I found this interesting. With the data showing more young people are opting out of going the car route and this maybe a slow shift is occurring???


https://io9.com/5908686/your-commute-...u?tag=exercise

I can believe it, at least in my peer group. Fewer people (that I personally know) my age (early 20s) own cars even though many could easily afford it. The re-urbanization trend is helping this dramatically.

I used to take the bus to school and then to work. A 4 mi trip took up to 90 minutes...you better believe that raised my blood pressure considering I could have walked that distance in less time. I did not walk because I did not know when the bus would come and whether it would let me on if it did. Sometimes the first 3 or 4 buses were too full to allow more passengers.

The study cited (https://www.ajpmonline.org/webfiles/i...4]-stamped.pdf) didn't actually compare car commuting to other forms. I just skimmed the study. But it looks like they correlated commuting distance regardless of method to cardiovascular fitness. Their study showed a positive correlation between distance commuted and poor cardiovascular health. Or that's what I got from it. It would be interesting to see a study that accounts for method of commute, time spent (or lost) commuting, fitness and health.

It is helping in a lot of areas. Last month when gas was up near $3.97 I saw about 5 people commuting via bike every morning I was so excited. I was hoping they would keep going, gas went back down and now I'm the only one on the road.

Tough financial times, tougher under 18 license restrictions, high insurance premiums, more expensive used cars have taken their toll on young would be drivers. Ten/fifteen years ago, our local high school parking lots were jammed packed, but today, they are less than half full.

Greetings Sen. ___,

I don't know what you can do to force people out of their cars and at least make them walk, but I'm sure it would go a long way to helping with the cost of healthcare, a dilemma of national proportion. However, when I ride my bike, the motorists roll down their windows to yell profanities. Their argument is that the fuel tax they pay isn't for my bike to be on the pavements. So then, I walk to discover many times there isn't a good stretch for pedestrians neither. There once was a perfectly good wagon trail, a road everyone could share. I don't know how the whole 9 yards was grabbed up but I'd need about 80k to keep up with the rat race. Then again, you need that for the expense of healthcare for all those folks who have the luxury of what is killing them. What are you going to do about so many spoilt brats?