This is an easy thing to say, but ride-sharing apps price gouge ridiculously. Have you done the math on this for the average person’s annual needs, or does it just “feel” true? Also I assume your groceries and other regular shopping needs are all getting delivered in this scenario, so need to work all the delivery overhead in annual costs as well. I wish we could get rid of individual cars, but not sure this adds up…
Also, curious on the reality of this in big cities versus more rural areas
If you live within 1 mile of a grocery store you could easily walk, and you don’t need anything else on a regular basis. Use a bicycle and 5 miles becomes just as easy. People lived thousands of years without cars. The problem is our cities are built around cars, and they’re built poorly because of it.
A couple of litres of milk, perhaps ditto soda, some canned goods and frozen items … easily 10 kg. Then add buying in bulk when there’s special offers.
The fact that it feels tiresome is worrying me. That should feel like nothing. 15 kg is not all that much (initially wrote “a joke”, didn’t realize that might sound disrespectful to some), unless you are either 12, 92, or really out of shape.
Have you tried carrying what equates to a toddler by one hand for 3km? Them plastic bag carrying handle bits are going to be digging into your fingers, friend. These days it won’t matter so much of course because the fingers will be frozen anyhow.
Frankly I haven’t used a shopping bag for years because I prefer collapsible cases (approx 40x60 cm) but economically those are even worse to carry farth than, say, 50m.
Why would I carry my groceries in a plastic bag or a collapsible box when I can just use a backpack? I can easily carry 15kg in my backpack.
I mostly go shopping with my bike though. I have huge bags that attach to the carrier and that can fit about a week of groceries for two people. I can transport even more with my bike trailer if I need to.
I might be a bad example indeed. I carry a lot of things in often quite unusual ways. As a male Paramedic working inner-hospital shifts in a 3000 bed hospital complex, well, there is a lot to carry around. And most things don’t have handles either; some resist.
I’m not good with cases, nor shopping bags. I use bags with long handles that I can hang from my shoulders. 12 kg per side won’t even make themselves felt.
Boxes are good to carry to a car.
The talk was about 1 km though, not three I believe? I might be wrong.
Anyhow, a good knapsack with a solid bottom. Two bags with long loops. I can carry 35 kg like that easily. In basic training, we carried that load for 20 km and more.
When I got my new barbells recently, I rented a car. My bench and rack I had delivered.
I pay about 12-20 dollars for a trip to or from the airport in my city. Let’s be quite generous and say I only need to take a trip like that once a week, and all my other needs can be met via public transportation.
That’s comically untrue in the Midwest but it holds true in places like Baltimore at least for some.
It would take 9 months of similar rides to equal what I spend on my car in a single month, including the loan, gas, and insurance.
Even if I took an under to and from work every single day which incidentally is about the same as a trip to the airport, it would cost half of what I put in to my car.
That’s true for me, but probably not everyone. I have a newer, upper mid range car that’s not great on gas mileage. And of course, I need my car a lot more frequently than just the ten trips a week. But there’s a string argument to be made in cities where public transit is even halfway decent for ditching a car all together and ubering when you need to get somewhere the bus doesn’t stop.
I don’t work from home but my sister does and yes she did some thorough calculations. And yeah she’s getting her groceries delivered and Ubers/lyfts pretty much everywhere else. There are also local buses that she takes if they’re useful depending on where she’s going. For example there’s a mall that’s about half an hour away but there’s a bus that goes from half a mile down the road to the mall.
We do the same. Having things delivered or using public transport. Takes a bit longer sometimes. Not a problem. Saves us hundreds of bucks per quarter.
Living in a city should mean exactly that. Cars are for place with poorly developed infrastructure. Grossly generalized.
I’m going to download the uber app when I’m not on some miserably slow internet connection and do the math, because I’m curious if it’s cheaper or not.
Right now, worst case scenario is if I have to drive my Samurai to work. It gets ~20 mpg. With insurance and gas and maintainence put together I’m spending about $4.13 to drive to work for one day.
