So it began

I'm American and have lived without a car for well over a decade. I originally gave up my car while I still had a corporate job.

At the time, I lived about a seven to ten minute drive from work by car. It was about an hour on foot if I walked the entire way, which didn't happen too often.

It would have been over an hour by bus and also cost money I didn't have, so I never once bothered. Public transit in most parts of the US leaves much to be desired, as was the case in Columbus, Georgia at the time that I gave up my car.

I worked in a building with about 1500 to 2000 employees and there was a building added next to it with another 700 people for the same company. This corporate campus was located in an industrial and commercial park, so there were other businesses around as well.

Thus, there was quite a lot of traffic into and out of the area where I worked and I rarely walked more than ten minutes before being offered a ride, whether going to work or going home. I soon altered the side of the road I walked on because so many people made a U turn to pick me up that I was concerned it would lead to a wreck.

Most people simply assumed I was poor, which wasn't untrue. Initially, people weren't too nice about it.

Then the recession hit and people began saying nice things about respecting my commitment to get to work without a car etc.

Once, someone actually ASKED me about my decision to give up my car instead of merely assuming I was poor and that was the entire story. I talked in part about the fact that I don't actually like driving, I never have, I always wanted to live without a car and also I'm an environmental studies major.

But in the US, the default assumption is "Only poor people who can't afford a car walk anywhere." and this is actively harmful to pedestrian quality of life. It's also not true.

Some Americans can't drive due to age, whether too young (under age 16) or too old (often due to failing eyesight) and some people have disabilities that prevent them from being safe drivers.

In the US, being unable to drive actively hampers employment and cuts you out of having a full life in various other ways. It causes people to be second class citizens and is generally seen as stigmatizing.

The title of this site -- walking while American -- is riffing on the expression walking while Black. It's a phrase intended to evoke legal language that you got charged with something criminal, similar to driving while under the influence.

My experience is that walking while American gets one routinely presumed to be poor or even homeless and probably up to no good. No, I'm not Black. 

I have long wanted to live without a car and couldn't while still married to someone with a conventional lifestyle. I gave up my car post divorce under circumstances where I had more say over my choices than I did as a homemaker.

I'm an environmental studies major and wanted to be an urban planner. I won't likely ever get to do that in part because urban planning jobs in the US typically require one to have a driver's license.

In fact, it's not uncommon for urban planners to have a long commute and to live outside the community they are being paid to help develop. When I was active on Cyburbia years ago, it was common for professional planners who talked about transit oriented design (TOD) to also openly mock and pick on forum members who actually lived without a car.

And then we act like it's shocking or something that America has intractable car-oriented design everywhere.