Foldy313

This was just posted on a local site. Best thing I've read in weeks. Hope there aren't rules against posting links.
Motorless in the Motor City: What I learned from six months in Detroit without a car

davidmcowan

Great, thoughtfuly written article. I can relate to the experience!

Jim from Boston

Thanks, and I just posted the link to a thread on the Great Lakes Regional Discussion Forum, "Riding in Detroit"

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

… Though Detroit was a great place to grow up and come of age in the 1950's and 60's, my discontent in the 1970's was that I needed a car to get around. .

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

…Back in the 60’s in the Motor City, I had an “English Racer,’ and longed to tour at about age 14, but then joined the car culture. In Ann Arbor MI in the 70’s I really realized the utility of bicycles for commuting, and began touring…

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

I was dimly aware of a competitve racing culture even in Detroit in the 1970’s...though not interested in participating…Detroit did produce some National Champions, and Olympian cyclists in that era, including Sheila Young who I found out later grew up in my neighborhood.

.

cooker

What film?

Jim from Boston

D'uh, I was referring to separate thread I had just read on the Fifty-Plus Forum I had just put in a call to my weekend cycling companion, who is also a MAMIL, to attend; just one showing, Feb 21 at 6:30. It's on my calendar. The link to the movie shows performances throughout the US though not Canada.

I deleted that comment on my post to this thread.

Maelochs

Detroit: You can't drink the water, but it's a great place to ride your bike (p.s. You might want ride a mountain bike---and bring a gun.)

J/K .... but the story is obviously fake: "Once, a month or so after I had lost my car, I had to have a little work done on my bike; when I got the $12 bill from the repair shop, I think I laughed out loud."

There isn't a bike shop on the continent that doesn't charge a service fee at least twice that just to let you wheel your bike Near the mechanic.

(And before all you folks start feverishly typing "I heard of a guy who knew a guy who dated a horse who carried a guy who ..." step away from your keyboards, bend down and look around under your desks ..... there might be some trace of where you dropped your sense of humor.


(LOL ... sense of humor on This forum? I must be off my meds.)

"Droped the humor ..." I wonder if that will catch on like "droped the hamer" did?

Carry on.

Maelochs

Not enough nested quotes ... it'll catch you out every time....

Maelochs

What I find interesting is that in what seems like an excellent environment for being bike-free, this author and his spouse realized that cycling is not that good an option by itself. (In fact, LCF didn’t work At All.)

Three-mile commute? Still enough that a person in upscale clothes, hair, and make-up couldn’t really do it. But, the bus system seemed pretty reliable ... and I’d much rather have to call and tell my boss I was going to be late because the bus never came than because I had three flats in a row (which I have done.)

And how convenient that he felt safe locking up his bike at a Bike-Share and (I’d guess) leaving it all day. There is no place outdoors in any city I feel safe leaving a bike unattended for 8-10 hours.

My big takeaway here, I guess, is that this was a multi-modal solution. They actually probably could have just about broke even renting a car when they needed one instead of buying one ... but the convenience of having a car When you want it, Where you are, is hard to beat and worth a few extra bucks (that’s what I’ve found, and this couple did also.)

Also, they were not “Motorless,” and Certainly not “Car-Free.” Even in the three seasons of decent weather, they rented cars.

To me this describes a Much more reasonable goal than LCF. Car-Light is just so much more doable ... and as for “motorless” ... every car-free person I ever knew either rode the bus, hitch-hiked, or got rides with friends.

What I like here is that this person placed no particular value on being “car-free.” He understood what auto-addiction does (and it ain’t good, I don’t need to tell anyone here ... ) but he had no issue with using a car.

He wasn’t on a mission, he wasn’t preaching .. he was just reporting about how going from two cars to none to one changed his life in a positive way.

LCF folks ought to consider this. LCF life benefits massively when there are a lot more car-light people around—more bike lanes, less traffic, more small stores, more acceptance for people riding bikes.

A good bus system with a reasonable provision for carrying bikes (not a rack in front where, if you lock your bike the driver hates you for wasting his time and if you don’t, someone else rides off on it at the stop before yours) does a lot for car-light and LCF.

