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I've got three bikes for my one car since I have poor luck with vehicles.
I caved and bought a Jeep Liberty CRD, only to have the transmission experience torque-convertor and internal sensor woes.
All these people that swear on owning a car seem to enjoy having a potential money-pit to deal with.
As soon as this thing is paid off, I'm getting another bicycle.
Comparing Europe to the USA is nonsense. This always comes up, the Europeans this and that. Fine.
Transplant 10,000 Europeans with their bikes in Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and Texas. Throw in the Central Valley area of California too, just to keep things interesting.
Can we take a friendly bet that within a month all of them get cars?
You see, it is real simple, Europe does not have the space as we have in the USA where one often needs to travel longer distances to get from point A to point B. While bicycles are great for cities, the USA is not set up like Europe where the greatest distance between cities is relatively close. Sure, Europe has rural areas but not like here in the USA. There are some farms in the USA that make some cities in Europe look like a sandlot in comparison.
The fact is and the fact most often and conveniently not discussed is that the average distances in the USA needed to travel are much more than those in Europe. Not everyone lives in cities and in many states, cities are often a great distance from one another.
In Europe, you can flick a booger in Germany and have it land in the latte of a Frenchman in Paris. In the USA, that booger would be carried by the wind and land nearly a thousand miles away and never have left the state.
Comparing Europe to the USA is nonsense. This always comes up, the Europeans this and that. Fine.
Transplant 10,000 Europeans with their bikes in Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and Texas. Throw in the Central Valley area of California too, just to keep things interesting.
Can we take a friendly bet that within a month all of them get cars?
You see, it is real simple, Europe does not have the space as we have in the USA where one often needs to travel longer distances to get from point A to point B. While bicycles are great for cities, the USA is not set up like Europe where the greatest distance between cities is relatively close. Sure, Europe has rural areas but not like here in the USA. There are some farms in the USA that make some cities in Europe look like a sandlot in comparison.
The fact is and the fact most often and conveniently not discussed is that the average distances in the USA needed to travel are much more than those in Europe. Not everyone lives in cities and in many states, cities are often a great distance from one another.
In Europe, you can flick a booger in Germany and have it land in the latte of a Frenchman in Paris. In the USA, that booger would be carried by the wind and land nearly a thousand miles away and never have left the state.
Peddle on.
It can be done here, but since everyone is attached to their cars over here so bad, they freak out and intervene when there's just one person spotted not using one in the country.
If you want to drive, fine, go ahead and do so.
But once you start butting in to someones choice of transportation and consistently hound them to switch over, you'll either transform them, anger them, or they'll get one and learn again why they stayed away from a car in the first place.
I personally caved into pressure, then the vehicle recently broke down, and now I'm pretty much berating everyone over how an expensive repair was inevitable.
But I'll leave bad car luck woes for the other thread.
Comparing Europe to the USA is nonsense. This always comes up, the Europeans this and that. Fine.
Transplant 10,000 Europeans with their bikes in Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, and Texas. Throw in the Central Valley area of California too, just to keep things interesting.
Can we take a friendly bet that within a month all of them get cars?
You see, it is real simple, Europe does not have the space as we have in the USA where one often needs to travel longer distances to get from point A to point B. While bicycles are great for cities, the USA is not set up like Europe where the greatest distance between cities is relatively close. Sure, Europe has rural areas but not like here in the USA. There are some farms in the USA that make some cities in Europe look like a sandlot in comparison.
The fact is and the fact most often and conveniently not discussed is that the average distances in the USA needed to travel are much more than those in Europe. Not everyone lives in cities and in many states, cities are often a great distance from one another.
In Europe, you can flick a booger in Germany and have it land in the latte of a Frenchman in Paris. In the USA, that booger would be carried by the wind and land nearly a thousand miles away and never have left the state.
Peddle on.
Also bikes are great in areas with good public transportation. If you can bike to the bus stop or train station in 15 minutes, then bike to your destination after exiting the train station in 15 minutes, sure, that sounds great. I wouldn't bother owning a car in some major cities such as NYC. However, in many areas that is not an option, either due to lack of public transportation or simply lack of GOOD public transportation. My understanding is that many European cities and even the surrounding areas have much better public transit than some cities here in the US. Also, being that it's not always feasible to live right by your workplace, it's not unreasonable to not want to bike an hour or two to work, especially in cities with inclement weather. Who wants to bike in below-freezing weather with snow on the ground for 20 miles just to reach your destination?
And to further your point, when I go up to the bay area of CA, I don't bother with a car if I am staying within SF proper or say, the east bay. Even when I went to San Jose I didn't get a car. But there are some beautiful off-the-beaten-path places an hour away that are really not reachable by bike unless you wish to bike all day...on some narrow, steep, windy, twisty roads...and forget taking a bus or a train...they don't go there...so what are you left with?
Hey don't get me wrong, I love being able to ditch my car when possible, and I love being able to spend 30 bucks on a bus pass for the week instead of hundreds of dollars for a rental car when I go to visit big cities with good public transportation. But you can't do that everywhere in the US.
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This always comes up, the Europeans this and that. Fine.
