car or no car?

[back alley]

did i tell you that my car died a few weeks back?
thought i'd see what life without one was like...i lasted a week and then bought another one. 2011 toyota rav4...nice little city in a blizzard car...kinda looking forward to winter now.

 

[Calzone]

did i tell you that my car died a few weeks back?
thought i'd see what life without one was like...i lasted a week and then bought another one. 2011 toyota rav4...nice little city in a blizzard car...kinda looking forward to winter now.

Joe,

Good luck with the RAV4. From what I know people like that little SUV and it remains popular.

Here in NYC I no longer own a car. A while back I had an 84 Jeep Scrambler with a Corvette engine and cut down Ford 9 inch rear with Lincoln Continental disc brakes. Had to deal with alternate side of the street parking when I lived in Greenpoint, and when I lived in Williamsburg in a loft I had private parking.

I miss the Scrambler, but I don't miss the headaches, the expense, and all the maintenance. The Jeep only got 15 MPG, but was fast as hell. Lots of fun to drive and rather dangerous because it was lifted and had big tires. Back in the day I beat a SVO Mustang in a drag race. Boy was that driver pissed. Got his ass whipped by a Jeep.

I really like the new 2017 Ford Raptor (F150 pickup, aluminum body, set up for dessert racing). Know that I'm known to drive like a fighter pilot. Also at one point I owned 5 cars.

Cal

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

I couldn't survive without a car. To begin, Fort Wayne has very, very limited public transportation. The nearest bus stop to my house is nearly two miles away. Second, I spend a lot of time in rural areas and driving to small towns for my documentary projects. A car is a requirement for my work.

 

[Ronald M]

Public transportation will get you from suburbs to Chicago and not much else. Calling a cab will take all morning to do a 30 min chore.

NYC has busses, subways and plenty of cabs. Subway may be risky. Big city life is not for me. Year back I enjoyed city shopping , not any more.

 

[Calzone]

Unless you live in a city with subways and good bus service doing without a car can make you a prisoner, unless you are a really dedicated cyclist.

I could however live with a Vespa in many places.

Fred,

Another reason is if you were poor. I did a lot of walking out in the suburbs.

One of the carefree parts of my life is when a friend and I hitchhiked to Miami. I had $14.00; my friend had $25.00; and I was only 16. To me owning a car is like indenturing your life because although required in some lifestyles the expense is great, especially if you want to drive anything nice or comfortable. Also hitchhiking down 95 in the early 70's was considered dangerous. We were on the road for 10 days. Never felt more free in my life.

In my past I was once King of the $200.00 car. I could buy any piece of junk and keep it running for a year. Many of my cars were eyesores and neighbors asked me not to park my car in front of their house. LOL.

I figure if I can't drive something that offers performance, then I'd rather be a pedestrian. To me driving just a normal vehicle is too pedestrian. One time I rented a midsize car for a vacation and the rental car company issued me a PT Cruizer. What a piece of junk. No fun at all.

At least on a bicycle I can race around and do crazy things.

Cal

 

[Mackinaw]

We live in the country, miles from town. Gotta have a vehicle, or, in our case, two. An old F-150 for truck stuff, and a car for the highway.

Jim B.

 

[rscheffler]

It depends so much on where you live, your work, lifestyle, etc., etc.

I survived in a city with decent public transit until age 30 without a car... then got one and got lazy. 🙂 I still own one. Being self-employed, I'm not out everyday on a job, etc., so don't fully utilize it, but the convenience is difficult to beat for situations that change at short notice. Last year the engine was replaced (it's a 2004), which took a few weeks to find all the pieces, get it back together and squash all the new bugs that arose. During that time i rented when needed. It got me thinking about joining a car-share service. Almost did it. Those seem great if you need a car for an hour or two, but for longer periods, renting seems the better option. Looking at my annual car ownership costs (maintenance, depreciation, insurance) and my relatively infrequent driving, I could probably rent and either save some money or break even. But there's no denying the convenience of having the car in the driveway, ready at any time.

