FWIW many moons ago, I made a detailed spreadsheet of various commuting methods specifically for my commute, including mixed mode commutes, and I also rated each on exercise, robustness (in case of storms, bad weather, etc) and reliability (how often the commute would be disrupted, whether by traffic, train delays, flat tire) as well as total trip time. Of the 20 or so options I examined, cycling was clearly the cheapest, coming out at 37c/day (rate is based on basic tire/tube/lube replacement). Driving came out at $2.34, but was the fastest and also the most robust and reliable, and did not include maintenance/insurance etc because I own the car and drive other places than work anyway. (One of the slowest and most expensive was to drive to the metro station, park, and then ride the train - which is what I did for years! The very slowest was to walk 3 blocks to the bus stop and transfer to the train station)

I come to the office only ~200 days in a year, so $400 isn't a great saving over a full year in my book. I can easily blow that on cycling parts and gear in a year, especially across 3 bikes. Also I do extra sets of laundry every week for my cycling gear. Detergent ain't cheap.

Nope! That's how we become addicts

For a high level engineering estimate, I just calculated my gas savings and doubled them to include wear & tear on the car. This assumes you're not getting rid of the car, so you still have insurance and capital expense on the car (either payments or depreciation), "opportunity cost", etc. I'd be surprised if my number was really far off. For my Honda Civic, that comes to about $.25/mile, with $.12 of that being gasoline.

Just use 50 cents/mile to calculate driving costs. That's what the federal government pays for reimbursement and it includes gas as well as maintenance, wear-and-tear. If you have to pay for parking when you drive, you can add that as well.

I know that I save money bike commuting, even though I spend a fair amount of those savings on bike gear. However, I would rather spend my money on bike gear than gasoline and car costs. If you don't buy a lot of unnecessary bike gear, you can save quite a bit. Here are examples:

-- Gasoline and maintenance savings @ 50 cents/mile
-- Parking
-- Insurance (my company reduced my rate $50/year when I showed my mileage reductions)

I also tend to spend extra money when I drive because I more frequently go out to lunch, go shopping during lunch hour. If I sold my truck, my savings would be huge but I don't want to do that. I like having the option to drive when weather is crappy, doctor's appointments, restocking clothes and supplies in my office, bringing home laundry from work, etc.

My commute was 22 miles for 4.5 years but increased to 30 miles in October. We got our gasoline bill the other day and it totalled about $250 for the month, and all of the charges were for my wife's car. I showed her the bill and said: "Look how much money I'm saving us by riding to work. Not a single one of these gas charges were for my truck." Of course, I turned around and spent $125 on a new light system, but that should last me a long time and I can recoup some of those costs by selling my old one.

https://www.bikeradar.com/road/news/a...ey-lives-32551

This is a great calculator, assuming all of its underlying assumptions are correct. Thanks for the link.

Ride, feel happy. More energy, not stressed in stop and go cager traffic. No contest. Whats the price of awesome legs and a normal sized waist? What is the price of my commute when I take the mountain bike and get 8 miles of dirt and 12 of pavement?

Yup, even though plenty of people still don't have a gym membership anyway -- BUT if someone's the type who wants to exercise and is likely to get a membership, they'll definitely save this way.

Being Mr. Despondent, if all your other coworkers can't show up, you're going to be stuck doing all of their jobs in the meantime and will never get back home.

Good to see another Nutley cyclist here!

Up to a point, but if the company looks to start letting people go the chances are the one guy who can get in no matter what isn't going to be at the top of the hit-list.

My wife and I have usually had two cars, but we have saved money on cars by keeping cars much longer than we would have otherwise. This has partly been due to lowered mileage/maintenance, but the greater part is that I am willing to own a much junkier 2nd car since I rarely need it to depend on it get to work. If we absolutely always needed it to be reliable, I would definitely own a nicer one instead. Therefore, we have gone pretty long stretches with no car payment at all. Right now we have a paid off 2008 and hope (knock on wood) to get a couple more years out of our 1998 minivan. We got the van for cheap in the first place partly because it had a lot of miles on it. Insurance is relatively low on that one because it isn't worth much (it's relative because auto insurance here is pretty expensive no matter what). In case no one else has mentioned it, you could see if there is a low-mileage discount for auto insurance.

Jim S.

I am looking forward to my first day of riding to work. I think it will be Tuesday but not sure. I am off until monday.

If you can get rid of a car, the savings will be obvious. Beyond that, there are the hard to define savings. Like less hospital/doctor visits, gyn nenbership no longer being necessary, oil changes and major vehicle repairs that will be fewer and faerther between (or eliminated if the second car goes), and the mental health benefits.

If you want to save money it helps to start with a stupidly long commute: mine is 48 miles one way. Then discover the local commuter buses (pass = $55/mo.) and ride the 9 miles to the nearest bus stop and back home from there. Longer rides home are optional -- just get off of the bus sooner.

