Pain in the Gas

How much would it actually take for drivers to change their ways?

Once upon a time, cars were hailed as the solution to an acute environmental hazard. A century ago in a city like Milwaukee, a quarter of a million lbs. of horse emissions fouled the streets each day. In Chicago, 10,000 dead horses had to be towed away in a single year. The flies and the pathogens in the manure dust aside, magazine writers compared the overall "horse cost of living" unfavorably with the cost of switching to cars. At the time, a gallon of gasoline cost 18ยข, which today would be close to $4--exactly where some experts think we might be...

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