> I see no point in wasting words seeing how differing viewpoints are received here. Somebody has even bothered to go over my comment history and downvote everything.

I understand how you feel. However if you are right and I am wrong - then your words are not wasted, even if they are not well received, as long as they are read.

> and still they have yearly encounters with adults who behave like feeble-minded children

I guess our road safety practices and status-quo should not bother to extend as far as guaranteeing the well-being of the feeble-minded. Children playing in the street are fair-game.

To be fair, I understand that your viewpoint is economically efficient, to an extent. I can accept that favoring cars has significant economic benefits, and I understand why society has done it at the expense of quality-of-life at the ground level (children shouldn't play in the street, the area around your appartment/house is not for you to enjoy but for commuting strangers, etc), and personal safety.

But is it really necessary to hold on to this so dearly and for so long? Especially when other cities/countries have shown that alternatives are possible and attractive?

Any transition from here to there on the scale of transport and land use policies is going to take a holistic and well-communicated strategy, durable commitment to that strategy, and multiple decades to play out.

I'm not sure the first of those pre-conditions has been met and I doubt our ability to commit as a nation to the second.

> I am honestly very worried for my friends and relatives who drive

Any worries about friends and relatives who walk?