Short-term affordable rentals (probably all-electric before long, because of the ease of refueling—people won’t get their receipt until the recharger is plugged in) make a lot of sense and while they don’t necessarily lessen the overall volume of in-town traffic, they let people Not have to own a car.

Also ... nd I don’t want to come across as anti-child (but wouldn’t it be a better world if ...) I mean, one reason this worked is because this couple is childless. Throw two kids in there and things get a lot more complicated.

To proceed towards more car-light we need to figure how a family of four with two working parents and two active children can make it work ... or how to make it work for them.

Jim from Boston

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

D'uh, I was referring to separate thread I had just read on the Fifty-Plus Forum

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maelochs

Not enough nested quotes ... it'll catch you out every time....

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maelochs

Detroit:You can't drink the water, but it's a great place to ride your bike (p.s. You might want ride a mountain bike---and bring a gun.)

Yes, but on that original erroneous post,

Quote:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Foldy313

This was just posted on a local site. Best thing I've read in weeks. Hope there aren't rules against posting links.
Motorless in the Motor City: What I learned from six months in Detroit without a car

Thanks, and I just posted the link to a thread on the Great Lakes Regional Discussion Forum, "Riding in Detroit"

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

… Though Detroit was a great place to grow up and come of age in the 1950's and 60's, my discontent in the 1970's was that I needed a car to get around. .

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

…Back in the 60’s in the MotorCity, I had an “English Racer,’ and longed to tour at about age 14, but thenjoined the car culture. In Ann Arbor MI in the 70’s I really realized theutility of bicycles for commuting, and began touring…

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim fromBoston

I was dimly aware of a competitve racing culture even in Detroit in the 1970’s...though not interested in participating…Detroit did produce some National Champions, and Olympian cyclists in that era, includingSheila Young who I found out later grew up in my neighborhood.

.

BTW,it was Flint, MI that made national news about high lead levels in the water.

Quote:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Donald Trump

Now, the cars are made in Mexico and you can’t drink the water in Flint.

I-Like-To-Bike

What kind of "reasonable provision" do you know of, or propose, as an alternative to a rack in front of the bus for transporting passengers' bicycles? Presumably "reasonable provision" would entail not creating ingress/exit problems for other passengers or significantly reducing bus passenger capacity.

cooker

Why so negative? They discovered they could live car free in Detroit if they wanted to, and they decided they would go car-light(er) instead, with one car instead of 2. That's 50% more car free than they originally were. Also the tap water is fine, and despite your Detroit bashing they found they can park a bike more safely there than you think you can in your city (har har!) And yes, they are a childless adult couple so they didn't face the same challenges a 2+ generation family would have (thank you Captain Obvious) but what do you want them to do - adopt a child to prove a point? The guy was discussing his experiences, not someone else's. As for "motorless", obviously that was a play on the term "Motor City" meaning car city, so motorless in this case meant car-less, and using public transit is part of being car-less. Nobody here is advocating for no use of powered vehicles. Nor do I actually see all this "preaching" some of you nay-sayers are allways complaining about here.

I-Like-To-Bike

You frequently post about your failure or inability to "see" what others complain about on this list. Do you think it is possible that your own biases may be clouding your vision?

cooker

Next time you see it, point it out. If you don't quote, it weren't wrote.

I-Like-To-Bike

Or you don't remember what you have posted.

Maelochs

Not to be a richard, but the fact that you see this as a negative post shows Your bias, not mine.

Apparentkly you did nto read either the article or my post.

They Never went "car-free."

My whole post was about the fact that they went multi-modal, and a good step towards car-light and car-free is to build up the non-car-OWNING (not "Car-Free") Alternatives.

This couple discovered, as most people do, that cars serve some very useful purposes, and that to make "car-light" feasible, alternatives like buses, trains, rental cars which are readily available----make it a Lot easier to not own a car (or cut down from two to one.)

You claim to see no preaching, but when I do Not preach "car-Free" but instead point out how the real world shows that certain small changes can make "Car-light" easier, you call me negative ... I guess you only like posts which preach.

