Bicycles are not an alternative for my 70 mile round-trip commute:
Posted on 04/16/2011 9:37:32 PM PDT by MeneMeneTekelUpharsin
There is a constant stream of cars entering the used car market.
The CfC program caused a brief dip in availability and increase in price of used cars, but any effects are long gone by now.
If there is a drop in supply at present, it would be because people are hanging onto their old car instead of buying a new one. Which would be an individual economic decision having nothing to do with a long-past federal program, regardless of how idiotic it was.
It's like visiting Fresno after a freeze damaged orange crops. There was about a 20% loss, but in order to get government assistance, they had to let the whole crop rot on the trees. The government would rather spend 5 times the money in order to ensure some poor shmuck didn't get away with a few extra bucks. Why not just subsidise the 20% and force them to harvest the good stuff?
I doubt it.
I don’t think there is any shortage of used cars.
Given the need for money to finance a used car dealership, I can see there might be a reduction in dealers.
I have a sixty something mile commute. I fill my gas tank every 8 days. Last fill up was 12 gallons -- $45 dollars. I drive a Cooper. Insurance is $60 a month. Then there is the cost of the vehicle. Oil changes. Tires. Brakes. Filters. Downtown parking.
My wife's car is not so fortunate. 20 mpg and a fill up costs her $75.
When I rode the bus, it was about $5/day and I drove 20 miles roundtrip to the bus park.
I'm fortunate in that the costs are incidental.
I know what poor is, however. I grew up in it. Poor people do what they must. Owning a car is an expensive luxury.
I wish I could still ride to work. I used to live 15 miles from work and had a rather pleasant ride. I lost my job, moved cross country for a new one. The only place I could find that was safe to live and affordable is a 30 mile one way trip, all highway. No more bike commuting.
We do have a warehouse 10 miles form the office. I can park there and ride in, which I have done. With city traffic, it’s not a fun ride though.
“We’re returning to the fuedal system;”
And,,,
Resistance is feudal!
I work for a taxi company in upstate NY that does medicaid transportation, and I can tell you that while most of the people we deal with use our service for actual medical reasons, there are definitely a few that are definitely “abusing the system”.
What really gets me, we take a group of people to a drug counseling program (court ordered I believe), and on the ride to this place they are discussing how to get around the testing, so they can use without getting detected!
And they get all they other benefits of medicaid as well, while I play by the rules, and I cannot afford health insurance!
For a year, about 10 years ago, I was able to commute 15 miles one way to the office, with most of the way on a very nice bike path.
As an experiment, during the last six months I tried to see how much I could cut down on the use of the car. In six months I drove about 400 miles altogether. Bike mileage averaged about 200 miles per week. Getting groceries and other shopping was interesting. I rode in 112F heat and in sleet, rain and occasionally snow, which is interesting.
This led me to reach the conclusion that if you ride 150 miles or more per week, it is just about impossible to be overweight.
In those six months I lost almost 50 pounds, my blood pressure went from hypertensive to well below “normal,” and my general health improved alarmingly.
Then I ran into the negative aspect of bicycling, with an accident that broke my pelvis on both sides. That was fun!
Then I moved and bicycling isn’t even slightly practical in my present job. I miss it. I get rapidly bored with the exercycle in a way I don’t when the exercise is actually providing useful transportation.
I find the enormous hostility to cyclists on this forum quite astonishing. I realize a good many cyclists are self-righteous *ssholes, but if more American used their own muscles to get around it would be greatly to their benefit and that of our society.
I agree all around
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