This is an easy thing to say, but ride-sharing apps price gouge ridiculously. Have you done the math on this for the average person’s annual needs, or does it just “feel” true? Also I assume your groceries and other regular shopping needs are all getting delivered in this scenario, so need to work all the delivery overhead in annual costs as well. I wish we could get rid of individual cars, but not sure this adds up…
Also, curious on the reality of this in big cities versus more rural areas
If you live within 1 mile of a grocery store you could easily walk, and you don’t need anything else on a regular basis. Use a bicycle and 5 miles becomes just as easy. People lived thousands of years without cars. The problem is our cities are built around cars, and they’re built poorly because of it.
You could easily walk there, yes. But walking back again? With 15kg of groceries? That gets tiresome.
You cooking for a whole gym or what?
You shop daily or what?
A couple of litres of milk, perhaps ditto soda, some canned goods and frozen items … easily 10 kg. Then add buying in bulk when there’s special offers.
If I lived about a mile I could shop daily. That’s an effortless walk. On the occasion I buy heavy liquids, backpack or bicycle.
Instacart bro. Groceries are the easiest thing to get
The fact that it feels tiresome is worrying me. That should feel like nothing. 15 kg is not all that much (initially wrote “a joke”, didn’t realize that might sound disrespectful to some), unless you are either 12, 92, or really out of shape.
Have you tried carrying what equates to a toddler by one hand for 3km? Them plastic bag carrying handle bits are going to be digging into your fingers, friend. These days it won’t matter so much of course because the fingers will be frozen anyhow.
Frankly I haven’t used a shopping bag for years because I prefer collapsible cases (approx 40x60 cm) but economically those are even worse to carry farth than, say, 50m.
Why would I carry my groceries in a plastic bag or a collapsible box when I can just use a backpack? I can easily carry 15kg in my backpack.
I mostly go shopping with my bike though. I have huge bags that attach to the carrier and that can fit about a week of groceries for two people. I can transport even more with my bike trailer if I need to.
Plastic bags? I just use my backpack
I might be a bad example indeed. I carry a lot of things in often quite unusual ways. As a male Paramedic working inner-hospital shifts in a 3000 bed hospital complex, well, there is a lot to carry around. And most things don’t have handles either; some resist.
I’m not good with cases, nor shopping bags. I use bags with long handles that I can hang from my shoulders. 12 kg per side won’t even make themselves felt.
Boxes are good to carry to a car.
The talk was about 1 km though, not three I believe? I might be wrong.
Anyhow, a good knapsack with a solid bottom. Two bags with long loops. I can carry 35 kg like that easily. In basic training, we carried that load for 20 km and more.
When I got my new barbells recently, I rented a car. My bench and rack I had delivered.
I pay about 12-20 dollars for a trip to or from the airport in my city. Let’s be quite generous and say I only need to take a trip like that once a week, and all my other needs can be met via public transportation.
That’s comically untrue in the Midwest but it holds true in places like Baltimore at least for some.
It would take 9 months of similar rides to equal what I spend on my car in a single month, including the loan, gas, and insurance.
Even if I took an under to and from work every single day which incidentally is about the same as a trip to the airport, it would cost half of what I put in to my car.
That’s true for me, but probably not everyone. I have a newer, upper mid range car that’s not great on gas mileage. And of course, I need my car a lot more frequently than just the ten trips a week. But there’s a string argument to be made in cities where public transit is even halfway decent for ditching a car all together and ubering when you need to get somewhere the bus doesn’t stop.
I don’t work from home but my sister does and yes she did some thorough calculations. And yeah she’s getting her groceries delivered and Ubers/lyfts pretty much everywhere else. There are also local buses that she takes if they’re useful depending on where she’s going. For example there’s a mall that’s about half an hour away but there’s a bus that goes from half a mile down the road to the mall.
We do the same. Having things delivered or using public transport. Takes a bit longer sometimes. Not a problem. Saves us hundreds of bucks per quarter.
Living in a city should mean exactly that. Cars are for place with poorly developed infrastructure. Grossly generalized.
I’m going to download the uber app when I’m not on some miserably slow internet connection and do the math, because I’m curious if it’s cheaper or not.
Right now, worst case scenario is if I have to drive my Samurai to work. It gets ~20 mpg. With insurance and gas and maintainence put together I’m spending about $4.13 to drive to work for one day.