"Born To Go"? Well it has to be "Silver Machine", considering you didn't put "Orgone Accumulator" as one of your chosen means of transport. Or "Levitation" for that matter. Hey man, Hawkwind rooooooock.......
Yes. But you can't get get 75 litres home from the cash and carry that way, nor buy a book case, nor load up with cheap books from a Galloway and Porter warehouse clearance. You can't take your guitars and amps to practice rooms or gigs. Nor could you take one of the company's dud PCs back to World of Computers for repair. And so on.
If I lived in Cambridge, I'd need to use a car for journeys within the city at least a couple of times a week — or make lots of small shopping trips and pay for home delivery on everything large (and somehow be in when they called to deliver). Needing a car for a hundred journeys a year is easily enough to make owning one worthwhile.
And, while Cambridge is a lovely place, I wouldn't want to spend the entire of my life within its confines. So there's all the trips further afield to consider, as well.
So. Either ewx is strange, or I am. Or we both are, in different ways, which seems the most likely explanation. (-8
I took most of this into account in my calculation (trains for going elsewhere than Cambridge, home delivery charges on our regular shopping, taxis and busses for local journeys where a bike won't do, etc). I have no obvious analogue of guitars and amps to transport around, and my various employers have historically managed without me moving their kit around Cambridge at my own expense.
Although admittedly in the case of the first one, WOC was still in Orwell House (http://www.cambridge2000.com/cambridge2000/html/0005/P5250990.html) and we were just over the road (http://www.cambridge2000.com/cambridge2000/html/0002/P2030060.html), so individual computers could be carried easily enough.
Well, I'm clearly strange in the same way as ewx, as I've never owned a car in Cambridge and have no intention of doing so. I've been insured on my housemate's car for a year, which he's just sold, and barely used it.
I live within walking distance of food shops, I get milk and vegetables delivered, I have too many unread books already, and my employers have always arranged return of computers themselves. I hire cars if I want to go somewhere where public transport is completely impractical, and that way I get the pleasure of driving something shiny and new when I do. For most weekends away, the train is far cheaper than car hire+fuel, especially if booked in advance (as most of my weekends tend to be). And that's before I factor in having to be sober and awake for the duration of the journey.
It's only really the guitars and amps that strike me as really requiring a car. I'm reminded of my friend who said he couldn't give up his car because he wouldn't be able to play golf any more.
I think it's starting from different assumptions. I start from the assumption that not owning a car is saving me 1k a year (at least, that's what my housemate calculated as the minimum cost to him) and regard the expenses of my workarounds as coming out of that saved 1k. I suppose it helps that I don't actually like huge supermarkets or driving in cities, so I regard avoiding both of these as extra bonuses.
You could probably manage to run a car for a bit less than £1000 a year if you were careful (or a lot less if you didn't mind an unreliable crock).
An important observation is that public transport in the UK is shockingly expensive. Especially if you sometimes take a passenger or two along for the ride, it's cheaper to go by car even in the cases where you could have gone by train or bus.
Once one has made the large initial outlay for a car, the savings steadily mount up if you use it whenever practical and economical to do so; to break even, you only need to save an average of £3 a day!
Think of a car as a really flexible season ticket you can use for groups of up to five people travelling together. (-8
I managed perfectly well in Oxford for about 16 years (the last 6 of those as a homeowner 4 miles from city centre) and only since the sproglet was due did we get a car (and we still probably wouldn't have got one without a relative saying `go and buy a car - here's the cash').
Anyway, most of the initial contents of my house came by home delivery from various places, so it's not true that you can't buy a bookcase. Travelling out of Oxford is fairly simple by bus and train - it sounds expensive, but then so is owning a car (the aforementioned cash didn't include any for the insurance, which I wasn't terribly happy about; the car is now due for a service which will cost a hundred quid or so, and in a couple of months it will be MOT and tax time again).
I didn't even get a bicycle until I started house-hunting.
I didn't say it was; I simply pointed out that you had to pay for home delivery, and arrange to be in when it arrived. The first of those is costly, the second inconvenient if everyone in the house works.
