My "Car Free" Experiment
 

When I was approaching 16 or so, a film about cars (of all things) prompted me to take an interest in bicycles. Being a computer nerd, I naturally logged onto the internet and began to Google bike customization. It wasn’t long before I stumbled across the Bike Forums where I discovered a sub-culture dedicated to this elegant machine. As I perused these forums I came across this revolutionary idea which gripped me and never really let me go: the idea of living car free.

Throughout my 20’s, I had all sorts of aspirations. I wanted to learn languages; I wanted to write stories; I wanted to be a scholar of the scriptures and sciences; I wanted to lose weight, get in shape and, of course, ride my bike (and maybe go car free). I came at life with all of these good intentions and ideals, but found myself again and again taking the path of least resistance: video games were easier than self motivated study; fast food was easier than cooking; driving was easier than riding; Before I knew it, I was 30 years old and no closer to achieving these aspirations than I was at 16.

Now, electricity is inherently lazy – like me, it follows the path of least resistance. The interesting thing is that we can exploit this lazy behaviour using semi conductors and resistors to direct and change the path of least resistance to create amazing electronic machines. So what if I try something different and make riding my bicycle the path of least resistance?

I’m not ready to give up my car just yet, at least, not until I have proved to myself that I can do just fine without it. So I am going to do an experiment: I have left my car keys in my office at work, and my car in the parking stall at home leaving me with two choices: either I ride my bike to work, or I get up even earlier and take the longer train ride to work. Guess which one is the path of least resistance?

This should be fun!

How far do you have to ride to work?

Do you leave your home to travel to any other destination besides your work site?
How do plan to get to and fro, year round from your home in Calgary? Anybody else live in your household? How do they get around?

I would suggest not disabling the vehicle (separating the keys from it) to force yourself to ride, but rather ride because you've made a decision and have the self-confidence to stick to it. Reason being, you probably see right through that self-manipulation and will find ways to compensate. Counter-productive to your goal.

I agree. Hopefully you like biking enough to want to do it more as part of your transportation lifestyle. If you want motivation to avoid the car, think of it like a counter that resets every time you give in and drive the car. The longer you make it without driving, the more you'll want to maintain your momentum and not reset the clock to day one again.

Then, if you find there are certain things that require driving, you'll make a special allowance for those without having to reset your counter. Then you can still count how many days (and years, eventually, :50:) you've LCF'd and just qualify it by saying, "except for a/b/c." Gradually, you might also figure out ways to replace those car trips with car-free modes and you can eventually sell your car and, imo what's even better, cancel your insurance.

About 10km one way.

I go to church, to my friends, to the grocery store, choir practice, coffee shops, etc - all of which are easy riding distance. If anything, work is the farther destination. Admittedly, I need to figure out a strategy for other shopping destinations (or alternatives) for ones that are not as conveniently accessed by bike. And I do periodically travel out of town to visit my folks, but if the car free thing goes well in the long term, I can always rent a vehicle for when I want to go out of town if other arrangement cannot be made. There are certainly problems to be solved and hurdles to overcome, and I'll not get it all figured overnight, but problem solving and wargaming different solutions is fun (and, fortunately, it doesn't all need to get figured out overnight).

If all goes well, come winter I'll put my winter tires on the bike, and take the train on days when there is too much uncleared snow on the ground.

At this time, I am single and have nobody else to concern myself with in that regard.

I find such good intentions on their own to be largely ineffectual for changing my behavior. I might decide in the evening that I am going to ride to work the following morning, but when I wake I may feel tired or like sleeping in an extra half hour and thus sleepy me overrides the decision made by not-sleepy-me. So I have created something of a Ulysses pact - I am making a decision in advance and creating the circumstances to aide me in sticking with it.

At the end of the day, this is an experiment - nothing is permanent yet. If I decide that it is too much all at once, I'll look to adjust things - whether that be taking the train a couple times a week to break things up or bringing my car keys home for weekends (or taking some of the above advice and keeping my keys at home... :)) or some other such thing.

Thanks for very responsive and well thought out answers to the questions about your proposed plan.:thumb:

Other LCF posters should take note as to how a "constructive discussion" about living car free is conducted!

I'm also a bit lazy too. When I first started trying to live car-light, we had bought a new car (mainly for my wife's use) and still had the old one for a while, so it was easy to just hop in and drive to work. When I got rid of the old car it made the decision much easier to bike to work as it is a bit faster than public transit.

However, after a while it becomes a bit of a locked-in habit, so now, even if my wife is out of town or otherwise doesn't expect to use the car on any given day, I would never think of driving, and if I do "have to" drive (about once a year, for example to take the car in for service) I'm now quite annoyed at the intrusion into my biking routine.

There is something to be said for that, especially going all-in on it like that. When I did a similar experiment it was after mechanical trouble with the car, and I was disgusted with pouring money into it. Not a bicycle enthusiast at all, in fact I didn't even like it but bikes were the fastest and most convenient so that's what I did. If the car had been in good shape I'd have used it for the more difficult trips, no question about it.

It was months before I said "hey this is easy" and a month or two more before "I actually like this" and started riding extra. Somewhat older than you at the time, it may happen faster but regardless of how you go about it I urge you to give it enough time to succeed.

