It is five months to the day that we gave up our second car and became a one-car household. It is also how long my wife and I agreed to this living-with-less experiment. I had no idea it was going to be as stress free as it was and still is.
You can link back to my first blog entry to learn more about the factors that drove our decision.
So what’s the take-away?We can live with one car.But living in a community that was build around cars makes it difficult if not down right impossible for most typical suburbanites.What truly cut down on the potential stress level is that both us work out of the house.Most people, even those who commute by train, can’t cut their ignition wires from the grip of suburban sprawl. But if one car living is unrealistic, you can still cut your use.
Here’s the five-month savings and expense tote:
New car payments (4) $3,300
Gas $ 500
Rental car ($98.00)
Repairs ($1,180)
Total to date: $2,522
Now, after all this, I really can’t say we’ll stay a one-car family forever. In fact, I hope that it ends in early 2009. My business is changing, or I should say, my business partner and I are changing to aggressively grow it.That will mean more meetings and (hopefully) more clients to visit and service, requiring maximum mobility to get the job done.
So, for now, the lifestyle continues…
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
The pro off-shore drilling crowd sure is naïve. Do they actually believe that gasoline prices will immediately fall if the ban on off-shore drilling is lifted? They apparently do. Consider home page text of www.drillheredrillnow.com:
"As gas prices continue to increase, Congress continues to blame others while ignoring practical steps to stop the pain Americans are feeling at the pump. To lower gasoline prices and reduce our dependence on foreign oil, we need real solutions to our energy challenges.
We, therefore, are petitioning the U.S. Congress to act immediately to lower gasoline prices (and diesel and other fuel prices) by authorizing the exploration of proven energy reserves to reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources from unstable countries."
That quote from Newt Gingrich sounds great during a contentious election year, but is it possible, let alone believable? Once drilling is allowed and I predict it will be, it’ll take a least a decade before the first drop of crude makes its way to a pipeline. It's not like someone can shoot at the ground and out spurts oil.
Second, with only three percent of the world’s proven reserves, a lot of oil needs to pump through U.S. spigots to make an impact on pricing. And, more importantly, oil companies will make us pay just as much for domestic crude as the imported Middle Eastern stuff.
While we are in a protracted economic slump (notice I did not say recession) that has dampened oil market speculators, Newt doesn’t seem to realize that a “practical” step has already delivered some recent relief at the pump: conservation. People are using their cars less and that is contributing to less pain at the pump.
It’s Labor Day weekend, and my family and I took a day trip into downtown Chicago today. Like any major metropolis during the summer tourist season (albeit the end of it), parking the car turned out to be an exercise in comparison shopping. Near high profile Chicago attractions, like Millennium Park, there is nary a parking meter in sight. No matter. We planned ahead; Sunday means free parking at city garages.
Except today.
Because of the park’s holiday jazz festival, the garage’s electronic signage flashed $25 for special event parking. Oh, yeah. That’s special alright. So special that I wheeled the car around and quickly exited to find cheaper rates.
Sure enough, a scant ten minute walk away was a relative bargain at 16 bucks. Parking was plentiful in what turned out to be an apartment building garage. But it was also a bit telling about the odd relationship between some city dwellers and their cars: they don’t seem to use them.
As I wheeled my trusty Subaru into an open space, I was struck by the number of cars covered in dust. I must have counted at least ten vehicles covered in varying densities of urban particulate. Some had light coatings, perhaps sitting unused for several weeks; several more were thicker, perhaps several months. But there was a 2008 Honda Accord that looked as if it hadn’t moved since, well, since it was sold. A thick layer of dust left the front and rear window opaque. More telling was the stalactite-type deposit from water seeping down from the floor above. It left a white stain that ran from the rear portion of the roof and down the rear window. Curious if the car was dead, or just hibernating, I peered through the foggy driver side window. Looking at the dash, the tell-tale car alarm light flashed dutifully.
It was strange about this Accord. Not a bottom-of-the rung four-banger; it was the lux edition six cylinder model with dual exhaust, fancy wheels, in-dash navigation system and black leather interior. And there it sat. The worst fate for a car, other than totaling it, is not to drive it.
