I owned my car outright. I sold it in part because it was wasteful. I saved a ton just by avoiding insurance and maintenance. I haven't driven to work on even a semi-regular basis for more than ten years. Adding parking to insurance, gas and maintenance just has never been worth it. This "gift" to a poor (or even modest-income) person is a true money-sucking white elephant.

I understand the need to safegaurd transit against terrorism to some small degree. However it was just one attack and it's a big country with many prejudiced eyes watching any of colour and voting to make a situation where only another McVeigh could succeed in another attack.

But at least it provided something for them to talk about, and allowed many closet racists to justify themselves loudly in bars right?

The only thing I've changed since then about my life is that I try to route flights over or around the states to avoid standing in line. (Proud American, to proud to worry unneccesarily)

The transporation infrastucture can hardly handle the number of cars on the road. From my experience living north of San Fransisco, the difference between sitting on the highway, not moving, and sailing through, in the ever present thick traffic, was mighty few cars.

Encouraging more cars can have amazingly high financial cost( in the need for adding highway lanes), create gobs of pollution, and contribute to the decreased livability of neighborhoods. Is Peterm5365 really saying that lightrail should be avoided, because it makes cities too nice? If lightrail does make a city more livable, it should be spread over the entire city, so that the cost of housing is not jacked up around one or two lines.

No, actually I'm an ardent supporter of public transit. I ride the train daily and choose where I live based on proximity to public transit. I was mostly being contrary. Light rail is a good investment for many more reasons than the fact that it brings urban revitalization. It uses less right of way than cars and has a much greater lifespan. Initial build cost is lower than subway and it pollutes less than buses. It's really a shame that GM scrapped all the old trolleys so they could sell more buses.

My point was really that economic prosperity may benefit the town and bring in more wealth, but it does not improve the lot of the people it displaces. Ask yourself how they were able to get right of way for a 20 some mile light rail in the most densely populated areas of the most densely populated state. The land was cheap because it was neglected for decades while it slipped into decline. Once it's filled with the poor you swoop in and push them out because no one cares about them anyway. You declare imminent domain and then developers come in and make a fortune off what was cheap real estate around the area.

And yes, they have fixed these areas up and cleaned up a ton of pollution to do it, but if these areas hadn't been neglected for so long they never would have gotten to that point in the first place.

I agree, poor people buying cars to get to work, is stupid. How many additional hours, would one need to work, to pay the difference between owning and opperating a car, and taking public transportation, on $17/ hr?

This is America. Public transport hardly gets you anywhere, and even if it does it may not get you there on time anyway. Most importantly, having a car makes the a huge difference in finding a better job, a safer home, fitting in some additional education, and having access to many other things. If you don't need a car count yourself lucky, because most people do whether they like it or not.

With 100,000 $5000 cars, it is statistically impossible for them all to fail at the same time. Compare that to a rail system that suffers a derailment or equipment/power failure.

Again: mass transit systems merit subsidies only to the extent that they reduce transportation costs elsewhere. Rarely do they do so.


100,000 $5000 cars create a lot of pollution, use a lot of extra pavement, and encourage a lot of people to live even further from work. I would love to live where rail was an option, after spending so many hours sitting in cars and busses stuck on roadways clogged with 100,000 $5000 cars all going to the same place at the same time. (Wow did bus travel improve tremendously when those HOV lanes opened up)

This is America. Public transport hardly gets you anywhere, and even if it does it may not get you there on time anyway. Most importantly, having a car makes the a huge difference in finding a better job, a safer home, fitting in some additional education, and having access to many other things. If you don't need a car count yourself lucky, because most people do whether they like it or not.
Few city people need cars. If you work downtown or on a busline, you can take the bus. If you chose to live away from the bus line, that's your fault. I challenge you to name a major city in which there is no affordable housing somewhere along a busline. The only person who "needs" a car for a job is someone who works in one suburb and works in another. Even then, they should look to see if their tranportation costs would make taking a closer job worthwhile.

