Author Topic: June Car-drop challenge.  (Read 1243 times)

Le Poisson

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June Car-drop challenge.
« on: June 01, 2018, 01:39:11 PM »
So here's the deal... we are a family of 4 in suburban Toronto. We own 2 cars. I think we could use one less car, but it would be a challenge. June is the testbed for the N-1 theory. Since Momma can't drive my car (stickshift) it means that if I haven't driven, we only used 1 car.

Let's see how long in June I can go without using the second car. If the answer is "all the days" then we'll talk about July.

I invite you join in or follow along, or whatever... but lets keep it positive.

Gilly

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Re: June Car-drop challenge.
« Reply #1 on: June 01, 2018, 08:33:12 PM »
I've been mulling getting rid of my SO's car. I told myself we would last September...
Well it's still here.
Reasons we can be a 1 car family:
There is only 2 of us and a dog.
We live 4 blocks from a bus route that is a zero transfer route to my work, two of the three grocery stores we regularly frequent, a major transit station, and a mall.
Bus pass is subsidized for me, through my work, with unlimited rides, pretax, for $25 a month
SOs car is a POS that is only used to get to work or single person errands since it was totaled out and two doors don't open.
I am biking distance from my work.
SO's work is 1.5 miles from my work. Either of us could easily walk or bike to the other person's work if we need the car.
We are walking distance from the library.
We are walking distance from the regular vet.
Our best friends are within biking distance and have provided emergency transport in the past.
My parents are retired, within (long) biking distance and have provided transport in the past.
Uber/Lyft are a thing

Reasons we haven't:
It's SO's car we would get rid of. It isn't in my control to get rid of it without buy in.
My car is the one we would keep. But SO is the one who is mostly restricted to driving for work due to on-call with quick response times, irregular working hours, a bad neighborhood for walking/biking at night-time hours, and a medical condition that would make a bike commute highly unpleasant. I don't trust SO to keep my car clean to my standards or not get in an accident.  See, I use my, not our, but its the first car I bought (while single and it was new);its only 3.5 years old, and I'm still enamored, and I don't think I will be able to justify buying a new car again.
Our work schedule's don't match up and I'd hate to have to run all the errands on our 1 day a week together.
Fear-broke my ankle last year, there were 3 months were if I couldn't drive I was reliant on others. Hated that feeling.
Laziness.
SOs car only costs us ~90 a month; is +$65 really worth the inconvenience?
Any way long way of saying I'm in on trying to do zero car miles for just me. experiment, not moral imperative though.







dashuk

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Re: June Car-drop challenge.
« Reply #2 on: June 02, 2018, 06:50:19 AM »
Good luck with it @Prospector.

We did an unplanned n-1 a few months back when my commuting motorbike was stolen from outside the office. Was already doing about 40% cycle/60% moto over the year*, gave me the excuse/kick to just go for it with cycling every day and cash the insurance cheque. Going ok so far, but then it is summer. Have the fallback option of a shorter ride then bus, but is £10 a day, so needs to be minimised to be cheaper over the year than moto ownership.

Sat in the car right now, 900 miles from home mid-family-holiday, so wont be joining in in June. In fact mid-May to mid-June will probably be a substantial chunk of our mileage for the year as we've cut a lot out when we're at home. Aim is to n-1 this one by the end of the year to get to zero motor vehicles on the road**.




* context: work is 15mi/24km away, so non-trivial cycle, and fairly time-consuming in the winter when I choose different routes because of darkness and traffic. I do only go there three days of the week, which helps.

**the less said about the three non-functional motorbikes in the garage and the truck in my parent's barn the better. File under 'Project Declutter' rather than 'Project Car-Free'. The truck (VW Transporter/Vanagon crew-cab) at least is probably appreciating.

Cassie

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Re: June Car-drop challenge.
« Reply #3 on: June 09, 2018, 07:16:07 PM »
We are retired and when one of our cars die we intend to try this.