Where I live in Europe, the expectation is that the kids will walk or take the bike to school. 95% of the paths they need to travel is covered by walkways (usually separated from the roads, and in many cases with dedicated bike lanes). Everywhere the kids need to cross, there are crosswalks, and every morning before school a team of parents is organized to safeguard these crosswalks.
Meanwhile, driving is slowed down significantly by the efforts above. The roads are underfunded and lines tend to form around the school (some parents still do drive their kids, up to about half when the weather is really bad). But with parents blocking the crosswalk every time a kid is near, bottlenecks do form. Basically, if you're in a car, you're treated as a 2nd rate citizen. :)
Oh, and I suppose one benefit of all this walking is that hospital bills go down. Mostly because of the exercise, but also to some extent due reduction in air polution (which is helped further by most of the remaining cars being electric, most of which, ironically, are of a certain American brand).
wow, didn't realize so much of EU can afford electric vehicles. They are more expensive over here in the U.S. - especially compared to a decent used car. Is this a function of the cost of fuel being much higher over there? Or are there subsidies for purchasing electric or something else?
I don't live in the EU, though. You need to move a bit further north and west.
And it's not that electric cars are cheaper here than in the US, rather other cars are taxed at +100% or so (more for "luxery" cars), while electric cars have had low to zero taxes.
Also, fuel has an extra tax of about $1/liter ($3.8/gallon) on top of the normal price (and 25% VAT even on that), meaning even before the current boom, fuel was typically priced around $1.5-$/l (around $5-$7/gallon), and has been approaching $2.5-$3/l (up to about $10/gallon) recently.
Another difference compared to the US is that we have about 25% fewer cars per capita here, despite having about 20% higher nominal GDP per capita than the US (purchasing power of households are lower than in the US, due to taxes and tariffs ). Partly because of car-hostile taxes (except for electric cars) and partly because other means of transportation are subsidized. More of the money is put into buses, trains and sidewalks and less into cars, roads and parking lots.
