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Unit 3

GETTING AROUND

CULTURAL POINTS

Gasoline is cheap, cars are affordable, and distances are
great, so cars are the most logical form of transportation in the
United States. Most people own a car, and except in large cities,
public transportation hardly exists at all. The sight of someone
walking any long distance in a town or suburban area is fairly
strange. Americans will drive from one side of a shopping mall to
the other rather than walk the whole way and back.
When going between cities, flying is the fastest means of
transportation.

CARS, CARS, CARS

There could hardly be a more car-crazy country than the
United States. Driving is the most popular means of transportation,
walking isn't really considered an option when it comes to getting
around, and since buildings and shopping areas are so spread out, a
car really is the most logical choice.
Most cities in the United States do not have much in the
way of public transportation, with the exception of larger places
like New York, Chicago, Boston, and San Francisco. Most cities
and towns are designed with cars rather than pedestrians in mind.
In fact, many U.S. cities are almost impossible to get around in
without a car, and people rarely walk any farther than from their
doors to their cars and back again.
Generally speaking, American cities are flat and square,
with San Francisco being a notable exception. There, city planners
took the basic grid design that was used when laying out most
cities and just laid it on the area's many steep hills rather than
building around them. In general, though, it is pretty hard to get
lost in an American town because of this grid. Streets and avenues
cross each other and form blocks. This is the basic unit into which
cities are broken down, and people use blocks when giving