You would be amazed what you can fit on an appropriate bike (something like an 8 freight (http://www.bikefix.co.uk/8freight.html)), or a cargo trailer (http://www.bikefix.co.uk/vitelli.html). A bookcase might be a problem, but I've only taken 12 or so bookcases home since moving house. Um. Well, most of them were a single purchase at Ikea, and I could have hired a van for that if necessary (for example if I only had a car, not a trailer as well). Though I do have a car, and no plans to give it up (and had a car when I lived in Cambridge, though it got used much less then). (I have considered getting a much smaller car and renting a big one for holidays, and decided it wasn't quite worthwhile.)
a bit disappointed not to see "space-hopper" anywhere on there, either. The thought of you space-hoppering through cambridge to work fills me with amusement. :-)
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(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-15 04:05 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-15 04:08 pm (UTC)livejournal in `crap' shocker
Date: 2004-04-15 04:11 pm (UTC)You must be logged in (http://www.livejournal.com/login.bml?ret=1) to vote in a poll.
… except that I am logged in, as it tells me when I click the link. I didn't have to enter a password to post this, either.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-15 04:19 pm (UTC)Well it has to be "Silver Machine", considering you didn't put "Orgone Accumulator" as one of your chosen means of transport. Or "Levitation" for that matter.
Hey man, Hawkwind rooooooock.......
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-15 04:31 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 01:18 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 01:41 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 02:36 am (UTC)Private cars are even cheaper than hire cars or trains, unless one really does go practically nowhere you can't get to sensibly by bike or bus.
In London, I can see it making sense not to have a car, but in Cambridge?
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 03:10 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 03:43 am (UTC)If I lived in Cambridge, I'd need to use a car for journeys within the city at least a couple of times a week — or make lots of small shopping trips and pay for home delivery on everything large (and somehow be in when they called to deliver). Needing a car for a hundred journeys a year is easily enough to make owning one worthwhile.
And, while Cambridge is a lovely place, I wouldn't want to spend the entire of my life within its confines. So there's all the trips further afield to consider, as well.
So. Either
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 04:28 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 05:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 04:32 am (UTC)I live within walking distance of food shops, I get milk and vegetables delivered, I have too many unread books already, and my employers have always arranged return of computers themselves. I hire cars if I want to go somewhere where public transport is completely impractical, and that way I get the pleasure of driving something shiny and new when I do. For most weekends away, the train is far cheaper than car hire+fuel, especially if booked in advance (as most of my weekends tend to be). And that's before I factor in having to be sober and awake for the duration of the journey.
It's only really the guitars and amps that strike me as really requiring a car. I'm reminded of my friend who said he couldn't give up his car because he wouldn't be able to play golf any more.
I think it's starting from different assumptions. I start from the assumption that not owning a car is saving me 1k a year (at least, that's what my housemate calculated as the minimum cost to him) and regard the expenses of my workarounds as coming out of that saved 1k. I suppose it helps that I don't actually like huge supermarkets or driving in cities, so I regard avoiding both of these as extra bonuses.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 07:07 am (UTC)An important observation is that public transport in the UK is shockingly expensive. Especially if you sometimes take a passenger or two along for the ride, it's cheaper to go by car even in the cases where you could have gone by train or bus.
Once one has made the large initial outlay for a car, the savings steadily mount up if you use it whenever practical and economical to do so; to break even, you only need to save an average of £3 a day!
Think of a car as a really flexible season ticket you can use for groups of up to five people travelling together. (-8
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 04:52 am (UTC)Anyway, most of the initial contents of my house came by home delivery from various places, so it's not true that you can't buy a bookcase. Travelling out of Oxford is fairly simple by bus and train - it sounds expensive, but then so is owning a car (the aforementioned cash didn't include any for the insurance, which I wasn't terribly happy about; the car is now due for a service which will cost a hundred quid or so, and in a couple of months it will be MOT and tax time again).
I didn't even get a bicycle until I started house-hunting.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 07:09 am (UTC)I didn't say it was; I simply pointed out that you had to pay for home delivery, and arrange to be in when it arrived. The first of those is costly, the second inconvenient if everyone in the house works.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 06:28 am (UTC)A bookcase might be a problem, but I've only taken 12 or so bookcases home since moving house. Um. Well, most of them were a single purchase at Ikea, and I could have hired a van for that if necessary (for example if I only had a car, not a trailer as well).
Though I do have a car, and no plans to give it up (and had a car when I lived in Cambridge, though it got used much less then). (I have considered getting a much smaller car and renting a big one for holidays, and decided it wasn't quite worthwhile.)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 01:06 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 02:07 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-16 02:55 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-04-28 07:57 pm (UTC)