One less car

Last weekend we went up to Mt. Shasta for some snowshoeing and hiking. We also dropped in on my great aunt and her son (my cousin once-removed?). It was a nice time; the weather was great and we got some amazing views of the mountain, both from the climbers' camp on its flank and from a few miles down the valley at Castle Crags. What made this weekend particularly noteworthy was that it was our first out-of-town excursion since we got rid of our car a couple months ago.

Some of you may remember that I got rid of my beloved but terribly unreliable Jeep about a year and a half ago. From that time up until last November, we got by with one car: Anne's 1983 Toyota Tercel. Luckily, her car -- like all Toyotas -- was incredibly reliable. It was the anti-Jeep in that respect. Also, not having a car didn't prove too much of an inconvenience. I ride my bike or the bus to school, and Anne takes BART most days (now every day). On weekends, we never needed to be in different places where at least one of them wasn't served by transit.

Every year since the Tercel turned 20, the state has been sending letters enclosed with its registration renewal offering to buy it, the logic being that it's in the state's interest to invest the $700 (don't ask how they arrived at that figure) they would spend on the car to get a potential polluter off the road. We always demurred, thinking that we would get rid of the car after I graduate and we leave the Bay Area. Well, last summer the stakes were raised because the car didn't pass smog. Now we had a dilemma. Although the state would provide some assistance to get the car to pass smog, it wouldn't cover the whole cost. Also, we weren't sure of the logic of using the state's money to repair the car only to retire it (and pocket their $700) ten months later. While we were weighing what to do, the state upped it's offer and promised $1,000 for retiring the car. Apparently a known polluter is of greater value than a suspected polluter. After dragging our feet and getting extensions on the registration as long as we could, we turned in the car at the end of November. (I say "we", but really it was Anne who put forth all of the effort here, including a few valiant trips to the DMV.)

We've been able to get around on public transit and bike without altering our lifestyle much. Luckily we live in a neighborhood where you can walk to most anything you need, although there are a few places that are more difficult to get to now (including, sadly, the Parkway, which we haven't visited since before we unloaded the car). With the exception of a couple interminable trans-Berkeley bus rides, we haven't been greatly inconvenienced. Which brings me to this past weekend.

When we got rid of the Jeep, we realized the big sacrifice we were making (other than the subtle pleasure of riding everywhere with the heat on full blast) was that we would no longer be able to get away easily in the winter without the four wheel drive. Last winter, we limited our winter adventures to places that are relatively easy to reach on the train (Truckee and Reno), but Mt. Shasta was out of the question. Ironically, getting rid of our remaining car has freed us up to head to more remote places. It somehow seemed fiscally irresponsible to rent a car while we still owned one, but now that we don't own a car at all, it's an easy decision to rent one to go away for the weekend. Which is how we were able to head up to one of our favorite places in California for a weekend of playing in the snow.

I must say that I'm really happy with our decision to go car-free. In fact, it's been oddly liberating, as if not being tied down to a vehicle makes us more free to move about. (It certainly helps ease the mind that we're not paying for gas, insurance, or the inevitable parking tickets for forgetting to move the car on street sweeping days). Obviously it's not for everyone. My mom, for example, would be confined to her house if she tried to get by without a car in Las Vegas, but it's worked out reasonably well for us living in an urban area (relatively) well-served by public transit. Depending on where we end up next year, we'll probably have to buy a new car when we get there. But I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts.