Safe Speed Forums

The RAC are reported in my local rag as saying, "One in five car journeys is less than 1.5 miles, therefore unnecessary".

What's the length of the average journey? If it's 20 miles, then the 1.5 mile journeys constitute 1.5/20 * 1/5 = 1.5% of total mileage.

And who are they to pontificate about what journeys are necessary or not, anyway?

Cheers
Peter

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Only when ideology, prejudice and dogma are set aside does the truth emerge - Kepler

I think what they're trying to say is that if people got of their arses and walked to the shops (for small items obviously) or let their kids walk to school then there would be a whole lot less congestion and everyone would be far happier.

Depends on the journey though doesn't it? 1.5 miles at 3 mph walking pace is half an hour. If you have to take kids to school over that distance then that costs you an hour's time rather than 10 minutes. 1.5 miles to the supermarket for a weekly shop is impossible on foot. It is tricky enough on a bus trying to struggle on and off with several shopping bags. I'd say a 15 minute walk is realistically the most you're going to get people to do on a regular basis compared to taking the car.

The big problem with the whole PT vs the private car vs walking is one of time not money. Money you can earn more of but once time has gone you can't get it back.If you had a car you would not choose to cycle the same journey in the piddling down rain, you'd take the car and stay dry. If taking the car saves you lots of time then you take the car. I think a lot of people are working such long hours they will object to the government expecting them to waste more of their life doing their daily chores. The govt are constantly banging on about kids not having parents around but aren't they making it worse by not making sure there is adequate road space and houses are more affordable? People only do what they think is best out of the options they have. I have no idea why some do travel 500 yards by car rather than walk. I can only assume they feel so short of time every minute is important to them or they find the fixed cost of motoring so high they like to get their money's worth.

Question is if PT was made free for a month and extra buses were laid on would people switch? No method of PT can compete with the convenience of the private car so I think it needs to offer something that cars don't eg free wireless internet or some other tangible benefit that is going to make someone switch from their personal, private, comfortable space for a shared space.

I suspect the feeling of having one's time wasted by those in authority is partly why exceeding speed limits is such a popular pass time. Everyone is trying to gain back all the time they feel they have lost by following stupid regulations or silly traffic calming schemes.

People who take the car to the Gym, then get on a walking or cycling machine amaze me.

Yes I know someone's going to say what when it's raining - I take the car when it's actually raining and cycle to work when it's not. So far this year (since January) I've taken the car 4 times.

because they're lazy? Just watch a shopping centre car park. You'll always find huge queues of people who'll wait for hours trying to get a park within 2 feet of the door. Bugger that, I park on the roof, or out the back, and end up walking past these idiots on a regular basis.

While waiting, their enignes are running, Then once they do get a space they spend alot of time getting their car in a bay.

I park my car out of the way, it is quicker, and eaiser.
However it does confuse me why when i leave my car on its own, I come back with two cars parked ethier side of it. dispite there being the worlds supply of empty spaces around it

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I have a car. I will use it whenever and wherever I like.

Its not for anyone else to tell me what I can do

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Speed camera policy Kills

And I do. But the 1/2 mile round-trip it would cost me if I used the car for that would account for 1/160th of my total daily mileage.
So kindly explain how you think that would result in a whole lot less congestion?

Cheers
Peter

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Only when ideology, prejudice and dogma are set aside does the truth emerge - Kepler

hmm, I've notice that on occassion too, and I'm not spending long enough for the carpark to fill up and empty again. I'd love to hear an explanation for it.
Now what really pisses me off are the tossers who'll take up 2 or more spaces because they're so important and their car's so flash that nobody can go near it. Well, all except the last person who I saw do that. He had an old beat up golf with a shiny exhaust tip and a few other tacked on go-fast bits, and was showing his mates what was under the bonnet

well it's not just about YOU is it? We're talking about millions of trips here. Just think think of how nice the roads are during the school holidays. That's the sort of effect we're talking about if more people chose to walk or ride for even just a few of the short trips they make every year.

Do walk and ride a fair bit - we enjoy walking and riding on the whole. However - we do this more for fun than necessity. Large family means big shop and full boot of goodies - which would not be easy to stagget home with - even if we all carried several bags!

Most of our rides are of the leisure type .... youngest does not seem to like my riding though - attached a baby trailer to my bike one fine weekend recently and rode out with her - and you could hear us coming from a long distance! Completely different in the car - gurgles and giggles away - and it does sound like "faster Paps" before falling asleep...

But...

See little point in driving to the local store for bits and bobs - can ride it easily and sometimes walk with the dogs on such small errands.

Also as teabelly points out - and I'd say he's right on this:




Most of these stores are situated out of town as well - so again fairly difficult to get there without a car in real terms.

Most of it is time as well. Know a chap who had a slight unexplained health problem. His doctor advised him not to drive for a period of six months , Initially he walked his kids to school but this took almost two hours of his time on return journey twice daily. He has since purchased a bicycle and now drastically cut the time. Only he has to arrange security for the kids's bikes with another pal who lives near his kids' school because the school "does not allow cycling in the grounds and has no provision for bikes" Incredible!




Nope - not pleasant - unless you know you will dry out in front of a nice warm fire or have a warm shower or bath afterwards. Hardly eco-warrior behaviour! (Is indeed what I suspect most of these "hardy" types do!