Then discover that your employer will buy the bus pass for you, saving you that additional $55/mo. Wow. I'm commuting a hundred miles per day for free. I saved enough in gas money to buy a new Fargo (so much for free!) and that's considering that my main motor vehicle is an old, paid for BMW motorcycle that gets 45 mpg and only costs $175/year to insure. Parts $ sure add up quickly but it doesn't need much.

I have also pretty much quit running, so I no longer need to buy $$$ shoes every few months.

I don't want to move (the more obvious solution to the long commute) because I live in the woods and like it here.

Yea, I know about the variable part...stupid endorphin/gadget addiction.... As for replying, I have no idea what my point was when I wrote that. Half the time, I probably sound and read like a bumbling idiot.

That reminds me I need to check that for my cars. I keep two working cars, as two operating is better than paying for a rental if one is having issues. It is rare that both need a repair that prohibits them from being driven on a daily basis.

Is that necessary? Seems the cost of maintaining an extra car and the added insurance cost would exceed the cost of a rental, should you need it.

I suppose it is a different way of looking at things. My wife and I have one car, a 2003 Subaru that we paid cash for. It hasn't broken down yet, but in the rare event that it did, we could go about our normal lives using public transit and / or bicycles. I would hate to be that reliant on a car that it'd be cheaper to own two cars in case one broke down.

This sure has been an interesting thread. After having read all the posts above, I'd say it just goes to prove that not only is everyone's commuting situation different, almost everyone has a different way of looking at their situation.

Luckily my wife has no problem with me bike commuting, so the OP's problem is (thankfully!) not mine. My car is very thrifty on gas ('06 Honda Insight), so I get 70+ mpg in the warmer months and no worse than 63 mpg during the colder months (like now). Since I commute for 15 mi. + 20 mi. on the Metro ($3.00 per day) and my Insight costs only $2.70 in gas per day, it actually costs me more to commute by bike. That's with gas @ $3.85 here in SoCal.

Unless I add in all the other costs (insurance, maintenence, etc.) which would make it (I'm guessing) even up or an advantage to the bicycle. Both the car and the bike are paid for, so no payment issues. I'm a recreational rider anyway, so I didn't have to buy much to start commuting. Well . . . except the folding bike itself (DaHon Curve 8spd). I still drive on Mondays (the least congested freeway traffic day) and bring food and clothing for the week; bring home last week's laundry.

So, overall, I like the commute for the bike ride twice a day and it's okay with me if it's a break-even or costing me slightly more to ride my bike.

Rick / OCRR

I agree with some that just using gas can be the quickest and most realistic if you plan on keeping your vehicle. Using the .51/mile reimbursement value can be misleading. It's great if you just want to win an argument or avoid hard math, but when you're using one, catch-all number to apply to everyone and every situation in the country, you know it has to be a very general estimate and may or may not apply to any one person's situation.

Maintenance/wear and tear can be really tricky. If you're strict about changing your oil every X miles, that can be an simple number to add in. Otherwise it's really guesswork and averages. I could go years without a major repair and then get hit with a big one. If the big one comes during the year I was bike-commuting, all of the sudden those maintenance savings aren't there. So figure in costs that have a clear, per-mile cost like oil, gas, and tires. Maybe throw in brakes. Everything else is guesswork, averages, and luck. Some people like to calculate vehicle depreciation, but that's another squishy number. Lower miles keep your vehicle more valuable, but it still depreciates just by getting older. By most calculations, my car depreciated into negative value shortly after I got it, which is ridiculous, so treat those calculation with some skepticism.

Other places to look for savings:
Extra mileage. Sure, you know what your commute is, but do you always go straight to work and back? I don't. If you cut out those other detours, or do them on your bike, you can figure them into your other mileage-based savings. Likewise if you can make other, local trips on you bike, those can figure in. For me it got to the point where I had to be leaving town to even consider using the car, so not only did commuting miles go away, but so did all miles associated with local errands.
Gym membership if you use it and are willing to give it up.
Parking costs at work if you have them.
Insurance costs if they will go down.

Health benefits exist, but are also hard to quantify. Cycling doesn't exempt you from any illness, but makes some issues less likely or less severe. On the other hand, some activity-related injuries might become more likely, so, again, a hard number to pin down. However, regardless of actual dollars spent or not spent, being healthier has real value. So while you might not be able to figure the money to any reasonable degree, I would still not want to downplay the value in general quality-of-life terms.

And, as has been mentioned, there are costs associated with biking. Those can be almost as high or as low as you want them to be. If saving money is the primary goal, bike costs can be minimized, but you might want to figure on some shift of funds from the car to the bike. Of course if you're already riding regularly and already maintaining a bike, then it's possible the increase in bike-related costs would be minimal.