Fact is, you yourself see "Car-free" as "Good," and "Car-light" as "Nearly as Good," and those personal moral judgments color how you see every post---and are why you don't see people "preaching"---you just think they are making sense, because they agree with you ... and you, of course, are "right."

I see car---free and car-light in terms of practicality---how do we do it, can we do it, what can we do differently (in the realm of common sense and readily achievable steps, not science-fiction) which can make it easier for people to make that choice.

While I prefer a car-light life, I don't consider it "better" in any moral sense, in the same way I don't think auto-racing is "better" than baseball, but I like auto-racing better.

i recognize the social and environmental costs associated with our car addiction, but so what? Saying "drugs are bad" doesn't help a heroin addict. Treatment programs, psychological counseling, a steady job, a structured life so s/he doesn't have time to easily slip back into the life ... that makes a difference.

I point out FACTS Mentioned By The Person Who Actually Went Car-Light ... I guess in your world, those are "inconvenient truths" and noticing them makes me negative. I guess the author is negative too.

You know, when a LOT of people see something you cannot see ... one has to wonder how hard you are really looking.

Maelochs

i have been thinking about this some.

The front rack is good, but having to use one's own lock is not----which is exactly what I said. It takes a while to maneuver the lock around the other bikes there, and to lock it up, and then to unlock it.

What would work better would be some sort of swing-up arm which went through the spokes or frame--I am picturing a two-axis bar which swung up and then the top swung in, which locked and could be unlocked only with the ticket issued by the buss driver and automatically printed when the lock was engaged, and could be read by a scanner on the lock itself.

All existing engineering or bone-simple engineering. Car-top roof racks and bumper racks have the sort of swing-down restraints, I have seen them. All that is needed is a little wire and a scanner and a servo.

Printing the ticket wouldn't be hard---parking garages use exactly this technology and have for years. No one has thought to apply it to a bus-front bike lock, apparently.

The lock would only have to be strong enough that it couldn't be pulled open without a tool.

A forward-facing camera which got clear pictures of any bike thieves would also help.

I am sure, smart as you are, you could easily device a far better system. Please do. It would help.

Maelochs

You'd almost think a thing like that would have been all over tha national news for .... many, many months.

Jim from Boston

Thanks for your defense of Motown, @cooker. We have visited Toronto on a few times both when living closer in Detroit, and in Boston. In fact I consider TO a virtual sister city to BO.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ekdog

Great to see Detroit is becoming a great cycling town.

Detroit cycling grows fast as the city rises on the national bike scene | The Detroit News

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roody

Nice article, except it didn't say much about bike commuting in Detroit.

I grew up in Highland Park, Michigan--a small city that is totally surrounded by the city of Detroit. I now live about 90 miles from Detroit, but I haven'tvisited as much as I used to. Detroit is still a popular tourist destination (believe it or not) especially for sports and culture stuff.

If you plan to ride there, keep in mind that the excellent bike riding conditions pertain to the actual city of Detroit itself. The rest of the metro area (suburbs and exurbs) are as sprawled asAtlanta or Houston. You will find there the busy congested stroads that areubiquitous in American metro areas.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim from Boston

An excellent description, Roody.

I grew up in Detroit in the 1960s on the East Side in a nice neighborhood, tha tfrankly is now as bad as anything you read about in Detroit these days. Nonetheless although Detroit proper is the Motor City, it did develop as a prosperous city prior to post-war suburban sprawl, and IMO has an excellent roadway infrastructure with wide, long roads through interesting, though now often decrepit neighborhoods.

When I go back to visit the family in suburban Macomb County though, the suburban sprawl and concomitant highway system really discourages road cycling, though there are some pleasant MUPS to nowhere.

Then there are these current threads on the Great Lakes Regional Discussion Forum, Riding through Detroit, and Looking for casual Detroit area ride groups.

Maelochs

Wasn't it that guy called "Jim from Boston" who wrote that he felt like a bolus in a concrete interesting riding in Michigan?

You guys crack me up.

I am so glad there is no real hardship in your lives, that you have to fight to "defend" cities from "online attacks!" I feel like a Powerful Russian Hacker, suddenly, undermining kapitalist *******.

