A limit on the automobile population of the United States would be the best of news for our cities. The end of automania would save open spaces, encourage wiser land use, and contribute greatly to ending suburban sprawl.

I plowed fields with horses and worked as a hired hand in high school for 50 cents a day.

We Americans are a funny people. We say that our favorite outdoor recreation is 'walking for pleasure' (or so it is reported in Outdoor Recreation Trends). Yet the average housewife will jump into the family car-or one of them-to go around the corner for a bottle of aspirin and a television guide. The businessman who walks four blocks to an appointment is the exception rather than the rule.

If, in our haste to 'progress,' the economics of ecology are disregarded by citizens and policy makers alike, the result will be an ugly America. We cannot afford an America where expedience tramples upon esthetics and development decisions are made with an eye only on the present.

Admittedly, we must move ahead with the development of our land resources. Likewise, our technology must be refined. But in the long run life will succeed only in a life-giving environment, and we can no longer afford unnecessary sacrifices of living space and natural landscape to 'progress.'

A limit on the automobile population of the United States would be the best of news for our cities. The end of automania would save open spaces, encourage wiser land use, and contribute greatly to ending suburban sprawl.

The auto industry must acknowledge that a rational transportation policy should seek a balance between individual convenience, the efficient use of limited resources, and urban-living values that protect spaciousness, natural beauty, and human-scale mobility.