Through a complex coevolutionary process -- involving interdependencies among vehicle engineering and design solutions, energy supply systems, street and road infrastructures, urban land use patterns, economic incentives, and government policies -- the automobile has become part of the urgent problem that cities now face. Cities currently consume too much of the Earth's nonrenewable resources to remain viable and livable in the long term. Their supply lines are too congested with parked and moving vehicles to be safe, convenient, and pleasant. And they produce more waste -- including the greenhouse gases associated with global warming -- than the Earth's natural systems can absorb without undergoing unacceptable levels of damage.引自 Introduction
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Automobiles respond to our desire to move about and interact. Ever since our ancestors walked out of Africa, personal mobility has been recognized as a basic human need. The transportation of people and objects and the creation of systems for moving freely from one place to another have been a part of the human story from prehistory.引自 Introduction
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