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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should know

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Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot Com? Hey, and welcome to

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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me as always as

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Speaker 1: the lovely and effervescent Charles W. Bryant. I'm invescent. I'm

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Speaker 1: not effervescent. Your effervescent, whether you like it or not,

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Speaker 1: doubt how you doing, sir? Do you seem like you

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Speaker 1: were in the best move today? It's Monday morning. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: compared to Friday afternoons when usually record, there's a like change.

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Speaker 1: But hey, I'm part up. You sound like it's the

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Speaker 1: first week of the rest of our lives. Yeah, sadly enough. Um, Chuck,

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Speaker 1: how did you get to work this morning? I drove

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Speaker 1: to the subway, then took the subway to work. You

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Speaker 1: took the subway, terrible. I drove to work, so let's

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Speaker 1: go with me. Good for you. I'm like the vast

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Speaker 1: majority of at Lantin's driving to work. Yeah. Um, I

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Speaker 1: remember there's the there was this huge This is ultra local,

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Speaker 1: but I'm sure it happens all over the United States.

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Speaker 1: There's this proposed rail line from love Joy way down

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Speaker 1: south in this in the southern suburbs of Atlanta that

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Speaker 1: was gonna come up to Atlanta proper city. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: the people who came out against this came out against

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Speaker 1: it like it was a proposal to murder every one

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Speaker 1: of everybody's kids, people who live in love Joy. No,

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Speaker 1: it wasn't just a love Joy people in every county

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Speaker 1: that this rail line was going to go through. I

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Speaker 1: mean they were elected representatives that were coming out against it,

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Speaker 1: like everybody was arguing against this public transportation. And simultaneously

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Speaker 1: they were throwing their support between because there's horrible congestion

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Speaker 1: below the city. It's probably the worst in Atlanta. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: they fought the Marty going too far north to I know,

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Speaker 1: and and always the the and by the way, everyone

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Speaker 1: Martha is our public rail system are sad. Sad public

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Speaker 1: rail system it forms in in Atlanta is one of

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Speaker 1: the major cities in the country. We have a cross

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Speaker 1: we have a plus sign for a transit system. There's

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Speaker 1: a couple of little UH lines that spur off of

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Speaker 1: it now, but not much. I've never seen them. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: but yeah, north northeast and then straight north. And I

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Speaker 1: should say in my defense. There's I could drive, I

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Speaker 1: guess to you know, Art Center stop or something like that,

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Speaker 1: and then hit the railness to right. Exactly. It's great

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Speaker 1: for me though, it is, Chuck, you are well served

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Speaker 1: by our transit system. But yeah, generally the argument against

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Speaker 1: transit is, um that you know, the poor will use

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Speaker 1: it to go No, No, they'll use it to go

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Speaker 1: rob houses in the suburbs. Oh I thought they thought

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Speaker 1: they'd start living along the line. No. The argument I've

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Speaker 1: always heard is that it will increase crime. So can't

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Speaker 1: you just see people, you know, laden with flat screen

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Speaker 1: t vs and you know all sorts of others. You know,

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Speaker 1: they have the the burglar mask on and that money

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Speaker 1: sack with the dollar sign on it. That they just

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Speaker 1: came from some wealthy suburbanites house and now they're using

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Speaker 1: public transit to make their getaway. Right. Um. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's one reason that it's stalled. But as I was

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Speaker 1: saying this, to solve this congestion problem down south, the

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Speaker 1: proposal is to make seventy five by seventy five, I

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Speaker 1: think from five lanes to eleven lanes in each direction.

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Speaker 1: You know, I I wish I had a stat to

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Speaker 1: back this up. But I've always heard that making roads

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Speaker 1: wider does not do much to East congestion. No, I've

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Speaker 1: heard that as well. Cars will fill it. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 1: kind of like, um, if you build it, they will

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Speaker 1: come right. It's like giving condoms to teenagers. They wouldn't

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Speaker 1: have sex if you didn't give them condoms, but once

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Speaker 1: you do, they're just like rabbits, you know. Ridiculous. Um,

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Speaker 1: so chuck the the The debate continues, and I'm actually

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Speaker 1: surprised after reading this article we're about to talk about,

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Speaker 1: written by our esteem colleague, John Fuller of Stuff from

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Speaker 1: the B Side. Yeah, very hip, young, soft spoken man. Um,

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Speaker 1: that rail is even alive these days. Yeah. Have you

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Speaker 1: ever taken a train ride at like an Amtrak I have. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's awesome. I think I went. I don't remember where

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Speaker 1: I went. I was kind of young, but it was

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Speaker 1: pretty cool. It's really cool. Yeah, I wish it were

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Speaker 1: a little more comprehensive and cheaper and expensive. It is,

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Speaker 1: and you also realize it's federally subsidized. Oh yeah, Amtrak

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Speaker 1: is is subsidized by federal money, so you can pay

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Speaker 1: for Amtrak pal. Yeah, I should take a do I

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Speaker 1: get free tickets? Or anything catch on that you can't.

