Door to Door

Edward Humes’s Door to Door: The Magnificent, Maddening, Mysterious World of Transportation (2016) explores the little-known realm of transportation in this world of increasing immediacy. The book reveals the truths, challenges, and logistics behind each journey we take and every product we purchase. Humes contends that we are in the midst of a new mobility revolution that is upending the car culture that helped build modern America. This unfolding change will disrupt people’s lives and trade across the globe, transforming everything from our commutes and vehicles to our cities, jobs, and environment. Humes’s work is a fascinating meditation on the people and technology that have allowed us to go from here to there.

Humes begins by stating that we live as no civilization has in history, considering that we embed a greater and greater number of miles into our lives and goods. He says that the logistics involved in a single day of global goods transport dwarfs the Apollo moon missions and the Normandy invasion combined.

Humes takes a look at the impact of the smartphone, “the Swiss Army knives of the tech world.” Just to create the home button on the iPhone means the involvement of dozens of suppliers and manufacturers, spanning Changsha in Hunan to factories located in Europe. This is largely made possible due to the shipping container, which transformed transportation. This development, alongside tariffs and political changes in China, drove the creation of the global economy.



Turning to the disposable aluminum beverage can, Humes points out that we have become so used to this product that we forget the infrastructure that lies behind it, ranges from aluminum smelting and can production to distribution at the nationwide scale. Our view of the aluminum can as commonplace has robbed this achievement of its wonder, rendering it unworthy of our notice. Such is the unintentional but unavoidable result of modern society: transforming the extraordinary into the ordinary. Humes questions who asks why—or even if—we need such products or if they make sense.

Humes then turns to the automobile. In the 1920s, drivers plowed straight into oncoming traffic, bicyclists, and trees, much like they do now. However, society was not too concerned with car accidents, referred to as “motor killings” at the time. Eventually, citizens became outraged, rioting and demanding reforms. They protested in “massive parades” and illustrated the type of civil unrest that was to become associated with social injustice.

When the car was introduced, America fell hard for it. New and exciting, the automobile was a sign of independence and status; until fairly recently cars transported people with little hassle or time. Cities were impacted by the influence of cars, allocating space for sidewalks and deserting public transit projects. Even the justice system accommodated the change, restricting pedestrians to crosswalks but allowing drivers who ran them over to walk away with fines or community service. Language developed in response to the reckless driver, and “jaywalking” became the term used for individuals who crossed streets when they felt like it. “Motor killings” evolved into “fatal accidents.”



As a result of our love affair with cars, we suffer congested commutes, a death every 15 minutes, a terrible injury every 12 seconds, and degenerating infrastructure. In the United States, annual automobile deaths outnumber annual combat deaths over the course of the Vietnam War, in addition to the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Korea. Currently, cars kill three thousand people each month. Humes says this is analogous to four airliners crashing each week, although such figures rarely make headlines or result in investigations, fines, or legal reforms.

Humes clarifies that the majority of the time, automobile accidents are rarely actually accidents. When there is an accident, 89 percent of the time it is because the driver is distracted. The author reveals that 15 percent of the time, other passengers are the source of distraction, whereas 12 percent of the time it is the result of smartphones, and 8 percent results from singing and dancing to music. If people are not distracted, they are likely drunk. Humes notes that in 2014 in the United States, inebriated individuals behind the wheel killed twelve thousand people.

In rare cases when the car itself is at fault, lawsuits, recalls, and headlines are the result. So why, asks Humes, have there never been any recalls aimed at designing cars so that drunks cannot start them, drivers cannot exceed the speed limit, or to prevent cell phones from being used while the car is in motion, especially since this technology has existed for a long time. Implementing any single element of such technology would, says Humes, prevent roughly thirty deaths and 2,200 injuries a day.



The future, Humes contends, is driverless. Google and Uber have already invested tons of money and research into this undertaking. The author paints a picture of a future in which driverless cars are summoned on smartphone apps, with miles or minutes paid for through simple subscriptions. This notion of the future is not only possible, it is inevitable. Efficient and nonlethal transportation can be had by all, including those with impaired vision or mobility.

The journey of horse travel, says Humes, provides a map for the future of human-driven cars, highlighting the difference between transportation and leisure. Whereas horses were once our motors, riding them is now enjoyed as a luxury that takes place on trails and in parks, rather than on regular streets and highways. According to Humes, cars will follow suit, with car parks and safe roads allocated for manual driving.

Using interviews and data, as well as an in-depth exploration of the unknown world of traffic control centers, ports, and research labs that are defining the future of transportation, Humes indicates that transportation is one of the few large-scale things we are capable of changing. Our own personal choices have an impact, and in the revolution that is on the horizon, these actions will define the new world of transportation.