The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking

May 20, 2015 1:45 PM ET

Audio File

“Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?” Jack Kerouac’s “On The Road” perfectly captured the essence of the American fascination with the automobile. But that love affair has been dysfunctional, at least as far as the environment goes. This week on Sea Change Radio, we hear from Ginger Strand, a non-fiction writer who has written extensively on the American interstate. Strand and host Alex Wise discuss the history of American roads over the past five decades, efforts to protect wildlife in the face of road encroachment, and the evolution of hitch-hiking as the rideshare movement continues to blossom. Then, we revisit our conversation with Paul Minett, the founder of the Ridesharing Institute in Auckland, NZ and Mark Svenvold, a journalist who’s profiled Minett’s work.