I have started to walk to work on some days (about 4 miles, taking about an hour and a half) and actually prefer it in some ways to driving my car, taking the bus or biking. I see more; pennies on the ground that I do pick up, the Downtown Alliance greeters/cleaners who smile and say ‘hello’ and the doorman at the hotel in the Old Arcade on Superior who opens the door for me when I need to use the facilities (my first stop is Gypsy Beans for coffee. More on them later). Some folks were handing out free cereal boxes several mornings in a row. I see friends like Maria jogging and Kathy and Anne Marie biking to work.
Walking is less stressful and is a great way to ease into the workday. I’m fortunate to not have to leave the office during the day, and fortunate that I have a gracious colleague, Bina, who lets me borrow her car if I need to.
I have also started using the bus (surprisingly friendly drivers), and riding my bike. To be honest, biking is a little stressful for me. There are drivers who clearly do not pay attention. I admire those bikers who zip through traffic as if they have every right to, and they do.
Taking the bus to work has been easy, straight shot down Detroit then Superior. A few days ago, though, I took it from work to my foot doctor on Madison in Lakewood. Actually a bus, then the Rapid, then another bus. I have also taken the bus to visit my Mom in Lakewood Hospital farther out on Detroit. At this point, there is no money savings to me by taking the bus; probably costs more. I do save on gas but it’s probably more than offset by the $3 or so a day for bus fare. I still have car payments and insurance. My next goal is to figure out how to use those “Rack and Roll” bike carriers on the front of all the buses.
When I started this green effort, I wondered how it would affect my son Robbie (who lives with me part of the week) and my partner Catherine. Would they be drawn in by default? Last night, Robbie asked me to drive him and a friend to Hollywood Video to rent a game. I said “I’m doing this green thing remember”? Well, in my mind the best possible outcome happened, they rode their bikes.
Last night drove my car to Blossom Music Center. Checked with Blossom, no bus even comes close. Did consider riding my bike and staying at the Stanford Youth Hostel but my biking the nine or so miles from Blossom to Stanford on dark, one-lane country roads did not seem like my cup of green tea. As I said earlier, I am not a purist, but I do believe I can make adjustments to my lifestyle that will significantly reduce my impact on the earth. My new rule is this: If I can get there another way (bike, bus or walk) reasonably, I will. Taking more time, paying a few bucks extra, is reasonable. Putting me in an unsafe situation is not.
“I don’t have the time to take the bus or walk”. This all takes longer than driving my car. But as Barbara Kingsolver explains in her book “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle”, life is a zero sum game. I could “save” an hour or more by taking my car instead of walking, but that “saved” time gets used on something else anyway. What would I use it on?
And here I am proud of myself for not driving to work when lots and lots of folks take the bus or walk sometimes because that’s what they can afford. Carrying kids and groceries. When it comes down to it, the car is a luxury.
my story is similar!
curatorius Says:Thanks for this post. Your situation is more similar to my own than anything I have read on eco-blogs for a while.
I live right in Coventry Village and work at Case, so my walk to work takes about 30 minutes each way. This is a really pleasant walk about two-thirds of the calendar year, and for the really hot, really cold, or really wet days I am lucky to have the #821 community circulator that runs right through the neighborhood. While walking I often listen to WCPN on my walkman; there's nothing quite like a 65-degree September day with NPR on my headphones on my walk to or from work, strolling through leafy Cleveland Heights.
I am also fortunate to be able to car-share, even though City Wheels is not yet in my neighborhood, because my parents live a block from me and they have two cars that they only drive a few hours a week. When I need one I check their availability and pay them 40 cents a mile. I drive to my volunteer job and a few other errands every weekend, but at about $200 a year my driving expenses - plus the couple hundred dollars a year I spend on RTA fare, is still way less than car payments, insurance, gas and parking at University Circle (which alone is $75 a month!). But I know most people don't have a relative close by to carshare with, so getting CityWheels into more parts of greater Cleveland would be a really, really good idea.
When I was a 20-year-old junior in college, I spent a year going to college in Dublin, Ireland. As a fearless, athletic young person, I zipped through traffic on a mountain bike like a demon, imagining I was a bike courier or a spy. Today I am in my thirties and regrettably somewhat less fit. Thought I do jog on the weekends, I find that getting sweaty biking to my shirt-and-tie job would not be the thing. Bike advocates, like this blog, say that employers should provide showers for bike commuters to change at work. As a citizen-activist, I fully support all of this blog's efforts to make the world safer for bicycling - like bike lanes on Euclid or North Park, or a big block of lockers downtown. I'll look for opportunities to vote for these things, but these days I'll choose to pass on most biking for transportation myself. I'll pass on the sweatiness and the grease on my pant leg; I do realize I'm lucky to have the ability to walk to work within a reasonable time frame. We need a balanced, multimodal transportation system so people will have lots of choices about how to get around; different strokes for different folks.
cycling infrastructure in the OC
John McGovern Says:Chuck,
Liked your post and while it was more about walking than cycling, i'm sure you would agree on the merits of cycling, especially when compared to driving and owning cars! that being said, i think we have lots of work to do in the OC and the DS in regards to enabling cycling to become more commonplace. a simple idea would be for many of us to ask, say the new rite aid @ 65th, to put-in a bike rack. they've got the room and i'm sure they'd rather not have kids bring their bikes into the store, so maybe each of us can make the request and see what happens?
as for a longer range plan for cycling infrastructure (paths, lanes, parking, etc), I think we definitely need one!
City racks still available?
Marc Lefkowitz Says:John,
You probably know that the City of Cleveland bought some 500 bike racks and installed most of them around town—in front of rec centers, libraries, and stores in commercial districts like W. 25th and Lorain and Bridge & Fulton. If you contact Marty Cader at City Planning and ask if they held some in reserve for future projects like the Rite Aid at W. 65th, maybe he can work with the store to get one installed there?
p.s. I just emailed Marty and asked about it.
car sharing
Susan Miller Says:Chuck,
Way to go. It seems you live in Lakewood. In the future, you could be the guy who sparks the need for CityWheels to be there. Right now the cars are in Oberlin and University Circle (close to students who are often without cars at school), but in the future with your leadership there could be a pair of cars in Lakewood. I'd love to see them come to Cleveland Heights, too. With your human powered preference and ability to walk, bike or bus to most of where you need/want to go, you make the perfect candidate for car sharing. The description of the trek to Blossom would have been an appropriate reason to utilize CityWheels' Prius to get there and back.
If your story spreads, one day there will be a CityWheels Prius and Scion for you to hop into when you plan a trip to Akron or the Eastside or elsewhere.
Speaking of kids, mine is in college and is home for the summer. We share a car. I know this is a reality for many families as their kids reach driving age. Will we have to buy another car, we wonder. I would suggest that for many families who have experienced the sudden disappearance of their automobile that has always been "on hand", car sharing with a broader population after car sharing with a teenager or two could be easier than we think. The best part is that the CityWheels car will be full of gas and won't smell like a locker room (a regular feature of the car I share with my lacrosse playing son). Once you get there, you can sell your car and ditch the expense of the constant, insuring, maintenance and security worries.
This is for down the road, but you're showing your inner ring neighbors the way. Good for you!