What Drives Me to Make Driving Suck Less

Because driving can only suck less if not-driving sucks less.

The first response I often get when people read this newsletter’s title. Before getting into my articles about bike lanes, transit, and walkable neighborhoods, there’s a certain apprehension, as if to ask, “Whose side are you on?”

It's a fair question. But the contradiction between saying “driving should suck less” and explicitly advocating for alternatives to driving dissolves when you understand what I'm actually working toward.

The Paradox of Urban Transportation

Here's the central paradox that drives my work: cars are what makes driving suck. It is physically impossible to add enough capacity for cars such that everyone in Philly would drive—without even getting into the question of whether that’s what anyone would want.

So, we can either choose to move more folks more efficiently, or we can damn ourselves to lives of traffic, exhaust, and car repair bills.

Without this understanding, folks often advocate for car-oriented policies and projects because they don’t know an alternate world. Because of how the city prioritizes cars now, they depend on their car to get around.

As a result of this dependency, they see bike lanes as preventing them from dropping off groceries; they see more abundant housing as causing traffic; and they see suburbanites as good for business.

I understand this inclination—and without a broader vision of where bike lanes, housing density, and a city with less emphasis on parking would take us, this inclination feels painfully true.

But when we see this vision, when we see the end goal—creating a city where walking, biking, and transit are feasible and pleasant—and when we understand the alternative—crashes, pollution, and just a generally hostile street life—that is when we can get people on board.

That is, we won’t get to a future where Philly is equitable, walkable, and functional by continuing to prioritize cars, but instead by creating genuine alternatives that make sense for how people actually move through their lives.

This isn't about taking anything away from drivers. It's about creating systems where those who can walk, bike, or take transit will naturally choose to do so—leaving more road space for those who truly need to drive.

Think about it this way: If everyone who would bike to work—if it were safe and comfortable to do so— suddenly did bike instead of driving, what would happen to your morning commute? The roads would clear up. Parking would become easier to find.

In a word, driving would suck less.

The Emergent Nature of Change

With how many factors are at play, there’s no way to “project manage” the city to a more sustainable future. I can't create a Gantt chart where by Q3 2025, we've reduced car dependency by 15%. Policy change doesn't work that way. Movements don’t work that way.

Thankfully, once the policies are passed, the effects do take effect that way. That’s why the hard part is passing them.

Policy, opinion, and “what is politically feasible” are all emergent properties of thousands of small decisions, conversations, and gradual perspective changes. They happen at the intersection of individual choices and collective systems.

When I write about protected bike lanes on Washington Avenue or transit priority for SEPTA buses, I'm not presuming to single-handedly swing all eligible voters in Philly to take action. Instead, I see these posts as contributing to an ecosystem of ideas that, over time, may shift the collective understanding of what's possible.

It's like planting seeds in a garden where you can't control the weather. You do the work with hope, but without the illusion of control.

Slowly, Then All at Once

The idea of emergent properties and “seeing what shakes out” stands in contrast to the energy of the corporate world. There, we're evaluated based on what we, by our own hands, can bring into being. What are our direct impacts? Did we hit our KPIs? What can we show at the end of the year, to say that we “added value”?

But city transformation doesn't work that way. We're all contributing to a city of 1.6 million people—making small contributions that bubble up through layers of complexity is all we can do. Then, as all of these contributions pile up, a moment comes where the camel’s back breaks; the avalanche starts; the change begins.

Each of those pieces has an impact—each of those conversations, each of those times you showed up to a rally, each flyer you put up. You give people a new question to ask. Instead of "how do we fit more cars?" folks start asking "how do we move more people?" That’s when entire new solution spaces open up.

I could spend years fighting for a single bike lane on a single street. Or I could help more people understand that protected bike networks benefit everyone—including drivers—by creating a more efficient system overall. And both of those pieces working together—the high-level vision and the low-level street-level changes—is how we convince folks of what is possible.

And when folks see what’s possible, they stop opting for “the lesser of two evils”—because they see that both are not evil.

The Power of Better Stories

Facts and data matter, but they rarely change minds on their own. What changes minds are better stories about what's possible.

When I talk about reducing car dependency, I'm not telling a story about sacrifice. I'm telling a story about abundance—a city where you can let your kid walk to school without fear, where you can get to work without sitting in traffic, where you can grow old without isolation.

And importantly, a city where those who need to drive can do so more easily because we're not forcing everyone into cars.

This isn't about urban planning wonkery. It's about creating the conditions for more freedom, more connection, and more dignity in how we move through our shared spaces.

The Long Game

I'm under no illusion that sweeping change will happen quickly. The transition to more sustainable, equitable transportation systems will likely unfold over decades, not years.

That's why I focus on making the case that these changes benefit everyone—not just cyclists or transit users. When drivers understand that good bike infrastructure makes their driving experience better too, we move beyond the false binary of "cars versus bikes" toward a more nuanced understanding of urban mobility.

The goal isn't a car-free utopia. It's a city where driving is a choice, not a requirement—where our transportation system offers genuine options that work for different needs and circumstances.

And paradoxically, when we achieve that, driving will suck a whole lot less.

A Better Us

At its core, my work isn't about transportation policy—it's about who we want to be as a community.

Do we want to be a city where space is allocated primarily to storing private vehicles, where crossing the street requires courage, where our children and elderly residents are effectively stranded without someone to drive them?

Or do we want to be a city where our shared spaces are designed for human flourishing, where people of all ages and abilities can move with dignity, where our transportation choices align with our values around climate, health, and community?

I work to make driving suck less because I believe in the second vision. And the beautiful irony is that achieving it would make life better for drivers too—less congestion, less frustration, more space for those who truly need to drive.

The path there isn't through top-down mandates or aggressive restrictions (though some leadership wouldn’t be begrudged). It's through the patient work of exploring better possibilities, telling better stories, and trusting in the emergent nature of human systems to gradually shift toward something more sustainable.

I can't control the outcome. But I can put these ideas (and stickers) into the world and see what grows.