Few city people need cars. If you work downtown or on a busline, you can take the bus. If you chose to live away from the bus line, that's your fault. I challenge you to name a major city in which there is no affordable housing somewhere along a busline. The only person who "needs" a car for a job is someone who works in one suburb and works in another. Even then, they should look to see if their tranportation costs would make taking a closer job worthwhile.

You're making a LOT of assumptions there, Mr. Sanctimonious. Many people don't have the luxury of picking-and-choosing where they live, work, shop, go to school, etc. Some of us are lucky to have any job at all, much less trying to get to something better. (Speaking as somebody recently unemployed for over a year, who had to move to the middle of nowhere to find work) A LOT of factory, warehouse, construction and even office jobs are located out in the boonies because real estate and taxes are cheap. Sometimes affordable housing is not close to where you work, and sometimes where you work changes frequently enough that relocating doesn't make sense anyway. Those of us with some money to spare and a stable job can afford to be picky, but not everyone has that luxury. You have no moral authority to preach to poor people about how they should pass up good opportunities to satisfy your pet transportation agenda.

This is America. Public transport hardly gets you anywhere, and even if it does it may not get you there on time anyway. Most importantly, having a car makes the a huge difference in finding a better job, a safer home, fitting in some additional education, and having access to many other things. If you don't need a car count yourself lucky, because most people do whether they like it or not.
However, the original story was about Portland, Oregon, which has an excellent bus and light rail transit system, so your generalizations don't apply to the specifics of the discussion at hand.

However, the original story was about Portland, Oregon, which has an excellent bus and light rail transit system, so your generalizations don't apply to the specifics of the discussion at hand.

Throughout the entire extent of the metro area, even beyond the burbs, with frequent connections to all points? That would be sweet, but I'm skeptical. I did a 3.5 hour round-trip bus commute for a few months once (vs. 1 hour by car), and I can tell you it was a real drag. Fortunately I was a 20-something with nothing better to do at the time.

Throughout the entire extent of the metro area, even beyond the burbs, with frequent connections to all points? That would be sweet, but I'm skeptical.
Not 100%, but mostly the answer is yes. Anyway, if you don't own a car, you should plan accordingly and living somewhere that is well-served by the transit system, and not somewhere the bus doesn't run, DUH!

Not 100%, but mostly the answer is yes. Anyway, if you don't own a car, you should plan accordingly and living somewhere that is well-served by the transit system, and not somewhere the bus doesn't run, DUH!

That would severely limit your employment opportunities, DUH! A lot of people don't have much choice where they live, DUH! A lot of people have workplaces which aren't fixed, DUH! The imaginary Armchair Utopia in your head is not the place a lot of people have to deal with to make a living.

You're a slave to America's car culture.

You're making a LOT of assumptions there, Mr. Sanctimonious. Many people don't have the luxury of picking-and-choosing where they live, work, shop, go to school, etc. Some of us are lucky to have any job at all, much less trying to get to something better. (Speaking as somebody recently unemployed for over a year, who had to move to the middle of nowhere to find work) A LOT of factory, warehouse, construction and even office jobs are located out in the boonies because real estate and taxes are cheap. Sometimes affordable housing is not close to where you work, and sometimes where you work changes frequently enough that relocating doesn't make sense anyway. Those of us with some money to spare and a stable job can afford to be picky, but not everyone has that luxury. You have no moral authority to preach to poor people about how they should pass up good opportunities to satisfy your pet transportation agenda.

he chokes up, Ryan gets his signal,, the windup, A SWING AND A MISS! good effort though. The miss was city, as in city people. People who live in suburbs aren't city people. They may go there to work or party, but they are suburbanites. He also said Few city people, cities have lots, still leaves room for the many who have no choices that they haven't investigated.

You're a slave to America's car culture.

That's hilarious, considering how I've been living for the last 15 years. If you ever manage to get a clue, hang it around your neck and don't lose it because it's probably the last one you'll ever have.

As for the ragheads, they may do what they may do. ...

WTF?!

I was enjoying the relative rarity of a civil political discussion on an internet forum until I happened upon this post.

