cooker

Be sure to work up to it gradually. You don't want to be hampered by injury from doing too much too soon.

Crawdaddy

Forget about the miles and count the miracles. Flow with it, not against it. Be who you are not who you think you should be.

McBTC

The LCF movement having it all wrong is obvious to most anyone whose lifestyle includes the use of a car. How can it be a cult when more and more folks who use a car everyday don't even own it-- they lease it.

The WSJ article yesterday, "The End of Car Ownership" (more a report on the Future of Transportation) looks at current trends that could change the paradigm of the family car and self-ownership -- such as due to ride sharing and self-driving vehicles -- but in the end, such changes do not eliminate the need for cars to satisfy everyone's personal transportation needs, although if freed from actual ownership, people may, "choose a compact model one day but a minivan the next day..."

Crawdaddy

Yes is a very interesting trend that I am glad to see happening. Pick the vehicle you need at the time. I just hope the vehicles become more environmentally friendly.

cooker

The ride sharing/self-driving trend mainly applies in urban areas and not in more rural areas such as MikeOK seems to live in. However as I said, while some people like Mobile 155's nephew might use it to extend his car use, my guess is that overall, it will be associated with fewer cars on the road and fewer miles driven. If your car is just sitting there, you can hop in it and drive 1 mile to Starbucks whenever you feel like it. If you have to summon a car each time, you might be more likely to walk, or make your own Nespresso, at least part of the time. And when you do call a car, it will likely be a sedan or compact a lot more often than it will be a pickup or 4-wheeler, because the owner is trying to maximize profit.

MikeOK

I am happy with the trend too, it would make riding in cities much better. I do ride in cities occasionally on group rides and I swear I can smell the exhausts some times. But I still think autonomous cars are 2 or 3 decades off. And they will be mainly used in cities where the infrastructure will be better than in rural areas. In many of the trails we run in CO you can't even get a cell signal.

Isn't uber expensive? I read on here where a biker had to call one, he broke down way out of town and the bill was $60!

JagR

Uber is about the same cost as a cab here. 2-3 decades?? I am thinking more like 5-10 yrs

McBTC

All is fair game for discussion but the best outcome, whatever it may be, is whatever in the end the market shall dictate with folks making decisions for themselves, in their own best interests, using their own money. Socialist, enviro-whacko, global warming LCF movement ideologues are free to be anti-car and think of people simply trying to earn a living are a part of a cult and adopt lifestyles in line with their beliefs but hopefully non of them will ever be in a position of power where their views usurp the liberties of the rest of us.

MikeOK

Tandempower- I just re-read your original post and I did exactly what you asked us not to do. I apologize for hijacking your thread. But you must admit your title is going to rev up all of us car lovers.

cooker

Again, Lolz at anyone who thinks transportation is a free market. Public roads are 100% communist.

JagR

Help me understand what you mean.

Crawdaddy

The predictions are 50% of the jobs will be done by machines within 20 years. Is that Enviro Wackos? No its your friendly neighborhood Capitalist Corporations. Its either we find a new system or its Soylent Green the movie in reality

cooker

It gets a bit political so I hope I'm not derailing the thread. All forms of transportation receive public subsidies in different ways, and the overall system includes both natural and artificial monopolies (for example you can't have competing road systems or competing rails systems operating in downtown Pittsburgh), so when people choose among driving or taking a bus or bike or plane or whatever, they are not making a purely personal economic decision based on actual costs, as you would in a true free market. Their decision is heavily dependent on the existence of options that have been created for them and paid for, largely by non-market forces. So the transportation system hasn't somehow been honed to maximum efficiency by everybody making the best deal they can for themselves.

I exaggerated a bit when I said roads are "totally" communist. They are created by the state using the underlying threat of force, and collectively owned by the people, but they do recover part of their cost from users through gas taxes and other fees, so they are only partially communist.

JagR

What predictions? And good for them! Business is about the bottom line...other types of jobs will surface. We are human...ADAPT!

JagR

As opposed to what? I hear you but what would you propose?

Crawdaddy

Beyond my peabrain to understand the future trends of transportation. I'm a truck driver and I hear the fear from drivers about autonomous trucks daily. Im old enough probably won't effect me. But I can see the writing on the wall that the old ways aren't going to work much longer. We are no longer in the 1950s. As with you I have kids. And grandbabies. I worry about their future and have to think the younger generation is much more important than flag waving.

JagR

I bet in 1950 you didn't think the world would look like it does today. Things are going to continue to change and as humans...we adapt! Always have and always will.

Crawdaddy

Don't know, wasn't here till 1960. But you need to listen to your own words. You are dead set against any change that might effect you

JagR

How so? I welcome change!

Didn't you reference the 50's in your post?

cooker

Not proposing anything right now, just responding to McBTC seeming to claim we already have the best possible transportation system thanks to "the market", and that anybody who disagrees is a

MikeOK

I'm pretty sure your job as a driver is safe for a long time. There's no doubt cars are getting smarter. We now have auto braking on new cars, there's no telling how many fender benders have been avoided just by that. Cars will even get smarter over time. But the average Joe can't afford these new cars. The average age of cars in America is 12 years. I really think some of you are underestimating how long it will take for cars to be self driving. Maybe we are witnessing the birth of the smart car cult.

I am concerned about machines taking our jobs. It has already happened and there's no way to slow it down. And have you thought how big of a hit our economy will take if world demand for oil drops in half in say the next 20 years? Countries rely on the oil patch for their funding. OPEC is already causing an oil glut by over-producing and shale oil in the US isn't helping. I am invested in oil so I watch it pretty closely. OPEC and Russia have agreed to cut back on production to try and raise the price but it's not been enough, a barrel of oil has gone from $53 to $42 in the last 2 or 3 weeks. The oil patch provides a LOT of jobs and some have already been lost, with many more to come. I suppose I'm part of the oil cult too.

Crawdaddy

Quote:
Originally Posted by McBTC
Socialist, enviro-whacko, global warming LCF movement ideologue

I kind of like that. May have business cards printed with that

Mobile 155

I can easily leave the bold sections up and not comment. Still that fact that something can be done does not mean it isn't possible. The fact that it is hard is only a fact of life. It is hard to work 40 hours a week and save to buy a house, send your kids to a good school and save for a vacation now and then. It is hard to save for retirement and put off travel till your have to establish yourself. Still people can and do live just as you posted, hard or not, so as to do as you say you want to do. So the freedom is there. And by the way India has outlawed riding on top of trains due to the death toll both daily and yearly. India moves to ban passengers travelling on top of trains - Telegraph

The NLRB is the National Labor Relations Board. The are in charge of making sure any employer doesn't violate the rights of employees in or out of the Union. They would be involved if a employer allowed a employee that had a car time off without charging vacation, or personal time and at the same time not give the same consideration to someone who doesn't drive. Yes I have had both cases and no I haven't allowed either one to take the time off without the missed time being accounted for. Yes I have had people come in late and yes they are charged for lateness, no matter why.

jon c. 

Market theory is, as the name indicates, theoretical. Free markets can exist only in theory as human influence inevitably corrupts the free market. Which doesn't mean markets cannot still promise efficiencies in the distribution of goods and capital, but they function best when protected from the self interests of the capitalists.

350htrr

Free market... Ha, Ha, Ha... No such thing. Someone ALWAYS has his fingers in the pie, and gets a few licks before anyone else gets a slice...