True. Car saves time - and I think my lifestyle would be different if I lived in a town as well. Have relatives (my side of family) who live in Manchester area. OK - supermarkets are 24 hours - but their nearest is a half hour walk - and buses are on every 15 minutes in peak rush hours and half hour to one hour thereafter. They live 10 miles out of city centre - and a return bus fare costs about £6 return - and a saver ticket on a twice daily commute 5 days per week does not give that great a saving in real terms. They are not far from the Trafford Centre - but the direct bus is every two hours and is the airport bus from Bolton and the other goes on a long meander through some estates on its way to the centre - which takes up over an hour. (This is Manchester - and not the back of beyond. Quite frankly - we've a better bus service up here in Cumbria!)

Cycle wise? Manchester apparently has some provisions - a few surprisingly good - such as around the Castlefield/area and obviously in the vicinity of the velodrome - and my sister down there reckons there is a decent network of old rail lines converted to walk/jog/cycleways and apparently since the Metro tram system is not being extended up to Bolton - the town has received some lottery cash to develop a cycle path network from the Rivington (hilly Pennine Fells area of the town) down to Manchester.




Has always surprised me too.





PT is not cheap and usually dirty as well. If it was regular, clean and pleasant and synchronised with connections as in Switzerland, Germany, France and even Italy - perhaps it would attract more people. But think out of town shopping and bulk buying has also created a lifestyle which few wish to desert.



I also suspect the impatience is related to convenience living - one click of a mouse button and you have internet data and software which can give an almost instant result. We also have the pre-pared egg omettlett whcih warms up in the microwve in 10 seconds and a person will still pace the kitchen looking at his watch ..

I do think we are losing out on life by this - wishing a life away and not savouring the moments - part of the fun in cooking is in the preparing anyway - and then taking time over the meal.

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Ah, remember the RAC wrote a report not so long ago indicating tht Britain was in the grip of a speeding epidemic. They also, along with Green Flag & direct line insurance, have supported BRAKE.

I no longer have my policy with Direct line (AKA Royal Bank of Scotland) and I am no longer with Green flag.

When I was a kid, our next door neighbour always used his car every day to drive to the newsagents, which was no more than 300m from his house. He also drove to and from work, which was around 600m from his house. He died of a heart attack at age 50ish.

Personally I walk for most journeys other than my 16 mile drive to and from work, but I live somewhere where most shops or facilities I need to go to are within a mile or so.

I will always walk for journeys of less than 2 miles where I will be getting less than two heavy carrier bags of stuff, so that gets me to Lidl, the Chippy, the Cantonese, the Barber (local town centre). I always have done, and always will - there is no point driving for such short journeys. As long as I have the time to waste that is.

But anything longer always involve the car, especially if it the big shop (Bus with 10 carrier bags? I don't think so) or recreational. My sport is playing Golf, and aside from the Course not being on a bus route anyway, the idea of going through public transport with all the Golf gear is rather comical.

My daughter will also be walking for the foreseeable future - OK she is only 10 weeks and cannot walk yet, but we have found a registered child minder 200 yards away, we back onto the first school, and after that she should be able to manage longer distances.

So having taken all these measures to minimise Car use, I am really getting sick of being told that I ought to cut down car use, and that I should pay more taxes to "encourage" me to use alternatives.

Apart from the extreme case noted above, I think most people combine short journeys with longer ones. For example, I drive the 500m to the paper shop in the morning and then continue my journey to work (about 15 Km). Would you really walk to and from the shop in these circumstances when time is at a premium in the morning? On Sundays, I walk to the shop and back.

Many school trips are actually parents dropping of children on the way to work thus combining trips.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

I pay damn good money to use my vehicles, and will use them how I wish, and I dont pay the RAC to lecture me on when i should use them. they should stick to what they are paid for.

I can honestly say that I dont NEED to ride my sportsbike ever, does that mean I shouldnt?

I heard some raving sandalista on Radio suffolk this morning ranting on about how we should all walk, cycle or take the bus. When asked if he practised what he preached he said'oh yes, but then I onyl go to my mothers'



We get the picture, and its not in the real world.

and then I'll whinge and moan about all the bl**dy traffic and the guv'ment should do something to fix it.

What the Government should be doing though, is building more roads - not coercing people off them by various means via their lackeys.

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

Corrrrect, where there's demand you produce goods to fulfil that demand.

That's all very well as a theoretical model, but in the real world we have to accept that we live on a planet with finite resources, and we all share a responsibility to try to conserve those resources. Okay, we might discover some marvellous new form of energy production, but on the other hand we might not. Even if we moved to massive use of nuclear fission to power processes that could manufacture hydrogen fuel for vehicles, there are limited quantities of the raw materials for nuclear fission on the planet such that it wouldn't last that many generations. The current oil party will eventually be over, nobody knows when exactly, but surely nobody thinks the oil is going to last forever, especially not if we keep increasing road capacity when experience shows that people simply drive more miles when it becomes more pleasant to do so, e.g. by choosing to live further from work because a longer commute has become more tolerable.

My favoured partial solution, personally, is to abolish stamp duty, or at least cut it back to a level that reflects a genuine charge for the adminstrative process that it originally covered, rather than the current effect of being a tax on moving house. The idea would be to remove a major obstacle to people living closer to where they work.