Rob Moodie wrote "I want to be gently eased out of my car and onto public transport or onto my bike or onto my feet. And I am delighted for my taxes to be used to encourage me to get off my bum. It might mean I don’t have to get another belt for my trousers."

Good for you Rob.

However, do not assume all of us out here agree with you.

I do not want this or any other government "easing me out of my car and onto public transport"

For the simple reason, despite being heavily subsidised by car-driver taxes, public transport remains, non-user friendly, incooperative in running reliable services and a complete waste of effort.

When public trasnport can deliver me, promptly and efficiently (ie when I want to be delivered in a time similar to me driving between points) to destinations of my choosing as economically and reliably as my car, then I will start to consider it. Until then, I will keep on driving and resist all efforts by any Nanny-State government to attempt to regulate my choices in personal transportation.

Col

I totally agree with you. For once, now where is my medication?

This thread reminded of an occasion when I was stuck on a bus in a traffic jam on Bexley Road (Sydney). This jam, which wasted several hours of my time, was caused by a demonstration against the M4 East Motorway. The majority of the demonstrators had arrived by, you guessed it, DRIVING THEIR CARS. This irony only dawned on me after my fury had subsided.

My family use car, public transport and walking to get around. Each has its place in Sydney, but with traffic becoming a snarled chaotic mess it seems that we haven't got the mix right.

But enough of the doom and gloom. For a good laugh check out Miranda Devine's latest column http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/traffic-hazard-ahead-vegan-cyclists/2006/06/14/1149964604277.html Apparently militant cyclists and pedestrians are to blame for Sydney's traffic woes and "newly entitled pedestrians and cyclists, and their emboldened lobbyists, behave increasingly arrogantly. Pedestrians wander across roads with iPods and mobile phones stuck to their ears, oblivious to the physics of car braking." Remind me not to step in front of Miranda's car, looks like pedestrians are fair game.

The traffic problem WILL be solved and quite soon as the price of oil continues to climb.
There might be tempory downturns in oil price but the trend is always up as is the trend of more population growth. The two combined is going to kill private car ownership eventually.
The trouble at the moment is, each state Government ( & federal as well)
Is blinkered by it's need to be re-elected and to pander to the corperations that pay for their campaigns.

PK, your question "to what extent is government lack of action and failure to tackle the transport mess ... a reflection of our own apathy and defeatism?" is relevant at a number of levels.

You can substitute almost anything for the word "transport". Health. Education. National security. We have gradually shifted the responsibility for our personal situation onto successive governments. And given this power over us, it is inevitably used - as with anyone who attains power - against those who relinquish it, and in favour of the politicians and public servants themselves.

It stems from the deep-seated longing of so many humans to be told what to do, rather than step up themselves to the many decisions we all take every day. This apathy also means we give up any right to complain when things go wrong.

I agree with Col, it is not the government's job to coerce us into one pattern of behaviour or another. The result would, inevitably, be similar to the failure of the centralized planning typical of a communist economy. When the farmers didn't have to make their own decisions on what crop to grow, they didn't have to take responsibility for the end result.

What to do about it? Adapt.

There's no chance of violent revolution or mass civil disobedience, after all, 'cos we simply can't be arsed.

Pericles: "What to do about it? Adapt."

Care to elaborate?