Roody

A couple weeks ago, our family car was in the shop for an extended period. My daughter-in-law (a poor but law-abiding person) said that she was going to be unable to do our monthly food shopping unless she rented a car. Alarm bells went off in my head--both at the prospect of going without food and the alternative of an expensive car rental when we were already struggling to pay the huge car repair expenses. But she truthfully had no idea of any alternative but to drive a car to the grocery store. She's a smart person, but really could think of nothing else. And this in spite of the fact that she's seen my carfree ways for years now.

I think there are a lot of people like this. When the car is unavailable, they basically freeze. They have been so brainwashed by out carcentric culture that no carfree solutions come to mind. This is why I think carfree literacy is a good thing to be taught in schools.

BTW, I did give my DIL a number of carfree and carlight alternatives to renting a car. She decided to take a bus to the store and return home in a cab with the groceries. Of course I had to tell her where to catch the bus and how to arrange the cab ride.

Walter S

She lives there and doesn't see the buses and the cabs regularly? Sure, maybe she doesn't know where the bus stop is. But knowing there's a bus at all should do a good job of putting you on the trail. Call the bus company. Google. Call the cab company and say "how do I arrange a ride". They're probably going to ask simple questions like "where are you leaving from? What time?". Whatever, you'll quickly learn what to do. I can see being "frozen" for a little while. Then you get hungry and need to figure it out.

tandempower

True, how far would it have been to walk? I find that walking creates a baseline from which to look forward to any and all increases in speed/efficiency of travel. It takes about an hour to walk 3-4 miles and most supermarkets are within that distance, even if very car-centric areas, I think. Probably Roody's daughter is not going to want to borrow a shopping cart to tote groceries a few miles on foot, the way some people do, but it would be an option, albeit a problematic one since you have to return the cart (if you care enough, that is).

This relates tangentially to something I've been thinking about lately as a way to facilitate car free shopping, which is to have shopping carts designed with slightly better wheels and (pneumatic or at least thicker) tires, and a small, folding bike type bike behind it to push the cart. At first I thought such shopping-cart bikes would be hard to stack, but then I thought about those baby carriers that sit atop the handle and realized that a push-bike could fold up over the handle when the cart is stacked with other carts. Similar to this but with a bike instead of baby seat:

Roody

As I posted earlier, I am aware of many people who have great difficulty even conceiving of carfree living, let alone actually trying it. Just look at the elementary questions on this forum from people who are considering it to get an idea of the average person's deep ignorance of bikes, buses, cabs, and even walking. And this is from people who have already made the mental leap of carfree awareness. Most people are simply lost without their cars.

Roody

It would have been a 4 or 5 mile walk to the store. Along a seven lane road with no sidewalks for part of the trip. Like I said, I suggested several options, but walking was not one of them. I used to walk about 3 miles to a supermarket, but only when my strong young son went along to help carry the groceries. But 4 or 5 miles along that road is not a viable option. And stealing a shopping cat was not something I suggested either. And if she had waited for your bike-cart idea to be developed, we would have gotten very hungry indeed!

BTW, my DIL was apprehensive about using the bus. She only went because my son went with her. She would not have gone alone.

Dahon.Steve

+10000000

Very good article and thanks for sharing.

If you read the entire article from the The Washington Post, it’s really one horror story after another how about how the motoring poor are being exploited by our judicial system that seeks to extract as much money from them as possible. The motorist is considered a cash cow and towns profit from the misery of others. It’s insane how quickly the fees and fines can cripple those who are improvised. Cities are famous for handing out tickets at the drop of a hat and before you know it, there’s a warrant for your arrest for not paying them.

Did anyone notice when the article stated , “her inability to drive makes it nearly impossible for her to find work“? People are practically crippled without motor transport and can’t find work, go shopping and basically cannot live a normal life. However, the current motorist life style of this poor woman is driving her to the poor house!