Perhaps if you want to be taken seriously, instead of just being written off as a raving "winger', you should avoid patently offensive, and racist terms like "raghead". I realize that in some circles hatred of brown people of middle eastern descent is currently in vogue, but I didn't think it was here.

-Trevor

Don't bother, he/she/it is obviously a "raving winger", and probably proud of it.

I don't know... all these talk about freedom with cars come with too high a price. First there's an up front cost of owning the vehicle. Then there's the maintenance of them, the roads, building highway systems to accomodate more cars, dealing with pollution, traffic lights, spending large amount of space for transportation infrastructure, destroy the mood in gridlocks, accidents, overhead in administrative work on road tax, staff cost for traffic police, etcetc.

While a well-established mass transit gives you the same amount of freedom. In Seoul, one can go anywhere from anywhere just by using subways. The bus lines are online and helps you determine the bus you need to take/change to get to a destination and are sometimes better than subways. I can even sleep half-sleep in a bus/subway. No traffic laws to deal with, accidents to caution against, weather to worry about. That's freedom to me. But that only happens when there's a high enough demand for them. So it's a chicken and egg thing.

Car ownership can be important. But if a mass transportation that takes you anywhere you want exists, would you rather take it? Or are Americans so individualistic they shun the idea of sharing the same space as others? One can say it's an irony that an individualistic society depends on one another so much on self-assurance, if car ownership is one of the ways to judge a person's status. Just look at the car ads.

In the short term, cars solve the problem. In the medium term, the coexistance is a must and mass transit should be encouraged. In the long term, all will be dead. In the very long term, our kids will benefit from this. Right now no one cares, because our ancestors didn't.

actually, around a hundred years ago, Henry Ford had the dream of producing a car cheap enough that every family in America could own one. Individualism, independance and freedom of the open road are some of the defining values of the American way of life.

In a perfect world, workers would be able to find employment near their homes and be paid a living wage. In reality, millions of Americans work for poverty wages at hard to find jobs far from their homes, jobs in areas unserved by public transit.

Many of us on this board are lucky enough to have work within bike commuting distance; and many have the option of driving when the weather is foul. If you live in a city, or major metropolitian area, commuting is usually easy and convenient.

If you live in rural america, and commute to the next county, or the next state for work, bikes or buses or trains won't work.

I'm all for increased public transit, and more people on bikes. But these anwsers don't work in many places for many people.

I don't think there's an easy anwser to breaking the cycle of poverty in this country.

he chokes up, Ryan gets his signal,, the windup, A SWING AND A MISS! good effort though. The miss was city, as in city people. People who live in suburbs aren't city people. They may go there to work or party, but they are suburbanites. He also said Few city people, cities have lots, still leaves room for the many who have no choices that they haven't investigated.
This is basically my point. I did not say that no one needs a car. But a lot fewer people need one than say they do. A lot of people who say they need a car either haven't thought through alternatives or just like the status of driving to work.

And again, I carefully limited what I was saying to people living in cities. Rural and some suburban areas are a whole different question.

If you live in rural america, and commute to the next county, or the next state for work, bikes or buses or trains won't work.

I'm all for increased public transit, and more people on bikes. But these anwsers don't work in many places for many people.




Well, I think some of the argument of bike/car/bus/rail etc is misplaced. What we really need is a diversified transportation system, using whatever form of transit is cheapest/most convenient at each point of transport. This may be planes, rail, or interstate trucking for long distances (goods, as well as people). For short distances, depending on the layout of the community, cars, bikes, buses are likely all to be needed.

And similarly, I would encourage some changes to be made simply for economic/budgetary reasons [new highways are expensive, etc...] and others simply for lifestyle reasons [walking and biking are more healthy, etc etc.

Given all these crosscutting forces, it is hard for me to come down on any ONE transport method as good, bad, etc.

roughstuff

I have to give the City of Portland kudos for trying to think outside the box. They could have just waited until she had no job and then thrown money at the problem in the form of welfare checks and food vouchers. Instead, they took a pro-active approach. I can't knock that.

