Master of Transport

This week I attended a friend's graduation. A few of us came to see it, and her partner arrived just in the nick of time. He'd driven in, and had a nerve-wracking time doing so.

Having got to campus, there was 20 minutes of driving around, to find a place to park. Then the ticket machine (yes it was paid parking) wasn't working. Once he'd sorted that out, it was another 20 minutes navigating an unfamiliar campus to find the graduation ceremony. All in all, it was a frustrating and exhausting experience in the heat of a Brisbane summer.

I have to admit I felt a bit smug that I'd zoomed in on my electric bike (total travel time about 10-15 mins), and parked in the bicycle rack about 1 minute's walk from all the graduation action. But I didn't gloat - that would have only made it feel worse.

Of course, he didn't have the option to ride (apart from CityCycle) but there's also a bus that goes from the street of his workplace to the university in 12 minutes.

I'm not sure why we seem to think that car is a fast and convenient option. Perhaps the graduates at the Psychology graduation would have a better idea.

I have two guesses. For many people it's the default, and our brains like to avoid decision-making so the default wins. Also, at the decision point (the journey start) the car seems convenient because in one minute you can be on your way. But the trouble comes later. Just like "buy now pay later", which seems like a good idea .. until "pay later" comes along.

Light on the Wallet

Aldi have just had one of their bicycle-related sales. Among the bargains was an LED lights set - front and rear for $9.99.

The bonus is that batteries ARE included - 6xAAA batteries. A 4-pack of these is $3. So that's $4.50 worth of free batteries.

All that maths means that really the front and back lights for your bike are just $5.49. That's loose change.

I'm continually impressed with how cheap it is to cycle.

Bubble Art

Another aspect of public transport that I enjoy is artwork. There's a lot to be seen from the train network, but this one's is near the ferry terminal at Teneriffe.

It might not be 'gallery-quality' art, but it's nice. A lot of people see it, and I'm sure it brightens their day.

It's certainly better than a plain brick wall, and better than motorist equivalent - a stream of roadside advertising billboards.

Double fees for car parking

One ever-increasing cost of car ownership is parking. At my work, these are the new parking prices.

Combined with last year's increase, it's almost doubled in two years. $75 per week - that's 2 and a half times my total transport cost.

Mind you, it probably has to increase that much. We can't just keep jamming more and more cars into the city. And the sooner we realise this, the better.

I reckon the best plan is to leave the car at home. Less stress. Fewer fees.

Changing Gears - and changing mindset

Greg Foyster quits his job in advertising to explore alternatives to the life of long hours in a soul-destroying work, to afford a big house and endless possessions to put in it.

Changing Gears is the diary of his journey from Melbourne to Cairns by bicycle with partner Sophie, exploring and experiencing different - and more sustainable - ways of living.

Despite coming from the city, having cycled trough rural and regional Australia, he arrives in Sydney with a new perspective on cars.

Here cars were crammed into every conceivable space, and for the first time I noticed, really noticed, just how many of them there were.

In 20 kilometres, we saw nothing but shops to buy cars, government departments to regulate cars, workshops to tune cars, stores to get accessories for cars, restaurants that encouraged people to eat in their cars, and mega malls that can only be reached by cars. And that was just one stretch of road in one suburb. All of our major metropolises are like this. We are citizens of car cities.

During the book he reasons that most things we do are because it's the default option. And cars are one of the big ones.

Cars are the main reason we live in sprawling suburbs, own big houses, shop at massive mega malls, and sit on our bums all day. Cars don't cause these things, but they enable them.

He refers to them as "consumption amplifiers". and says that without them, we'd

live in smaller spaces more closely together, we'd have shops within walking distance, and we'd exercise more.

The obsession with cars even affects our thinking. The funny side of this was when Greg and his wife would ask locals how far it was to the next town.

people looked at our bicycles stacked with belongings and still said 'It's a 30-minute drive'. Cars have come to dominate our concept of distance to the point where we don't think in kilometres any more.

Giving up our harmful addiction to cars is one of the lessons learnt on Greg's trip that he (and we) can take back into our normal lives.

More than 20 years!

Brisbane's Little Stanley Street hosts a series of restaurants with outdoor dining overlooking Southbank Parklands. One is the Eastern European restaurant Torba.

While our meal was prepared, a pretentiously expensive looking car arrived nearby. This prompted my girlfriend to share a recent realisation:

You know, my public transport costs me about $30 a week, tops. For the same price as a $30,000 car, I could catch public transport for 1,000 weeks. That's 20 years! And that doesn't even include petrol, registration etc.

She's right of course. And I've written about how expensive driving is. But her thought is a great way of expressing just how much sacrifice is involved in owning a car.

PS. I recently did a course on behavioural economics, where one example was car buying. We compare one car with another, but struggle to compare across categories. We rarely ask a question like "Is this car worth more than two vacations a year?" to work out if there are better things we could do with our money.

PPS. We then caught the bus home - on free travel.

The mobile device that charges you

There's nothing quite like a nice bike ride.

I reckon this would be t-shirt worthy.

(Image is my slight variation on this one)

Free Holiday Travel

Last weekend I went to the Gold Coast for a weekend break. Because I went by public transport, all the travel was free.

This is part of the go card 9-trips-then-free deal. Normally I'm up to 9 trips by Thursday so get the rest of the week for free - but this is the first time I've used free travel for a holiday.

Including the trip down to the Gold Coast, the trip out to dinner on Saturday night, the trip back to our accomodation, and then Sunday's trip back home. Because weekends are off-peak, it would have only cost $31.62 each. But because of the 9-trip deal is was free!