Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

General cycling advice ( NOT technical ! )
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: RE: Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by [XAP]Bob »

sjs wrote:
[XAP]Bob wrote:Got rid of the second car years ago.

Now commute 15 miles each way, it's a shade slower than driving, but much more predictable and of course I get 90 minutes of excercise each day. So it is quicker than a car and a trip to the gym.

Cheaper too - even if I do attribute vehicle cost...

You average 20mph? Pretty good!


Some of the journey isn't exercise :p
(and it's actually 14 miles, not 15, don't know why I typed 15)
I can average 18+, I'll be interested to see what I do in the summer, when I leave the laptop in the office and take two wheels rather than three...
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
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tykeboy2003
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by tykeboy2003 »

Vorpal wrote:It seems silly to pay so much for something to use it 3 times per week.


If there were more people with the same outlook there would be (and in some places maybe is) an opportunity for a car-share business.

Sadly the majority of people are prepared to pay a lot of money to have the car sitting on the drive even if they don't use it. I seem to have fallen into this category, I cycle commute and go to the shops on my bike, I only really use the car for longer trips like days out etc or when I have carry a lot of stuff. I really do wish I could make the break but it would make trips to visit remote friends and family very difficult.

At the weekend, I stupidly used the car to go to the shops on my way back from a longer trip and spent more time trying to park the damn thing than I did in the shop.
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meic
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by meic »

Sadly the majority of people are prepared to pay a lot of money to have the car sitting on the drive even if they don't use it.

I too am in that category (though my lot of money is much smaller than most other people's).
The utility of a car is not just transporting you from A to B, it is also having the thing ready on call 24 hours a day and where ever you happen to be and with what you want in it.

I seem to remember an old Sustrans slogan "Be proud of the car that you dont drive".
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tykeboy2003
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by tykeboy2003 »

meic wrote:The utility of a car is not just transporting you from A to B, it is also having the thing ready on call 24 hours a day and where ever you happen to be and with what you want in it.


Very true. Maybe if people used their cars less, the cost of ownership would come down;

The obvious ones

lower maintenance costs,
lower fuel costs,

Not so obvious

cheaper insurance due to reduced mileage (some companies do offer this),
VED adjusted based on annual mileage (it's reduced for low emission vehicles so why not base it on annual total emission? Better still, get rid of it and put it all on fuel)

etc.

It really is time to reverse Norman Tebbit's famous "on your bike" policy (more accurately "in your car") which increased road traffic massively.
nomm
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by nomm »

5+ years and counting carless and only one bike - my steel do it all - commutes everyday, weekend mile muncher and touring steed (the tandem doesn't count as it's the families steed)

Holidays with bikes and trains, hire cars only when there is no other option, pool cars at work for community visits.

It felt like a much bigger decision than it actually turned out to be - it is a amazing to see friends and relatives embrace riding and still keep their cars which get used less than weekly

It does still shock me the level of laziness I see among some of my peers though. My house mates must drive to the supermarket 4+ times a week which is 0.5 miles away. IT'S A 10 MINUTE WALK YOU ******!
Elizabethsdad
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by Elizabethsdad »

tykeboy2003 wrote:
Vorpal wrote:It seems silly to pay so much for something to use it 3 times per week.


Sadly the majority of people are prepared to pay a lot of money to have the car sitting on the drive even if they don't use it.


Driveway? Most people leave their car parked on the street in cities thereby causing a huge amount of congestion and dangerous driving/riding conditions by narrowing roads down to long stretches of single lane traffic. Worse are the ones who park with two wheels on the pavement "So that traffic has more room to get by" Wrong as it just encourages two vehicles to try squeezing into the extra space which isn't enough and blocks up the pavements for people like wheel chair users and parents with baby buggys.
Cyril Haearn
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by Cyril Haearn »

nomm wrote:5+ years and counting carless and only one bike - my steel do it all - commutes everyday, weekend mile muncher and touring steed (the tandem doesn't count as it's the families steed)

Holidays with bikes and trains, hire cars only when there is no other option, pool cars at work for community visits.

It felt like a much bigger decision than it actually turned out to be - it is a amazing to see friends and relatives embrace riding and still keep their cars which get used less than weekly

It does still shock me the level of laziness I see among some of my peers though. My house mates must drive to the supermarket 4+ times a week which is 0.5 miles away. IT'S A 10 MINUTE WALK YOU ******!


They are like the people who drive to the gym, sorry fitness club to get on an exercise bike. Sometimes the car park is so big one still has to walk a long way
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[XAP]Bob
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by [XAP]Bob »

At which point they.circle around, parking as close as possible to the lift before getting on a treadmill and stepping machine :roll:
A shortcut has to be a challenge, otherwise it would just be the way. No situation is so dire that panic cannot make it worse.
There are two kinds of people in this world: those can extrapolate from incomplete data.
Viv4
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by Viv4 »

No, but since having a retrofit front hub kit fitted to my touring bike I am using my vehicle less and less. I don't have to sit in traffic any more on my way into our local town (12 miles away) but have a leisurely cycle through the lanes. It can take up to an hour to get into town in the morning in the car, most of that time spent sat in traffic. It takes me the same amount of time on the bike and is much more pleasurable. I use panniers for my shopping but loaded these can be pretty heavy so I have just invested in a trailer for the bigger shopping trip.

