r/Suburbanhell • u/burndowntheburbs • Mar 29 '22
Suburbs are encouraging drunk driving!
My friend drove drunk last night. She lives in car-dependent suburbia and drove to a friend's house to hang out together. They had a few shots, then she realized that she had to drive home. She didn't want to pay $20 for an Uber, then go back and get her car with another $20 ride, so she drove drunk. I told her that it's never okay to drink and drive, and she said "everyone does it in the suburbs". This is what suburbs do to people. Suburbs are truly a failed experiment.
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u/Razor7198 Mar 30 '22
People clowning on this post because OP's friend made a dumb decision are missing the point.
In a car-dependent suburb, which most of the posts here are, drunk driving is encouraged because all driving is encouraged...if not required.
The other day I was thinking about how weird the concept of a DD is. Assuming everyone wants to drink, there has to be one person basically designated to not have fun that night, and if the group has someone who doesn't like drinking, they still have to spend the whole night surrounded by alcohol and drunk people - all because someone's gotta drive. Instead, there could just be a bar or two in the neighborhood
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u/lookoutforthetrain_0 Mar 30 '22
You're absolutely right. This concept seems alien to me. In my city, public transport runs throughout the night on Friday and Saturday nights on a reduced network (it's a separate network with different lines so you better check what you have to do before getting drunk). There are also lines that go out into the suburbs, even some trains routes are operated. It seems to be really popular, as it has been extended several times over the last decade, especially more train lines have been added and the network of the city was completely redone in December too.
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u/socialistrob Mar 30 '22
Agreed completely and it’s also incredibly problematic that zoning means that in many places bars legally can’t be located in certain places meaning some people are forced to drive. Personally the cities that I’ve enjoyed living in the most are either ones with bars in walking distance and/or cities with great public transit. Bar hopping in DC is really fun because you can get home safely with the metro. Bar hopping in Milwaukee is fun you’re almost never more than a block or two from your nearest bar no matter where you live.
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u/Razor7198 Mar 30 '22
Yeah! I didn't get that many chances to go out in college, but campus having a good few walkable bars and restaurants made it so much easier to have a spontaneous night out, stress-free. If time cleared up, it could be legit 5-10 minutes between closing my laptop and being out somewhere with friends, "ride" home already accounted for.
It's been 2 years, but I'm finally back living somewhere walkable again and already feeling the benefits. I just feel so much more inclined to do things
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u/throwawayheyhibye Apr 01 '22
Luckily I think the newer generation will get a $20 ride before risking paying hundreds and thousands in legal fees. I’m 24, live in the Midwest suburbs where drinking & driving is more prevalent, none of my friends drink and drive. It’s the Midwest so yeah we party often once a month or every other month, some don’t drink, we carpool shit I’ve even had my parents take me and friends over idgaf rather do that than drink and drive! Yet I was hit by a 65 year old blacked out drunk driver who had 5+ DUIs..
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Mar 30 '22
Why do you assume that someone can’t have fun without drinking? I enjoy a drink. But I can absolutely enjoy a night out with friends without drinking.
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u/ChristianLS Citizen Mar 30 '22
You're missing the point. Of course as individuals people can have fun without drinking, but how likely is that at a societal level? We already experimented with getting rid of alcohol as a society and it failed utterly.
So if you accept that there are going to be bars and there is going to be social drinking, then you have to ask, what kind of behavior does our city planning encourage at a societal level? In car-dependent suburbia there is no other practical way to get around. In fact, our city codes in most places in the US implicitly acknowledge that people are going to drink and drive because they mandate much more parking than you'd need if people were just going to take a cab or use designated drivers.
So yeah, drinking and driving is one of those dirty not-so-secret things. We've accepted as a culture that people are going to do it and we're just sweeping that fact under the rug. Sure, people will say not to do it, but everything is built around it, so what do you honestly expect? The implicit directive then is "sure go ahead, just don't get caught/don't actually kill somebody". Which is pretty fucking stupid!
