Asphalt Nation: How the Automobile Took Over America and How We Can Take It Back

What makes Asphalt Nation far more interesting than the typical anti-auto diatribe is Kay's discussion of the cultural mores that helped create America's current car glut--namely, our attitudes toward land use and growth management; her comparisons between American and European practices in these areas are particularly interesting. Others have written about the American love affair with the automobile, but Holtz revisits the discussion with lively writing and a dramatic narrative.

Product Description
Asphalt Nation is a powerful examination of how the automobile has ravaged America's cities and landscape over the past 100 years together with a compelling strategy for reversing our automobile dependency. Jane Holtz Kay provides a history of the rapid spread of the automobile and documents the huge subsidies commanded by the highway lobby, to the detriment of once-efficient forms of mass transportation. Demonstrating that there are economic, political, architectural, and personal solutions to the problem, she shows that radical change is entirely possible. This book is essential reading for everyone interested in the history of our relationship with the car, and in the prospect of returning to a world of human mobility.

There could have been a little more attention to using the already in place car infrastructure for alternative fuel vehicles. But that doesn't take away from the basic idea behind the book.


Loss of Economic Competitiveness   January 16, 2004
 3 out of 6 found this review helpful

No wonder our American jobs are being outsourced oversees - we demand more money from our employers so that we can drive farther from our home to work and spend, spend, spend on our cars to do this. We think buying a cheaper house in the 'sububs' saves money, but we spend more money on our cars and gas bills in the long term than we initially bargained for. Living closer to where we work maybe the solution - or telecommuiting (whatever happened to that idea?) but that's not really the point of the book, just an unstated theme throughout. I thought I could live in the county and work from home, but now I spend $500 a month on driving into the city and wasting precious time trapped in a car. Live and Learn - and think about reading this book (or at least the reviews...)


should be in every cardealers showroom   January 14, 2004
 1 out of 3 found this review helpful

They should put up a stand in front of every cardealer's showroom to preach the message. Though some of your writers said Kay's message was nothing new, it clearly makes a polemic that carries more weight and more solid and elegantly put information than Fastfood Nation. Actually, it replaces or supplements that book by saying if we moved more...we'd be healthy, wealthy and wiser, never mind saving the planet's diversity and co2 emissions.