I have cycled for years and always enjoyed it but having an ebike really has given my cycling a boost. I don't suffer (yet!) from any of the health conditions that some folk think are mandatory before you can be seen riding an ebike but I 've found that having the assist means I ride so much more and for trips that I would usually drive. Cycling 12 miles to the hairdresser or the dentist where you don't want to arrive as a sweating red faced heap is now a doddle. Level 2 or 3 power assist on the way in means I arrive on time and looking smart(ish) and level 1 or no power on the way home means I get a work out. So a win win situation as they say.

If you have never ridden an ebike look around and find a test ride and don't wait until you think you need one either. Ebiking is so much fun and will really put a smile on your face, it's safer as you're quicker in traffic too. If anyone says to me it's cheating then I ask them to pick my bike up. Why I should be cheating ride a bike I would struggle to pick up but the Lycra lads/lasses aren't cheating with a bike you can pick up with one finger I will never know.

As a footnote, I believe that if more women had access to an ebike then there would be many more women cycling, building it into their everyday life and not seeing it as a sport with special clothes, goals and targets to be met. If some of the guys want the woman in their life to cycle, treat her to an ebike or at least a kit for the bike she doesn't use. You never know she might want to fit it herself :D
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The utility cyclist
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by The utility cyclist »

I spent too much money on my car (Passat TDI) last November to get it through its MOT, more than it was worth but will see it through for a few more years without needing parts/repairs. It's been a great servant, has hardly cost me much over the last 11 years - bought SH at 4.5 years old and I got it for £4k which was massively under book price so the depreciation hasn't been a big factor. annually over the last 6 years bar last Nov it's cost me roughly £900/year all in including fuel/ins/VED/MOT/parts, about 23p/mile (3 years with no replacement parts/straight MOT pass helps)

I declared the car SORN from 30th Jan this year, I've borrowed my sons car once (to meet friends across country 26 miles away) however as a volunteer for AGE UK the last 15 years and my family ties up in East Yorkshire there are times when getting to where I need to be by bike is not just simply impossible for me physically but in some instances utterly impractical, more costly and more stressful.

As an example I collect and distribute the charity's quarterly magazine, that's 15x 5kg boxes so I'd drive to collect from the local branch and drop them off near me by bike in multiple trips. More recently the local branch has closed and the magazines are now 14 miles away by the physically shortest route (by bike). there's 45ft/mile with an 8% incline on the way back as well as some fast downhill bits too. Aside from needing a suitable trailer I'm not even sure I could do it never mind want to do it and that's just one example.
Last year there were several family matters that meant I needed the car, immediate travel by train is hugely more costly and journey time door to door much longer, sometimes by 50% more.

I'll keep the car SORN until i really absolutely need it, in a way it's good because I'm not buying bike bits I don't need so has curtailed my jackdaw tendancies. :lol:
Those who can do without a car all year round I applaud the effort.
Last edited by The utility cyclist on 24 Mar 2017, 10:15pm, edited 1 time in total.
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tykeboy2003
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by tykeboy2003 »

Elizabethsdad wrote:Driveway? Most people leave their car parked on the street in cities thereby causing a huge amount of congestion and dangerous driving/riding conditions by narrowing roads down to long stretches of single lane traffic. Worse are the ones who park with two wheels on the pavement "So that traffic has more room to get by" Wrong as it just encourages two vehicles to try squeezing into the extra space which isn't enough and blocks up the pavements for people like wheel chair users and parents with baby buggys.


Too true, have you ever cycled in Bristol? Nightmare.
nomm
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by nomm »

tykeboy2003 wrote:
Elizabethsdad wrote:Driveway? Most people leave their car parked on the street in cities thereby causing a huge amount of congestion and dangerous driving/riding conditions by narrowing roads down to long stretches of single lane traffic. Worse are the ones who park with two wheels on the pavement "So that traffic has more room to get by" Wrong as it just encourages two vehicles to try squeezing into the extra space which isn't enough and blocks up the pavements for people like wheel chair users and parents with baby buggys.


Too true, have you ever cycled in Bristol? Nightmare.


I live in Bristol and I will testify that parking on pavements seems like a local hobby of most drivers, even when it is not warranted by the road width. Where I used to live it was so inconsiderate for anyone walking with a stick/wheelchair user/pram - that I often used to print out big a4 signs stating "thank you for parking so inconsiderately" on the worst offenders with the relevant logos and stick them on peoples cars. Eventually quite a few people in the street banded together to help fund the council to put large raised beds with nice plants in, on the corners of the junctions, as these were the worst or most dangerous places for this type of parking. This resulted in the systematic vandalism or pro-active destroying of the lovely raised beds by the people who lived on the street and disagreed with he whole concept. It was at this point gave up on society - I now work in finance/marketing - instead of the NHS, I vote tory and play the stock market - instead of volunteering with local causes and as a white, straight middle class male - continually berate anyone/thing/view that may question my social privilege. I am in a much better place in life now.
De Sisti
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by De Sisti »

Can't travel to weekly rehearsals and concert performances with my double bass on the back of my bike.
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by Vorpal »

De Sisti wrote:Can't travel to weekly rehearsals and concert performances with my double bass on the back of my bike.

I can get two cellos on my trailer. I imagine that I could haul a double bass, instead (that's known as hauling bass ;) )
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Re: Anyone Ditched their Car Completely for a Bike?

Post by Vorpal »

“In some ways, it is easier to be a dissident, for then one is without responsibility.”
― Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom
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