Credit: Shinjiman / Wikimedia Commons
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We're back with a new challenge! This time it's ditching the car once a week. It's a great way to explore your alternatives - train, bus, bike, your own feet.
I've got a confession to make though: this one is going to be really super easy for me. I don't have a driver's license, and I haven't owned a bike since I was 13.
Public transport and I have been friends for a long time. It's my main method of getting around, along with walking. It's meant that I choose where I live very carefully! I've never lived further than one kilometre away from a train station.
But I'm not above getting my husband to drop me off at work when he drives to his office, usually because I enjoy sleeping in more than I enjoy getting ready for work! So the challenge for me will be cutting that back by 50%.
And I do love taking the train and bus to work. It gives me time to read a book, or listen to a new album on my iPod. I can call my sister (another public transport user) for a chat on my way home, and sometimes our schedules match up and we catch the train home together. In our very busy lives, public transport can be an opportunity to take a little me-time.
So how can you make taking public transport easier?
The first thing to do is work out when and where you've got access to trains, buses and ferries. Each capital city has a website with timetables available (if you've got info for other areas, please let us know in the comments).
South East Queensland
Adelaide Metro
Perth
Melbourne
Sydney
Hobart
Darwin & Alice Springs
Canberra
These have journey planners, where you enter in your start point, your destination and what time you have to arrive, and they figure out for you what bus or train to take.
How about you? How will you be taking on this challenge? Let us know if you'll be taking public transport, riding a bike or walking.
Comments
I've recently just moved to Brisbane, ditched the car and bought a bike instead and I love it. Everywhere I need to go is within a 30 minute bike ride (which includes work, and university), we walk home with the shopping in green bags and backpacks, and as we are students, money is always tight so buying in bulk and sticking to simple foods made from scratch is so much cheaper than pre-packaged stuff!
Giving up the car isn't as hard as people think it is, it saves you money in registration, fuel and other costs, plus if you look into public transport its not normally that far out of your reach anyway. Plus bikes are just so much more fun :) If you really can't avoid a car, then car pooling with friends is a good option.
Sabrinaeb.
That's great, Sabrinaeb! Living in a walkable/rideable place makes all the other eco decisions so much easier, doesn't it?
Hi Julie,
I too don't have a drivers license, and have always been a big fan of walking and catching the train wherever I need to go (like you, I live reasonably close to a train station, so this makes life quite easy!).
I admit that some days, however, I may phone someone at home to come and pick me up from the station if I'm not in the mood for the 20 minute walk - requiring them to take a trip that otherwise wouldn't be taken. Because short car trips, like runs to the shop or the station that take five minutes or less, are actually the most polluting for the distances travelled, by using this G Challenge to stop myself from making that "come collect me" phone call, I can feel good about nixing those extra emissions.
As with all of G's challenges, hopefully this will also help us all form lasting habits (and if nothing else, the extra bit of excercise won't hurt!).
Good luck everyone!
Yeah, some days you're just not in the mood for the last leg of the journey! Great idea for the challenge, let us know how you go with it.