Urban Space

According to Bill Watterson, the legendary American cartoonist, “If you can’t win by reason, go for volume.” This piece of language stands to be true in relation to the body of work analyzed in this essay for many reasons. As this writing progresses, we will explore the many validations of evidence that support why volume and reason win the favor of the author’s writing. Clive Thompson says, “Self-driving cars will be a positive impact on the world, as parking lots will reduce.” Ultimately he has made a great argument with many reliable sources to back his thesis.

The Canadian Author, Clive Thompson, is a reliable writer in the journalism community. He is a contributing writer for The New York Times and is also a columnist for the online information blog, Wired. A huge majority of his work holds the same tone as “No Parking Here.” This tone is consistent in the voice of optimism towards the new age with major appreciation for the authenticity of the Earth and its raw qualities. He is an "environmentalist" style writer, to say the least. His online portfolio flosses articles like “The Sunny Optimism of Clean Energy Shines Through Tech’s Gloom” and even his book Smarter Than You Think: How Technology Is Changing Our Minds for the Better.

“No Parking Here” repeatedly provides a mantra of Pro-Earth standards on exactly why humans should be excited for self-driving cars and is consistent in the tone of persuasion. Thompson’s many sources also uphold this standard. Sightline.org, a Seattle Institution dedicated to "promoting smart policy ideas and monitoring the region’s progress towards sustainability" according to the company mantra, created a major study used by Thompson that states public parking is taking a huge fall. Although, the study was done in December of 2013, the three year difference in the origin of the data and the publish date of “No Parking Here” shows that these numbers the author has reported are factually proven.

When the topic of evidence and fact-checking comes to the surface, Thompson has not done the best job of citing every single fact that he presents. The first example shows up in the very first paragraph of the article, ironically. He presents very numerical information about Walt Disney’s Epcot parking lot being nearly the same size of the park itself. The author then goes on to state the number of parking spaces in the entire lot, but he never gives a source for this specific information. It is hard to believe the claims he has made about such a particular example to support his case. After doing personal research on Google maps, it is found that the Disney Epcot center is indeed the same size as the parking lot. This does not negate his argument any more than it does encourage it, but according to the rubric of evidence—he fails to leave evidence multiple times within the essay.

The rest of the essay is not balanced. This is for logical good reason. Common sense would tell the human race that cars are indeed toxic tools of transportation. Thompson gives excessive support of this ideology. He is constantly on the humanitarian side of the argument between self-driving cars and the unheard rebuttal of car companies that will take a huge loss in revenue. The article fails to leave any voice from the opposing side as to what are the cons of self-driving cars? What are the pros of man-operated vehicles? The article is 100 percent for the abolishment of the stone age. Although, this is all for good reason. He leaves no space for a balanced article and maybe this is the right thing to do. If Thompson was to have a balanced position on such a radical topic, he could contradict his entire story.

Aside from his various points of not citing random facts, Thompson does manage to use Scholarly interviews in his research which seems to rebound the lack of evidence for both the reader and his record. Near the end of the article, Thompson quotes Mr. Tom Radulovich, executive director of Livable City, a nonprofit transit group. Based on good judgement, one could say that Tom is most-likely an expert in his field of work, given the subject matter of his interview. Another example of Scholarly peer reviewing is cited by other San Francisco city officials who are involved in various projects to help near-future downsizing for parking and excessive car usage like Timothy Papandreou, the city’s director of strategic planning and policy for SFMTA, Shannon McDonald, an architect and historian of American parking and Kara Kockelman—a professor of transportation engineering at University of Texas-Austin to name a few.

It is safe to say Clive Thompson has created a very thorough report on why Self-driving cars will make a positive impact on the world, as parking lots reduce. His language was objectively positive, always looking for a solution to the problem and not blaming the opposing side. He gives a countless number of valid points accompanied by ethical and factual evidence—both cited and some not. Overall, Thompson’s article received a final twelve points on the Evaluation Rubric.

The urban space of the Earth needs recycling and saving! We are closer and closer to finding a better way to make the most of the land we share here. Clive Thompson’s articles is a great representation of the first steps needed to take to make this dream a reality. In conclusion, this article promotes the absolute funeral of all parking lots in the near future.