I think you'll find that things like crappy weather and being really tired will tend to make the latter the path of least resistance.

I should clarify: in order to make it to work on time, I must leave the house by 6:30 am if taking the train. If, however, I am riding my bike I can leave just after 7:00 am (otherwise, I would have to say that you would be right). Once 6:30 am has passed me by, the train is really not an option any more - so if I am only getting up at 6:30 - cycling quickly becomes the only path available to me. Admittedly, in the winter I will have to get up earlier so that I can check to see how much fresh snow is on the ground to decide whether to bike or take the train, so that will change the dynamic somewhat. Hopefully by that point, it will be enough of an ingrained habit, like cooker suggests, that I shall not need as much motivation to choose riding when feasible. (I suspect the prospect of not having to stand around in the cold as I wait for trains and the bus leg of the trip will also serve as motivation).

For me, getting an E-Assist on bike has doubled the miles I put on the bike in a year, up to 2,400Km a year now, and has made choosing... to ride the bike more often workable, rather than driving my car to everywhere like I used to...;) You know, getting somewhere 2X faster with 1/2 the sweat, works wonders for using the bike as transportation, at least for me it does...

Day 2 & 3 – On the Joys of Electric Assist

I’m am stiff as a pinetree! Or, at least, that is how I felt as I climbed on my bike the past two mornings. On Monday I made a mad dash home in the rain, dropped my e-bike off and grabbed my CCM single speed to make a run out to meet a friend for wings (30km all told). That extra 10 km on a single speed probably compounded any stiffness and soreness I was feeling.

The steps leading to my current experiment weren’t undertaken overnight. Having decided months ago that I wanted to get back into cycling with an eye towards going car free, I purchased a new bicycle. From there, I did a trial run to my office one weekend... and was thoroughly trounced by the hills.

Understand, I am an out of shape 300 pound man. I hate going to the gym, so training at the gym and building up to riding to work is a pipe dream that will get me well on my way to 400lbs. If I want to get anywhere, I need to ride in the real world where I actually enjoy the ride. In light of being whalloped by those hills, I decided to blow the remainder of my tax return on an electric assist.

Without that electric assist, this experiment would have been done on Monday. With the electric assist things still take effort (I am still sweaty when I get to work – so it is of some value from a work-out perspective) BUT they are doable. If I am tired and stiff and not at all interested in making the ride to work, the electric assist gives me that extra boost I need to make it happen.

One of my longer term goals is to build up my endurance such that I will eventually be able to comfortably do my commute without electric assist. But for now, it is getting me out the door and up those steep hills. And, I have to say, things are going well.

Not everyone will agree with me but I think single speed is a bad choice for you at 300 lbs. You're putting a lot of strain on your knees with that combination of weight and "grinding" - ie. riding in a tough gear as you start to accelerate from stopping, or when going uphill. If you get knee strain, or worse, arthritis, it will have long term consequences for your ability to exercise and manage your weight. I think you're much better off using a bike with low-end gear choices so you can always "spin" at higher rpm.

Second day this week I got up at 4 a.m. for a bike-train-bike commute to my satellite office. Both days I made it to the office at 6:40. I was going to do it yesterday but stayed in town and walked to work because of a bad weather forecast. (My regular office is 1.75 miles from home.) Wouldn't you know it that I got soaked when the skies opened up in the evening while I was 5 blocks from home.

I agree with your response. A single speed bike for a 300lb out of shape individual who plans to regularly ride any kind of distance over a mile to include hilly terrain = a super bad idea, evolved from listening to wee-wee poor advice and/or not thought out at all.

Absolutely no chance of success; only thing worse for this plan would be a fixed gear single speed.

The reason for the single speed is to have something that looks older and less appealing to an opportunistic thief that I can lock up outside without worrying about it wandering away. I picked it up a few years back, intending to upgrade it to newer parts until I realized how neat the vintage parts are. I refurbished it and use this for the closer range stuff (and it is a good deal of fun to ride on flat terrain). But, even-so, perhaps you guys are right: it may well be worth looking for something with more gears and finding a new home for ol' Black Beauty.

I hate to tell you not to ride a bike you like! I would encourage you to only use it for short, flat rides (as you mention), be very gentle in accelerating, make sure your seat height is optimal so your knees aren't coming up too high, and maybe stand up on the pedals if you have to do a bit of an uphill section, to avoid too much knee flexion.

As you have learned, the lack of ease in riding a single speed on hilly terrain is also the reason why this bicycle doesn't appeal to you.
It is also the same reason why nobody would want to steal it.

By 'poor,' do you mean the people whose net worth is nearly $0.00 or the people whose net worth is the highest negative number, i.e. those with the most debt?

Then what you mean is 'frugal,' not 'poor.' Frugality is what keeps more of your income from going out. Saving by managing your spending is how you get rich, not how you go poor.

Is that how you got rich? :rolleyes:

Do you really believe that many people have a goal in life to become rich as you have?

No, most people seem to have the idea that they could get rich by making more money, but they are always complaining about the economy, etc. instead of just cutting their spending and saving up money in a way that they can actually control