Comments on: What if I didn’t drive my car everyday?

By: Harm

Harm — Wed, 16 May 2007 02:37:13 +0000

I haven’t been too inclined to make unneccessary
trips by car since I first saw $3 gas, around the
time of Katrina. Lately, I’ve just cut out all
drving except to work and grocery shopping. I
might make a longer drive to see a friend in a
couple of weeks, but still have saved a lot of gas
in the past few years. My car has about 45000
miles on it in almost 7 and a half years.

By: Judith Lautner

Judith Lautner — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 18:54:53 +0000

This is something I am thinking about as well. Right now I have committed myself to not driving three days out of the week. A pretty weak commitment, I admit, but I figure I’ll just start there and I can make a better one later if that works for me.

Like you, I don’t live near good mass transit. It’s really pretty awful, in fact. I also have severe arthritis in my knees which makes walking and biking painful. So that is why I gave myself some time in the car.

One of my other challenges is to stay with an arthritis “program” that is outlined in the book Arthritis Rx. I am on my thirteenth week on that, still have pain walking on concrete but do better on softer surfaces.

If nothing else, committing to fewer days in the car per week means I will combine the trips I do take and save gas and reduce pollution accordingly.

By: MossySF

MossySF — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 21:44:16 +0000

I had the bright idea of rollerblading to work every day. I mentioned it to my wife who immediately put her foot down and said it was too dangerous with all the traffic. Mind you, I’ve been rollerblading for about 13 years — I know all the good streets in this area for biking/skating. But trying to break through my wife’s prejudices is gonna be hard.

Of course, since my commute is about 3 miles each way, it would have saved me roughly $5 in gas per week.

By: bluntmoney

bluntmoney — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 21:13:42 +0000

Well, most of my transportation on the days I decide not to drive my car would be by foot. But I might enjoy that too :) I’m glad it’s worked out so well for you. That’s very encouraging.

By: S/100/30

S/100/30 — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 16:41:05 +0000

I think that cars are so ingrained in our culture that it’s hard to conceive of not using one regularly. (Especially here in the land of urban sprawl and poor public transportation — we are very LUCKY to have a bus line near us.) I think I may give it a try though. At least on a very baby-step scale. Anyone else do this?

It’s amazing how much our perception of a city shapes our decision to seek out public transportation. I went to college in Boston and spent a summer working in NYC, so by the time I graduated college I was very familiar with (and a huge fan of) public transportation. But the city I moved to was mid-sized and, like most mid-sized cities, wasn’t known for it’s public transportation. So, embarrassingly enough, I didn’t even consider exploring public transportation — this was “clearly” a driving city.

It wasn’t until my fourth year in this city, and my second year in my house, that I realize that our small subway system ran right by my house. One morning I decided to hop on it and try to figure out how to get to work just using PT. It was great. I became a true believer again.

My husband and I sold one of our cars, and drive the one car we do have at most every other day. We ride the train into work and avoid driving stress, road rage, gas costs, and get an insurance break for putting less than 7500 miles on our car every year. Instead we read or chat leisurely on our way in.

Give it a shot, I bet you’ll love it.