| Two Blasts from Our Car-Past, Courtesy of Disney |
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| Written by Joshua Liberles | |||||||||||
| Sunday, 06 January 2008 | |||||||||||
.jpg) I just came across two old Disney clips appropriate for carectomy patients. The first, Magic Highway USA (video below), I discovered via the Brazilian apocalipse motorizado – an awesome site name, and one I’d frequent if I spoke any Portuguese.
The 1958 television episode looks toward the future of American transportation. Once you dig past the kitschy sci-fi aspects, this auto-pian vision terrifyingly reveals the values which have led us to our current predicament. Everything becomes super-highway accessible – from the steepest mountains of the U.S. to the Sphinx in Egypt. Mom and son drive to a convenient parking spot in the mall where they are whisked away along a moving sidewalk. Dad’s car is lifted to within a few feet of his office desk and the film’s narrator jokes that he must then walk to work from there. The level of isolation as well as the lack of physical activity in our somewhat prescient techy-dream-future is creepy.
Disney’s pro-Auto propaganda predicts urban sprawl, boasting how automobiles will change the shape of cities by facilitating decentralized, horizontal development. Urban sprawl is shown as a boon which will allow people the space to stretch out.
Other accurate predictions include vehicles big enough to need a television for a rear-view mirror and an interactive updating navigation system (think GPS) that will help us find the way through our self-imposed mazes.
There are reasons why modern society look the way it does: conscious decisions to shape our cities around vehicles and highways. Of course the oil/auto industries wanted it to happen, but they needed companies like Disney to help push the message.
Disney’s Magic Highway USA:
I find it incredible that the same company that produced Magic Highway USA made Motor Mania eight years earlier. Not surprisingly, Disney’s “serious” treatment promotes the car as the ticket to autonomy and individual bliss. It takes a cartoon with Goofy to bring us some car-truth. In a clip that belongs with our Car Damages Your Health article, Goofy demonstrates the monstrous transition people undergo when they get behind the wheel. Disney gets soft at the end though, with parting advice along the lines of “drive nicer.”
Disney’s Motor Mania:
Comments (5)
Joel Sanda
said:
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What a blast from the past. Though I grew up in the 1970s cartoons like this were part of my life. I remember the mythology around the interstate system and grew up being told you could anywhere in America by car. And in the event the Russians attacked our interstate system doubled as a transit network for our mobile nuclear missiles. My how things change. I put 4,000 miles on my car last year, including the 2,200 for the summer vacation. Fortunately that was to Zion where we parked and then road the natural gas buses to trailheads once in the park. I do everything in my power to avoid the car - bus when the weather is crap and bike when it's not. Thanks for tossing these up! |
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Wow, that first video blew my mind. Can you imagine anyone putting a road through the Grand Canyon like that? The mythology is astounding...helps em understand how we got where we are.... |
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I really like the idea of a heated highway. Heck, we have the power to do it, why not! Just put an auto fired coal unit every few miles to melt the snow as it falls. Imagine the plow truck problems it would solve... But seriously folks (waaaamp waaaaamp waaaaaaaaahhhhh) Isn't it funny that they REALLY were focused on burning so much fuel...the segment where Dad goes to his office. Television conferencing in the car, but Dad still has to go to the office. Wow, what a concept. Thanks for putting up this gem from the past. Anyone wearing their free masons ring?? ;>) |
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wow as "Mom and son drive to a mall" and "while dad drives to work" and "as father choices the route in advance". wow sexist growing up in the 1990's and 2000's this all just seems crazy to me. and using an atomic reactor to plow through mountains just sounds crazy from my perspective. maybe all of this was more believable 50 years ago |
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"...arrrrr shudarp!"  I remember parts from the first clip in the queue for the ill fated Rocket Rods at Disneyland. Very scary stuff, a lot of it was echoed in Thunderbirds, from the same era. They also had massive engineering "solutions" to everything, and an automatic free way constructing behemoth. |
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