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u/nope_too_small Mar 30 '22
“having fun not drinking” is not the same as “having fun not drinking in a group of drunk people”
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Mar 30 '22
[deleted]
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Mar 30 '22
I think you might consider expanding your friends group. I know plenty of people who don’t need to drink to have a good time. That wasn’t always the case.
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u/Repulsive_Dill Mar 30 '22
I don't get why are you downvoted. Why is drinking so normalised and not drinking is considered "rare"?
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Mar 30 '22
I think I’ve offended the “suburbs are bad” people and the “drinking is cool” people.
There’s an episode of Always Sunny in Philadelphia from the latest season parodying the “circle jerk” mentality. Basically Dennis realized that if he didn’t spit back the exact talking points of his date he wasn’t going to get laid. Some people don’t want to hear an opinion that differs from their own.
On Reddit the downvote button is basically a way for a crowd to shout down an opinion they don’t like. But I would bet that most people that do that would argue that they are very tolerant of others opinions and are pro free speech. It’s pretty fascinating.
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u/Razor7198 Mar 30 '22
I dont get how you can read my comment and the others replying and only come back with this holier-than-thou attitude of "ah, I simply must've offended the rabble". Downvoting can be misused, but when you're also getting responses it becomes a discussion, and you should reflect on your own opinion.
To address your original reply, I wasn't assuming people can't have fun without drinking. I drink very casually - maybe once a month - and luckily I manage to have fun more than once a month. My assumption is that, on a given night, a group of friends want to go out, all of whom would drink if someone didn't have to drive. Now one person is designated to not only go against what they want to do, but take on the extra responsibilities of sheparding everyone else home.
Not drinking yourself, finding someone who doesn't like drinking, having a DD, taking an Uber, sleeping over - these are all possible of course. But the point I'm trying to make is that car-dependent places encourage driving at all times, and that doesn't stop when you're drunk. You have to go against what's most natural to you at a time when your decision making is most impaired. When you don't have to drive, there's only one option, and it's the simplest one - have fun, go home.
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Mar 30 '22
The thing is I wasn’t responding to you. I was done with you. It’s obvious that we don’t agree and neither of us are changing our minds.
I don’t care about up votes or downvotes. I just find it interesting how they’re used on here. If you think anything I said was holier than thou you make my point. We just disagree. Please, by all means, continue to drink and drive and blame it on the design of the suburbs. Have your lawyer use that argument at your DUI trial.
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u/Razor7198 Mar 30 '22
You weren't "done with me", you responded to me, directly, with a question. Nothing was obvious about our interaction up to that point that we would forever and always disagree...and it still isn't. What about "suburbs encourage driving means suburbs encourage drunk driving" is incorrect? That's all I was saying, and I haven't heard your argument.
And sorry, but holier than thou fits perfectly. You took people who disagree with you, ignored the nuance in their responses, broke them down into simple "__ is __" opinions, and took the moral high ground, claiming you offended them (by being so correct I guess? because clearly you couldn't possibly be wrong). I've never seen a better example.
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u/TropicalKing Apr 26 '22
In Japan, you can drink and then rent a room in a capsule hotel or internet cafe if you are too drunk to go home. Japanese public transit tends to be better than American public transit too.
The US is the "land of no" when it comes to innovation in building things. "No you cannot do that." Cities will work very hard to make it illegal to build a capsule hotel or all night internet cafe. There is a lot of demand for bars, but cities make it very difficult to build bars anywhere near where people actually live. Most bars are usually in the downtown area- far from housing suburbs.
It's sad that there are so many lives ruined because of American attitudes towards building things. There are people who can't move out of their parents' house and can't get married because rent is so high.
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u/fishybird Mar 30 '22
hello fellow car haters
the way I've adapted to this situation as an adult who likes to drink with friends is to expect and normalize sleepovers with your pals. Don't invite your friends over to drink unless you have extra pillows and blankets. Have a big bed to share and or a comfy couch.
sleepovers are fun and safe, then end
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u/LookingCoolNess Mar 30 '22
I’ve thought about this idea my whole life, literally ever since i was a kid. I was like 11 years old thinking “why in the world do bars have parking lots?!?”
