economy | Car Free Days

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This just in: driving a car costs a whole bunch of money. Crazy as it may sound to all eight of our car-loving readers, puttin’ the pedal to the metal isn’t quite as cost effective as actually pedaling.

This according the American Public Transportation Association’s Transit Savings Report. They looked at what a car costs to own and run (the whole deal from buying it, maintaining it, parking, registration, insurance and more) and then compared that with what transit use would cost the same family.

The PI says in Seattle such a comparison nets a$10,483 savings for those chucking their car keys. And that’s for transit use. A bicycle switchover would probably fare even better. Pretty impressive.

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NY Times ♥’s Portland Bikes

Posted on November 5, 2007 by Tim K | 3 comments

I opened my Gray Lady this morning to find I wasn’t the only one smitten by the bike. This time, it’s the Times with an early November Valentine for our neighbors to the South. It is a good read and don’t have a lot to add, other than:

I’m Jealous: Why can’t my city do better? Why can’t we live in Portland?
My friends know how to get to me — four of them sent me this article.
The article is pretty shallow. The article emphasizes high-end frame builders and how Nike and Columbia sell cycling products, but lacks info about the large number of cool shops, amazing resources like BikePortland.org, and the other businesses who cater to regular cycling folk.
It’s the Times’ most-emailed article. Hey, you crazy politicians take that. The nation is indeed interested in bikes as modern transportation alternatives.
The PDX buzz is nearing an unsustainable level and I’m concerned about a hype fallout. I remember when all the college kids were moving to Seattle in the early 90s because of the music (and later, the dot.com scene). I got so sick and tired of meeting people from Virginia whom had moved to Seattle because they heard it was cool. And then they decided it wasn’t, but hadn’t got around to moving to the new IT town.

At least we had jobs here, back in the day. I think the reality of BYOE (Bring Your Own Employment) in Portland might not be so kind to this generation of hype gypsies.