The modern world has granted many people an individual identification and freedom, as many people that are now living in urban areas of South Africa were some wild villagers that had no freedom or sense of individuality. If we look at the current world, its base economy mainly depends on continuous circulation between people and goods. People provide services to manufacture goods and consume these goods to continue the process.
However, the circulation of people can be done by transportation means. Whether people travel by car, bus, train, or even airplane, they require energy or fuel. Initially, we developed trains that could transport people and goods at great speed. However, the movement of the train was limited to the areas where the train track was set up.
To reach other areas that were across other terrains, such as lakes and seas, that’s when steamships took the role. However, the steam engines were thermally unstable and very different to control. So in the twentieth century, the role was filled by airplanes, which were much more fuel efficient and easy to
control than steamships. So soon in the twentieth century, cars appeared on the road and facilitated the rural people.
Those rural people who had to walk miles of distance to reach the urban areas were able to access the urban areas much more easily than before due to cars. The cars were a simple tool for the middle car people who took cars to be granted. However, for the lower and below-class people, cars symbolized luxury, modernism, and power.
By seeing all this, it can be concluded that the means of transportation are evolving again and again by mankind to fulfill their needs. But to how much extent can this evolution go? Can cars in this day and age still be used as an everyday means of transportation? We are currently facing many different problems and crises.
The main ones include the climate crisis due to global warming, the energy crisis due to the shortage of fuels, and the economic crisis due to the difficulties in the circulation of goods and people.
Most people worldwide cannot afford the fuels for their vehicles due to such high prices. The alternative they use to get to their destinations is public transport. Traffic is another main problem with transportation. A person who wants to get to his office will prefer to take the whole car with him except for public transport to reduce traffic on the road.
To prevent such traffic problems, many people who have workplaces near their residences should use bicycles or walk. Others should use public transportation. This way, we face the traffic challenge in the evolution of the transportation system. Other problems remain, and we can wait and see by ourselves what kind of evolution will face all these modern-day challenges.