Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
however. In 1899, for example, the
New York Times
sni
ed “There is some-
thing uncanny about these newfangled vehicles. They are unutterably ugly
and never a one of them has been provided with a good or even endurable
name. The French, who are usually orthodox in their etymology, if in nothing
else, have evolved 'automobile,' which being half Greek and half Latin is so
near indecent that we print it with hesitation” (quoted in Jackson 1985:158).
Like the railroad, the auto had widespread social and perceptual e
ff
ff
ects. The
generation that
first learned to drive on a mass basis—in the 1920s—may be
the only one to appreciate these changes fully, for their predecessors never
mastered the art of driving and their successors took it for granted. Learned
doctors warned that the human body was not designed to withstand speeds
of 60 mph, and young men boasted if they had traveled at such velocities.
Sharp gender di
fi
erences characterized early automobile ownership: driv-
ing was an exclusively male phenomenon, and women took to the road in
large numbers only after WWII (Scharff
ff
1991). The invention of the electric
starter in 1912 helped to bring a few women into the automobile market, but
they remained the exception. Cresswell (2006:196) aptly sums up the gendered
mobility of this technology: “The early history of the automobile was thor-
oughly entwined with the construction and defense of particular visions of
masculinity. Mechanical prowess, the control of space, ideas of sexual con-
quest, and the feeling of power that comes from being in control of one's
destiny were all wrapped up in the automobile.” Early automobile time-space
compression was thus essentially for males only, often at the relative expense
of women.
Although most urbanites still used light rail transit in the 1920s, it was not
long before the private car was no longer a luxury but a necessity for the middle
class. Spurred by Henry Ford's Model T, mass ownership of automobiles in
the U.S. grew stupendously. Whereas the Model T cruised at 30 kilometers
per hour, by the 1930s improvements in engines, chassis, and the introduction
of leaded gasoline doubled this speed (Hugill 1993). Farmers turned to cars
because of their ability to negotiate unpaved roads, and urbanites because of
the convenience they o
ff
ered. Within two generations, almost universal avail-
ability of motor transportation became the norm. In the U.S., the number
of registered automobile owners rose from one million in 1912 to 10 million
in 1921, 30 million in 1937, and 60 million in 1955 (Vance 1990:499). The
American experience was quickly emulated by Canada and several Western
European countries. As Table 4.5 indicates, however, no European country
attained the high levels of U.S. auto ownership, in part due to lower
incomes, better mass transit systems, and higher gasoline taxes. European
cities, in consequence, assumed a very di
ff
erent form from the sprawling, low-
density, multinucleated model prevalent in North America. Even the identical
technology had di
ff
erent impacts in varying cultural contexts.
With the internal combustion engine, it was the infrastructure rather than
the vehicle that presented the greatest constraint to continued reductions
in travel time. The internal combustion engine allowed investments to be
ff
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