Title. I asked the same question on the car enthusiast community. Please share thoughts here for comparison.
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If you live in a car dependent country (like the US), you will have to use a car sadly (if you aren’t living in a city).
- Saving Money
- Better for environment
- It’s safer for everyone
- No need to find a parking spot :D
Not having to spend money on insurance, maintenance, fuel, repairs, etc.
I’ve got wrid of my car 3 years ago. The benefits I’ve encountered.
- I save about 500 euros a month (this is a conservative calculation)
- Commuting has become something I can’t control so I’ve let go.
- I ride my bicycle a lot more. It has made me healthier and I’ve lost about 15 kgs
- No more searching for parking spots, paying for parking fines,…
- The mental load of owning a car is gone. No maintenance, no insurance, no low emission zones.
- I’ve become more aware about the room cars take up in our streets and our society.
On the occasions we need a car I rent one or use a car sharing service.
Less stressful. I never have to worry about accidentally killing anyone, except for that time I bought worcestershire sauce because I didn’t know it had anchovies
I literally do not believe that you just know how to spell Worcestershire.
I really like Worcestershire, I was heartbroken to learn it wasn’t vegan. Now I have to put Nando’s hot sauce in my spaghetti sauce and who knows what they put in that?
I have vegan worcestershire! Let’s see if I can find where I got it… BAM!
I very nearly made the same mistake once, but damn me if I don’t read the label first.
I save a huge amount of money compared to somebody with a car. HUGE.
- I don’t have to pay off the car,
- I don’t need to buy a driver’s licence,
- I don’t need to pay road tax,
- I don’t need to pay for an annual MOT,
- I don’t need to pay for service checkups,
- I don’t need to pay for fuel/oil/fluids/parts that wear out or break,
- I don’t need to pay for insurance,
- I don’t need to pay for parking spaces, etc etc.
All I need to pay for is a bus, tram, or train ticket, and I can easily get anywhere in the city with minimal walking time.
And heck, that’s cheap. All the buses are capped at £2.00 regardless of the journey length, for example! Two quid!
There are a lot of other benefits too. For example, I don’t have to worry that someone will nick my car, and I don’t have to make sure I live somewhere with parking available.
Owning a car just seems like such a ball and chain, especially considering how fragile that relationship can be. One day everything’s great, the next day boom, you need to fork out 2 grand for repairs, or maybe the car’s just… gone.
2 quid buses is amazing. Shitey First Bus doesn’t even get me out of the first zone for 2 quid.
Move to Vienna, 365 euros for all year day and night (weekends and public holidays) public transport. Half of it if your company pays the other half. And if you use Wien Energie you’ll get some free days electricity on top.
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You are forced to take your bicycle far more often. No excuses. You cannot just take the car whenever you feel lazy, tired or if the weather is mediocre. Your health will benefit from this a lot.
I lived in a walkable city for a decade and now live in a more rural area where cars are a necessity.
Now that I need a car, I need to:
- Keep my driver’s license up to date
- Pay tolls/monitor my transit account
- Renew my registration every year
- Get the car inspected every year
- Pay for my car insurance
- Remember to refuel
- Keep up with oil changes and general maintenance
- Monitor tires and wipers for degradation
- Keep the interior clean and tidy
- Budget extra money away for more expensive repairs or service
- Deal with snow removal for a driveway
As someone with ADD the extra responsibilites are stressful and often slip by me, not to mention the costs add up. It’s also omnipresent in my mind that on any given day that I drive, especially on the highway, statistically that is the most likely way I will die considering my current age and health. I don’t miss carting my groceries around in the snow or rain, and it’s nice to be able to move large, heavy items relatively easily, but man I miss the freedom of just leaving my door and walking somewhere.
I keep wondering whether I raised my kids right or deprived them. My older is 18 and has no interest in driving - he’s also anxious about his adhd. But I’ve had to really push to get him to do any time behind the wheel. My younger is really jumping on the opportunity to drive but expects to live in a walkable city with transit like we do now - he’s used to being able to go anywhere without a car
That’s all well and good, and we should all aspire to that, but what are the chances they can live without cars here in the US? They probably should be able to, even if they think “most places you do t need a car”
It’s certainly possible to live in a walkable place but it’ll be very expensive. Most actually walkable areas in the US are in well established cities in the east where the “bones” of their layout were built before the GM conspiracy played out. I could barely afford to live there at the time and probably couldn’t afford to live there now. There are still some towns out there that haven’t lost their downtown main streets though. Unfortunately I think the path forward for the moment looks like settling for car dependency and pushing your local area to make positive changes for pedestrians and alternative transport.
