The simple nub of this is that car ownership and driving is far too cheap and a classic 'tragedy of the commons' has resulted.
Energy has been too cheap for too long. Allowing the poorest people the use of a car can be argued to have caused all sorts of social, environmental and problems (the same arguments can be used in even greater amounts for the cash-rich) but I see personal transport for all income levels something which should be a force for good.
Where it has gone wrong is governments failing to prevent the whole thing growing out of hand, power-wise, size-wise etc. The French have been most effective at discouraging powerful, inefficient cars. Unfortunately that is seen as something to be associated with Soviet Russia, but the success of the motor car has been allowed to ruin too much.
Worldwide, a different sort of vehicle ought to be in use within urban and suburban environments together with hugely impreoved public transport. Something which is barely more than half the width, a quarter of the power, a third of the mass of what the car has become.
Speed was originally something desirable because it implied efficiency and fine design, now roads have become so clogged, engines so powerful and the state photographing transgressions to inflate the pensions of a few, acceleration is the new speed. It's nonsense, since it requires massive batteries, wide tyres and reduces the brain of an adult to that of a child. And has an appalling effect on the environment.
Given the ultimate efficiency is how far you can travel on a unit of fuel, why shouldn't fuel efficiency become the figure to beat? Only a generation ago, owners of those cars which were far safer both in primary and secondary safety than your average Ford or Vauxhall, Peugeot or Fiat were near-oddities. Yet as soon as the crash videos and stats were posted online, car buyers started demanding safer cars.