So suppose we don’t like cars and want to not need them. What are the transportation alternatives for rural areas? Are there viable options?

Edit:

Thank you all for interesting comments. I should certainly have been more specific-- obviously the term “rural” means different things to different people. Most of you assumed commuting; I should have specified that I meant more for hauling bulk groceries, animal feed, hay bales, etc. For that application I really see no alternative to cars, unfortunately. Maybe horse and buggy in a town or village scenrio.

For posterity and any country dwellers who try to ditch cars in the future, here are the suggestions:

Train infrastructure, and busses where trains aren’t possible

Park and rides, hopefully with associated bike infrastructure

No real alternative and/or not really a problem at this scale

Bikes, ebikes, dirtbikes

Horse and buggy

Ride share and carpooling

Don’t live in the country

Walkable towns and villages

Our greatgrandparents and the amish did it

A lot of you gave similar suggestions, so I won’t copy/paste answers, but just respond to a few comments individually.

  • @[email protected]
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    41 year ago

    Yes. Again, there are good and bad ways of implementing these things. I was also just thinking that having hire bikes at P&Rs would be a good idea, to give people more options, and that train stations bordering rural and urban areas should also be effectively P&Rs.

    • Treczoks
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      -11 year ago

      Keep in mind that there are more than enough people in this world for whom a bike is not a solution.

      • @[email protected]
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        41 year ago

        I did not say that bikes are the solution for everyone or everything, so I don’t know why you felt the need to say this to me.