and the
Giving up the car
Posted July 15th, 2008 by clattin
Well, I just watched as my car rolled away. Yes, I sold it. I am now committed to biking or bussing to work every day. We still have the family hybrid Highlander for longer distance trips, but it feels good to get rid of one of our cars, which we weren't really using anyway. Anybody else out there given up your car recently? I'd love to hear about how many people have given up their car entirely in favor of bike commuting.
in my dreams
Sometimes I think we could make do with a single car, and during the summer one of them sits parked most of the time. But we're not there yet. Way to go.
The car dillema
What about car sharing? That cul de sac on the top of Bernard by Sumner would be the perfect spot! I'll call Zipcar and Flex car and see if they'd be interested! :) Then we could all sell our cars and get new bikes!
only two blocks
That cul de sac would be perfect. It's only two blocks from my house. Maybe when the zip or flex cars get to down, we can drop one of ours. I'd love to save that money, even though both of our cars are paid for.
Selling the car
Congrats, Chris! Someday we'll be there.
We're not selling my car, a Honda Accord, because it gets better mileage than my husband's Toyota pick-up. So it's there when we do have to make a big grocery store run or a long drive to visit my folks in Lewiston.
I've pretty much cut out all use of the car for errands that can be done via bike. However, I don't yet have a trailer to make it possible to haul canned goods on the bike. I'd be coming down Southeast Blvd fully loaded from the Rosauers on 29th, which makes me a little nervous just thinking about it. Banzai! Garbanzos everywhere.
But the car stays parked almost 100% of the time. My teenage daughters are expected to use the city bus for most of their transportation to and from jobs, friends' houses, downtown for shopping/movies, and the like.
When it's too snowy to ride my road bike (which is my only bike right now), I'll switch to the bus as I did last winter. I loved it--time to read on the way to work instead of worrying about sliding through intersections.
I actually had a conversation with Zipcar about 3 weeks ago, along with Andrew Rolwes of Downtown Spokane Partnership. They like to start on college campuses where they can, so the combination of Riverpoint and Gonzaga might be enough potential users to get going. Catch is the institutions have to underwrite the monthly costs as a revenue guarantee for Zipcar....
--barb