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Speaker 1: But let's talk about it. Man. If you look around,

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Speaker 1: we take for granted just how much we rely on

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Speaker 1: the car. Yeah. Like Fuller points out in this article,

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Speaker 1: the very designs of our cities, of our shopping malls,

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Speaker 1: and everything is made with the car and mine. It's

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Speaker 1: hard to imagine a life without parking lots. And what

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Speaker 1: if everything were street cars and subways and you know,

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Speaker 1: trains and things. I can't even conceive it. What if

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Speaker 1: parking lots were green space, like you still had your

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Speaker 1: shopping mall right, but it was just surrounded by like

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Speaker 1: a park. That'd be awesome. It would be awesome. But

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Speaker 1: it's too late. Not necessarily. There's a movement from mixed

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Speaker 1: use development in walkable cities Atlanta. We have our own

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Speaker 1: thing going yeah with the uh yeah, the belt line proposal, yes,

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Speaker 1: which I got really excited about when I first started

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Speaker 1: hearing it, and then I read the finer points. It

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Speaker 1: is great, but it's going to be finished when I'm

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Speaker 1: like seventy. Yeah, it's like cool, Maybe I can have

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Speaker 1: kids and grandkids will enjoy it. Hopefully it'll be wheelchair

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Speaker 1: accessible for you. Yeah. Um, so well, let's do. Let's

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Speaker 1: give a little background, right, okay, eighteen thirty two, New York. Okay,

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Speaker 1: let's do it. We're in New York in eighteen thirties.

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Speaker 1: There's newses everywhere. Um, there's the Irish are fighting one another.

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Speaker 1: It's crazy, so let's not spend too much time here.

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Speaker 1: It's eighteen thirty two, and New York has just installed

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Speaker 1: the first street rail line and it's horse drawn. So

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Speaker 1: we see the little horsey right there, can you hear it? Yeah? Alright,

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Speaker 1: let's get out of here. Chuck, Yeah, I see Daniel

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Speaker 1: deay Lewis is come. Okay, So now my friend were

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Speaker 1: in New Orleans only slightly less dangerous eighty five? What

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Speaker 1: do you mean slightly? And New Orleans has just opened

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Speaker 1: its first street rail line, and Chuck, if you want

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Speaker 1: to go ahead and flash forward with me to two

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Speaker 1: thousand nine, take my hand. Okay, all right, here we are.

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Speaker 1: The same rail line is still in use in New

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Speaker 1: Orleans and it's just as dangerous here. Let's go back

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Speaker 1: to the studio. So rail line have been around a

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Speaker 1: little while, a long while actually, and longer than the car. Um.

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Speaker 1: Apparently there was a what is it called zeitgeist when

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Speaker 1: a bunch of people come up with the same idea

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Speaker 1: at the same time. That happened with the automobile Germans

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Speaker 1: mainly well, yeah, and a guy named Gottlieb Daimler was

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Speaker 1: the first. He is widely viewed as the first to

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Speaker 1: come up with the real functioning automobile. Right, the kild

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Speaker 1: gets you from point A to point b uh. And

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Speaker 1: he named the car after his daughter, named Mercedes. Yep.

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Speaker 1: He hooked up with a guy named Carl Carl Benz

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Speaker 1: and hold on, I've got to say, Chuck, hats off

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Speaker 1: to you for your extra dedication to throwing that little

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Speaker 1: German exci what was Yes, I thought it was interesting

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Speaker 1: to think if it would end up being called the

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Speaker 1: Daimler Benz said of the Mercedes Benz good name, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but certainly not now it's the iconic Mercedes ben so uh.

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Speaker 1: They were the first ones, like you said, to come

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Speaker 1: up with a working car four right, uh huh. And

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Speaker 1: years later they looked to America because we kind of

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Speaker 1: perfected that that scene and started building highway. So they

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Speaker 1: looked at us in there, how to build an auto

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Speaker 1: bonn super highway. Yeah, And there was a guy who,

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Speaker 1: again by historians is widely considered the man who did

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Speaker 1: perfect that scene. As you put it, a guy named

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Speaker 1: Henry Ford, industrialist, fascist, eugenicist, well at the very least

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Speaker 1: supporter of eugenics, dentist. Why not. Probably in his fare

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Speaker 1: time he was something of a renaissance man um. And

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Speaker 1: the reason he's credited is perfecting the automobiles because he

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Speaker 1: applied the principle of the assembly line. A lot of

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Speaker 1: people needed that term. Actually he did. He didn't come

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Speaker 1: up with the assembly line itself. He did coin the term,

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Speaker 1: but he applied that to car manufacturing and all of

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Speaker 1: a sudden, you know, making one car by hand by

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Speaker 1: one person, which took forever. They just popped it on

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Speaker 1: a line and each person had their own job, and

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Speaker 1: he cranked out I think fourteen million cars. Yeah, between

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Speaker 1: nineteen thirteen and nineteen twenty seven they built fourteen million