Well, if you choose to live at the hub of the hub-and-spoke system, it does make public transit feasible. That's one of my reasons for living in Downtown...

I'm going to turn this around a little and say that if you ever donate your used vehicle to charity for a tax deduction, it probably gets fixed up and put to this use - thousands and thousands of old cars across the nation.

Forget that! How much money does a $1000 dollar tax deduction save me? Because I know that a midsize will get me $100 cash at teh scrapyard and I get to watch them crush it too!

Well, if you choose to live at the hub of the hub-and-spoke system, it does make public transit feasible. That's one of my reasons for living in Downtown...

Downtown or "Uptown"? Or Dinkytown? Or maybe you live in the famed Ghetto In The Sky? :) Spent so many hours riding the 2, 3 and 16...and that slow-arse bus to White Bear...

-- The time I used to spend waiting for and riding buses was used for... OK America, here is the "R" word...
I spent that time [4 hours?] R E A D I N G.
Do you read Chinese and Japanese? My son does. He's got translator status at Disneyworld, where he's interned for two years now. He works, goes to school, studies, reads, and somehow, he has a social life.

I guess you think he is Superman and doesn't need to sleep at all. Sure thing, bud.

I forgot to say one thing:

When you get to be 65+, you will do what makes life better for you, and you won't give a damn what 20 year-olds say about it.

Downtown or "Uptown"? Or Dinkytown? Or maybe you live in the famed Ghetto In The Sky? :) Spent so many hours riding the 2, 3 and 16...and that slow-arse bus to White Bear...

Nope, Downtown Minneapolis.

I now ride the 3, 16, 50, and Hiawatha Light Rail line pretty much on a daily basis. I also use the 17 and 18 to get around Downtown more quickly.

I'm going to turn this around a little and say that if you ever donate your used vehicle to charity for a tax deduction, it probably gets fixed up and put to this use - thousands and thousands of old cars across the nation.


Actually most of the time, the vehicle is never even handled by the charity. They have a deal with a dealership who manages the sale. The charity gets the cash after the car is sold.

I dont want to come off as suppporting americas car culture, and think there are probably better solutions to issues like the one stated in the article, but think there are some things that need to be considered. First, Public transportation works great for city resicents if you happen to live in the right parts of town, work in the right parts of town, and have access to things like groccery stores in your neighborhod. But this isnt the case for everyone. It costs too much for many people to live ion neighborhoods with access to those things.
Why not promote commuting by bike instead of car? Sounds resonable to you and me, but maybe not for the mother or father who has to get their kids to daycare in the morning before work, there isnt anywhere in their neighborhood to take them, and their low wage service industry employer sure as hell aint going to provide it. It also calls for a major behavioral change on a large segment of the population. Its a lot easier to buy a couple of people cars, then to convince everyone that they dont need them.
For the city/state/federal government or who ever is supplying the money, the car grant makes sense. But its typical bandaid solution to major structural issues in our society.

I dont want to rant, but I would recomend reading some of the writings of William Julius Wilson. He's a sociologist who has done a lot of work on issues of concentrated poverty, and the life of the urban poor in america. His book "When Work Disappears" is full of information on subjects like this, and its not too acedemic of a read.

I just read through this thread, and gotta add my 2 cents. First, Oregon is not Jersey. I've lived on both coasts, the midwest, and now Australia. You can get around someplace like New York or NJ with public transport, and never need a car. When I lived in Missouri, it was an hour drive to buy groceries. I had to drive an hour to work, one way, as there were no jobs nearby. You can't compare these kinds of places until you've lived there.

Which leads me to my next observation. Anyone remember when the bus drivers went on strike in L.A.? Remember seeing the Mexican house cleaners and laborers interviewed? No way to get to work, no groceries. Simple as that. Hard to argue that they wouldn't have been better off with a car.

My wife turns 39 tomorrow. She's never had a license. Public transport is that good in Australia. I lasted a week before I bought a car here. We ride our bikes everywhere, but that's not an option when it comes to taking kids to the doctors, or buying a new BBQ. Even NYC doesn't have public transport as convenient as it is here.

