Living Car Free - Car lite living is now on the mainstream's radar

From CNN:


(CNN) -- As rising gas prices leave drivers with ever-heftier tabs at the pump, Americans have started looking for ways to reduce the drain on their budget. For some, transitioning away from a one-person, one-car lifestyle has proved rewarding...


iReporters change lifestyles to dodge hefty gas bills (http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/05/27/lifestyle.change.irpt/index.html)

From CNN:




iReporters change lifestyles to dodge hefty gas bills (http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/05/27/lifestyle.change.irpt/index.html)

We're lunatics until TV validates our decisions.

We're lunatics until TV validates our decisions.


I take exception to that statement, I am still a lunatic!:lol:

I take exception to that statement, I am still a lunatic!:lol:

I stand corrected.

We're lunatics until TV validates our decisions.


Sadly, this is so true. I've gone for years telling people 'the truth as I see it' about various matters, and have been met with skepticism or outright denial from others. As soon as the television proclaims something to be true, these same people excitedly report it to me, as though I'd never mentioned it. TV has an absolute stranglehold on this society. If it's not on the tube, it isn't real.

while we're complaining about media, here's my biggest media gripe: when a scientific study comes out and the media uses logical gymnastics to make their own groundbreaking headline

Case in point: Scientists release a study saying that anti-oxidants found in green tea or coffee beans statistically lessen cancer risk. Media runs a story saying "Can coffee cure cancer?" and they show all this stock footage of double lattes with cream, sugar, whipped toppings, etc. while they throw out BS statements like "Maybe that Carmel Ice Blended Coffee is not so bad after all! A new study by..."

It seems that the media doesn't cover a story until it fits into a nice package narrative. It's like the news editors all graduated from USC film school instead of Columbia University Journalism school.

The people highlighted in the story are people who've existed for ages (A girl who bikes 5 miles to work). If they really wanted to, there's surely very interesting stories about people who are radically changing their lifestyle to a car lite/car free routine. But they probably won't dig deeper than this. I mean, they've got to get back to covering the squirrel riding a surf board or the new study that shows that regular vodka drinking might cure Alzheimer's.

From CNN:

..... ]
Especially sad was the mention by a Ms. Smith in the CNN article that the only way she could have fun was in an inefficient sporty car.

Shame that she never tried go-karts, enduros, drags, or motorcycle hill-climbing in her early years as I foolishly did.

But I 'saw the human power light'. She might enjoy a recumbent trike as I do in my later years. Never know if you never try; and I doubt she ever will. Department store bike, maybe

People are forcing themselves into this Big Oil mess not changing habits. She may not be a re-born cycling evangelist, but sitting around thinking of pie-in-the-sky cars is not too wise in my opinion.

countersTrike

Saw this on SF Chronicle today:

"The good news: Gas is racing merrily past four bucks a gallon and oil is skipping over a previously unheard-of $130 a barrel (http://www.oil-price.net/) and Big Oil execs are snorting like pigs in diamond-crusted mud, and hence people are quickly rethinking their transportive ways, driving less and dumping the land yacht in favor of more Priuses and Mini Coopers and Smart cars, as ultra-efficient auto technology suddenly becomes very attractive indeed.

Positive side effects: Bike sales are way up (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/05/11/national/a100201D90.DTL), as are roller skates and electric skateboards and walking shoes and SPF face lotion and hats and sidewalks and strolling amiably through the neighborhood instead of driving (http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/05/26/gas.driving/index.html), waving casually to the neighbors and saying hi and suddenly noticing all manner of amazing detail, all the flower beds and stoops and architectural curiosities of the city you never really noticed before because you were too busy racing the stop light to get to IKEA. Just imagine all the happy socioeconomic shifting when gas hits six, seven, eight bucks a gallon. Mmm, uncomfortable market-forced behavioral adjustments. It's the American way."

I have noticed that showing up at work with a bicycle earns a little more respect lately. It's the big truck and SUV owners who are starting to get a little uncertain and even defensive.

Having a bike gives everyone the impression that you've seen all this coming and you've had a plan.

I have noticed that showing up at work with a bicycle earns a little more respect lately. It's the big truck and SUV owners who are starting to get a little uncertain and even defensive.

Having a bike gives everyone the impression that you've seen all this coming and you've had a plan.

Well, I did see this coming, and I did have a plan :D:D.

I have noticed that showing up at work with a bicycle earns a little more respect lately. It's the big truck and SUV owners who are starting to get a little uncertain and even defensive.



Well, if they get too insecure, they can always hang some plastic testicles from their trailer hitch...

Having a bike gives everyone the impression that you've seen all this coming and you've had a plan.

Yeah it feels like only 2 years ago that 4 dollar gas was a tinfoil hat theory. Oh wait... it WAS only 2 years ago!

And fortunately, we did all have a plan. What I don't have a plan for is food costs when those eventually respond fully to fuel prices.