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Speaker 1: Model Ts, which is a huge jump because just in uh,

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifteen, there were only two million cars, and that

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Speaker 1: was when there were about a hundred million people in

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Speaker 1: the United States. Yeah, that's that's a lot of cars. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's a that's especially for it having been considered um

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Speaker 1: kind of like a plaything of the rich. Yeah, it

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Speaker 1: was almost like a toy and like a personal submarine

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Speaker 1: is today. Sure, maybe so. And they weren't even uh

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Speaker 1: that well liked at first because they were clunky and

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Speaker 1: they smell bad. I know. John said that one of

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Speaker 1: the early names nicknames for a car was a stink chariot,

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Speaker 1: which I thought was pretty funny. Yeah, couldn't stink worse

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Speaker 1: than horse manure? Or could it could? I guess it's

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Speaker 1: a different kind of thing. I kind of like the

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Speaker 1: smell of horse manure. Yeah, but what if it was

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Speaker 1: coming out like that was the emissions of the time,

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Speaker 1: I'd be in heaven. How do you control the emissions?

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Speaker 1: I wonder? With the corks right or like, don't do

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Speaker 1: like a Kramer did in Seinfeldwani and Ernie fed the

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Speaker 1: horse rabby all the years. Um, that was a tangent

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Speaker 1: u Chuck. Let's talk about rail lines. Yes, we can't

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Speaker 1: forget about rail and say actually opened up the country.

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Speaker 1: You know, back before then, John Candy was in a

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Speaker 1: covered wagon and that's how you really got around. You

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Speaker 1: ended up devolving into cannibalism. It was nothing but hardship.

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Speaker 1: There were no roads. Really, basically, you had to have

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Speaker 1: a murder rap on your back east to take a

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Speaker 1: covered wagon. Uh out west. Well, there were no inner

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Speaker 1: states and freeways, there were no local roads. You were

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Speaker 1: literally a trailblazer, which is why Portland has that name Trailblazer. Interesting. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: well that's an assumption of mine of facts. So, um,

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Speaker 1: the railways open this up and actually they're wildly successful.

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Speaker 1: They actually are are are considered to have created the

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Speaker 1: modern and austrial state of the United States that we

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Speaker 1: view it totally right. Um, they opened up the continent

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Speaker 1: and uh, I think one point two billion people were

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Speaker 1: using rail lines every year by and that was at

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Speaker 1: its peak, peaked in and that's what that's about a

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Speaker 1: hundred and six million people living in the United States

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Speaker 1: then carrying one point two billion. So it's pretty clear

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Speaker 1: that you know, every American was probably traveling by rail

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Speaker 1: several times a year or maybe several times a week

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Speaker 1: or day, who knows. And it also opened up the

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Speaker 1: rest of the country too, ordinary everyday people. Um, they

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Speaker 1: before it was pretty much horse drawn carriage, maybe a

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Speaker 1: Model T but with with the absence of roads in

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Speaker 1: between towns, not very comfortable now no, and they were bumpy, Um,

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Speaker 1: people just kind of stuck around their town. Yeah, people

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Speaker 1: didn't even leave it where they were born their entire life.

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Speaker 1: There are people who do that still today, which is

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Speaker 1: just weird. Yeah. I remember when I took my grandmother,

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Speaker 1: who lived to be a hundred and one and passed

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Speaker 1: away a couple of years ago, when we took her

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Speaker 1: to the ocean for the first time. Dude, she was

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Speaker 1: like in her seventies, Yeah, what do you think of it?

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Speaker 1: She walked out and forget it was like twelve. She

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Speaker 1: walked out to the ocean and stood there and went, well,

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Speaker 1: it's big, I swear to God, that's all she said.

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Speaker 1: Granny Bryant's famous quote, and that we actually called her

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Speaker 1: Granny brand That's funny, did you? And she pretty much

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Speaker 1: turned around and was like, all right, let's let's go home.

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Speaker 1: That was it, go back to Tennessee. Yeah. Yeah. And

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Speaker 1: once you've seen one ocean, you've seen them all pure Yeah. Um.

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Speaker 1: So rail lines are really making a huge impact, but

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Speaker 1: they kind of fell to the wayside, even though cities

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Speaker 1: like New York and Boston um started offering commuter stops,

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Speaker 1: but it was still it was a train. It wasn't

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Speaker 1: all that convenient. It was really good for long distances.

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Speaker 1: But with the some some refinement of the automobile and

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Speaker 1: some huge marketing campaigns and lobbying and some unholy alliances. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we'll get into that. Um, the automobile started to take

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Speaker 1: on more play, more and more and more of a

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Speaker 1: role streamline into the manufacturing they of course, like any

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Speaker 1: manufacturing process, I got a little cheaper too. That's huge

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Speaker 1: consumer once prices started coming. Ultimately, no matter how played

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Speaker 1: upon your brain is by by pr firms, UM, no

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Speaker 1: matter how little of a choice you're given by huge monopolies,

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Speaker 1: Ultimately it comes down to the consumer's choice. It's something

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Speaker 1: that's really easily forgotten. Yeah. We talked about that in

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Speaker 1: our econ audio. Yeah, definitely. Um. And when consumers are

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Speaker 1: given a choice, they almost invariably choose the cheaper options.

