Oh no. Not just how much does it cost you. How much does it cost society? We like to delude ourselves into thinking driving pays for itself somehow through property taxes that presumably pay for the roads we live on, but those quickly disappear into other buckets. Then we assume our gas taxes and user fees pay for the highways through the highway trust fund. Except we’ve so overbuilt highway infrastructure, sprawled so much, and so dislocated, isolated, and fragmented people from that vague memory of community that we can’t afford to keep up on this ever faster hamster wheel.
Here’s a general infographic showing how we’ve been systematically bankrupting our public coffers in the notion that driving = freedom. Well, freedom isn’t free. And when you have no choice but to own and drive a car, then you aren’t free either.
Spending on highways more highways is irresponsible public policy at this point. You can actually calculate the cost of your commute here.
