Our theme for the month of October is “This Day in History.”
On October 1st, 1908, the Ford Model T was first produced for sale to the public. Because of assembly line production, the vehicle was able to be mass produced and sold more cheaply than previous models. This, according to wikipedia at least, made car travel accessible to middle-class Americans. Thirty-two years later, on October 1st, 1940, the Pennsylvania Turnpike, America’s first superhighway, opened for public transit. Jump to today, and the vast majority of our nation’s transit infrastructure is built around these personal vehicles.
Cars have become ingrained in American pop consciousness as a symbol of transition to adulthood. So many 80s movies about high schoolers feature teens no longer under the supervision of their parents—thanks to their cars—as they enter adulthood. A scene from Andrew Hussie’s coming of age webcomic, Homestuck, takes this freedom more literally, when after the teenage protagonist finds his dad’s car, he uses his newly gained magical wind powers to fly the car around a planet-sized chess board. Milestone of adulthood achieved.
For a while I discredited this freedom as merely symbolic, a narrative device employed by the discerning creator to showcase the transitional state of characters. That changed last year, when I went on my first solo international road trip. It was only a day’s drive through Canada from Rochester, New York, to Grand Rapids, but with my passport on the seat next to me and the sun rising in my rearview mirror, I felt like I could drive literally anywhere in the world. And I loved that feeling. And I hated that I loved it.
Intellectually, I understand that cars use a lot of our space, warp our infrastructure around them, and make cities more unfriendly to people who don’t have access to a car. One piece by Swedish artist Karl Jilg helps put into perspective the amount of space we’ve surrendered to cars in our cities, showing roads as gaping chasms, crosswalks as rickety planks for crossing them. Emotionally, though, there is something calming about driving a car down a highway, even with no destination in mind.
I bought my own first car this year, itself a Ford, and in the three months since, I’ve found the metaphor for adulthood more apt. Along with the freedom of travel and increasing my inventory, cars need taking care of. Insurance must be paid, the gas tank must be filled, and leaky tires must be fixed. When I bought my car it was already under recall, and owning a car just emphasized how hard it is to get around when you have to send your car into the shop for maintenance for a day or two.
Next week, I’m taking another road trip, this one to Minnesota and the Upper Peninsula, to see friends I haven’t in a while and hopefully see some fall leaves. I am excited to see them, and to have time on unfamiliar roads, eating Twizzlers and listening to Carly Rae Jepson. At the same time, I’m annoyed there’s not an option to get there faster than driving and cheaper than flying. I hate having a car because it means I participate in a system of infrastructure hostile to people and the environment. I hate not having access to a car because it traps me without locomotion within that system.