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Speaker 1: So when cars started to become competitive price wise with

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Speaker 1: maybe rail service that kind of thing, Uh, people started

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Speaker 1: buying more and more cars, right, And you didn't have

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Speaker 1: to depend on the rail services schedule. Of course, all

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Speaker 1: of a sudden you were in control of when you

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Speaker 1: went somewhere and how far you traveled, and you didn't

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Speaker 1: have to worry about what the rail line said about it, yeah,

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Speaker 1: which is still a criticism today of public transit. Cars

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Speaker 1: offer freedom. It's as simple as that. They also offer

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Speaker 1: more privacy, to which I think a lot of people value, right,

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Speaker 1: and an ability to h engage in road rage, a

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Speaker 1: national pastime here in the United States, which is a

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Speaker 1: little more removed than subway rage. If you remember, what

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Speaker 1: was that girl's named soldier girl? Yeah, who went off

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Speaker 1: again on Marta or beloved Marta. Yeah, you can find

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Speaker 1: that on YouTube. Still ensure what what would they type

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Speaker 1: in chuck Soldia girl? I think s O U L

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Speaker 1: j A if you want to watch a nice subway rant.

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Speaker 1: Nothing like road rage though. Um so, rail lines is

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Speaker 1: kind of fading into the background as far as public

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Speaker 1: transportation goes and taking on more and more of a

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Speaker 1: role as um, you know, goods, good transportation, commodities, transportation

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Speaker 1: right right. But there's also those street rail lines that

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Speaker 1: we were talking about. They were actually most cities, whether

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Speaker 1: huge or not, had public transportation in the form of trolley's.

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Speaker 1: L A Dude was one of the big I had

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Speaker 1: one of the biggest trolley and street car lines, the

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Speaker 1: red cars and the yellow cars what they were called,

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Speaker 1: and man they connected and This is way back then.

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Speaker 1: They connected like five counties and it was really vast

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Speaker 1: and they were pretty much squashed. But that's what we're

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Speaker 1: getting to now. This is arguably the death the death

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Speaker 1: blow of public transportation. National city Lines, National city Lines.

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Speaker 1: This is where I think it really comes down to.

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Speaker 1: Let's go ahead and say that we found in our research,

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Speaker 1: um two views of this. There. I read an article

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Speaker 1: by a guy who says that this this the scandal

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Speaker 1: is so not everybody is is on board that this

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Speaker 1: actually happened the way that it's said, but that we

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Speaker 1: do have some facts. Let's do it, chuck. National city Lines. Yes,

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Speaker 1: National city Lines was a group that formed made up

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Speaker 1: of I think it was about eight companies, but that

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Speaker 1: included General Motors, Firestone, Standard Oil of California, Phillips Petroleum,

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Speaker 1: so clearly the big hitters and what would be the

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Speaker 1: burgeoning auto business. And they basically what they wanted to

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Speaker 1: do was buy up the street car systems and replace

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Speaker 1: them with busses. They did, and they did it quietly.

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Speaker 1: What they did was, um, it wasn't just busses, but

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Speaker 1: like all the tires on these buses were Firestone, all

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Speaker 1: of the gas put into these buses with standard oil

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Speaker 1: and all the busses were manufactured by GM. Yes, so

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Speaker 1: basically all of a sudden automobiles, whether it was a

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Speaker 1: bus or a model TS, that was the way to

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Speaker 1: get around. Yeah, the trolley line was dead and it's

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Speaker 1: called is referred to as the Great American street car Scandal. Right.

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Speaker 1: And also if that sounds vaguely familiar, Um, you may

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Speaker 1: have seen who framed Roger Rabbit. I was going to

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Speaker 1: mention that that informed one of the sub plots loosely,

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Speaker 1: loosely masked, but definitely based on that that whole scene.

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Speaker 1: So back in seven there was a guy um who

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Speaker 1: was actually a trolley enthusiast. I guess he was a

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Speaker 1: wealthy He was from a wealthy family. His name was E. J. Quinby. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He was a naval officer. He sounds wealthy. He was,

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Speaker 1: but he bucked the family trend of just being wealthy

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Speaker 1: uh and took a job managing trolley lines in New

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Speaker 1: Jersey after as his first job after college. Right. I guess.

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Speaker 1: Then he went into the navy after the war or

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Speaker 1: during the war, um, and he noticed what National City

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Speaker 1: Lines was doing because he was right there, he'd been

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Speaker 1: there while you know, they were buying up all these

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Speaker 1: trolley services. So he figured out what was going on,

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Speaker 1: and he wrote, um this letter with all this detailed

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Speaker 1: evidence to every person he could think of had anything

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Speaker 1: to do with federal, state, municipal elected officials and transportation.

