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Life After Cars: Freeing Ourselves from the Tyranny of the Automobile

by Sarah Goodyear

Rethinking the car-centered city

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Hardcover New English

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AlbakiReads Editorial

Rethinking the car-centered city

Sarah Goodyear, Doug Gordon, and Aaron Naparstek examine how automobile dependence has reshaped communities and transportation. Drawing on historical records, interviews, and statistics, the book connects car infrastructure with neighborhood demolition, traffic, isolation, road deaths, and environmental costs. It also considers the forces that sustain the current system and links transportation reform to questions of equity and social justice. The closing emphasis is practical: the authors present ways to engage in change, from raising awareness to speaking at public forums. The result is a work of urban sociology that frames the automobile not only as a means of transport, but as part of a wider civic and environmental debate.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Readers interested in urban sociology and how transportation shapes communities.
  • Readers exploring car dependence, environmental impacts, and alternatives to automobile-centered planning.
  • Readers seeking discussion of civic engagement and transportation equity.

Themes

Automobile dependenceUrban infrastructure and community changeEnvironmental costs of transportationTransportation equity and civic action

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

From the hosts of The War on Cars podcast, a searing indictment of how cars ruin everything--and what we can do to fight back


When the very first cars rolled off production lines, they were a technological marvel, predicted to make life easier and better for all Americans; yet a hundred years later, that dream is running on empty.

Instead of unbounded freedom, the never-ending proliferation of automobiles has delivered a host of costs, among them the demolition of our neighborhoods, towns, and cities to make way for car infrastructure; an epidemic of violent death; countless hours lost in traffic; isolation from our fellow human beings; and the ongoing destruction of the natural world. Globally, SUVs alone now emit more carbon than the nations of Germany, South Korea, or Japan.

That's why we need Life After Cars. Through historical records, revealing interviews, and unflinching statistics, Sarah Goodyear and Doug Gordon, hosts of the podcast The War on Cars, and former host Aaron Naparstek unpack the scale of damage that cars cause, the forces that have created our current crisis and are invested in perpetuating it, and the way that the fight for better transportation is deeply linked to the fight for a more equitable and just society.

Cars as we know them today are unsustainable--but there is hope. Life After Cars will arm readers with the tools they need to implement real, transformative change, from simply raising awareness to taking a stand at public forums. It's past time to radically rethink--and shrink--society's collective relationship with the automobile. Together, let's create a better Life After Cars.
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