insurance to not be affordable, than to make the car unaffordable to begin with?
They’re talking Singapore. It’s an island city with excellent transit, plus quite walkable. This is the poster child for “designing your cities properly”
There’s lots of things you don’t need. Like freedom, space to move, privacy, the ability to travel outside your city.
I am far from being the fuckcars type. With that said, you do know that you can have those things without a car, right?
It is the American car mentality.
Cars are so ingrained in their society, they can’t even fathom anything else.
I know plenty who do not even have a driver license in Belgium. They get around by bike and public transport just fine.
Hell I have a car and I get around most of the time without it.
US urban planning was centered around cars basically since the 50s, not without the help of lobbying and the funding of certain urban planning studies. It’s part of the notion of the “neighborhood” which also arose via similar means, where the ideal of the Yeoman Farmer/middle class, that’s been a fixture since the country was founded, is now contained in the single family detached home. You may not live off the land anymore or have any material connection to that lifestyle, but you CAN own a commodified form of it shaped by your consumer preferences! It’s ironic how the individualism behind all this produces such conformity.
The full-cab pavement princess pickup trucks that line the suburban streets and mid-upper class neighborhoods symbolizes this so well. It’s like bitch, I got a big fuck’n truck here, you see that truck? That’s America.
Well, considering my work area is like seven times larger than all of Belgium, no, i cannot fathom life without a car.
Rent a car then? It’s not brain rocketry
You do realize Singapore is basically a city country? There’s no country side or neighbouring town/city/village.
There is. You just drive over the bridge to Malaysia. Lots of neighbouring everything.
Why would you buy a car in Singapore just to travel to Malaysia? Might as well have a Malaysian car.
That would make sense if the goal was to JUST drive in Malaysia.