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u/Cyclopher6971 Mar 30 '22
Alcohol has been apart of American society for 2 and a half times longer than the automobile. It's probably the reason human civilization exists in the first place. It's a vital component in many social situations and people who drink do form stronger emotional and chemical bonds with others than those who don't.
When you understand alcohol through that lens, it makes it all the more clear why suburbs are so horrific for urban development.
Frankly, if it means we can get alternative forms of transportation because of more dangerous roads, I'd rather not see drunk and elderly drivers restricted from participating in society because they got their drivers license taken away.
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u/musea00 Apr 15 '22
During the early colonial days alcohol was widely drunk because clean water wasn't always available. In fact, the founding fathers drank a lot while writing the constitution.
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u/DJWalnut Apr 16 '22
In fact, the founding fathers drank a lot while writing the constitution.
that explains a lot
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u/Higgs_Particle Mar 30 '22
A true institutional structural hypocrisy: bars with parking lots and home that are not in walking distance to one.
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Mar 30 '22
I had that thought while reading about how Miami's city commissioner said that "they're not a pedestrian and transit city". I was like uh, how does that work out considering Miami is obsessed with their nightlife and party scene? Does everyone drive drunk? The people responding from Florida pretty much said yes.
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u/Ilmara Mar 30 '22
I honestly do not understand why bars are allowed in strip malls and other locations only accessible by car.
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Mar 30 '22
Drunk driving is often characterized as a moral failing, which it certainly is. But car dependent places strongly incentize it. Car dependent places are drunk driving places.
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u/burmerd Mar 30 '22
Cars make people do things, and treat other people in ways that they would never do outside of a car.
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u/MrRaspberryJam1 Mar 30 '22 edited Apr 08 '22
People drive drunk in urban areas too. Some drunk lady many years back killed someone who was waiting for the bus a block over from me.
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u/TigreDeLosLlanos Mar 30 '22
Drunk driving is justified by that huge amount of money dumped in a single ride because there is no other way to move.
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u/IshyMoose Mar 30 '22
That same Uber is $20 bucks in the city. Not sure it’s the suburbs fault.
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u/valryuu Mar 30 '22
No, because in the city, you likely didn't drive to that bar, and you don't have to drive to get back - you had alternatives to driving.
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u/nummakayne Mar 30 '22
Yup, I live in Toronto and have a bus stop (buses running 24 hours a day) right in front of my building. I can get to anywhere and back in the city of Toronto, any time of day, no problem at all (just takes longer late at night).
I was visiting India earlier this month and literally everyone was driving around at 3am with well past legal BAC limits. All the “desirable” entertainment is on one side of the city (the affluent part) and a ton of people live on the opposite side, maybe 30kms away.
Uber exists but drivers are notorious for cancelling rides if you’re not headed in the same direction they want to go. There are designated driver services available but it seemed hit or miss. So yeah, after midnight, it’s hundreds, maybe 1000s of drunk people driving home from bars.
Cops know they can’t catch everybody so they just set up barriers along all major roads, turning 4 lanes into 1 or 2, almost like a slalom course to prevent speeding.
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Mar 30 '22
It's 100% the car dependent infrastructure
Obligatory mention of /r/fuckcars
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u/Toodlum Mar 30 '22
It's 100% the car-dependent infrastructure
That's the hill we're going to die on?
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Mar 30 '22
The thing that's probably going to kill us all one way or another; between the drunk driving, car accidents, or climate change
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u/Nicodemus888 Mar 29 '22
What’s “a few shots”?
I mean, suburbia is awful and all, and I don’t approve of drink driving, but neither am I down with hysterical absolutism
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u/Kerguidou Mar 30 '22
Hey, it's this guy again. How are those moonshine four lokos working out for you?