By the way, cooker ... one reason to read without bias ... I noted that the author was LUCKY that eh could lock up his bike somewhere safe all day because there was no city I had been in where I would feel safe doing that.

You attacked me for saying what you wanted me to say and told me I should realize.

Get a grip. As the mod, you should either stay clear of all debate and just Moderate, or expect to get called out when you Completely Fail to Understand exactly what was said Very Clearly.

“And how convenient that he felt safe locking up his bike at a Bike-Share and (I’d guess) leaving it all day. There is no place outdoors in any city I feel safe leaving a bike unattended for 8-10 hours.”

Your response: "...despite your Detroit bashing they found they can park a bike more safely there than you think you can in your city (har har!)"

Notice how we .... agree?

Read it S L O W L Y and see if you can figure it out.

Time to up your game, kid.

Seriously ... if you want to pick a fight read the related material first. Then think about it.

I would hope that the Mods at least would not pick fights over nonsense. I expect everyone else to.

So ... show me the Factual error or mis-statement I made about this person's article. We can proceed from there.

Jim from Boston

Quote:

Originally Posted by maelochs

....step away from your keyboards, bend down and look around under your desks..... There might be some trace of where you dropped your sense of humor.

(lol ... Sense of humor on this forum? I must be off my meds.)
carry on.

Hey @Maelochs, I was J/K too.

Maelochs

Whew.

Things get crazy around here.

Thanks for being an anchor of sanity.

Rob_E

That's an interesting take because I didn't get that out of the article At All. Seems like the places where they resorted to a car were times when it was luxury. The points at which they used cars were when calling a Lyft or using the car share. Lyft was arguably a necessity since they were taking it to work, but only one of the two people were regularly using they Lyft, which means one half of the people were successfully commuting without a car. The other was the rental/car share. The uses they mentioned for that seemed mostly deviations from their normal routine. It seemed to me that over the course their not-owning-a-car experiment, they found that they could live their daily life without a car, but on occasion found it convenient. Far from proving that LCF didn't work, they proved that it could work, but, since that was not their stated goal, they still made use of cars when convenient.

This is a weird collection of arguments against living car free. For my part, I don't car who lives car-free or car-lite or whatever. I do think there are significant benefits both personal and societal to car-free/lite lifestyles, but I don't generally go around preaching. I do, however, try to knock down ridiculous objections when I hear them. Most people say, "I could never do that." when what they mean is, "I have no interest in doing that." Having no interest not to is a perfectly legitimate reason to drive to work, as far as I'm concerned. But let's not make a bunch of fake excuses about why it's impossible or impractical.

The author of post found that they could get to work by bike or by bus, and did so many times. I don't consider taking mass transit any "violation" of car-free living. I'm sure there are people out there who try to be "motorless," but I don't think that's the majority of car-free people. Hell, at 3 miles, walking isn't out of the question. This couple was ideally suited to get to work without a car, which they proved. The fact that they occasionally did use a car, doesn't disprove the many times they did without.

And of course if you're unwilling to lock up your bike and trust that it will be there when you come back, then, sure, getting around by bike is not going to be your thing. By extension, I would assume that hanging out in a bike forum dedicated to getting around without a car would also not be your thing, but I guess not. My bike is always locked up outside of work for 40+ hours a week. Also gets locked up outside of restaurants, clubs, bars, stores, etc. Do bikes get stolen in my city? Absolutely. I've had a bike stolen... when I left it unlocked. Most of the stories I've heard are of people who thought just keeping their bike out of sight was okay, or that the cheap cable lock they had was sufficient, or leaving it unattended for just a minute would be fine. Most people who rely on their bikes for transportation figure out what level of security is required. The idea that locking up a bike outside is fundamentally unsafe is just untrue. Some areas are worse than others. Some bikes are more attractive than others. But the problem is far from insurmountable.

