I love these threads...

According to the IRS... the cost of operating a motor vehicle is $0.55 per mile. This number goes up and down with fuel prices. Add tolls and parking to this. For me, this equates to $17.60 per day for my 32 mile round trip commute. But... the 0.55 per mile includes the cost of insurance, so you would have to "sell / get rid of the car" for a closer apples-to-apples comparison... So, I use $15.00 per day as my break even number for cash flow purposes, and based on everything that I have ever spent on the bike, I had to ride it 133 days to work. I killed that in my first year of commuting, am on my third year now, so I have been "banking" the savings, a portion of which I will put into a replacement bike some day. This assessment does not take into account that I've gone from 218 pounds to 182 pounds during the period, so I assume that I am healthier, but at a minimum, the weight loss has dramatically cut the number of spokes that I have broken!