Matthew McIntosh’s Reviews > Life After Cars: Freeing Ourselves from the Tyranny of the Automobile > Status Update
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 184 of 300
Reading section of chapter 9 going over how the Belgian city of Ghent in 2017, under deputy mayor Filip Watteeuw, went about doing car reductions in the city.
Filip had checked out Copenhagen and Utrecht for inspiration but was intimidated about how much infrastructure they had to accomplish the car reduction whereas Ghent had a smaller budget and less space to give up.
Groningen served as a better model.
— Feb 02, 2026 05:45PM
Filip had checked out Copenhagen and Utrecht for inspiration but was intimidated about how much infrastructure they had to accomplish the car reduction whereas Ghent had a smaller budget and less space to give up.
Groningen served as a better model.
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Matthew’s Previous Updates
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 161 of 300
Mention of how 1/3 of people can’t drive a car. Talks about older people who shouldn’t be driving cars anymore continuing to do so because they didn’t want to give up the mobility.
— Feb 02, 2026 03:24PM
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 137 of 300
I finished reading chapter 6. Thought provoking subsection was Motor Mania (starts on page 123) that starts with describing a 1950 Sisney animated short about Goofy being depicted as Mr. Walker and Mr. Wheeler where he becomes the latter when he drives a car. Both the short and the chapter go over how we become assholes and our values shift when we get behind the wheel of a car.
— Jan 29, 2026 11:52AM
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 121 of 300
Mention of the loneliness crisis and how it was recognized by the surgeon general of the US under Biden (Vivek Murthy) and that there are near zero mentions of how cars + traffic contribute to that crisis.
— Jan 28, 2026 12:15PM
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 116 of 300
Page the book is talking about the 1969 San Francisco study where heavy, medium, and light automotive traffic destroys social bonds.
— Jan 27, 2026 04:33AM
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 65 of 300
“In 1975 the traffic fatality rate in the Netherlands was 20% higher than in the US. But just 3 years later, in 1978, cycling policy became a major part of local elections in Amsterdam, helping a new set of elected officials take power and beginning a push for bicycle-friendly streets that continued to this day. Now, the traffic fatality rate in the Netherlands is more than 60% lower than in the US.”
— Jan 21, 2026 10:24AM
Matthew McIntosh
is on page 45 of 300
“The American economist Lant Pritchett says that all changes to social norms generate four reactions in successive order: They’re first perceived as silly, then controversial, then progressive, before finally being seen as obvious.”
— Jan 20, 2026 12:41PM
