Driving 2008 w/o a Car

Jared Diamond's article today in the New York Times about the average US consumer consuming 32 times more than the average world citizen is another compelling and riveting reason to stay the course of not owning a vehicle another month at least. Our family has been involved in this on-going experiment to leave the car parked in the driveway since the end of August. Our comsumption has decreased and savings increased as a direct result better planning. For example, we eat out less often, because of the simple reason it's more difficult to pick up fast food and after a long day, the push is to get home and relax, not take extra time out to eat.
We've all been walking much more and during the holidays this extra walking helped us to keep off the extra pounds. We still have some way to go, but are moving in the right direction to keeping fit. And I'm thrilled I've been able to finish reading more books since I began the car free existence.

The coming months will be challenging however, as our 15 year old son pressures us to start driving. However, he has to achieve a minimumn grade point average to receive the reward of driver's education which may hold him off till summer. I hope for his sake he can do it, at which point we'll fire up the old volvo.

In the meantime I can't think of any reason to get a new car. The main obstacle is weekend and entertainment driving. We have not taken as many hikes as we did last year, but we've offset that with more frequent in- city walks. My stress level is way down not having to drive on a daily basis and I can't see any reason to ever enter the commuter frenzy again!