Less vehicles is certainly a goal, and maybe some of them back on rails like they were before the auto industry drove them away from most urban areas. Also a US centric problem, but less sprawl and need for distance traveling, more common needs locally within foot and bike traffic would help too. It's all connected and contributing to the issues at hand. If we designed cities from the ground up, we could make them so much better, but cities don't grow that way over time, nor can they be changed that easily.

Heavy EVs with ridiculous battery packs are hard on tires. Smaller EVs with reasonable packs are not.

Reminds me of suburbs in Dallas wanting to withdraw from DART because it doesn’t benefit the rich enough. The same ones that employ cleaners and other household personnel that don’t own cars….

I would have responded with "your kid is clearly the first in the family to attend college"

Cash for Clunkers didn’t really have the negative effects that people purport it to have had. Only 677K vehicles were scrapped out of 246 million in the nation (less than 0.3%). I do agree it was more of a benefit to wealthier people due to the fact that you needed to buy a new car to use it, but what really hurt the poor was the recession happening at the time which drove up the cost of used vehicles since fewer people were buying new.

A caveat that is often forgotten - inflation. It's an economic nostalgia. We have prices set in our head that is deemed reasonable, and use that to compare against today's costs. My parents bought a used car in 1975 for $200 that needed repairs to run. Sounds like a bargain, but that's around $1200 or so now. A lot to pay for something that may or make not be fixable.

But that's not even the real problem. It's the ability to keep up with costs of expenses when your income isn't keeping pace.

It's also whats offered. Like you said, you can't buy base models anymore, they have to have all the frills. Imagine being able to buy a base truck to just haul stuff in. Maybe still possible for companies who buy large amounts wholesale, but not consumers. I'd like to have my grandfather's POS manual Datsun these days. It just ran.

gasoline smell good.

Yeah, I also really enjoy planning around the wait time.

On another trip, we stopped somewhere for a charge on a level 2, cuz I'm not a huge fan of fast charge prices if I can avoid them (plus not great for the battery, by my understanding) and I’m never really in a hurry to get places. So instead of rush rush to get back on the road, we walked 20 min to a nice lakeside bar and grill, sat outside on the deck, and took an hour or so for lunch. Then another 20 min back to the car for about 2 hours worth of charge (40 or so additional miles for $2, not a ton, but enough to get where we were going so we could drop it longer at another level 2 charger).

I actively enjoy how it slows your travel down to a more relaxing pace. Between needing to drive slower to increase range, and needing to wait for a charge, it really encourages experiencing the trip. It encourages getting out to stretch your legs. It encourages time to sit and enjoy food, and have a conversation. It encourages stopping in small towns because “hey this town has a free/cheap charger! Let’s see if theres any good food!”

I’m in a part of the midwest that doesn't have a whole lot of EV infrastructure, so I go out of my way for stuff more. I’d prefer we had more chargers, but I'm totally fine with getting a bit off the standard path, taking back roads to small towns, and avoiding highways entirely. Its good for exploration!

Yeah but I don’t want a truck

What if it's an F150 Lightning?