I agree there is a need for a central location that provides free information for those looking to become carfree. A free website with all the knowledge base in one location on the following:

Bike Commuting./Multimode commuting
Transit APPs/Timing buses and trains
Electric Bikes
Adult Kick Scooters
Searching for Apartments near bus/rail stops.
Working from home
Occupations that do not require a car
How to Shop without a car
Businesses one can work from home/or use transit/bikes

I’m sure there are more but this is a short list. No one should have their lives ruined because they can’t afford to pay traffic fines.

Dahon.Steve

Agreed.

People want door to door service like their cars and would rather wait travel three hours transferring across two or three buses instead of taking one and walking 1 mile to their destination. Our public transportation is made slower and inefficient because it has to stop at each block to pick up passengers. When people start motoring, walking becomes time consunming, exhausting and to be avoided.

Years ago, I used to hate drving into my town because many of the streets have parking meters. My town like many others ticket cars to generate needed revenue but now that I'm carfree, the city receives no money from me. The fear of driving in my town is gone and I'm no longer taken advantage by the meter police.

Walter S

Same here . Sometimes I suggest a place to go when I'm with a person driving. The parking turns out to be a nightmare. The most popular places naturally have some of the most challenging opportunities for parking close by. It always takes me by surprise and I think Oh, yeah. With a car, you have to find parking. Uhhh. Nevermind then.

tandempower

It's very hard to understand any mentality that lacks awareness of something you are aware of. I can remember a time, for example, when I simply wasn't aware of the amount of trees present in an area, and I certainly couldn't have told you whether a tree was a pine/evergreen or hardwood/deciduous. Probably I could have learned to pay attention and distinguish at that time, but it just seemed like a pointless endeavor then, a waste of my time. I think paying attention to car-free options is like this for people who take driving for granted. They simply don't consider themselves minoritarian enough in any way to end up as one of the people who goes car-free, even if a significant minority of people would be transitioning away from driving. In their minds, the people transitioning would be like the unlucky losers in the competition to remain normatively middle-class; and so they would just sort of turn away from such people and focus on those with the privilege of ignoring societal changes.

Although I can remember having this mentality at some point in life, it's hard to fathom the depth and breadth of what people are capable of ignoring since I've developed an active approach to seeking greater awareness instead of eschewing it. It almost seems like it should be difficult, if not impossible, to have a functional life if you eschew awareness of large portions of reality but, in reality, most people probably have little problem functioning within such a subset of reality, especially if the subset is shared by a majority, or at least a very significant minority of people.

tandempower

Wow! Thanks so much for validating this thread like this. I wouldn't have guessed anyone else would see this problem as being as systematic as it seems to be and also seeing clearly that motor-dependency is the root cause of the problem and not a culture of poverty or exploitative local governments. Indeed your idea for a central information resource for LCF sounds like it could be a beacon of hope for people who lack personal experience with LCF. It would be even better, I think, if there was a general portion of the website and then links with specifics on how to get around various localities, tips, Q&A, etc.

Walter S

For most of my adult life I've driven a car - I quit nearly five years ago. When I was a young adult I drove and I certainly didn't aspire to be car free. But nevertheless I was from time to time. I did as much mechanical work as I could then and learned on my own vehicles and got it wrong a number of times. I drove old beat up cars that suddenly needed water pumps and what not. Suddenly I was car free. I imagine the same is true of a lot of poor people. Sometimes they have a car and sometimes might as well not. Plus they have the challenge of getting the thing towed or maybe having to go back to the scene of the breakdown with the right tools to get it home. Plus they work by the hour and aren't getting paid for this.

People have to learn what opportunities are out there such as buses and cabs and trains and bicycling and walking or flounder around in a dysfunctional state waiting for somebody to rescue them and let them continue to pollute the gene pool in spite of themselves.

Machka 

So ... doctors should set up lean-tos in the forest?

And doctors should stop going to medical school?

Bandera

So that's what the Tarp is for!

-Bandera

Roody

That's what this LCF forum should be. Sometimes it is. But we could do a lot better.

Anyway, this is a very thought-provoking and important post, IMO.

