I-Like-To-Bike

I don't travel as much since retiring. Earlier this summer, my wife and I drove to the Philadelphia area by way of Grand Rapids, MI area to visit relatives. No problems at all we didn't lose a minute in travel time (as estimated by my Magellan GPS.) Carried lots of luggage. Door to door service. Listened to audio books the entire trip without the use of headphones. No so-called interesting strangers to interact with while en route. Brought back three cases of Yuengling Beer to this beer desert. 13 year old car delivered 32.5 MPG for the entire trip while in full A/C mode. Rode the bike I keep stored at my sister's suburban house to and from downtown Philadelphia several times, revisiting old haunts; as always very enjoyable.

Last year we flew commercial to SF for a wedding, rented a car while there. Traffic leaving the SF Airport was slow but the car was quite handy for getting to numerous venues in and nearby the Berkley area for the hotel, parties, wedding on the U of C campus, visiting the Muir Woods National Monument, etc. as well as the return to the airport without any problems. Don't know what the cost of the airfare was, as I had sufficient frequent flyer credit on United (from several flights to and from the Middle East while working). Really didn't make any difference since flying and car rental was the only practical method to make the trip pleasant and timely.

If I was destitute I might have considered some other means to make such trips to save money at the cost of comfort and convenience, or more likely just stay at home and pat myself on the back for saving money and doing my part to save the planet.

Dahon.Steve

I remember seeing this movie at a public library. I had no idea the movie had curse words because the version at the library was all clean!! It was a good movie for it's age. Thanks.

Ekdog

I didn't know there was a "clean" version. I've watched it many times over the years and it still cracks me up. Here's an interesting bit of trivia from IMDB:

Originally meant to be filmed in the United States; however, the National Rail Passenger Corporation (Amtrak) was fearful of adverse publicity and refused to cooperate. As a result, the producers were forced to work with the Canadian Pacific Railway, using thinly disguised CPRail equipment and shooting exteriors along the CP Rail right-of-way.

tandempower

Maybe he means it would be nicer if there were no railroad and only a bike road or even just a hiking path. After doing a few days on the Appalachian trail this summer, I have to admit that there is a pristineness to a hiking trail that would be lost if it was paved, even just for biking.

The problem with all these modes is that it scrambles priorities. Hiking trails are valuable and shouldn't be paved for driving or even cycling. That said, there still should be more bike paths so people can cycle through nature without motor-traffic. Then, of course, there should also be bike paths through urban and suburban areas so people can bike there instead of driving.

Not too long ago, the rails-to-trails conservancy published an article about having rails-with-trails so that biking could be done along functioning rail corridors, not just those that have been shut down and converted to bike roads.

Train travel is a very efficient alternative to driving, flying, or even bus, but cycling has the lowest impact of any mode. You just need the time to tour and the ability to afford it and/or work while traveling.

People have limited time to travel because their schedules are booked up with work. Solution: work less and bike more. That requires more free or inexpensive bike-camping options and more work flexibility to combine bike travel scheduling with paid employment.

tandempower

Current retirees are in the interesting historical position of potentially being the last generation to experience private long-distance auto travel as a normal cultural choice. I don't think the Generation X baby-boomers II generation and their children will be able to auto travel en masse much, even if they want to. They will (hopefully) be the generation of baby-boomers to establish other modes and methods of travel that leave private auto travel to the elite. As gas prices keep falling, I wonder what it would look like if everyone took to the highways as was common once upon a time in decades past.

You talk about patting ourselves on the back for saving the planet, but I feel a little happy every time retirees get to take a road trip by car without disappearing into a sea of motor-congestion. It's also interesting that smooth auto-travel has become something of a luxury for retirees who probably once looked forward to graduating to the global jet set in retirement. I wonder how many people still think the shortage of affordable air travel options is an economic problem instead of a population growth problem. Maybe Donald Trump will get elected, cut taxes, and there will be a free-for-all where the vast majority of people start flying and renting cars again, often. What would cities look like if that happened?

Mobile 155

TP. From what I have read Gen X vacationers are far more likely to fly for a vacation than you might believe and they are hardly the most likely to work less so they can bike more. I have have to see a link to your reasoning. Like this one.

Stat: Why Gen X Travelers Could Be a Marketing Opportunity | Travel Agent Central

And it isn't much like your hope for millennials are going in the work less to bike more for vacations either.

https://hospitalitynews.mobi/?p=76046

Both seem more than willing to pay for comfort as well. A bit more like ILTB's vacation example.

skye

Sorry to hear that. I've been riding Amtrak for years (no fear of flying), and only a couple of times had any problems. Amtrak gets bunged up around the holidays, especially Thanksgiving.

I've enjoyed my cross country trips immensely. Amtrak is much more fun than flying. Their bicycle policy is aggressively awful, however, especially compared to the UK.

cb400bill

Lets keep the conversation on topic and free from name calling.

Walter S

But since you're not destitute, screw the planet!