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Speaker 1: Anybody who had any kind of thing it got a

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Speaker 1: letter from this guy across the country. He started this

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Speaker 1: whole thing for people to start paying attention to this. Yeah. Really,

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Speaker 1: I didn't know that. Yeah, a lot of people say

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Speaker 1: that he would have it may not have ever been

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Speaker 1: noticed that he not brought it to everyone's attention, and

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Speaker 1: he wasn't. Remember he was from a wealthy family. But

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Speaker 1: um he he did such a thorough job that National

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Speaker 1: City Lines was indicted by the federal government or the

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Speaker 1: Justice Department for um anti trust for breaking anti trust laws. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: the Sherman Anti Trust Act, right, So okay, now we've

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Speaker 1: got him by the short and curlies. Obviously National City

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Speaker 1: Lines is going to go under. These people are going

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Speaker 1: to all be taken out behind the wood shed and

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Speaker 1: shot in the back of the head for trying to

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Speaker 1: One of the charges was monopolized ground transportation in the

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Speaker 1: United States, which is pretty huge very huge. They were

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Speaker 1: actually acquitted of that charge, Yes they were, and they

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Speaker 1: were found guilty of a lesser charge of guilty of

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Speaker 1: monopolizing the sale of buses, which which, let me come on, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: they were found guilty. What happened, Chuck? They were fined

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Speaker 1: five thousand dollars. The whole thing, the National City Lines

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Speaker 1: was just owned by GM. This firestone in standard oil

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Speaker 1: was find five thousand dollars, which in seven even wasn't

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Speaker 1: that much for corporate, not for all these corporations at all.

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Speaker 1: The executives surely had to pay, right, Chuck, they did, dude,

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Speaker 1: how much? One dollar? One dollar piece a symbolic fine

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Speaker 1: of one dollar, and from an outsider looking in, you

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Speaker 1: would see this lesser charge quote unquote, it's pretty much

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Speaker 1: the charge, and they just I don't know how they

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Speaker 1: got around it. I don't know if there was some

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Speaker 1: nefarious bribes or anything like that. I know so that

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Speaker 1: some conspiracy folks think so, but it's still hasn't been

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Speaker 1: found out. Really, So the the fact that that case was,

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Speaker 1: you know, tried and convicted in ninety seven, it's still

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Speaker 1: it didn't catch the public eye all that much. It

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Speaker 1: was actually a district attorney or federal attorney I think

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Speaker 1: named Bradford Snell, who in nineteen seventy four testified before

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Speaker 1: the Senate and really drummed up public ire about this occurrence.

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Speaker 1: That it happened, uh, you know, a couple of decades before,

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Speaker 1: so that it wasn't really considered a scandal or a

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Speaker 1: huge nefariest plot until Bradford Snell came about, right, and

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Speaker 1: again still not everybody's on the same page about whether

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Speaker 1: this was a nefariest plot. No one actually disputes that

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Speaker 1: GM and in National City Lines were trying to sell

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Speaker 1: busses across the country. But they're saying monopolized ground transportation

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Speaker 1: prove it. Uh, you can't really prove motivation like that,

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Speaker 1: or clearly the federal prosecutors couldn't. But as as one

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Speaker 1: guy pointed out in a Mountain Express, which is a

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Speaker 1: paper out of Asheville, and I read a cool article

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Speaker 1: in there about this um, the result was still the

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Speaker 1: same for the trolley car. So whether that was the

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Speaker 1: intent or not, that was still the result. And I

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Speaker 1: think one of the reasons why this became such a

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Speaker 1: point of or source of irritation among the public when

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Speaker 1: Snell came out because that was nineteen seventy four, which

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Speaker 1: was kind of right in the middle of the energy crisis,

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Speaker 1: wasn't it. Well, that was part of it, but also

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Speaker 1: it was around the birth of the the environmental protection

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Speaker 1: movement we have like the Nasson e p A. And

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Speaker 1: people are starting to think about that kind of thing. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and I think also faith in corporations that had been

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Speaker 1: lost time and time again. People were kind of getting

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Speaker 1: fed up with it. Right, Yeah, it's a good point. So, Chuck,

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Speaker 1: we were talking about public transportation and cars being in

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Speaker 1: a horse race, uh, to see who was going to

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Speaker 1: serve or which was going to serve the United States. Right,

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Speaker 1: there's also another sub race going on between what exactly

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Speaker 1: would fuel those cars. Yeah, oil or gasoline or ethanol? Right.