I currently live in a very walkable area.
Rent is indeed significantly more expensive, but not when factoring rent/transportation together. (At least in my experience).
For an equivalent apartment in the suburbs & a car, it comes out as roughly the same cost as my current apartment without a car.
Money - a lot of people are not aware of the money a car costs over a period of time.
Dependency - you are only able to drive a car in a special time of your life. If you are too young or too old you are not allowed - or it is very dangerous - to be the driver of a car. There are places you are just able to go by car. This is a problem: they are just made for car people. For instance: malls outside a city. Nobody is shopping in the inner citys, while everybody have to take the car to the mall. This system needs a lot of good working roads, parking spaces and other infrastructure.
Health - in regards of physical activity or is a lot healthier to live in an area where you are able to take public transport. Due to the last mile, which you are probably going by bike or by feet, you get your daily “workout”. Also you are emitting much less emissions into the air. It seems that particulate matter of the reason for a lot of illnesses of our time.
Public Space - you are consuming much less public space than people who are owning a car. Parking lots are in habitats of humans all around. They cost a lot of money, are sealing good soil and the precious space in city is wasted to it. There are such nice projects all around the world, where former parking spaces or streets where changed to spaces for everyone.
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Sure thing! But there is not the need for every person to own a 1to steel case to go anywhere. Cars need a lot more infrastructure than an integral system, where you are able to use and change between bus/train/bike/walk/e-scooters - and so on - to reach your target.
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Being able to look at your children in the eyes and knowing that you aren’t contributing to the pollution they are breathing, to the traffic noise they hear while they are trying to rest, or to the traffic that puts them in danger every time they go out.
Future generations will judge us for the shitty legacy we have left them.
Saving a fuck tonne of money. Between the financing, tax, MOT, petrol, parking and maintainable, I save thousands a year.
Better health. I walk about 2 miles total a day that I wouldn’t if I had a car and drove to work. And then if I need to go to the shops or something that’s either more expersise or I just don’t buy the snacks I wanted. Plenty of people i know that drive will take their car to shops that are 5 mins walk away.
More “free” time. Since I don’t have to focus on driving during my commute, I watch TV shows or movies, or play games (Currently binging Stargate and watch an episode each way on the commute, and beat the new Zelda mostly on the train)
Then the less tangible things like knowing I’m doing my fair share to stop climate change and encourage the government to invest in public transport.
Knowing I’m not repaonsible for kids growing up with respiratory diseases, knowing ill never get in a car accident and kill someone, whether due to my own negligence or not and have that on my conscience forever (my sisters husband killed a kid that ran infrint of his car. There was nothing he could have done, but he’s still never been the same since)
And my mental wellbeing, my walk takes me through parks and woodland on one side and cute side streets filled with boutique stores and pop up art exhibitions on the other
Oh and I don’t have to worry about my car when I go out drinking, or worry about it getting stolen or the catalytic converter being ripped out like my housemate does.
And probably a few other little things that I can’t think of right now.
In a dense city finding parking is a huge pain that can take half the time of the drive lol
If I bought a car I would never be able to afford anything nice or fun again. We’d be behind on bills all the time and struggling to keep food in the fridge. Also, I’d be so stressed all the time, between stressful driving and being broke, I’d go nuts. Public transit gives me time to relax and watch a video or something on my way home from work too, which is nice. My only critique is that transit needs a wider range in my area. A train would be lovely.
Unfortunately it is necessary that I drive sometimes so I maintain my license and rent cars when I need them. It’s mildly inconvenient and I don’t always like walking out to the rental place, but life is so much nicer without a car. I also like knowing that I am doing my part to help the environment by walking and taking public transit.
More money for other things
More than everything else, peace of mind. No worries about the condition and repairs and maintenance of a $40K hunk of metal and glass, or about accidents, injuries, insurance, parking, the idiot in the other lane, the price of gas, or anything else.
My bus comes at 7:45, la-di-da. :)
The cars community is completely toxic, I needed the :). Thanks
Eeek. Hadn’t noticed the toxicity, but with 6,000 readers I suppose some have to be idiots. Have another :).
I realized they were toxic because I was being an asshole but :) :)
