If you’re stuck in the suburbs without a car, consider yourself collateral damage from the Cold War.
“It is wrong to believe that postwar American suburbanization prevailed because the public chose it and will continue to prevail until the public changes its preferences. … Suburbanization prevailed because of the decisions of large operators and powerful economic institutions supported by federal government programmes, and ordinary consumers had little real choice in the basic pattern that resulted.”
Source: How older Americans got stuck in the suburbs | MNN – Mother Nature Network