We'll see what happens with autonomous vehicles and the predictions of some that it will become a situation of low individual car ownership and massive scale on-demand car sharing/renting. I wouldn't mind this if a high positive customer experience level was maintained.

 

[Kenj8246]

TX. 'Nuff said.

 

[Calzone]

Public transportation will get you from suburbs to Chicago and not much else. Calling a cab will take all morning to do a 30 min chore.

NYC has busses, subways and plenty of cabs. Subway may be risky. Big city life is not for me. Year back I enjoyed city shopping , not any more.

Ron,

I live 2.5 miles from work, and most days I walk to and from work. I save the $2.75 fares so I can buy film and afford so many cameras. The money has to come from somewhere.

I bought a Epson 3880 from B&H and I took it on the subway. Had to transfere from the "E" train to the number "6," and by the time I got home both of my arms were broken.

Another time a friend gave me a HP 9880 printer, paper and supplies. Again this was another dumb trip on the subway that kinda killed me. LOL.

Then there was this time when I bought the largest air condition I could find on 14th Street (about 20K BTU's) to cool my loft in Williamsburg. I purchased the airconditioner, but discovered that no cab would stop to pick me up. I ended up going back to get my hand truck and was forced to take this near half the size of a refrigerator airconditioner on the subway. Anyways this was truely crazy. Some man helped me get it down the stairs, but in Brooklyn I somehow got it up the stairs by myself.

Out in the suburbs the cast iron transmission for the Jeep I mentioned above came delivered off a tractor trailor. The driver and I lowered the 200 pound transmission to the ground (NV 4500 three speed manual trasnsmission with a 6.31 underdrive and and overdrive that pretty much is the ultimate transmission for rock crawling) by holding the input shaft and output shaft, but I somehow had to get it up a 100 foot gravel driveway. Realize that I weigh only 150 pounts, so dead lifting this transmission and taking one step and then resting to do it again took a long time to get it into the garage.

Getting by without a car requires some strength and some craziness.

Cal

 

[sevo]

There is little point in owning a car here in town - I am faster by bicycle within 80% of the city area, and legal parking within walking distance sometimes is plain impossible.

 

[rscheffler]

To me owning a car is like indenturing your life because although required in some lifestyles the expense is great, especially if you want to drive anything nice or comfortable.

Completely agree. It's a cost of trying to achieve the feeling/appearance/illusion of 'freedom'.

I have to say, I love being able to drive somewhere whenever I want. It feels great to be able to do that. Conversely, when doing my business accounting, I can't help but wonder if it's worth spending the money on car ownership. Who owns whom?

 

[Rangefinder 35]

Seattle suburbs here. My last car got totaled by bus 3 yrs. ago. For most of the time afterwards I just used bike for commuting and shopping, even in Seattle's winter. My stamina improved. Great savings in gas and insurance payments. Bad for photography (it's suburbs, for Christ's sake). Now I have a car again. Looking forward to hitting the trails.

 

[Godfrey]

The RAV4s are generally pretty reliable and serviceable. Good choice for a utility/transport machine.

I have an older Mercedes SLK 230 sporty car, now 16 years old. But honestly, traffic is so unpleasant around here that I can't wait until I retire and no longer have to drive to meet schedules and such. Public transit around here isn't great when you're working and need to get around, but it's fine for when you go places at your own pace. I'll keep the SLK anyway for those moment when it's useful.

I do more photography when I'm not encumbered with a car... 🙂

G

 

[rscheffler]

Then there was this time when I bought the largest air condition I could find on 14th Street (about 20K BTU's) to cool my loft in Williamsburg. I purchased the airconditioner, but discovered that no cab would stop to pick me up. I ended up going back to get my hand truck and was forced to take this near half the size of a refrigerator airconditioner on the subway. Anyways this was truely crazy. Some man helped me get it down the stairs, but in Brooklyn I somehow got it up the stairs by myself.

This reminds me of the time when my GF was studying in Munich and I helped her move apartments. We (well, more accurately, I) did most of it by taking a few moving boxes on a hand cart per trip on the subway.