I-Like-To-Bike

All the better to determine what kind of tree are creating the all important shade, count unicorns, and expanding the awareness of both doctor and patients; a win-win situation!

tandempower

This post captures something that isn't usually recognized because of the higher profile middle-class experience of calling road-side assistance and letting insurance companies deal with car problems when they occur. Many people forget that their cars get passed along to poorer people who deal with them in a more problematic state on lower budgets, with more headaches. I don't have the impression, however, that most people with a tighter budget oscillate between driving and LCF the way you suggest. I do see poor people walking and biking here and there, but I guess I always assume they are living in some social vacuum since those I talk with just dismiss LCF as something ubiquitously undesirable, as if everyone has the choice to drive regardless of their economic situation.


You're twisting my comment. All I was saying is that meeting with a doctor doesn't use any material resources, really. It is only a question of the doctor's time and expertise. The doctor and patient have to find a way to communicate and the doctor has to be able to examine whatever aspects of the patient's body can't be described sufficiently via phone or a video connection. Plenty of people go to health screenings in mobile outreach clinics that don't require clearing any land. The point is if you analyze the details of what the economy actually consists of, a lot of money is being spent on industrial conversion of material resources and land into developments and goods, but other money is being spent on services that don't directly require material resources. Indeed there is the possibility of reducing the impact of paid interactions and services as well as unpaid ones.

Why does a forest structure need to be as small and open as a lean-to? What about pyramid-shaped buildings whose base footprint is custom fit around the trees in an area, whose walls then extend diagonally, or with stories in a receding step pattern, so that the canopies of the trees can bush out over the first and second stories of the pyramid? That way, you get significant indoor area as well as living tree shade. How is that for a win-win?

wolfchild

Yeah pyramids also have mystical healing powers, just walk in while sick into a pyramid shaped object and come out healed. That way we could do away with all the doctors, I mean training doctors in medical schools is such a waste of resources and money. Forests and pyramids can do all the healing without wasting any resources.

wolfchild

No, not lean-tos. It has to be tarp pyramids with straw beds.

Roody

It isn't only poor people who have difficulty keeping up with car expenses. Working class people are in the same boat. Add a couple parking fines to a major repair bill, on top of jacked up auto insurance costs because you don't live in the ritziest neighborhood or your credit rating isn't the greatest. All of a sudden, your monthly car expenses are higher than your rent or mortgage. So what do you pay for? Car or housing? If you wreck your credit by missing a payment on either, the expenses will go up even more. You'll have to pay higher interest rates on your next car and your insurance rates get higher too if your credit rating declines.

For somebody with a lower paying job, losing the car can be disastrous. Yes, partly (but not totally) because they don't know HOW to be carfree. I think more online resources are needed, as you suggested.

If you type "carfree" into Google, you get this forum in fourth position. But will you get the help that you need? Or will you get a lot of snarky comments and "clever" putdowns?

Ekdog

The latter, more than likely, which is a shame because it didn't use to be that way.

Walter S

Don't forget the banter about ad-hom, Religeon, screenplays, and other trendy ways to express how worthless you find comments by others to be.

Roody

Those comments are meant to be hurtful, but they reflect only on the writer of the comments. I wish I could wrap them all up in a tarp and bury them in the back yard! I'm sad that your interesting and thought provoking post earlier has gotten lost in the surrounding drivel, along with great posts by @Dahon.Steve

Roody

To help us get back on track:

And also this one, from the other side of the issue:

Roody

Ironically, my daughter-in-law just got home from a shopping trip in the front seat of a tow truck. The car, which was just repaired at great expense, wouldn't start when she finished buying gas for it. So this will probably be another drain on the household income, on top of a string of unplanned expenses such as the previous auto repairs, medical bills, and lost income from my illness. I'm telling you--very few of us are very far from becoming impoverished ourselves. And cars can be a big contributor to this.

I really do wish that carfree literacy was taught in the classrooms. It would be good for all people to at least become aware of the alternatives to cars--as poor as they are in most parts of this country.

Bandera

Is Eugenics essential to Living Car Free?



Perhaps Fitter Family competitions will be revived and a bus schedule, Schwinn Breeze equipped with Wald baskets and a Capper Medal will be awarded to the Grade A individuals.

-Bandera