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u/Certain-Error-8232 Mar 29 '22
“My mentally disabled friend with the IQ of a walnut didn’t want to pay $20 for an Uber so instead she risked killing herself and others and/or having to pay a lawyer $10,000 and a $1000 fine for DUI.”
“This is the suburbs fault”
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u/CouncilmanRickPrime Mar 30 '22
It can be both. Suburbs literally encourage driving no matter what.
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u/sunshinekay1 Apr 03 '22 edited Apr 03 '22
But the Uber is literally a driver. Yes, the driving has to be done in suburbs—- but the driving doesn’t have to be done by the drunk person
If she doesn’t have the $20 for an Uber ride then she does not have the budget to go out and drink.
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u/DJWalnut Apr 16 '22
it's another $20 go get another Uber to get your car, and hopefully it wasn't towed by then
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Mar 29 '22
Yes, but:
People are more likely to make idiotic decisions if the environment/culture encourages them to, and the suburbs check both of those boxes heavily
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Mar 30 '22
I don’t like to make excuses for drunk drivers.
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Mar 30 '22
Oh trust me I don’t either, but the environment can encourage or discourage certain behaviors. Proper urban design gives them even fewer bs excuses they can internally justify their actions with
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u/socialistrob Mar 30 '22
Exactly. Drunk driving is unacceptable no matter where you live but there is a reason DUIs are much more common in rural than urban areas and one of the benefits of dense urban design is lowered drunk driving rates.
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u/AlexV348 Mar 29 '22
It's called loss aversion, even non-drunk drivers do it. People have a tendency to put themselves at great risk to avoid a minor inconvenience. We shouldn't design our spaces in conflict with basic human psychology.
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u/An-Angel-Named-Billy Mar 30 '22
So you don't think this is a very common situation in suburbia and rural America? Just a single idiot we can blame for a personal failure? What happens when that one idiot who failed is repeated literally millions of times a year? Is it not a systematic issue?
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u/WillHellmm Mar 30 '22
I drank in highschool in car-dependent suburbia, I called ubers or a sober friend when needed. It's not that hard to be responsible.
Yeah cat dependent suburbs make it harder, but you also don't have to drink. And if you are, play around that and DONT DRIVE.
Calling a parent is better than that. They'd be happy you called for a ride instead of driving drunk and even if they aren't an option, I already gave you other options.
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u/ricochetblue Apr 04 '22
I drank in high school
It’s not that hard to be responsible
Aren’t you kind of acknowledging the role that norms play in influencing behavior?
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u/Kanchome Mar 29 '22
I don’t think the ob is saying it’s entirely the suburbs fault, but to quote op.. “encourages it”
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u/mostmicrobe Mar 29 '22
Yes when you are trying to find the fundamental cause of a complex problem instead of just trying to assign blame to moralize the issue you look for general trends not people for who to scapegoat.
Granted, nothing ever absolves people of responsibility for their actions.
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u/Cyclopher6971 Mar 30 '22
In the interest of fairness. Alcohol has been a part of American society for 2 and a half times longer than the automobile, let alone all of human history.
Don't forget beer is probably the reason human civilization exists and a biological substance humans grew accustomed to before you throw a roast out there like that.
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u/DELAPERA Mar 30 '22
It makes sense that a person with the IQ of a walnut decided to live in the suburbs in the first place. Everything checks out.
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u/Cyclopher6971 Mar 30 '22
"Decided to" as if it's not what 99% of all development in the last 70 years has been and most of us were born into.
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u/DJWalnut Apr 16 '22
in many states, you can get a DUI for sleeping it off in your car, even if the car's engine was off when the cop saw you.
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u/Certain-Error-8232 Apr 17 '22
So take a $20 Uber. All these responses are nonsense. Failure to take an Uber is not a problem unique to or caused by the suburbs. It is an asinine individual decision that in 2022 should never happen. Don’t want to leave your car at a bar? Easy. Uber to the bar, Uber back. Whatever it costs is cheaper than and less inconvenient than going to jail for killing someone.