Now, I’m all about utility. We use our single car. We use it effectively. We’ll use it until it dies. But, to all appearances, this Accord owner is content on paying a monthly car payment, the insurance to protect it, and the space to leave it parked in. He or she is certainly saving money on gas.
Now that we all know that proper tire inflation can save gas (and money), you might wonder who collects the 75 cents or so you pay to keep your black walls within spec. Is it:
A. The gas station owner B. The air pump vendor who pays to place its inflation device at the gas station C. The oil company whose gas is pumped there
If you guessed A or B, congratulations. You are in the know, unlike former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.
If there was a way to connect the utterly unrelated topics of off-shore oil drilling and Michael Phelps’ prodigious food consumption, leave it to comedian Rush Limbaugh to, well, at least try.
During his nationally-syndicated program today, Limbaugh said that since extra energy helped produce excellence in Phelps, drilling for more oil would do the same for the U.S.:
But now we read that Michael Phelps is burning and using 12,000 calories a day, while the Democrats are trying to alert everybody to the dangers posed by energy. The Democrats and left are now demonizing oil, they’re demonizing our own ability to be energy independent. They don’t want us to be able to get our own independent sources of oil or natural gas. Yet, look at Michael Phelps. […]
American consumption for the greatest production and the greatest rewards, why, that is fine if we do this in sports. However, if we consume and produce exceptionalism in goods and services for others, including ourselves, then somehow we are committing a sin.
Barack Obama delivered some common sense advice on the stump recently about the high price of oil: properly inflated tires and regular tune ups can save gas. If everybody did, it would save a lot of gas. Did you know:
The Department of Energy estimates that 1.2 billion gallons of fuel were wasted in 2005 as a result of driving on under-inflated tires.
Fuel efficiency is reduced by 1% for every 3 PSI that tires are under-inflated.
Proper tire inflation can save the equivalent of about 1 tank of gas per year.
Proper tire inflation also reduces CO2 emissions.
Experts estimate that 25% of automobiles are running on tires with lower than recommended pressure, because people don’t know how to check their tires or don’t realize that tires naturally lose air over time.
This is part of Car Care 101, about as basic as knowing where to put your car key.
So since when did common sense advice about saving gas become something to ridicule?You probably know some of the media “celebrities” that slung the most of this hydrocarbon-aided hash.But you may not know that some people and organizations not whole supportive of the Illinois senator actually agree with his suggestions. They include:
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
McCain V.P. short-lister Charlie Crist
NASCAR
President Bush’s Highway Traffic Safety Department
Here’s what that aforementioned organization published in the “Energy conservation from systematic tire pressure regulation” study in 2006:
The study indicates that substantial benefits would accrue if car care facilities systematically offered complimentary tire pressure checks with oil changes including: (i) increased safety by decreasing all crashes and saving more than 100 lives per year, (ii) reduced petroleum consumption by over a billion gallons/year, which would (iia) provide over $4 billion in economic savings for US consumers that could in part be recouped in retail/auto-care facilities, (iib) reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 13.5 million tons and automobile pollution and (iic) enhance national security.
Mr. Obama never suggested that the U.S. could achieve energy independence by inflating tires.He said the aggregate savings from better maintenance would eliminate the need for off-shore drilling, as explained recently by Time magazine reporter Michael Grunwald:
“The Bush Administration estimates that expanded offshore drilling could increase oil production by 200,000 bbl. per day by 2030. We use about 20 million bbl. per day, so that would meet about 1% of our demand two decades from now. Meanwhile, efficiency experts say that keeping tires inflated can improve gas mileage 3%, and regular maintenance can add another 4%. Many drivers already follow their advice, but if everyone did, we could immediately reduce demand several percentage points. In other words: Obama is right.
Is the math entirely accurate? Maybe, depending who is doing the ciphering. But even if it’s off by half, less off-shore drilling is a good thing.Because, in the end, the U.S has only three percent – yes, that’s right – three percent of the world’s proven oil reserves. And if it will take 10 years to see the first trickle of oil, drilling now won't do a thing to bring prices down. Driving less, like we're doing, along with better maintenance, is already achieving that,
