L.L. Zamenhof

This is something I struggle with constantly.

I've only driven my car 103 miles in the last 107 days, so I'm good there. But sometimes I don't know if I just want to reduce the number of miles I've driven, or put as many miles on the bike as possible.

scroca

I just drive when I need to, but never to work. So my car driving miles are strictly weekend errands.

aggiegrads

Great question! I ride as many trips as possible, but try not to feel guilty when I drive.

I have found that if I make an effort to ride to work every day, that I either do more errands by bike, or I combine errands when I do them by car. Biking has a synergistic effect in reducing car usage not just because I am biking more, but because biking more forces me to use my car more efficiently.

robyr

I went through this debate with myself as well. I ended up selling my car. For the times where a larger vehicle really would help, I just rent a truck from Lowes/Home Depot. When i need to go long distances I take the busses or Amtrak. Our public transport really sucks, and no light rail, but I have made it work thus far. The biggest issue I have run in to is I have to plan my trips, since Amtrak's schedule is really really weak. The only train that runs to the nearest large city runs at like 10:30PM, which is fine since the only time I need to go there is to visit my aging parents.

All in all, getting rid of my car has forced me to think out of the box, especially in a smaller southern town like the one I live in.

Scooby214

My goal it to replace a minimum of one full gas tank worth of commuting by car with commuting by bicycle. I am fortunate enough to do more than that most months, though there are many days during the school year that I have to drive. I have a middle school child that at times has to be dropped off at school early, and doing so prohibits me from cycling on those days.

Lately, I am finding more opportunities to use the utility bike for errands. Those stop-and-go short errands, when driven by car, seem to eat up quite a bit of fuel.

jeffpoulin

My goal is to put more miles on my bike than I do on my car. It's an easy goal, though. Last year, I rode 5 times more miles than I drove.

vaultbrad

I just like being on my bike more than being in the car.

jdgesus 

for us, its just the parking hassle, so we ride most everywhere, all year.
i just love being on teh bike anyway

surfrider

I live in the Southern California/Los Angeles area where 'alternate commuting' programs are required by bigger employers to help reduce air pollution. One of the incentives of bike-commuting is gift cards to local stores - the more days you ride, the more $$$ in gift cards you get. Maximum you can get in gift cards in one year is about $300; not a huge amount, but great to keep me in bike parts or even buy groceries!

FWIW: I've lived in the L.A. area almost my whole life, and even though the population has doubled, the air pollution has been cut almost in half. Biggest air polluter is still private automobiles, so bike commuting helps keep it down.

exile

No.

No.

I guess its not really an "either/or" question for me.

travelmama

I don't struggle with it but I am aware of what I do and how I do it. Since I swim several days per week in addition to cycling, I drive to the pool only because the roads are open and many speed through them. I sometimes will go by bike but it depends on the weather, winds and how I am feeling. Whenever I am in the car, I try to make as many stops as possible to justify driving because most errands are local and can be ridden to.

jpatkinson

When I start bicycle commuting on July 18, I will be ending a 5.5 year-long 13 mile SUV commute @ 16 miles per gallon with a 2 mile bicycle commute (new job location!). For me, replacing an hour in the car with twenty minutes on the bicycle is all that matters. I have no intention of keeping track of my my mileage on the bicycle, FWIW.

azesty

Havent had a care since the start of 2007 when I moved to Korea. After a couple of years living in Seoul, I now live in Chengdu. Both are large cities (20 and 11 million) and as such are fairly compact. I have walking access to a couple of supermarkets, many restaurants and bars. When I need a car it is a cab or I can rent anything bigger with a driver easily.

z

irwin7638

When gas passed the $2 mark permanently,I decided to drive only when absolutely necessary, started passing my annual mileage goals in June, threw the computer away and quit worrying about it.

Marc

CCrew

I keep track. I shoot for 250 miles a week on the bike which still has me a touch beyond that in the car. I don't beat myself up if it swings one way or the other though. At 84 miles door to door on the commute and a bike trail that runs 45 of that I have a lot of options.

Hippiebrian

I don't keep track of/care how many miles I bike.

