Traffic Congestion: Sponsored by Your Local Media
Going through my morning headline round-up I clicked on ABC Channel 7's story, Should There be Tolls in Manhattan? While my eye was being drawn to the giant, red "Lukoil: We Love Cars" ad banner (What genius came up with, "Traffic: Sponsored by Lukoil?"), an animated little Gen Y hipster wearing a Toyota.com t-shirt jumped out in front of the text urging me to click him to hear more about Toyota's gargantuan new FJ Cruiser. The automobile and oil industry ad assault was so aggressive, I never even got around to reading the news story about how New York City is losing billions of dollars every year due to overwhelming gridlock. Is anyone still wondering why traffic reduction is a tough sell?
11:00 AM EST on December 5, 2006
Going through my morning headline round-up I clicked on ABC Channel 7’s story, Should There be Tolls in Manhattan? While my eye was being drawn to the giant, red “Lukoil: We Love Cars” ad banner (What genius came up with, “Traffic: Sponsored by Lukoil?”), an animated little Gen Y hipster wearing a Toyota.com t-shirt jumped out in front of the text urging me to click him to hear more about Toyota’s gargantuan new FJ Cruiser. The automobile and oil industry ad assault was so aggressive, I never even got around to reading the news story about how New York City is losing billions of dollars every year due to overwhelming gridlock. Is anyone still wondering why traffic reduction is a tough sell?
Aaron Naparstek is the founder and former editor-in-chief of Streetsblog. Based in Brooklyn, New York, Naparstek's journalism, advocacy and community organizing work has been instrumental in growing the bicycle network, removing motor vehicles from parks, and developing new public plazas, car-free streets and life-saving traffic-calming measures across all five boroughs. He was also one of the original cast members of the "War on Cars" podcast. You can find more of his work on his website.
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