Trapped In The Drive-Thru

The meme posted above has been thrown around so frequently that it’s practically in the public domain at this point. I’m not sure exactly who created it, but in the highly unlikely event that this person reads my article and brings their identity to my attention, I will credit them. I think I’ve covered my bases here.

In any case, take a look at that photo. The caption is typically something along the lines of “30 American people waiting for coffee” versus “30 French people waiting for coffee.” It’s often used to mock either American urban planning or American café culture. 

Now, I should probably make clear that the specific images chosen for this meme are somewhat misleading. The “30 American people” photo of a suburban drive-thru in Anywhere, USA was taken in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Even though the United States had far fewer pandemic-related restrictions on gatherings than most other countries (and our death rates speak for themselves), the photo isn’t inherently reflective of how it always looks here. Most restaurants were closed for indoor dining, making takeout or the drive-thru the only option.

Conversely, the “30 French people” photo is of a famous café in Paris. Of course, Paris is and remains one of the most-visited cities in the world, and the café in question is a well-known tourist trap near the Louvre. You can probably get considerably better coffee at a considerably lower price just a few blocks away. Additionally, given that it’s a tourist trap, some of the people in the photo are probably Americans. So the “30 French people” part is likely not true.

But let’s also be clear about something else: It doesn’t really matter that the photos are misleading. The overall point is still a very salient one.

It’s no secret that American suburbs, generally speaking, aren’t the best places to live if you don’t love driving. Then again, even if you do love driving, plenty of urbanists have argued that it’s more pleasant to operate a motor vehicle in a place where not everyone has to do it. Let’s have a look at that photo again.

According to the original source for this image, the location is Hicksville, New York. It’s in western Long Island, not far outside of America’s biggest city. But if I didn’t tell you that, you’d have no idea, because a lot of it looks the same as anywhere else in the USA.

Let’s talk about how depressing a drive-thru is. Basically, you get in your car and drive to the nearest fast food restaurant. Maybe there’s a lot of other cars, or if you’re lucky enough, you may escape bumper-to-bumper traffic. But if you’re getting dinner after a long day at work, that’s a big if.

Once you arrive at Mickey D’s, Burger King, or Wendy’s, or whatever other chain dominates your metroplex, you sit idling in your car as you pull in next to the restaurant. In the past, drive-thrus invariably had a human being working them, meaning that you at least had that modicum of interaction with another living thing. In fact, this is still largely true today, but McDonald’s briefly tried using AI voices for their drive-thrus last year. If anything, that makes it even more dystopian.

You wait in a line with several other cars. Again, if you’re lucky, several means seven just like David Jelinsky teaches us. If not, you could be stuck in a considerably longer line as they prepare your “food.” Even though Google Docs gave me a blue squiggly line here, I’m not removing the quotation marks, as I use the word “food” loosely here.

Once you get your Happy Meal or whatever they call them these days, you either drive home through even more intense traffic to enjoy it, or you just eat in your car while questioning your life decisions. If you went to a specific location in suburban Philadelphia on a specific day in October 2024, your non-biodegradeable fries might have been served to you by one Donald Trump. Remember that?

Now, look: They say McDonald’s is better in Europe than in the United States. Given the ingredients they put in the food here that they don’t use in Europe, not to mention the fact that other countries have unique menu items that aren’t found in America, I don’t doubt that this is the case. But is it really so much better that it’s worth skipping a meal at a far more authentic restaurant just to get a Big Mac? Quite frankly, I can eat as much fast food as I want on this side of the pond (and for the record, “as much fast food as I want” is “very little” for me).

Compare that to the café culture in many European cities. It’s perhaps ironic that the volume of your coffee in fluid ounces (or rather, milliliters) is a lot smaller in Europe, because people tend to linger over it for a far longer time. In America, most people just chug their coffee or soda and then toss it into the garbage can. Or, if you’re Morgan Spurlock, you toss it a different way.

By contrast, European coffee culture is about sitting at a table or bench beside a street lined with picturesque old buildings. You’ll take sip after tiny sip, possibly reading the newspaper (not that very many people do that nowadays in the United States or elsewhere - “possibly” might be doing some heavy lifting). If you’re the more outgoing type, maybe you’ve got a friend with you. You might discuss the events of the day, both in the wider world and in your personal lives. And of course, ordering your coffee and possibly a pastry actually entails looking at another person’s face.

Of course, I’m not going to say that everyone in Europe engages with this culture in its most complete form. Plenty of people there stare at their phones too - if anything, more people do while ordering because they don’t need to focus on other people in their cars. But the American drive-thru is truly one of the most isolating experiences a person can have in this country.

Think about that for a moment. The car in front of you might have anywhere from one to five or six occupants. Depending on the identities of the people within the vehicle, their stories and reasons for being there could vary wildly.

Maybe it’s a family on a road trip that happens to pass through your suburban area. In that case, perhaps the parents are exhausted from driving all day and don’t want to take the time to look at a potentially unfamiliar menu. Instead, they’d rather go to Burger King in Anywhere, USA (which has the same menu as Burger King in Anywhere Else, USA) and know exactly what they’re getting. It’s by no means gourmet, but it’s probably not horrible either. It’s consistent mediocrity, a “reliable level of shitty” just like Ryanair.

Or maybe the family isn’t on a road trip. Maybe they’re just tired from a long day at work or school, and the children disagreed about what they wanted to eat, and the parents didn’t really feel like cooking. So they aim for consistent mediocrity, figuring that if it’s a reliable level of shitty, it’s not that shitty. They’ll eat fast food that night and maybe cook the next day.

Or, perhaps, there’s only one person in the car. Maybe they’re on their way home from work and, like the hypothetical parents in our hypothetical family from the previous paragraph, they aren’t eager to whip up something edible. It could be a total stranger, or it could be the next-door neighbor whose name you’ve never bothered to learn because you’re too overwhelmed by the daily grind to form relationships with the people in your next pod over. 

If you stopped to talk to this person (even if only for a few minutes), it’s possible that you could learn a lot about them. Maybe they watch the same TV show as you. Maybe they’re fans of the same sports team, or maybe they play the same video games. Maybe there’s some other hobby that you two have in common, or at least would have in common if both of you had the energy for hobbies after such a commute. 

In order to truly form a bond, it would help if you two could leave your cars and find a place to meet. Even if it’s just a picnic table beside the parking lot, that’s still better than nothing. And once you spoke for a few minutes, and potentially established that you have some common interests, it could be that you’ll become close friends. In a different world, the person in the next car could have been your best friend. Or maybe you’re just completely different people with nothing remotely resembling compatible personalities. 

But if you never try (and in a drive-thru, you can’t try), you’ll never know. You’ll never know.