SPECELIZEDRIDER

It is funny how when you don't have a car, I now a loser, so my value as a person is dependent if I have a car or not, society has lost it. Vegas is Very car dependent, but I love the money i'm saving.

I-Like-To-Bike

Suddenly?

Omiak

You're hanging around the wrong crowd.

SPECELIZEDRIDER

I need to meet some bike people huh.

longhaulblue

Who cares what other people think? Their problem, not yours.

mtbikerinpa

Money talks. You have more available, 'loser' or not, you win.

bragi

I didn't have that experience the last time I went car free; I got teased by a few friends, warning me not to think of them as a taxi service, but generally speaking, people I know didn't judge me negatively when I gave up the car. (OK, they thought it was a little eccentric at first...) Strangers have looked down on me from time to time, but I don't care about them.

In our society, people will judge you based on your wealth, and a car can be a symbol of that wealth, but most people are able to recognize that a symbol isn't the thing it represents. If you have a nice car, but you're always broke because of it, that doesn't earn you much respect; it just lets the world know you're an idiot.

gerv 

Nice....

I would add that -- depending on the city you live in -- attitudes will change over time. I occasionally felt as you do perhaps 7-8 years ago, but nowadays I run into many people who think carfree is a cool thing, even if they can't join in.

In the long run, none of this matters... do what you think is right and lets the chips fall where they will.

Gojohnnygo.

I know a few people at work who had the car hauled away by the repoman and hear the story’s about what people have to do in order keep the car, like going to the food shelf, selling off property at the flea market for a weeks’ worth of gas, some even steal from fellow coworkers. >>>>>You are Winning they are losing.

Johnonaschwinn

at 4 something a gallon i think you have won

Smallwheels

If I were a car owner with a 20 mpg vehicle I'd be spending twelve dollars per week on fuel. The cost of the car would be my biggest expense. A $300 per month car payment would cost $71 per week. There are times when I wonder just how people believe their cars are worth the price they spend per mile to get around town without passengers. A full car would seem efficient. a one passenger trip seems too expensive.

dynodonn 

Not necessarily, you have to remember that wolves run in packs, anything outside the pack is fair game.

AsanaCycles

If its any consolation, at the social level most of cycling is grossly misunderstood. Even amongst my brethren cyclist, me being sans external combustion locomotion, it's a bit of a struggle.

AsanaCycles

Here is a really cool reference:

Ivan Illich of energy and equity

https://ebookbrowse.com/ivan-illich-e...-pdf-d38852305

ubringliten

Absolutely true. When I told my coworkers that we were planning to go car-free, they were all ears, but our plan didn't happen.

Biking is in and car is out. It is too bad that you live in Las Vegas where it still continues its status quo. All the forward thinking cities have moved toward biking and it is here to stay.
When you start feeling happy and healthy from riding your bike, you will feel like a winner.

I-Like-To-Bike

In which forward thinking U.S. cities are cars now "out" while bikes are "in"? Any info on what the percentages of transportation mileage might be for bikes and cars in these forward thinking cities?

TiBikeGuy

I remember working as a trainee in a bank, we were told to escort the potential customer to his/her car, and to observe the car that they drive. Now, looking back, I can't believe that 'one of the leading banks in the US' taught us to judge a person's worth or 'net-worth' by the car that they drive.

cruiserhead

How do you expect to pick up hookers with a bike? Looooser!

longhaulblue

On my tandem

Jamoni

Damn, beat me to it!

gerv 

I don't know if this is completely true. I keep thinking of the case of Toronto where the suburbanites put an anti-bike mayor in office. There's a lot of back and forth that goes on. I don't think he'll be in forever, but you can't count on a victory anywhere.

wolfchild

What do you expect from somebody whose last name is FORD. Just last week there was a bike lane removed on one of the major streets in downtown Toronto. Thousands of taxpayers dollars was spend few years ago by the previous mayor to put a new bike lane in..and now thousands of dollars is spend to remove it...I just don't get it.

wolfchild

Has anybody actually come to you and called you a looser because of riding a bike?? Or are you just imagining what other people "might" think ?

ubringliten

I don't have the stats on the % of transportation mileage for bikes vs car, but surely if there is one, car mileage would blow bike mileage out of the water even if there's a huge improvement in bicycling popularity.

Examples below are showing evidences that bicycling is more popular than driving.

SF: Over 70% increase in cycling from 2006-2011. SF already has funding for bike infrastructure for the next 5 years, almost $2 million/year. Pretty good for a 49 sq. mile city. Bicycling market in this city has gone through the roof and has the largest market in the nation.

Washington DC: Bikeshare there is the most popular in the nation with 1700 bikes at 170 stations. In 2011, DC has added almost 60 miles and 2300 bicycle racks.

Chicago: The mayor is spending $91 million on bike facilities to attract young professionals and will have a $18 million bike share program that comprises 3000 bicycles at 300 rental stations. Crazy!

NYC: Polling has never shown that 60% of NYC residents support bike lanes and over 3/4 want to increase or maintain the number of bike lanes. Cycling has doubled since 2007. I could never imagine a dense city like NYC could have separated bike lanes.


Los Angeles: One of the most car-centric cities in the world with pretty poor public transit, and cycling has increased 32% from 2009-2011. They have the world' largest bicycling event called Ciclavia attracting more than 100,000 cyclists.

Portland: Don't need to explain here.

Minneapolis: Cycling increased 47% from 2007-2011 and from 2010-2011, the city expanded its on-street bike lanes network by 75%. By no means, this city has good public transit. So if people ride more is because they drive less.

You could argue that these are all dense cities. I will give you another example. Palo Alto is a suburb in the Silicon Valley and saw a 7.1% of commuters cycling in 2011 vs 5.6% in 2000. There are 11 bicycle bridges, over 40 miles of bike lanes and 11 miles of trails. They are building yet another bicycle bridge to link east and west Palo Alto.

Toronto is an exception (there's an exception to everything) and besides, there is a bike lane on a block down which is parallel to this major road. Vancouver and Montreal are going full force. The mayor of Vancouver commutes to work by bike and Montreal has a great bike share program in Bixi.

wahoonc

The Greater Boston area has made major inroads too. With the director of the MassDOT publicly stating that they will not be building another interstate in the state of Massachusetts that attention and funding will go to alternative forms of transit, including pedestrian and cycling infrastructure.

Aaron