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Speaker 1: Henry Ford design in the Model T to run on

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Speaker 1: either one, which is pretty interesting to think back, this

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Speaker 1: country could have gone in a whole different direction. Man,

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Speaker 1: it totally could have. Ford was actually a huge proponent

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Speaker 1: of ethanol. He called it the fuel of the future. Uh,

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Speaker 1: and it was, which was kind of weird because it

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Speaker 1: had been around for several decades already. It used to

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Speaker 1: power all sorts of equipment I think Ford also said that, um,

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Speaker 1: one one year's yield of an acre of potatoes can

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Speaker 1: be used to fuel the machinery to cultivate that acre

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Speaker 1: for the next century. But we went with gas. We

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Speaker 1: did go with gas. And do you know why, I'm

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Speaker 1: not sure. I know that gas was just kind of

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Speaker 1: a dirty byproduct at the time of oil crew to

394
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Speaker 1: oil production. Yeah, they were looking for kerosene because they

395
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Speaker 1: wanted kerosene to light things. Um, and no one really

396
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Speaker 1: had any use for gas right right at the time.

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Speaker 1: But once some oil fields opened up. You ever heard

398
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Speaker 1: of a little movie called There Will Be Blood. Once

399
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Speaker 1: some oil fields opened up in Texas around that time, Uh,

400
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Speaker 1: oil suddenly became cheaper, Gas became cheaper, advances in the

401
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Speaker 1: refining process became cheaper, and ethanol was more expensive. It

402
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Speaker 1: was as simple as that. And Daniel day Lewis once

403
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Speaker 1: again drinks our milkshake, yes, which we've mentioned before. I

404
00:23:20,119 --> 00:23:25,560
Speaker 1: will eat your a long time ago, so chuck the

405
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Speaker 1: I guess with the National city Line scandal going on,

406
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Speaker 1: there was one real last nail in the coffin that

407
00:23:35,760 --> 00:23:38,960
Speaker 1: came from a president, right. Yeah, that was you know,

408
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Speaker 1: the cars weren't in full swing. People were digging it

409
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Speaker 1: and what we needed now was major interstates to connect

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Speaker 1: everyone together. And in President Dwight Eisenhower, he signed the

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Speaker 1: Interstate Highway Act, which created about forty two miles of

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Speaker 1: highway from coast to coast and the rest is history,

413
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Speaker 1: literally the history. UM also that that one act really

414
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Speaker 1: changed the American economy a lot too. Either way we

415
00:24:06,600 --> 00:24:09,199
Speaker 1: spend our money, not just that, I mean think about um,

416
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Speaker 1: fast food is one sure roadside attractions through food billboards.

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Speaker 1: Johnald talking about billboards in the article, which I thought

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Speaker 1: was pretty uh pretty cool. Yeah, I came across the

419
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Speaker 1: study by these two guys named the Shapiro and Hassett,

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Speaker 1: and they they reckon. I guess you could put it

421
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Speaker 1: that every year cars in the highway system, just automobile

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Speaker 1: use generates three and fourteen points seven billion dollars for

423
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Speaker 1: businesses in the United States. That's direct. Like you've drive

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00:24:39,280 --> 00:24:44,199
Speaker 1: up to a McDonald's, um, you drive to you know,

425
00:24:44,400 --> 00:24:48,240
Speaker 1: the mall. This is the fact that automobiles exist generates

426
00:24:48,320 --> 00:24:50,439
Speaker 1: that you know what. You know what else happened to

427
00:24:50,440 --> 00:24:54,840
Speaker 1: help this along? They started, Uh, new zoning laws were

428
00:24:54,880 --> 00:24:57,280
Speaker 1: created and when businesses were built and for the first

429
00:24:57,320 --> 00:25:02,159
Speaker 1: time parking spaces were required, and uh, you know a

430
00:25:02,160 --> 00:25:05,119
Speaker 1: certain amount of parking spaces per business which still exist today.

431
00:25:05,560 --> 00:25:08,280
Speaker 1: And what that what happened was they some cities like

432
00:25:08,320 --> 00:25:11,960
Speaker 1: abandoned sidewalks altogether at this point, and they pushed businesses

433
00:25:12,000 --> 00:25:15,880
Speaker 1: back further from the road in favor of parking lots, obviously,

434
00:25:16,520 --> 00:25:19,960
Speaker 1: and uh, places that were pretty easily accessible by foot

435
00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:23,119
Speaker 1: or by whatever, you know, bicycle, all of a sudden

436
00:25:23,119 --> 00:25:24,480
Speaker 1: they were a little further away and they weren't as

437
00:25:24,480 --> 00:25:26,280
Speaker 1: accessible and the the only way he'd get there it was

438
00:25:26,320 --> 00:25:29,480
Speaker 1: by your car. So thanks a lot for that too. Yeah,

439
00:25:29,920 --> 00:25:33,240
Speaker 1: it looks like, uh, I don't know public transit does

440
00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:36,280
Speaker 1: it have a choice chance. Uh, Well, it's making a

441
00:25:36,320 --> 00:25:39,600
Speaker 1: comeback now, obviously because gas prices are so so high

442
00:25:39,680 --> 00:25:43,560
Speaker 1: now and the car car production has reached I think

443
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:47,639
Speaker 1: a tenure low last year, John said, dropped eight percent

444
00:25:48,119 --> 00:25:50,400
Speaker 1: last year, but that was because gas was five bucks

445
00:25:50,440 --> 00:25:53,359
Speaker 1: a gallon. And everybody you remember Martyr Ridership went up

446
00:25:53,800 --> 00:25:56,119
Speaker 1: through the roof that like double or tripled, and then

447
00:25:56,160 --> 00:25:59,440
Speaker 1: gas goes back down. Everybody's like, what the heck is Marta? Yeah,

448
00:25:59,560 --> 00:26:01,800
Speaker 1: but I think people are starting to realize a little

449
00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:04,919
Speaker 1: more a couple with the environmental impact than public transports

450
00:26:04,960 --> 00:26:07,280
Speaker 1: coming back a little bit, but it'll it'll never overtake car.