I haven't seen the tax laws regarding vehicles over 6,000lb GVW, but I'm sure the IRS was not issuing checks to doctors or lawyers. I'm guessing they allowed a tax deduction for vehicles over that weight, in order to help out owners of commercial vehicles. If I'm wrong, someone please cite the relevant tax code.

On a final note, it's nice to see a heated discussion without animosity. Guess that's because it wasn't something we all hold near and dear, like chain lube or helmets.

[edit] My next move will probably be to Utah. With snow expected for 4 or 5 months of the year, I'd like to hear how others commute by bike in the snow.

"The program, funded with federal transportation dollars"

Where can I check off the box to not fund anything like this? I swear America is one giant socialist cesspool but no one can admit it.

Let's see: money being siphoned out of federal budget to increase profits for automakers and car dealers.

That's not socialism, that's fascism (or corporatism).

Let's see: money being siphoned out of federal budget to increase profits for automakers and car dealers.

That's not socialism, that's fascism (or corporatism).

Hmmm. Low interest loans to benefit low income earners. Average loan $2,500.00 for 40-60 people. Politicians abuse their franking privilege for more than that a year. $150,000 is about 1 day of construction on any public transportation project. I won't be losing any sleep. The US government has pissed away much larger amounts on absolutely worthless projects and studies.

Hmmm. Low interest loans to benefit low income earners. Average loan $2,500.00 for 40-60 people. Politicians abuse their franking privilege for more than that a year. $150,000 is about 1 day of construction on any public transportation project. I won't be losing any sleep. The US government has pissed away much larger amounts on absolutely worthless projects and studies.

You're right of course. This isn't large enough in scope for anyone to start going Chicken Little.

And about the rebates on SUVs, yes, it was a tax deduction for "small businesses." It applied to a heavier weight of vehicle and encouraged the wealthy who could take advantage of it to buy larger, more wasteful vehicles. If you bought a $50,000 H2, for instance, you paid $50,000 less in taxes that year. If you bought a small SUV, you got no deduction. IIRC, the maximum rebate was $80k.

In essesnce, the federal government would pay for your new SUV.

This was only a freebie for those "small businesses" who were paying at least that much in taxes, however.

You're right of course. This isn't large enough in scope for anyone to start going Chicken Little.

And about the rebates on SUVs, yes, it was a tax deduction for "small businesses." It applied to a heavier weight of vehicle and encouraged the wealthy who could take advantage of it to buy larger, more wasteful vehicles. If you bought a $50,000 H2, for instance, you paid $50,000 less in taxes that year. If you bought a small SUV, you got no deduction. IIRC, the maximum rebate was $80k.

In essesnce, the federal government would pay for your new SUV.

This was only a freebie for those "small businesses" who were paying at least that much in taxes, however.

I doubt you paid $50k less in taxes. Generally a tax deduction allows you to deduct that amount from your taxable income. A $50k loan over 5 years in the higher tax bracket might net someone a tax savings of $4k per year. Not big compared to all the other things a good account can find for you.

Back to Ken Lay, I suppose not too many people posting on here actually have a mortgage. The last time I did my taxes, the federal government only allowed you to deduct the interest on your primary residence. He paid plenty of property tax. Of course, he paid for it with stolen money, much like the properties that he bought. *******!

I doubt you paid $50k less in taxes. Generally a tax deduction allows you to deduct that amount from your taxable income. A $50k loan over 5 years in the higher tax bracket might net someone a tax savings of $4k per year. Not big compared to all the other things a good account can find for you.

This is much juicier than $4k a year. You get an initial kickback and then the remainder comes trickling back over the next five years.

Free SUV.

Here's how the SUV tax break works:

Suppose a business owner wants to purchase a $45,000 luxury SUV for use in his business. He or she could write off $24,000 of the cost under section 179 of the tax code as accelerated depreciation. Then the buyer could write off additional depreciation of the remaining $21,000 under a five-year schedule -- 20 percent, or $4,200, in the first year.

That's a total $28,200 tax write-off.

