If Not Now, When?

I learned a bunch of things by riding my bike a quarter of the way across this gigantic continent of ours (actually, it was further than a quarter but only because of the circuitous route we took, so I'm still calling it a quarter.) I learned a few things about the people that inhabit the spaces between here and there, I learned some things about the infrastructure that we have for traveling from here to there, I learned some things about time and space, and I learned a whole bunch of things about one particular citizen of these United States. That would be myself of course. I'll get to all of that eventually but today I want to focus on that infrastructure bit. As you probably know, we have an incredible array of roads and highways in this country, most of them in fantastic condition. I have done only a tiny little bit of traveling abroad myself but Marc has traveled widely and deeply, often in parts of the world that are still in juvenile phases of development. This caused him to comment on the state of our roads, how beautifully maintained they are, how numerous they are, how many options we have for getting from, say, Rutland VT to Freeland MI. The little bit of traveling I've done in the developing parts of the world, like Maine and Costa Rica, has taught me to be mindful, even thankful, for roads that go in a relatively direct fashion from point A to point B, especially if they do so on smooth surfaces. I'm thankful, I really am. But all of these great roads have come to us at a cost, and we've not yet begun to pay that cost down. I'm pretty sure we will, if not in my lifetime, at least in the lifetimes of people that I know. This all sort of bums me out.

This country was shaped by the automobile. There are a handful of exceptions, places where one could live a rich and satisfying life without owning an automobile but, for the most part, if you don't have a car in this country you are some kind of a kook. How are you going to get to work, get to the grocery store, get anywhere? Not on a bike or on foot, that's for sure, unless you happen to be a suicidal kook. Great tracts of our cities and, even more so, our suburbs are all but inaccessible to bicycle or foot traffic. One place that really stands out in my mind is Bowling green Ohio. This is a college town, a State University town and, from what I've seen, a town that is pretty much off limits unless you are driving an automobile. If you happen to be in Bowling Green on your bike, and you want to get a room for the night and some dinner, well, there's good news and bad. The good news is that there are a multitude of options including all manner of chain motels and restaurants, all conveniently located along the same strip. The bad news is that the road going through that strip is an awful place to have to ride a bicycle, a place that requires one to suspend all self preservation instinct for a time and hope for the best. The people using that road for it's intended purpose -- occupying it in a motor vehicle -- are seemingly very happy to be stuck in their metal boxes. They've got the air conditioning cranked up, they're making lots and lots of phone calls, and they certainly don't want to slow down or move laterally to avoid killing the kooks on the side of the road walking or riding a bicycle. In case you're wondering, Bowling Green isn't the only place like that. In fact there are places just like that here in my hometown of Rutland VT. If I was determined to go to the Hannaford Supermarket, the best supermarket in this fair town (my opinion, others tend to disagree) I would be taking my life in my hands trying to get there by bicycle. I would stand a better chance on foot, but since it's probably a four mile round trip from my city home, I'd need quite a bit of time to accomplish the task. So like, what should I do? Buy a car? Fortunately, I do own a car, so I'm not, you know, a totally irrational and dangerous subversive. But you know what? Owning a car is such a bad deal that I just wish I didn't have to own one.

I did some digging around and found some good statistics. According to AAA of Minnesota, the average annual cost of ownership for a vehicle driven 15,000 miles a year is $7,754 (that statistic is from 2003.) Since the average American earns somewhere in the neighborhood of $17 an hour, that means that the average person has to work over three full months each year just for the privilege (?) of owning that bad investment. That's a quarter of my time, man. Or in a year like this, when no one wants to build or renovate anything, all of my working time. I'm not down with that. If I had been saving that money all these years, instead of using it to pay for my car, I could probably be retired right now. Or, consider that you can park between 7 and 12 bicycles in the space that one car takes up. Think of all the nice green spaces we could have if we didn't need so many parking spots. Or you could build two Bed Bath and Beyond stores, instead of just one, with all that left over space. It costs about $50 to build and maintain a bicycle parking space in a bike rack. It costs about $8500 to build and maintain an automobile parking space in a parking structure. I'm not great with numbers but that seems like a really good savings. I know this is all massively simplified, and also I didn't bother to do any fact checking because I'm a blogger and I don't have to (that is the rule, bloggers can print anything they want) but it just seems to me like we could clear up a couple of our societal problems by taking some of this stuff into account. And I think we should maybe start doing some of these things sooner than later because, you know, our current model of living all spread out and relying almost totally on automobile transport is just not sustainable. Judging by the level of impatience I see in motorists who have to wait behind me for 10 seconds at a stoplight, I'd really hate to see the reaction elicited by a complete and total collapse of our petroleum economy. I think there might be physical violence.