> The problem is that corporate interests pushed for a car-centric society
I'd say it's more NIMBY interests than corporate interests.
The US, in contrast to Asia and Europe, builds sprawling suburbs, consisting only of single-family houses, with no multi-story apartment complexes and no other services/infrastructure in walking distance.
Most people would tell you that they don't want things to be this way, but will actually complain about proposals to make things better.
If you build apartment complexes, you can fit more people in a smaller area, which makes public transit a lot more economical. Add the fact that you don't need to go anywhere far at all for a lot of things, like grocery shopping for example, and that makes you need a car a lot less.
It's also worth considering that the US has been constantly rich for the last century or so, it has been far less affected by the second world war, dictatorships and communism than Europe and Asia, which made cars a lot less of a luxury, and hence made public transit a lot less of a necessity.
Leveraging cars as a self-reinforcing socioeconomic class boundary is a direct consequence of all of this, but also one more (self-reinforcing) reason why people need cars. You just can't do that sort of thing in Europe, if there are well-off people without cars, you can't assume that well-off people have cars, so well-off people will keep not having cars, and so it goes.
I'd say it's more NIMBY interests than corporate interests.
The US, in contrast to Asia and Europe, builds sprawling suburbs, consisting only of single-family houses, with no multi-story apartment complexes and no other services/infrastructure in walking distance.
Most people would tell you that they don't want things to be this way, but will actually complain about proposals to make things better.
If you build apartment complexes, you can fit more people in a smaller area, which makes public transit a lot more economical. Add the fact that you don't need to go anywhere far at all for a lot of things, like grocery shopping for example, and that makes you need a car a lot less.
It's also worth considering that the US has been constantly rich for the last century or so, it has been far less affected by the second world war, dictatorships and communism than Europe and Asia, which made cars a lot less of a luxury, and hence made public transit a lot less of a necessity.
Leveraging cars as a self-reinforcing socioeconomic class boundary is a direct consequence of all of this, but also one more (self-reinforcing) reason why people need cars. You just can't do that sort of thing in Europe, if there are well-off people without cars, you can't assume that well-off people have cars, so well-off people will keep not having cars, and so it goes.