The balance of the vehicle could be written off over the next five years. A more expensive large vehicle, like a Mercedes E-class SUV, a Range Rover or a BMW X5, would qualify for an even greater tax break.

The break for trucks got bigger this year under a schedule Congress adopted in 1996 when businesses could claim $17,500 in accelerated depreciation on equipment.

That lump sum increased to $20,000 last year. It went up to $24,000 this year. Next year and thereafter the deduction will be $25,000.

link (http://www.detnews.com/2002/autosinsider/0212/18/c01-38875.htm)

Thanks for the helpful link. I'm not sure if you understand or not, but that amount is not off your taxes due. It's a deduction taken off your taxable income. Self employed people get screwed with higher taxes to begin with, but that's not a huge amount of saving by any means. If you're making $100k/year, your taxable income income gets reduced by that $24k the first year. You may be saving up to 30% of that figure the first year, which isn't too bad, but the remaining 5 years won't be a big deal. In the end, you've saved on taxes in order to own a rapidly depreciating, expensive to insure, thirsty, hard to park piece of crap. I say let the w@nkers have their tax break.

[edit] I don't know how current these figures are, but here's US tax brackets:

Above US$62,450 31%
Above US$130,250 36%
Above US$283,250 39.6%

I've assumed that if you make less than $62k, you're not buying a $45k SUV. Above $283k you're paying about $100k in taxes before your accountant starts looking for deductions to reduce your taxable income, so that $9,300 they save is only 10% of their taxes. I hate taxes. My accountant was the best!

Mrs Cromwell would do well to attempt to find work in her area. She's already a low wage earner, if she found herself a low wage close to home it would dramatically reduce her expenses while allowing her more time to find a way out of her situation or at the least make it a more pleasant situation to become accustomed to.

Poor folks in the US often live in places with few job opportunities. Think about it. If there were good jobs there, the housing would be more valuable and poor folks couldn't afford it.

The top tax rate is now 35%, Expat...good clarification about the deduction, but it is still a masively abused tax credit here. I see Hummer2s and other obnoxiously large SUV's driven in town by people that have no useful purpose owning one except ego compensation.

You know the story of the elephant and the mouse, right? A mouse is walking through the forest when he hears an elephant yelling for help. Turns out the elephant fell into a hole, and couldn't get out. The mouse tells him to wait there, while he runs home and gets his Hummer. He ties a sturdy rope to the front bumper, and pulls the elephant out. They're best buddies after that. A few months later, the elephant is walking through the forest, and hears his friend the mouse yelling for help. Turns out the mouse fell in a hole. The elephant walks up to hole, turns around, and drops his sexual organ into the hole for the mouse to climp up.

Moral of the story? If you have a big one, you don't need a Hummer.


[note] edited for content on a public forum

I've been a driver and busser and a biker. I can understand the outrage on the part of the bicycle crowd. Sure, no one wants more cars on the road. Look at it this way, though. In this area the price for a three-zone bus ride is over four dollars. That's each way. Three zones would get me from my home in Surrey into Vancouver. Since that's well less than an hour's riide, I'm going to assume Mrs C goes at least that far. With the current gas prices, I could probably get there and back for about five bucks.

A few years ago we had a bus strike that lasted from April first until the end of summer. There was one before it, in '84 that was just about as long. Then there's the times the driver doesn't see you or the bus is full or has been in an accident or - well, you get the idea.

Mrs C is fifty-seven, right? Don't assume that gets her an automatic seat on the bus. If she's on a busy route I'll bet she ends up standing often as not. Then there's the wait for the bus. It may be cold, wet, dark, but she'll be out there until the thing shows up.

Personally, I'd vote for repairing her old car and making it as pollution free as possible.

"Cromwell's trip to work, which used to take thirty minutes by car, stretched to as much as two hours by bus."

I just took another look at the article and read the whole thread. It sounds to me like her commute is two hours each way. That sounds more like it for fifteen miles. Figure in all the stops, rush hour slowdowns and the wait for the bus to actually show up, plus very likely a roundabout route through the neighbourhoods.