To echo sevo's comment, whenever I was in Munich (and in western Europe in general), I always used public transit, or bicycle, and was generally happy. Part of it is certainly that there is a concerted effort to maintain decent public transit networks, even to smaller towns.

As for the stress of driving... yes, sometimes it is. But for me at least, driving is often a way of winding down after a job. For example, I shoot NFL football for one of my clients. It's great fun to shoot the games, but I also look forward to the road trips before and after each game, particularly if time allows and I can take some detours from the efficient but frequently boring interstates. Last year I drove the Blue Ridge Parkway over multiple days to/from a game in Atlanta.

 

[Calzone]

I quit driving in 1995. I drove a few times in Canada, but really did not drive until recently when I rented a car in Washington DC and drove south.

About the same as I remember, only there are even more cars on the road. I honestly don't know how people do it all the time.

Fred,

I have driven cross country three times. While we live in the third most populated country in the world, we live in a rather large country, and driving around I think is a very good way to get the scale in perspective. The road trip is an adventure into the unknown that is full of surprises. Anyways the car is so American and it presents so much culture of which I'm part.

There is a saying, "You know you are a red neck when half the cars you own are not running." LOL. This is true for me, or was at one point in my life. Out on Long Island I was rather famous as the guy who has the Jeep with a Corvette engine. Many also knew that I worked at Grumman, even though I did not know them.

One part of me is proud that I built a Hum Vee before there was a Hum Vee. Also proud of my mechanical skills, expressive talents, and extension of personality that a car can convey.

I had a maroon 1967 four door Ford Falcon that featured a $300.00 Yakoma bike rack, yet the car was only worth about $200.00. Add onto that it often sported high end titanium bikes, and that I use to use this car to drive out to the Hamptons every Saturday and Sunday to go riding with the Wall Street crowd. My old junky car made a powerful statement and was way cooler than all the Mercedes and even the Porshe with bike racks. About half the paint was gone so the care was rust and maroon, on the passenger side there was no floorboard and driving in the rain sometime I would get splashed when driving through puddles.

Cars can convey lots of style and personality.

Cal

 

[giganova]

My wife and I were sharing a car for the past 7 years, but I finally decided to get my own for more mobility. I bought a Jeep last week that should take me to places for photography other cars can't, plus it's a short car and easy to find parking, and with the top down it's such a joy to ride. Now we have two convertibles, a BMW and the Jeep, both new. 😀

 

[Moto-Uno]

Life without a car ? EASY Peter

 

[kxl]

Survival necessities in Southern California - food, water, car (and not necessarily in that order).

 

[Calzone]

As for the stress of driving... yes, sometimes it is. But for me at least, driving is often a way of winding down after a job. For example, I shoot NFL football for one of my clients. It's great fun to shoot the games, but I also look forward to the road trips before and after each game, particularly if time allows and I can take some detours from the efficient but frequently boring interstates. Last year I drove the Blue Ridge Parkway over multiple days to/from a game in Atlanta.

I bet that driving is rather beautiful.

I once got diverted near Saint Louis and tried to get back on a different interstate. I asked for directions at a stop and was directed onto this small road and to hug the river. The road was illuminated by all these reflectors on poles that were at headlight level, it was at night, and the road was foggy. The effect was twisting through a cloud like flying a plane where one just followed runway lights. This drive was spectacular, but it is unlikely that I might find this road again. The experience was for about 10-12 miles and was unforgettable. Especially in my Jeep Scrambler (pre Corvette engine).

Cal

 

[giganova]

Life without a car ? EASY Peter

Someone likes yellow! 😀

I've had a motorcycle for the past four years, but I decided to sell it. Before I bought it I had this naive idea of hopping on the bike and enjoying the wind in the hair and freedom, but that was nothing but an illusion. It takes a good 10 minutes to get on all your gear and armor, then you arrive and have to change cloths again for work/meetings, looking for a bathroom to change, a place to put all your gear, can't walk much in the boots so you need to change shoes... no space on the bike to store anything ... and very often I arrived soaked in sweat because of sitting on the hot engine in all the gear. It's just not at all what I envisioned.