Yeah it feels like only 2 years ago that 4 dollar gas was a tinfoil hat theory. Oh wait... it WAS only 2 years ago!

And fortunately, we did all have a plan. What I don't have a plan for is food costs when those eventually respond fully to fuel prices.

Actually some of us have that covered too...:thumb:

Aaron:)

Actually, as I entered my work building today, one of the guards remarked (as he gazed over the full bike rack) that "these vehicles are the only ones making any sense these days."

I didn't hear too many people making that type of remark a few years ago.

Of course, some of this is just a knee-jerk reaction to a scary (for some) situation. I'm sure a lot of folks will think the same as the guard, but very few of them will resort to cycling to work.

What is more likely, though, is that for the young people, the image of a household with 1,2 or 3 autos will seem like squandering excess. Many of those young people will resort to hoofing it or bicycling just to keep up with their lust for tiny electronic devices. (Like the iPod, which keeps you in your own world even if you are on the bus.)

If you have room, I'd consider a few piglets too.

One problem with growing animals in a suburb is that you have to feed them something. This means you have to truck food from somewhere. If you wanted to be self-sufficient, it would probably be easier if you replaced the pig with a soy-bean crop.

This cartoon was on the front page of the local newspaper this morning.

http://data.desmoinesregister.com/duffy/cartoons/0601DUFFY.gif

While it's further evidence of the car free lifestyle hitting the mainstream, the Des Moines Register has been pretty pro-bike over the years. They started RAGBRAI event back in the 1970s I think.

Well, if they get too insecure, they can always hang some plastic testicles from their trailer hitch...

I should hang them from the back of my rack....wow, that'd look really cool.....

What I don't have a plan for is food costs when those eventually respond fully to fuel prices.

I'm worried about that one, too. Talk about sh*t hitting the fan, especially in poorer countries....

Jim Borgman, Cincinnati Enquirer May 13, 2008:

http://borgman.enquirer.com/cartoons/2008/05/100056tn590.jpg

Check to see if your town or city has an ordinance for keeping and processing live chickens. Back in the day, my family use to have chickens and quails running around our gated yard. We always had fresh eggs...mmmm...and on special occasions real fresh fried chicken and quail.
You just have to get past the bleeding, the rest is very similar to cleaning out fish.



Just heard about this on Good Food:
http://www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/gf/gf080531a_fly_in_your_soup_n

And fortunately, we did all have a plan. What I don't have a plan for is food costs when those eventually respond fully to fuel prices.

When I was a kid, we had a huge vegetable garden in the yard. Of course we were on a farm, so we had lots of natural fertilizer available for our use too. Potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, squash, beans, onions, pumpkins, sweet corn, cabbage, lettuce, asparagus, and others that don't spring to mind right now..

Even when we moved into the city, we still had a (smaller) vegetable garden.

On the subject of gardens and rising food costs: if you don't have land, put the land in pots on your porch! I literally at this moment have the following list growing on my deck in containers - an initial cost of around $50 for seeds, starter plants, soil, and pots, combined with a $10 vacuum zip-lock kit from the grocery for freezing some of the harvest later in the year. $1 for a box of pasta, $3 for a box of rice, $6-10 for bulk frozen meat or protein, and you'll have meals for several weeks at a time - fraction of what you're already spending at the grocery for these things. :

Broccoli, carrots, green pole beans, summer squash, 2 kinds of tomatoes, cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, brussel sprouts, carrots (needs a 12" deep pot), green bell pepper, strawberries, baby watermelon, 2 kinds of onion, dill, rosemary, cilantro, chives, basil, and mixed salad greens - all in simple pots in potting soil.

Just pot, water, sun, protect from hail and wind - and you can have a continuous bounty.

Not that you car-liters aren't already hip to that, but just offering my experience to the folks who might not have thought their porch could turn into their new fridge. Still time yet to plant for summer harvesting.

I have noticed that showing up at work with a bicycle earns a little more respect lately. It's the big truck and SUV owners who are starting to get a little uncertain and even defensive.

Having a bike gives everyone the impression that you've seen all this coming and you've had a plan.


+1

One problem with growing animals in a suburb is that you have to feed them something. This means you have to truck food from somewhere. If you wanted to be self-sufficient, it would probably be easier if you replaced the pig with a soy-bean crop.
A friend was just describing how her grandmother grew one pig at a time in small yard in a city. The pig ate scraps and other stuff that the grandmother could get for it. The grandmother apparently had a theory that a happy pig grows bigger so took good care of it until butcher time. Anyway the pig was a part of the garbage disposal system. I've seen this in other cities in south asia where the urban cows graze on the corner garbage piles and convert the garbage into stove fuel or maybe some of the manure also goes to the vegetable gardens too. It makes sense that urban animals be tightly integrated into the urban ecology so you don't have to "truck food from somewhere".