You’re right that this is a very American thing. But we are a huge country responsible for huge amounts of climate damage. Our parking lots are enormous. 5% of our entire country is parking lot, owned by companies that can sure as hell afford contractors, especially if there’s incentive.

Also, here, banning cars in city centers here often does NOT work. Even the city I live in tried it for decades - businesses constantly failed, there was no foot traffic despite being surrounded by residential communities and beautiful upkeeping of the town center. Once we opened it up to cars, suddenly it’s a flourishing area of local businesses and community organization. We as a nation are too focused on cars, yes. But changing that right now is absolutely not happening. There’s no alternative right now, and changing that has too much opposition to overcome. There has to be steps along the way. Covering massive bare parking lots in solar panels would absolutely be something we can get this country on board with.

It’s not a matter of who’s serious or not, it’s a matter of what is more attainable right now. Small steps are more achievable than massive ones. Public transportation and walkable cities are already a topic that capitalism has been fighting forever, and the amount of infrastructure that would need to change is massive. It would interrupt daily lives, close roads, probably close businesses at LEAST temporarily, and while those of us who support it would understand it’s a means to an end, there is absolutely no way to get everyone on board right now. We DO have car parks right now, on private property where the companies that own them likely have the cash to spare for contractors to build solar panels. We’d have some areas of parking lots coned off while they build, and it would be a huge improvement that will be much easier to attain than the kind of overhaul needed to transform cities.