No kidding, they are still building the Autobahn in Germany
#354
My Dear Friend,
How do we save democracy?
By raising public awareness of necessary changes.
What do I mean by that?
I'd like to describe it using the Germans' favourite thing: das Auto, the car.
Why is the car so important to Germans? And why might this be a problem today?
A look back.
Germany's economic and international rise after World War II is closely linked to the automobile.
Automobile manufacturing brought prosperity to the Germans (for decades, no other country manufactured more cars than Germany), and the automobile gave the Germans (back) some freedom, the individual freedom of movement.
But it is the Nazis that had laid the foundation for this.
Their authoritarian vision was that goods and people would no longer be transported by rail, but by road. To this end, they had automobile factories built and a 4,000 km long road network constructed exclusively for cars, the Autobahn.
Then the German regime started the most terrible war of all time – and lost it.
Everything lay in ruins, but the Germans retained their vision of the automotive future.
Factories and roads were rebuilt, and as the economy grew and the federal government began to subsidise driving (by making parking in cities free and by taxing less for company cars and giving tax relief for those who had a long commute), individual road mobility slowly and steadily grew into a mass phenomenon in Germany.
And that's how it's remained to this day. The number of cars is still growing in my country (and so is the weight of the cars). Despite climate change. Despite the extremely high resource consumption in car manufacturing. Despite changing mobility needs. Despite new possibilities for mobility. Individual people are still sitting in a ton of steel, squeezing through cities.
Yet mobility could already look completely different today.
With individual, AI-supported mobility for the last mile. With better bike and pedestrian paths. With a significantly expanded, resource-efficient public transport system with frequent intervals. Plus, an end to an urban planning (also initiated by the Nazis) that is separating living, working, and leisure, which has only allowed mobility needs to rise to today's heights.
But change is slow in coming.
Germany's newly formed federal government is conservative, consisting of the Christian Union (CDU/CSU) and the Social Democrats (SPD). Both have an established electorate and are therefore committed to the motto that most things should stay as they are.
As is often the case in democracy, new needs, demands and opportunities are reflected only slowly in political decisions. Things only change when the need for change has reached broad sections of the population.
Therefore, everyone who contributes to raising awareness, who explains why some things can’t stay as they were, don’t need to stay as they are, who creates an understanding of change, who thus contributes to overcoming the Achilles heel of democracy, its slowness, is strengthening democracy.
If this advocacy is successful, then, I am sure, no more new motorway corridors will be cut through major cities.
See you in Democracy,
Johannes