Their solution was absolutely multi-modal. I suspect that a large number of people who live car-free are multi-modal. I don't see a contradiction in that or a condemnation of LCF just because you take a bus some times. I don't spend much time on this forum, but my limited experience is that most people don't equate LCF with "motorless" the way you seem to be doing. In their particular situation, I think they might do a little better than break even by buying a car. Not because they needed a car, but because one of them was unwilling to make the adjustment to commuting without a car. Not unable, because half of the couple was able to adjust, and it seemed like they shared or had very similar commutes. The article as I read it was in no way a condemnation of the idea of LCF. It was an example of how LCF was very possible, but just not always desirable to people who have become attached to driving.

Also the bus thing. What are "reasonable provisions?" The front bus rack is a standard. Yes, it's not immune to theft attempts, but they seem to be extremely rare. I've heard of them but have not actually met a person who suffered the theft of their bike from the bus rack. And, like locking your bike up outside, if you know your area has that kind of bike theft, you plan accordingly: leave the bike in high gear ; stay near the front of the bus ; get a ring lock ; take the time to lock it, even if the driver scowls. The idea that bike integration with transit could be done better is one I wholeheartedly agree with. The idea that bus rack theft is any kind of deterrent to LCF in one that sounds a lot more like an excuse than a problem someone has actually encountered and failed to solve.


Again with the "motorless." Is there actually a significant number of people in the forum who think LCF means never using a motor, or is that a straw man you made up just because it's easily defeated?

I like how you point out that author placed no value on being car-free after you start out by saying that LCF didn't work at all. In fact, the reason it didn't work was because it wasn't their goal. It seems like a very clear example that they didn't need a car, but they did prefer one, and they had no goal of being car-free, so why not?

This is a two-way street. Or a two-way, protected bike lane, as it were. All bike traffic enforces the idea that bike accommodations are useful. One could argue that adamant, LCF folks actually drive(so to speak) that point home by biking even in the absence of on-road, bike facilities. But it's hardly a CF vs. CL thing. More bikes on road means more bike accommodations means more bikes are willing to get on the road. I don't see any way in which car-lite people are pushing infrastructure more other than that there are likely more of them.

You don't have to be anti-child to realize that it adds complication to the situation. But adding complication does not equal insurmountable obstacle. I've seen stories of people taking kids to daycare on their cargo bikes, for example. And in my own, decidedly non-car free childhood, having a car was not at all necessary to get to and from school. In fact, our car-driving parents were long gone to work by the time school started, and we either bussed or walked or biked there. My experiences getting around without a car as a child are what led to me feeling confident about getting around without a car today.

Basically this article seems like a great example of how being car-free or car-lite could be attainable. It doesn't endorse one or the other. It just shows the possibilities. The fact that you see it as a condemnation of LCF seems like you're bringing your own bias into it.

cooker

I'm actually not looking for a fight, but yes, I thought the tone of your posts was negative. You made some negative statements about Detroit - can't drink the water, need a gun, etc. and by pointing out the the author is "not on a mission, not preaching" I thought you were making a clear inference that some forum members are on a mission or are preaching. Also when you said "how convenient" that he could lock his bike, I'm used to that phrasing being used to convey sarcasm, as if the implication was that this is not generalizable to other people or sites. Those are just few examples. but of course I could have read your intentions wrong. You also claimed the author was lying about his bike repair bill. I have also had repair bills that were in that low range. And I lock my bike outside frequently.

As for my "bias", since you yourself refer to "the social and environmental costs associated with our car addiction" it seems you have a mental hiercharchy yourself, in which less car use is "better" so I am not sure why you think I have some bias you don't in this regard, or why you consider it bias at all, if it is accurate.


Also I am not sure if you think I am a mod - I am not.

I-Like-To-Bike

Before I would spend much time to "device" a system to correct a problem of theft off of bus bike racks, I would first have to agree that the current situation needs fixing or improvement, and that the alleged problem of theft off of bus bike racks is not imaginary or so isolated in occurrence that no changes to the system are required or worthwhile, or that devising a "easy far better system" of transporting bikes on public buses is quite low on anybody's priority list except perhaps the person who "devised" the problem.

I-Like-To-Bike

He must have confused you with one of the other two posters who frequently play at being a mod; that is one fault of which you are innocent.