I think the younger generations are just a
little, but really just a little, more educated concerning global warming, air pollution, health concerns (sedentarism, etc), so some may try a little bit to improve their habits.
At the same time is understandable the habits of older generations because before global warming, health matters, etc weren't even a thing and people weren't educated about that, so they don't care or even know about those issues, so is understandable they have that kind of behaviour.
Without even mentioning the financial and political power of the automobile industry. Culturally it was a car dependent society, and the automobile industry reshape the cities, states, etc with their horrible superhighways, urban sprawl to worsen it up even more.
Now mobility independency could even be greater in general but people just don't have good alternatives right now to individual cars, even in "progressive" places like California and New York.
But certainly progress must be made.
Forbes: Bicycling Could Help Save The Planet, Says IPCC Climate Report
Image of Earth, taken by the GOES-7 weather satellite. Credit: Getty
Quote:
According to a globally-significant report published earlier today one of the ways of saving our world will be for more of us to cycle more frequently. If we want to prevent "rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society" we have to keep the global temperature rise to under 1.5°C, the world's leading climate scientists agreed in the report. After a week of haggling between scientists and government officials at a meeting in South Korea, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued its hard-hitting report on the impact of global warming.
There are many mitigating tactics, what the report calls "pathways," we will all need to take if we want our planet to remain habitable, and among them are walking and cycling more. The stakes could not be higher. The risks, says the IPCC report, include "high levels of public unrest and political destabilization due to the increasing climatic pressures, resulting in some countries becoming dysfunctional."
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Governments will have to change tack on the way they manage energy, land use, and urbanization, but individuals also have to change their lifestyles, eating less meat, drying clothing on washing lines rather than in tumble driers, and walking or cycling short distances rather than driving.
"This is not about remote science; it is about where we live and work," said Dr. Debra Roberts, the IPCC's other co-chair, adding that "we can choose the way we move in cities."
The IPCC's report classifies cycling and walking as "non-motorised transport" and says that "viability rests on linkages with public transport, cultural factors, climate and geography."
Among the 6,000 scientific references cited in the report are studies on car-restraint policies and bike-share's potential for getting people out of cars. An estimated 800 cities globally have operational bike-share schemes, says the report. It adds that London's congestion charging scheme helped pay for the roll-out of protected cycleways, and that in the charging zone, vehicle kilometers driven decreased by 15% in 2003, the first year it operated, and a further 6% a year later, while CO2 emissions from road traffic had reduced by 20% by 2008.
“One of the key messages that comes out very strongly from this report is that we are already seeing the consequences of 1°C of global warming through more extreme weather, rising sea levels and diminishing Arctic sea ice, among other changes,” said Panmao Zhai, another co-chair of IPCC Working Group.
Dr. Roberts concluded that the report "gives policymakers and practitioners the information they need to make decisions that tackle climate change while considering local context and people’s needs."
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