I'm lucky to live in a place that gives me plenty of options. And I have a tech workers idea of tenure, in that I change jobs every few years. So I've done them all.
Cycling to work is the best. When the sun shines and birds are singing. It's a miserable experience when it's pouring rain and the headwind is strong.
Public transport is kind of nice for reading, or catching up on a bit of sleep. But it takes forever, and you're dependent on its schedule. And the walk on both ends is only fun in spring and summer. Umbrella's make it less bad than cycling when it rains, but it isn't great.
Driving is annoying when the traffic is bad, but it is by far the fastest for everything over a few kilometers. The roof and the AC protect against the worst of the weather. You have full flexibility on when to go. And while a podcast or audiobook isn't as good as a newspaper or ebook, it's not bad either.
Also, you can fart in peace.
Honestly, the whole "shops are nearby" are such an uninteresting part of the car-free discussion to me. I have to get to work more often than I have to get groceries. And nowadays, I just get them delivered, just like everything else.
Yeah, there's definitely a sparsity cutoff where it stops working so well.
Possibly a climate one too although Londoners and Parisians manage fine.
I get the impression our experiences of car free living were at different densities. Public transport is a slower, more difficult compromise at one end and car travel/ownership is a burden at the other.
I'm lucky to live in a place that gives me plenty of options. And I have a tech workers idea of tenure, in that I change jobs every few years. So I've done them all.
Cycling to work is the best. When the sun shines and birds are singing. It's a miserable experience when it's pouring rain and the headwind is strong.
Public transport is kind of nice for reading, or catching up on a bit of sleep. But it takes forever, and you're dependent on its schedule. And the walk on both ends is only fun in spring and summer. Umbrella's make it less bad than cycling when it rains, but it isn't great.
Driving is annoying when the traffic is bad, but it is by far the fastest for everything over a few kilometers. The roof and the AC protect against the worst of the weather. You have full flexibility on when to go. And while a podcast or audiobook isn't as good as a newspaper or ebook, it's not bad either.
Also, you can fart in peace.
Honestly, the whole "shops are nearby" are such an uninteresting part of the car-free discussion to me. I have to get to work more often than I have to get groceries. And nowadays, I just get them delivered, just like everything else.