I'm just curious. Does anyone know how much are the monthly payments on the $2,500 upper limit of the loans? I'm thinking probably around a hundred bucks, or less. Let's see, around here the bus would cost, um, about $160.00 a month. That's assuming of course that she just goes to work and back without doing anything on weekends or stopping long enough to actually shop, which would probably make her ticket expire, forcing her to buy another one.

I'm a little curious also about why anyone thinks it's easy to pull up stakes and move. The lady is fifty-seven, right? Given the "marry young, buy a house" culture of the Sixties, I'd say it's a pretty safe bet she's in a house that's been paid off for the last ten years or so. Why would she want to move?

"I just took another look at the article and read the whole thread. It sounds to me like her commute is two hours each way. That sounds more like it for fifteen miles. Figure in all the stops, rush hour slowdowns and the wait for the bus to actually show up, plus very likely a roundabout route through the neighbourhoods.



Good work, zoogirl. This post and your previous one make several points about buses which account for their poor patronage except as an act of desperation.

(1) They are awkward, oversized vehicles that almost always have standard instead of automatic transmissions and thus waste fuel during their frequent stops and starts.

(2) Buses get stuck in the same traffic jams as cars do. Would you rather be standing on a bus or sitting in your own vehicle while in a jam?

(3) Bus schedules are for the convenience of the buses, not the passengers.

(4) Since they have to go to the curb to drop off passengers, buses cut into bike lanes and shoulders more often than almost all the other vehicles combined. Nor do passengers look for bicycles when they cross in front of the bus after debing discharged.

(5) unlike cars which are parked during working and non-peak hours, buses run all day filled with much less than capacity during non-peak hours, belching fumes into the air the entire time. It reminds me of the old joke..."whats worse than a car with only one passenger? A bus with only two passengers."

roughstuff

Forget the poor- let 'em fend for themselves. In fact, I think we should put all non-bicyclists in camps. The real issue is how to get the government to subsidize MY life, so I would not have to work.

A hypothetical but realistic and common scenerio:

I'm a single parent. My job is 20 minutes away and two miles off a bus line. I need to drop off my child at 7:30 at the daycare center and then haul ass to make it to work by 8:00. I finish work at 5:00, have to pick her up by 5:30 and then go grocery shopping before I can go home.

And you're telling me that I don't NEED a car?

Forget the poor- let 'em fend for themselves. In fact, I think we should put all non-bicyclists in camps. The real issue is how to get the government to subsidize MY life, so I would not have to work.

Move to Australia.

[QUOTE=zoogirl
I'm just curious. Does anyone know how much are the monthly payments on the $2,500 upper limit of the loans? I'm thinking probably around a hundred bucks, or less. Let's see, around here the bus would cost, um, about $160.00 a month. That's assuming of course that she just goes to work and back without doing anything on weekends or stopping long enough to actually shop, which would probably make her ticket expire, forcing her to buy another one.

I'm a little curious also about why anyone thinks it's easy to pull up stakes and move. The lady is fifty-seven, right? Given the "marry young, buy a house" culture of the Sixties, I'd say it's a pretty safe bet she's in a house that's been paid off for the last ten years or so. Why would she want to move?[/QUOTE]


I'm glad you bought the thread back to it's original topic.

We have monthly bus cards where for $60.00 bucks a month, you have an unlimited number of rides. I have a $53.00 dollar light rail ticket and I probably use it every day of the month. Seriously. I'm sure there might be something like this provided by her transit company.

The loan or it's interest is not Cromwell's problem but her low income compounded by the fact that she's paying for unaffordable motorcar transport. You can give her the loan but eventually, she will need to replace the car and with what money?

I doubt she has a home because an equity loan would easily solve this problem. During college, I'd see many seniors just like her buying cat food all the time because "they used to feed strays" was the story they'd tell me. Folks. They were eating the stuff! There are millions of poor seniors living today right on the edge with little or no pensions and Cromwell is one of them. I suspect this poor womans' transportation costs exceed 15 to 20 percent of income.

