Originally Posted by
base2
The US and Europe are geographically similar in size (inso much as it matters in this context.)
The US chose to spread out horizontally basically guaranteeing car dependency. Other places chose human scale infrastructure design & city planning. Making car ownership a choice.
The Netherlands was indistinguishable from any major US metro until around 1960-1970. Then they collectively said: "This sucks" & chose something different. That's right. All of the bicycle & transport you see in pictures of the Netherlands has been built since the 1960's...& they are financially solvent.
I urge you to become familiar with how your parents & grandparents made decisions that limited your freedom, mobility & chained us all to high cost infrastructure maintenance bills for infrastructure that fails at it's primary design purpose: moving people.
I think a lot of European cities were laid out before automobiles were the norm. I’m not saying that in a way that gives US an excuse, just that the timeframe might matter.
And I don’t know how decisions were made to rebuild after WW2.
I do know Germany kept the ban on homeschooling put in place by the national socialists.