Could We Survive Without Private Cars?.
It’s an interesting article. I can see how folks in built-up areas could maybe make do without their own car – infact I know quite a few folks who DO make do without a car.. But it seems to be an inner-city possibility only, really..
What about those of us who live out of town? Or for whom Car ownership/driving is a way of life or hobby, or even part of their work? There are those of us who have Ham Radio gear in their car (in a lot of cases, worth WAY more than the car too!), or use their car for work (aka van/4wd with tradies rack, towbar, etc etc) I sure wouldn’t be trusting a hired or ‘public shared’ car I can’t see a ‘public shared’ car coming with offroad-ability, and the reliability that you’d WANT if you went off-road? I sure wouldn’t take a hired 4wd (if you could even hire one!) offroad – You’d be pretty SURE you couldn’t trust it! I’ve hired plenty of cars and trucks before, and I know how abused they are – I remember heading to Kempsey, the weekend before the start of my 4th year of uni, with two 1-tonner utes, pulling tandem trailers, and then towing back two old wolseleys.. By the time we got back to Melbourne, the engine on the manual was blowing a LOT of smoke, and the auto on the second was slipping like mad between gear changes.. Was a small petrol 1-tonner the wrong choice for towing that load? sure – but the hire places don’t hire anything larger! Or at least they didn’t way back then anyway 🙂 Although I note that most hire places don’t have towbars on their utes anymore.. Infact, last time I needed to hire a car/truck to pull a trailer, I couldn’t actually find one! So we ended up sorting out a larger moving truck when we shifted house, so we could fit motorcycles on the tailgate.. And found a towtruck driver to whom 50 bucks and a case of VB was enough payment to move a couple of minis across canberra..
I thought this was interesting too:
It’s easier not to go to a shopping centre if there’s a reliable home delivery service
I dunno about other folks, but working from home, I *LOVE* going to the shopping centre, as it gets me out of the house! Now sure, in fine weather, I prefer to ride my pushbike the 12km round trip to get the mail every morning, but some days I just don’t have the time to take out of my work day to do it, so it’s on the motorbike, or in the pajero.. And yes, I know I can have austpost email/sms me *if* i have mail.. but that costs extra on top of the already spiralling costs of owning a postoffice box!
IMHO, *NO* we couldn’t survive without Private Cars. *AS A WHOLE* that is. I’m sure there’s a small portion of the Australian Population who live close enough to city centres to be able to. But for the majority of us, it’s simply not an option!
Meanwhile you see soccer mums driving big 4.8L land cruisers, to take the kids to school and back. yeah, if that’s not a waste of fuel, road wear, and parking space, i don’t know what isn’t.. Heck, even the folks who drive all year round with their aircon on shit me to tears – c’mon guys, you don’t need the aircon on when it’s 15C outside! I don’t know what the smaller cars are like, but the missus’ commodore uses about the same fuel as my pajero in summer – that’s an extra 5L/100km, just because the aircon is running!
Meh, ok, that’s my rant done 🙂
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