Small Town/Rural Life Requires Cars

A while back I read an article by a guy who lives in New York City celebrating all that could be had on the block he lived on. There were restaurants and shopping and grocery stores and little mom-and-pop businesses. And he could walk to all of them. And, of course, the next block over, not very far away, were more delectations of city life. Anything he couldn't walk to there were, of course, the subway, buses, or taxis.

He owns a car, but he keeps it at his country house (the guy's a successful non-fiction writer) where it was needed.

And it made me think about the block I live on which I suspect is bigger than his block (it's one mile in circumference). And on my block there are...houses.

I live in a subdivision outside a small town. There are farms a few streets over and there the blocks tend to be one-mile by one-mile squares. People who live out there are miles from their nearest neighbor, sometimes.

The nearest store of any kind to my house is three miles away and it's a gas station/convenience store. The nearest grocery store is probably closer to six miles away. And those farmers, try twenty or so miles to the nearest store.

What about public transportation? There is a bus system, but it's very limited and doesn't serve rural

areas.

Anything exotic is probably more like 70 to 100 miles away in larger towns/cities. Such as good sushi.

I don't think some people who live in cities understand why some of their fellow Americans needs cars. And gasoline cars, not plug-ins. If you need to go grocery shopping, you don't want to wait 8 hours for your car battery to charge. If you need to go to the emergency room, you really don't want to wait.

And we need reasonably-priced gasoline while you're at it.

Now I like cars. But cars are also necessary tools in rural areas. And I think some policy makers from large cities don't understand that.