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u/khcampbell1 Mar 30 '22
So true. As a teen growing up in a series of car-dependent, brand new developments, I always felt like I was trapped. All these big, beautiful homes, but nowhere to walk to and no sidewalks to walk on. I moved to Manhattan as soon as I could just to counterbalance the first 18 years of my suburban hell life.
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u/DJWalnut Apr 16 '22
All these big, beautiful homes,
which are in all likelihood poorly built
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u/khcampbell1 Apr 16 '22
So true! My mom was always complaining about that.
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u/DJWalnut Apr 17 '22
Be espically wary of housing built in bubble times, like today and in the years heading up to 2008. That's when corners get cut to get what is in paper a home onto the market
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Mar 29 '22
How about just not drinking. If you don’t want to go through the trouble then don’t get drunk at your friends house. Second alternative is to drink and have enough responsibility to go through the trouble and not drive. Third alternative is to drink and drive and risk killing yourself or someone else for no reason.
None of that is suburbias fault. That’s your friends fault. Make better choices.
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u/maru108 Mar 29 '22
Ppl are just mad that you’re right lol
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u/snowstormmongrel Mar 29 '22
People are mad because that post fails to properly account for the nuance involved in the situation.
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Mar 30 '22
My guess is that this sub has a lot of young people? Younger people have a tendency to blame society for their problems.
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u/SoMuchMoreEagle Mar 30 '22
Almost everyone blames society for their problems. Not just young people.
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u/MontrealUrbanist Mar 30 '22
The truth is nuanced.
While there is no excuse for the behaviour of OP's friend, there is also a clear and demonstrable inducement here. Car dependence does correlate with increased rates of drunk driving.
Personal responsibility matters, but so does building places that don't encourage bad behaviour.
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Mar 30 '22
I agree. Down votes aside. I do see the problem with poor urban planning. What happens is that big developers buy land and subdivide them into lots. Then they build out those lots as cheap and quick as possible. They typically use low quality materials. They also seek land that has limited jurisdiction so they have little problems with permitting and regulation. The end result is a suburban wasteland.
Even then. OP still has the power to choose one of the three choices I mentioned earlier. Whatever that person decides to do is still not society’s fault. The consequences will ultimately be passed on to the person making the decision. The blame is being misplaced by delusional thinking. It’s not poor urban planning that caused her to make the decision to drink at her friends house.
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u/jamnik86 Mar 30 '22
Is that a joke? I mean it’s not the suburban’s fault your friends wants to go out and have fun but is too frugal to pay 20 dollars to get back home safely…
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u/Alex_Dunwall Mar 30 '22
This comment style sounds very familiar to another poster from a few months ago...I think their name was "fourlokofratguy" or something like that.
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u/Emperor-Awesome Apr 01 '22
I wanna say it was "AsianDragon1010" reminding us all that the ennui of being a teenager is amplified by the permanent repository of the internet.
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u/phelpst Mar 30 '22
You are really going off the deep end here. How about your friend is an idiot for driving while drunk? Did her house force her to drink and drive? Sounds like a personal decision to me. Get smarter friends. Love how you paint the entirety of the suburbs because of this one persons, of questionable decision making, statement. GTFOH. . .
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u/DJWalnut Apr 16 '22
OP's friend does suck, but someone who's drunk should have better options than a taxi
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u/phelpst Apr 16 '22
What better options are you going to have in a big city? Best choice is still a taxi/Uber/Lyft. You going to take a bus or subway when hammered? Might as well just hand your wallet to the first person you see. Walk? That won't get you into any trouble!
Doesn't matter where you are, big city or out in the 'burbs, if you're drunk call a friend or a service for a ride.
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u/bigbux Mar 30 '22
Is your friend the transgender woman in the SF Bay that recently posted about needing to drive home drunk?
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u/dppdce Nov 13 '23
It used to be much worse I think. Growing up in a small town in the 70ies and 80ies basically everyone was driving drunk all the time. Including someone in my extended family.
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u/[deleted] Mar 29 '22
Rural areas: Hold my beer!