The automobile cut down the nature of travel and the meaning of distance between urban areas, while at the same time urban areas expanded. Automobiles created a greater sense of autonomy and thereby individuality, so had an enormous part in structuring western and global civilisation. At present, there seems nothing to take their place unless more efficient railway systems at created. Overpopulation demands highly efficient means of travel.

To me, the states have to change. It is a question of values (even typically American values). But it will be difficult. Even with the help of a magic city planner, you do not re-shape Phoenix in a decade! The USA, as a political entity will probably survive. But differently. In the West, the bay area transit system seems adequate. In the East, the corridor Boston/ Washington is already well performing. In the middle, it’s for me an open puzzle. I happen to have visited Louisville.

I don't see this happening either, guys. This is nostalgia talking, but also unrealistic. Populations and urban areas have grown much too large, and public transportation is not nearly flexible enough to take up the slack. Not even in Europe.

There are restricted zones, in parts of cities, and they have been shown to kill businesses, if they become too large. For example, people go to restaurants, in the evening, which are outside those restricted zones.

But

The more likely trends are, one, electric cars, to displace completely internal combustion engine cars. I think Cadillac is coming out with one in 2022, and many more GM electrics by 2025. If I remember correctly, GM has claimed only electric cars by 2035. Several car companies have already indicated that they are no longer developing new internal combustion engines. (Of course, you never know if this will stick, but that's the mindset now.)

The other is the autonomous taxicab, in essence. Some people call this "car as a service." You use an app in your smartphone to summon the car, it takes you where you need to go, and leaves. It's a better form of public transportation, although unclear what this does for long road trips.

Combine this with increased telecommuting, assuming that trend does not vanish after COVID, and sure, the landscape changes. But I don't see private transportation going away. Too many people, too large cities.

And on telecommuting, I'm already hearing a barrage of motherhood and apple pie, touchy feely nonsense about the wonders of face to face meetings. So, this suggests, people trying really hard to go back to the old wasteful ways, not the other way around. Has anyone asked themselves why it always seems to be the talkative under-producers, who love their face to face meetings most? Reach those people first, to see whether there's any likelihood of car-free societies.

Dear colleagues and especially Thomas, I have not written in this space for a long time, but I have been reading you carefully and I think the problem is fundamentally epistemological. The concept of sustainability is not autological and "the only thing that science does -which is not little- is to substantiate the validity of what is done (Maturana 2021), Therefore, sustainability cannot explain itself, so we need a superior framework. That framework is that of Systemic Relational Viability (A living system (ecopoietic) is viable to the extent that it reproduces the relationships that support its relational organization). In this way, its relational-ability is established from the culture-nature conception, which implies relations of reciprocity and cooperation, which regulate sustainability (Principle that regulates the culture-nature relationship. A set of material energetic resources that support the organization). If the culture-nature relationship is dissociated, as capitalism does, and transforms both into objects, then it is possible to accumulate capital as exchange value, which implies the loss of sustainability of the relationship. The same happens with Eurocentric socialism, which locates the solution in humanism and breaks the culture-nature relationship. For these reasons, seeking the solution in dematerialism necessarily implies changing the relational structure before seeking solutions in energy management. The great mistake of socialism is to believe that the solution for humanity lies in the development of productive forces rather than in the relations of production. That is why here in Latin America we are building cybernetic systems based on the Quechua concept of living well, SUMAK KAWSAY, and organizing governance on the territorial basis of AYLLU. The basis of relational viability is the process of OIKOS POIESIS (eco-spontaneity) and the minimal production of non-required variety which supports low entropy production.

The future bodes badly for access to energy, in general. The sphere of access will diminish over time, leaving most to physical power alone!