My wife doesn't like to waste money, but she also worries about my health as well as her own. Any money that I put into my bike is money that eventually translates into better health, so she is, for the most part, fine with it. Gas savings are there. Car maintenance savings are there. Medical cost savings are there. Insurance, parking, and no gym membership figure in. But they aren't the justification. They are the gravy. But not the fattening, artery clogging kind.

I couldn't tell, is this a "she doesn't want me to commute unless I can show her that it saves money" thing or a "we have a difference of opinion on whether or not this will save money, but I'm doing it anyway and she's cool with that" sort of thing like a bar argument?

We went from 2 cars to 1. It's problematic at times with two kids and diverging schedules, but we make it work. Even if you own a vehicle outright, if you eliminate the insurance associated with owning the car, as well as the depreciation of owning the car, the equation is easy. I have to say though, at $3.50 +/- per gallon of gas, it shouldn't take too many tanks of gas to pay for most of your annual commuting needs providing that you're going to own a bicycle whether you commute on it or not.

Get your wife to agree on the cost savings equation, and then negotiate the value of each term.

The equation goes something like this:

(Savings by bicycle commuting) = (Reduction in gas costs) + (Reduction in auto insurance cost) + ( Reduction in auto maintenance cost) +( Reduction in tolls and parking fees) +(Reduction in auto depreciation) +(Reduction in health care costs) + (Reduction in gym membership fees) + (Reduction in costs for coffee and donuts while driving) + (Renewable energy credits) - (New bike and equipment costs) - (Bike maintenance costs) – (New bike clothes costs) – (Costs for extra food due to increased exercising)

According to calculator, saving $6k a year. In all practicality, I think it is more of $4k a year. (not counting Gym membership, fitness class, etc)
I don't think I really save it all at the end of it though with the amount of bike gear I keep getting, as well as nutritional supplements. More like $1-2k a year.
But I am truly enjoying it

Here's how I look at it. The money doesn't even enter into the equation; it's simply an unintended bonus.

I am severely overweight. I'm a lot less overweight than I used to be, but I'm still 150+ pounds above where I want to be. I need to lose weight. In my life I need to get from point A to point B frequently. I can choose to do so with an automobile, or I can choose to do so with a bicycle.

When A and B are my workplace and I chose to use my car, the variables are

Time: 40-50 minutes (and occasionally 2 hours if traffic is bad, but that's an outlier)
Energy expended: Virtually zero

On my bicycle they become:

Time: 70-100 minutes (and occasionally 2 hours if I have a flat, but that's an outlier)
Energy expended: 1000-1200 calories

Now, prior to my biking-to-work phase, I was exercising 120 minutes a day on average, trying to lose weight. So if we added up the time I spent cycling for fun, and the time I spent driving to work we get:

120 + 40*2 to 120 + 50*2, or 200-220 minutes a day.

Now, if eliminate the drive and cycle to work, this figure becomes:

70*2 to 100*2, or 140-200 minutes a day.

So by cycling to work, I actually have anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes extra per day, to do whatever I want. I get to exercise more, and save time at the same exact time. It's really a no-lose scenario for me.

As long as I need to lose weight, and this condition will remain true for at least a few years, bicycling saves me time. It literally makes no sense to drive unless I simply need to be somewhere faster than I can cycle there. Now here's the best part. I would have spent money on my bicycle regardless of whether I commuted or not, because I would be riding the bicycle anyway! So yeah, there's a few things I purchased for commuting, like the lights for commuting at night (which I now use for cycling at night even when not commuting!), but by-and-large, almost none of the money I've put into my bicycle is only used for commuting. So I'm saving money simply by not driving, no matter what, and all that money is a bonus, in addition to the time-and-health benefits I gain regardless.

I really can't stress how much of a win-win scenario this is.

Tell Ms. Accountant that she's making a mistake by looking at the short term hard cost savings.
She needs to put that big GAAP book down and take a look at the long term soft costs.
Heart disease, diabetes and obesity to name a few...

Yeah, but from a pure accounting perspective, you're also going to have to figure on an extra 10-20 years of food and shelter expenses.

Getting a rental is a pain in the ass that we don't like dealing with. Since we both own our cars outright and our agreed to plan of action on them is to run them until they are too expensive to fix, why not keep both? Her car just sits until I take it out to circulate the fluids and such, so one weekend a month of going to Ralph's or Target isn't going to cause me any additional maintenance on it. Maybe a tank of gas, no oil change, and some fuel treatment by STP and it is fine. My car insurance won't change if I have 1 or 2 cars, but if the mileage changes, my rates will change.

Now, if I were making payments on mine, I'd be seriously consider selling it. But since I don't, it doesn't cost me too much to have one of our cars sitting there.

Public transit is horrible here, even though it was an award winner in the past. 2 hours by bus to get to my office is far to long to travel less than 10 miles.