Why you should give your car a break

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Happy Monday everybody! It’s a new week, time for new ideas. Welcome to the first regular feature of this new blog, Bit by Bit. I love goal setting and small challenges, so I want to give you one thing to try every other week.

Who knows, maybe it will inspire you to make a permanent change in some areas of your life. This first challenge  is to simply not use your car for one week. Does this sound impossible to you? Well, to be honest it isn’t really for me, because I don’t even have a car since moving to another city for college. Ha! Still, this is not a cheap trick to give you a challenge that I am fulfilling anyway, I just want to show you that not driving is totally doable! Here are some  reasons why:

1. This ones pretty obvious: it’s good for the environment (I guess I don’t have to tell you about CO2 and everything since it has been in the media for years, right? Basically: CO2 is one of the main reasons for global warming and cars have really high CO2 emissions, especially in contrast to riding your bike since this is free of CO2 emissions).

2. You will save a lot of money. Firstly, because fuel is really expensive at the moment (at least in my part of the world). I suggest you google how much a monthly bus or train ticket would cost you and how much you spend on your car every month. Quite a difference, isn’t it? Going only by bike doesn’t cost anything, although I don’t know if that is realistical at all. Secondly, without a car you have to plan out your trips to the grocery store or shopping in general a lot more, since you can’t be buying too many things you actually don’t need. Having to carry it all home may put some perspective on the XXL-versions of some products.

3. If you go by bike or walk everywhere, you get some free exercise without having to drag yourself to the gym. It’s basically a two in one deal – no fuel money and no gym money (makes more new shoes!).

4. If you take the train instead of a bike, you can use the time as well – for example for reading a book or the newspaper or just listening to music and relaxing.

5. You get to know your neighbourhood and your city a lot better  since you  move so much slower. Thus you  are able to see  more than if you are just driving by. Maybe you will discover some cool new café to try (which actually happened to me last week)?

So, what do you think? Are you going to make that change and try to use different ways of transportation (even if it’s just for one week)? If you really can’t survive without your car, I suggest you try to do at least one of your normal weekly chores without a car (for example grocery shopping). As you know, every little bit makes a difference!

MerkenMerken

4 Comments

  • Jules
    April 22, 2013

     

    This is a great idea! Love the bit-by-bit. It takes a lot of time for people to make change and when it’s rushed, old habbits always come back. I live in San Francisco and while I own a car, I rarely drive it. Public transportation is my main way. :)

    xoxo,

    Jules of Canines & Couture
    http://www.caninesandcouture.com

    • hanna
      April 22, 2013

       

      Thank you! I also mainly go by public transportation (also at home at my parents although I could theoretically drive a car there) and since I started not relying on cars so much this has become much more comfortable. No search for parking spots, no gas bills…

  • Ali Mackin
    April 22, 2013

     

    I give my car a really big break, I don’t know how to drive!

    Ali of

    http://www.dressingken.com

    • hanna
      April 23, 2013

       

      Haha, well that’s a solution as well!


Meet Hanna
Hanna's Places - a green lifestyle blog

Hanna’s Places is a green lifestyle magazine written by Hanna Ulatowski. It’s all about slowing down in a fast-paced society and finding ways to live a more sustainable, simple lifestyle.

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