Bike jc presents

Life After Cars:
An Evening with the authors

When the very first cars rolled off production lines, they were hailed as technological marvels, promising convenience, progress, and freedom. But more than a century later, that dream is running on empty.

That’s why we need Life After Cars: Freeing Ourselves from the Tyranny of the Automobile. Through historical records, revealing interviews, and unflinching statistics, Sarah Goodyear and Doug Gordon, hosts of The War on Cars podcast, and former host Aaron Naparstek unpack the scale of damage that cars cause, the forces that have created our current crisis and are invested in perpetuating it, and the way that the fight for better transportation is deeply linked to the fight for a more equitable and just society.

 

Name an issue affecting society today and there’s a good bet it is caused or at least exacerbated by society’s overreliance on cars. Instead of delivering unbounded freedom, the rise of car culture has come with devastating costs, such as:

• the demolition of our neighborhoods, towns, and cities to make way for car infrastructure

• an epidemic of violent death on our roads

• countless hours lost in traffic

• isolation from our fellow human beings

• a worsening housing affordability crisis, exacerbated by land-use regulations that prioritize sprawling, car-dependent suburban development

• disproportionate impacts on traffic enforcement on Black and brown communities

• the ongoing destruction of the natural world

 

Crucially, the book challenges one of America’s most cherished myths: that cars equal freedom. In much of the country, driving isn’t a choice—it’s a requirement, the product of underfunded transit systems and decades of car-centric planning. This so-called “freedom” is often coerced, costly, and isolating.

 

Instead, the book offers a more meaningful and collective vision of freedom—freedom from dependence on fossil fuels, hours lost in traffic, ballooning maintenance costs, and the daily threat of injury or death. It imagines a world where walking, biking, and transit are safe, accessible, and reliable—for everyone.

This urgent and hopeful work arms readers with the tools they need to implement real, transformative change, from simply raising awareness to taking a stand at public forums. It’s past time to radically rethink—and shrink—society’s collective relationship with the automobile.

This is a call to action for anyone willing to challenge the status quo. Together, let’s create a better Life After Cars.