It's sad to think my public transportation costs of $93.00 dollars per month is far less than Cromwell who is earning less! I could buy a new car with cash from all the savings I've accumulated over the past several years from not having to support secondary transportation costs.

Poor folks in the US often live in places with few job opportunities. Think about it. If there were good jobs there, the housing would be more valuable and poor folks couldn't afford it.

There are loads of opportunities in Boston, New York, Chicago, London, Paris etc. Yet, there are loads of poor people living in these very expensive cities with many opportunities and good paying jobs. It's people like Cromwell who are poor with little education, no skills and living in places with few opportunities that have problems.

Ok, I don't know how many of you are actually listening to yourselves as you are spouting all this garbage about public transportation but I don't buy it for a second. Now unless you've never been "poor working-class" people like myself and my family and friends are, then I don't want to hear how we don't deserve a break every now and then (whether it be in the form of money, a brand new car, or some education). Being poor isn't something I would wish on anyone, it's a curse of the worst kind and can't always be resolved with a snap of your fingers. You constantly have to worry about whether your car is going to make it one more day so you won't lose the job that provides your very existence (because let's face it, I'd rather drive myself to work than get mugged or raped while waiting for a bus or taxi to pick me up), about how you're going to feed your family each week, about who is going to get sick and how you'll manage to get them to the doctor if they do get sick, and how your bills are all going to get paid so you're not sitting in the dark for weeks at a time. And I don't ever want to hear people say that all "working-class poor" people are UNEDUCATED. I know a lot of very educated people, that because of circumstances beyond their control (as is my situation), are in the same situation as me and every other poor person on this planet. I, myself, am very highly educated and could get just about any job that I want. There are many factors to consider before downing on a person about not being able to improve their living situations. You have to factor in such things as race (because it plays a part in everything whether you want it to or not), you have to figure in weight (because there are employers that won't hire a fat or ugly person because it's "not good for business"), and you have to figure in where in the country people are living (because there are some states where economic factors play a major role in determining how much a person is going to be able to make). Take Florida for example (since it's been hit pretty hard economically lately), with all the hurricanes hitting there and all the businesses being destroyed those people that had jobs have now lost them and pretty much everything they've ever owned. Are you going to say that those people don't deserve some help? I don't think so, they didn't ask for those hurricanes to come along and blow away their entire lives. And take these people that literally have years of college training behind them, but because of economic problems (namely money matters) they were unable to get those little pieces of paper stating that they know what they are doing. You know what happens then? They don't get those good jobs that they are more than qualified for (they go to people who are way less qualified to do them) and now have to work at McDonald's or Burger King. Well, I'm sorry, just because a person wasn't born a millionaire or owns their own damned oil wells doesn't make that person less deserving of some help once in a while. I say we stop giving all these damned millionaires all the help and start working on helping out our "poor" people so that we can all have a good quality of life. I guarantee that if there were less poor people there would be less crime because nobody would be trying to kill someone just so they can have what that person has. Wake up people! We are a byproduct of "rich" folks in this country. Everything that we do has to be dictated by what those millionaires do. Well, again I'm sorry, I'm an individual and I will be damned before I let my life be dictated by those people more fortunate than myself. Who are any of you to say that just because you make more money than me (or are so well off that you can show off your wealth by not owning a vehicle) that you are 1) more educated than me, 2) better than me, or 3) a luckier person than me. Guess what? You're no better than me or anyone else. Get your ego out of the way and wake up and realize that we are all human. No one is perfect! I don't care if they own a hundred cars or none. A car is a luxury that everyone in this country should be able to enjoy. I don't know anyone that can actually say that he/she enjoys waiting around in the steaming heat or the blistering cold or the drowning rain for some crusty, nasty taxi driver or some overcrowded, unsafe bus to come and pick you up. If you are saying that, than you need to quit lying to yourself and wake up and smell the roses. There is no such thing anymore as safe public transportation. I hear stories everyday from all over the country of people being robbed, mugged, raped, or murdered on public transportation. Stop being so blind to the real situation here. I mean, Jesus.

Nice rant. Notice everyone else gave up on this thread 6 1/2 months ago?