“Imagine life in a city free from the noise, stench, and danger of cars, trucks, and buses. Imagine that all basic needs, from groceries to child care, lie within a five-minute walk of every doorstep. Imagine that no commute takes more than 35 minutes from door to door, and that service is provided by a fast, cheap, safe, comfortable public transport system. This is the future that J.H. Crawford envisions in Carfree Cities.”

Mr. Crawford also publishes an exquisite website that has thousands of photographs of European cities where the pedestrian, not the Range Rover, is king of the street. Will Los Angeles marshal its profound imagination and resources towards building a city where life is kinder and gentler or will we proceed down the ruinous path of environmental destruction and needless sprawl and time wasting?

We residents of the city of Angels live in one of the wealthiest places on Earth, but how poorly we live.