That's a really interesting take, Chris. Some intruiging points there. If I may, as a sort of thought experiment, I've partially rewritten your post. Here's the set-up: it's back in "horse-and-buggy days," the car has only recently begun to come into use here and there and is not very popular yet. Of course those who have discovered the convenience of a car - the faster speed, the shelter from the weather, no need to care for it as one would a horse - are prone to encourage others to give up their horses and drive as well, for environmental as well as other reasons. (You may know that, especially in major cities, the excrement from all the horses in use daily was a significant pollution problem.) Here's a treatise from one such person:
"More cars less horses". It's the sort of phrase we hear often from driving advocates. After all, with so many benefits, getting people off of their horses and into cars can only be a good thing, can't it? Or can it? Certainly I know the benefits of driving both in my own life and it's effect on the environment around me, like reduced pollution in our streets and gutters. However, I also worry about what else needs to happen to facilitate this, and what might follow.
People talk about the environmental benefits of driving and the reduction of crops consumption. A very notable aim. People talk about driving reducing traffic congestion, and this appears to be a valid point. After all, one person sitting in a car takes up far less space than one person driving a big wagon pulled by a four-horse team. However, has anyone critically considered the alternative in this case?
Horse gridlock may appear intimidating, but for a moderately skilled driver, it really isn't a problem. Every day my current ride to work takes me along Bundall Road, passing gridlocked horses for several kilometres on end. At the squeeze point at the Sorrento Shops, I actually change lanes, passing between the rows of horses, simply because that's where I have more space to pass. Traffic doesn't get much heavier than this, yet the heavy, ponderous nature of the horses these people are riding makes them sitting ducks, easy to evade and pass. If all of these people were in cars, I fear that the traffic would be impregnable for any driver.
I've noticed the skill level that many people have on horses and frankly, the thought of many of them taking up driving without any training or even a clue in most cases is really frightening. Yes, they are also a problem when the get on horses, but that least there is a nominal training program to govern this to some degree.
The other thing that frightens me is the infrastructure that would be built to service this. Once there are a heap of unskilled and untrained drivers on the roads, the government response is likely to be trying to build facilities to deal with it. Now this is all well and good, until a few people start making laws compelling drivers to use these "facilities" that the government have spent big dollars putting there (this usually happens as soon as the opposition whines about "under-utilised facilities"). It becomes even more scary when one considers the extent to which a lot of these "new" drivers are likely to support laws aimed at simply "getting drivers on the new roads."
Frankly, I have no intention of being forced into using some dumbed-down infrastructure aimed at the above purpose.
As the only driver in my office, I get to park right up close to the building -- an area not used by people who ride horses. As the only one riding a car to my local grocery store, I get to leave it right up near the door rather than have to trudge across from the horse stables.
So while everyone here seems to be running around trying to convert everyone else to driving or more often trying to make the government do it for them, my advice is to be careful what you wish for. Make sure what you're asking for is what you really want.
My point here is that "the change," if it happens quickly, is liable to happen very quickly, due to peak oil or some sort of minor apocalypse; or it will happen slowly, so slowly that I don't forsee us having a huge issue with infrastructure changes. Or there may never be such a change. If enough people eschew autos for bikes to necessitate a major infrastructural change, the change (I hope) will have to be accommodating to this new large group. Just my opinion, though. Hope you liked my changes to the infrastructure of your post.