451
00:26:07,320 --> 00:26:10,959
Speaker 1: Consider this the the Cash for Clunkers program right in

452
00:26:11,000 --> 00:26:16,000
Speaker 1: and of itself, supports automobiles. The recently defunct as of today.

453
00:26:16,000 --> 00:26:19,320
Speaker 1: I think, actually, did they go through all three billion

454
00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:22,879
Speaker 1: dollars already? I don't know. It was hugely successful. I

455
00:26:22,920 --> 00:26:25,080
Speaker 1: know they sold the an estimated quarter of a million

456
00:26:25,119 --> 00:26:28,679
Speaker 1: cars with just the first one billion dollars. That's a

457
00:26:28,720 --> 00:26:31,920
Speaker 1: lot of cars. And I mean, yeah, you say four

458
00:26:32,400 --> 00:26:36,639
Speaker 1: four miles per gallon? I think was the requisite? Was it? Yeah? Weird?

459
00:26:36,960 --> 00:26:40,800
Speaker 1: But yeah, So the American obsession with cars continues, and

460
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:44,439
Speaker 1: answer this question, why are we so dependent on it?

461
00:26:44,720 --> 00:26:47,760
Speaker 1: How did it become the dominant form of transportation? Because

462
00:26:47,800 --> 00:26:50,919
Speaker 1: it was cheaper at the right time and that's what

463
00:26:51,040 --> 00:26:54,199
Speaker 1: consumers want. So if you want to know more about this,

464
00:26:54,240 --> 00:26:56,440
Speaker 1: there's all sorts of cool links on the l on

465
00:26:56,520 --> 00:27:00,280
Speaker 1: my page on this article. Type in automobile dominant form

466
00:27:00,280 --> 00:27:02,640
Speaker 1: of transportation in a handy search bar at how stuff

467
00:27:02,680 --> 00:27:06,320
Speaker 1: works dot com. And Chuck, let's plug real quick too.

468
00:27:06,600 --> 00:27:08,600
Speaker 1: What are we plugging? This time's plug? The blogs in

469
00:27:08,760 --> 00:27:12,840
Speaker 1: the webcast. Josh and I have a shared blog called

470
00:27:12,880 --> 00:27:15,520
Speaker 1: stuff you should Know. You can access it on the

471
00:27:15,600 --> 00:27:18,040
Speaker 1: right side of the home page or website. Yes, and

472
00:27:18,119 --> 00:27:21,119
Speaker 1: we write about interesting things and newsy items and people

473
00:27:21,160 --> 00:27:23,359
Speaker 1: getting a little scrappy debates. It's good. It's what we

474
00:27:23,400 --> 00:27:26,239
Speaker 1: do then. Yeah, and social media, my friend. Yeah. And

475
00:27:26,280 --> 00:27:29,280
Speaker 1: the Friday blog recap is getting a lot of traffic now. People,

476
00:27:29,600 --> 00:27:31,320
Speaker 1: we welcome you. If you want to say something about

477
00:27:31,320 --> 00:27:33,840
Speaker 1: the show to to log on on Friday, it's in

478
00:27:34,080 --> 00:27:36,960
Speaker 1: Uh tell us what you think? Yeah. Uh. And the

479
00:27:37,080 --> 00:27:42,720
Speaker 1: webcast is live at one pm Eastern Time every Wednesday. Video. Yeah,

480
00:27:42,760 --> 00:27:45,080
Speaker 1: you can find that on your blog post at that day.

481
00:27:45,880 --> 00:27:49,000
Speaker 1: It's also on new stream and Facebook. Right, So there's

482
00:27:49,040 --> 00:27:52,159
Speaker 1: the plugging. Plugging is over, which means it's time for

483
00:27:52,240 --> 00:27:58,040
Speaker 1: listener mail. Listener mail, Josh, I'm just gonna call this uh.

484
00:27:58,240 --> 00:28:02,040
Speaker 1: We shall use all powers for good. We have a

485
00:28:02,080 --> 00:28:05,359
Speaker 1: regular kind of a email buddy, Christopher that writes in

486
00:28:05,400 --> 00:28:07,600
Speaker 1: a lot and he's a really cool guy. And he

487
00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:09,320
Speaker 1: wrote in and asked us to give a little shout

488
00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:13,359
Speaker 1: out to blood platelet donation. He is a He and

489
00:28:13,400 --> 00:28:16,520
Speaker 1: his family have been donating platelets for years and he

490
00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:18,840
Speaker 1: says beginning at the end of August, it's a very

491
00:28:18,880 --> 00:28:21,520
Speaker 1: critical time when blood and platelets are needed the most.