I-Like-To-Bike

Thank you for saving the planet whenever you take the train.

Artkansas 

If you were destitute, making the trip would be out of the question, and you'd be suffering because you knew you were missing out on an important event just because you couldn't afford to go.

I-Like-To-Bike

Maybe I would have considered hitchhiking or bicycling while stealth camping, and couch surfing all the way. Anything to avoid spending a buck or save the planet is a good thing, eh?

Or maybe just would have convinced myself that if I couldn't travel to an event or location in a manner compatible with my chosen lifestyle, the event/locatiom is best ignored.

Ekdog

This post is all about the wonders of travelling by car. What on earth has this got to do with living car free?

Ekdog

And lord it over on the poor and jeer at advocates of carfree living while you're at it.

I-Like-To-Bike

It is a spot on response to a specific question, "Flown or driven recently?", asked specifically of me by another poster at https://www.bikeforums.net/living-car...l#post18199661 after he reported his personal experience traveling by car. A post which you had no question about why it was posted.

Machka 

Has anyone here done a train trip like the one described in the article? In the US ... or elsewhere?

Ekdog

Delighted to get back on topic.

I commute to work on local trains and use middle and long-distance ones for leisure travel. I almost always have my trusty Brompton at my side. Trains and folders--what a great combination for carfree living!

I-Like-To-Bike

Yes, Oregon to PA and return. As previously posted, a day late on one end and more than a little short on service both ways (surly Amtrak personnel,lack of heat, dirty windows, food). The good news was no problem passengers and that we did get there, eventually.

A couple of years ago my wife and I flew to Europe for a two week vacation and traveled on an eight day rail pass from Frankfurt Airport to a friend's house near Kaiserslautern and from there traveled back and forth to Amsterdam, Paris, Stuttgart, Köln, and return to the airport. Not cheap but convenient, comfy and practical for our purposes.

While living in Germany we traveled to Berlin from Heidelberg several times by ICE train and in 1987 or 88 we took a stream train from Nürnburg to Vienna with the return by conventional power. Most of our family travel with three children throughout Europe (England, France, Belgium, The Netherlands and Austria) was by our 1976 MB station wagon and later by 1995 Ford Taurus. The Autobahns are mighty convenient especially when we lived near Heidelberg and had three of them just a few minute away. We could drive to NL, Paris or Munich or visit our daughter studying at the Univerity in Freiburg and not see a traffic light on the way. Sometimes my wife and/or I took tour bus trips from our home in Germany. Myself for weekends in Paris she took a week long trip to Italy, another to England, and another to Poland.

Roody

It is great to read accounts of carfree travel here on the carfree forum!

Jim from Boston

Though this post is off-topic from cross-country train travel, I too commute with a train and bike. I travel from downtown Boston to a suburb, and as a reverse (non-peak hour) commuter, I bring my fully assembled full-sized bike right on board. Typically I ride the 14 or more miles to work, then Commuter Rail home. Only folding bikes are permitted during peak hours.

Even sweeter. the train station is about one mile from home in Boston, and about 300 yards from the workplace.

cooker

I don't think those links tell us very much. They say that GenX'ers are looking forward to travelling for pleasure, bu no mention of the mode of travel or destination, and that millenials who fly would like more alcohol and social networking on the plane. So that tells us what they might like, but not what they are actually doing. Plus the latter link only surveyed millenials who were actually flying - no information about the ones who weren't on a plane at the time.

cooker

I enjoy the fact that trains pass right through or by neighbourhoods, gritty industrial districts, docks etc. Nobody makes an effort to block your view of junkyards or gravel pits they way they do on highways, so it is a much more authentic experience. And you still get plenty of wide open country and grand vistas, and obviously see much more, as a passenger, than if you were driving your own vehicle. In my first post in the thread where I mentioned you only see "a stripe" of America or whatever, in a way I was lamenting the fact that there aren't more railroads going more places.

Still, if you are travelling a long distance (more than 600 km) and are not on a "sightseeing tour" like the person in the OP, it usually makes more sense to fly simply due to the time factor. If you are concerned about the environmental impact of flying, try to minimize your number of trips. For example I used to do 2 day consulting trips every month and I convinced the client that it would be just as effective to go for four days every 2 months. Cheaper travel costs for them, less wasted travel time for me, and of course, less pollution.

I-Like-To-Bike

Not to worry, no movie references, environmental costs or sociological theory was ever discussed or mentioned in the OP or the referenced article as the reason or justification for cross the USA train travel.

Doesn't prevent others from wandering into OT territory whenever the mood strikes. The only objection to those OT posts appears to be when posts do not fall in line with some others' feel good platitudes, and thus "Car free lifestyle" is allegedly not supported.

Jim from Boston

Maybe not so much “off-topic,” as described above, but “entre-nous,” FYA.

Artkansas 

San Diego to Seattle is the farthest I've done. Some pretty countryside especially in the Northern California mountains where the train was alone in snow covered valleys. But it got to be too long.