I started all of this thinking that if I could do it by bike or walking, I wouldn't drive or ride the motorcycle. After several months (7 actually) of not moving the truck or motorcycles, I finally realized I can do most anything I want without them, so I canned them. I figure now, if something comes up, I can rent. It hasn't happened yet, but it is an option...

MNBikeguy

I keep it simple. No cycle computer on the commuter. Don't keep track of mileage. Just monitor # days riding.

Jim from Boston

"Do you care how many miles you ride? Or only how few miles you drive?"

Definitely how many miles I ride on the bike. I have a 14 mile commute that I do daily all year round. From about May through September I do a repeated 10 week century training program which has daily mileage quotas that I incorporate into my commute, and my weekly mileage gradually increases from about 70 to 190 miles per week, including a long Saturday ride to go into work for a few hours.

Having the mileage quotas is very motivating to ride farther than I would ever make the time for otherwise. On Saturday I rode to work 64 miles, the last 20 miles in a drenching rain. Besides the increased fitness, I'm wonky enough to further savor the miles by plotting them on Excel graphs in comparison with the quotas.

sharrn

What's driving? Never heard of it I actually rarely drive (no car, no problem.) I do try to log as many miles as I can on my bike. I'm at 136.85 for the month so far.

tarwheel 

Definitely. I've cut my driving mileage in half since I started bike commuting. I would like to get rid of my truck completely, but that isn't feasible because I sometimes need it for work as well as tasks at home. However, I have steadily increased my bike commuting mileage since I started -- initially riding once a week, then twice and now about four times a week on average.

bikegeek57

funny question.... my insurance company called the other day to ask about annual mileage. wife answered. she told them 12,000/year between the cars. I flipped when I heard that. I need to call them back. With my daily commuting I had cut driving back to under 5000 a year between 2 cars. She drives a couple miles/day for her work at school in the neighborhood. The second car sat so long recently the battery died. oh well. glad I can commute.

himespau 

I like to keep track of the miles because it helps me set goals that I can use to try and get in better shape and lose some weight. With a new baby, commuting is my only time to exercise for the most part (or Saturdays before the wife/daughter get up).

Seattle Forrest

I'm not really sure why it's important...?

I try not to drive too much, because it's less pleasant than other things I could be doing, and because I pay for gas by the gallon (which roughly translates to per mile). Generally I enjoy riding my bike. In the end, I try to live an enjoyable life. Sometimes that means driving, sometimes it means cycling, sometimes it means walking, sometimes kayaking, and sometimes staying at home. Whichever way it goes, I try to use the most appropriate tool for the job. ( This weekend I'll be camping and hiking on Mt Rainier, a 100 mile drive each way, and my bike will not get me there and back. )

AdamDZ

I don't keep track of my biking miles because (a) I don't care and (b) it'd be too complicated: between my commuting, errands, weekend rides and an occasional tour it'd be too much to keep a record of. I don't have goals other than I want to ride my bikes as much as possible and only take the car when I can't do something by bike... or if I need to take my bike out of the City for a ride

Although I drive infrequently, most of my trips by car are long, highway trips. I'd much rather drive a day somewhere than fly, I hate flying So every year I do 1-3 really long road trips and many weekend trips totaling thousands of miles.

I would much rather use trains though but US rail system sucks.

enigmaT120

Obviously I'm keeping track of my bicycle miles, but I'm not sure why. My main motive is to stay in shape, so days per week (hours, really) is more important than overall miles. I try to do a longer ride on the way home from work at least once per week, so that my minimum 9 miles each way becomes easier.

At one point I had the idea to bicycle more miles than I rode my motorcycle. But that didn't last long as I realized that, when I ride the motorcycle, I do my full 49 mile one way commute. When I ride the bicycle, I only ride 9 in the morning to catch my bus. I'm nowhere near ready to even do the 49 one way home on the bicycle, though I would like to work my way up into the 30s, anyway. I'm still trying, with all of your unknowing help, to configure my bike in such a way that neither my hands nor my butt go numb with longer rides. One way to accomplish that seems to be riding farther, so that I just get used to it.

After I started riding the bike/bus, gas prices started going up. That was kind of icing on the cake but was not an original motivator.