492
00:28:22,440 --> 00:28:24,840
Speaker 1: And people know a lot about blood donations and how

493
00:28:24,880 --> 00:28:27,400
Speaker 1: important that is, but few people know about platelet donation

494
00:28:27,760 --> 00:28:29,840
Speaker 1: and other forms of donation that the Red Cross and

495
00:28:29,920 --> 00:28:33,640
Speaker 1: State Blood Services take and what they're used for. Platelets,

496
00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:37,080
Speaker 1: for example, are used for chemotherapy and leukemia patients. These

497
00:28:37,080 --> 00:28:40,800
Speaker 1: treatments destroyed platelets, which are essential for the clouding of blood,

498
00:28:40,880 --> 00:28:45,040
Speaker 1: which is very big deal, and patients frequently require platelet

499
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:47,560
Speaker 1: transfusions to allow their blood to clot if they get injured.

500
00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:50,800
Speaker 1: Platelets are needed all the time, especially with the increase

501
00:28:50,800 --> 00:28:54,920
Speaker 1: of cancer and leukemia cases in recent years. Blood Services

502
00:28:54,960 --> 00:28:58,680
Speaker 1: also accepts red blood cells and plasma to help other

503
00:28:58,760 --> 00:29:01,719
Speaker 1: patients and people we need. So his family has a

504
00:29:01,800 --> 00:29:05,400
Speaker 1: freakishly high platelet count and when they donate one single

505
00:29:05,400 --> 00:29:07,680
Speaker 1: donation goes to help three or four people in need. Cool,

506
00:29:07,720 --> 00:29:11,480
Speaker 1: pretty cool, and most people single donation goes to help

507
00:29:11,520 --> 00:29:14,320
Speaker 1: at least two patients. So he said, it takes a

508
00:29:14,320 --> 00:29:16,360
Speaker 1: little longer, about an hour and forty five minutes, which

509
00:29:16,400 --> 00:29:18,600
Speaker 1: is one reason why they don't get as many donations.

510
00:29:19,280 --> 00:29:21,560
Speaker 1: And uh, that's just the process though, and they really

511
00:29:21,560 --> 00:29:23,880
Speaker 1: need it. So we just want to encourage folks to

512
00:29:24,240 --> 00:29:26,400
Speaker 1: uh he actually wanted just the podcast about it. So

513
00:29:26,400 --> 00:29:29,120
Speaker 1: maybe we'll do that one day. But go give blood

514
00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:33,959
Speaker 1: platelets people. Did you know that my girlfriend's blood saves infants? Really?

515
00:29:34,120 --> 00:29:36,200
Speaker 1: She lacks the type of her pies that most people

516
00:29:37,040 --> 00:29:41,240
Speaker 1: get by age five. Um so, but you're not supposed

517
00:29:41,280 --> 00:29:45,520
Speaker 1: to get it before age five. Very few people, um

518
00:29:45,640 --> 00:29:47,920
Speaker 1: are without this type of herpes. She's one of them.

519
00:29:48,080 --> 00:29:50,800
Speaker 1: So her blood is used directly to save infants. How

520
00:29:50,800 --> 00:29:52,920
Speaker 1: crazy is that? Did you know that a gaze from

521
00:29:52,920 --> 00:29:57,080
Speaker 1: my wife saves baby puppies all from all over the

522
00:29:57,120 --> 00:30:00,240
Speaker 1: world that she looks upon them. That's very cool. She

523
00:30:00,280 --> 00:30:04,720
Speaker 1: should exercise, should beat that UNI? Okay, um yeah, you me,

524
00:30:04,920 --> 00:30:07,800
Speaker 1: I want to see a UNI and Emily saved down right,

525
00:30:07,920 --> 00:30:11,080
Speaker 1: let's do that. So donate blood platelets and blood and

526
00:30:11,120 --> 00:30:14,000
Speaker 1: plasma and import and Josh and and puppies and Josh

527
00:30:14,000 --> 00:30:15,720
Speaker 1: and are gonna go do that today? All right? If

528
00:30:15,760 --> 00:30:18,840
Speaker 1: you have an email about what you can save, send

529
00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:27,920
Speaker 1: it to Stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com

530
00:30:27,920 --> 00:30:30,320
Speaker 1: for more on this and thousands of other topics. Does

531
00:30:30,360 --> 00:30:33,880
Speaker 1: it how stuff works dot Com. Want more how stuff works,

532
00:30:34,160 --> 00:30:36,320
Speaker 1: check out our blogs on the house. Stuff works dot

533
00:30:36,360 --> 00:30:41,640
Speaker 1: Com home page brought to you by the reinvented two

534
00:30:41,680 --> 00:30:44,200
Speaker 1: thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you