[SDCBC] Fwd: UT Mid City Transit Article Saturday - What does pla nning f...

[Gale Chan]

Parking and traffic issues have induced more bike riding in this household--for work commute, appointments, shopping, and leisure/entertainment.  We used to make a lot of choices based on parking/traffic, for ex not making an appt at 8:30 or 9am to avoid morning commute traffic, deciding it was "too much hassle" to go to the Del Mar Fair, or avoiding shopping malls entirely during the holiday shopping season.  No way my husband would have even CONSIDERED a job due to location (just north of UCSD).  But once we got into cycling most of those parking/traffic "barriers" were eliminated.

Bicycling has even played a big factor in our retirement planning.  A lot of our friends are planning to leave SD when they retire because in retirement they don't want to deal with the traffic congestion.  We were worried about it too until we got into cycling.  Now we figure we'll just ride everywhere when we're retired.  My plan is to get an electric bike someday to extend my riding range if need be.  I might even do that sooner--20 mi is too far for me to bike commute to work but might be doable with some electric assist.

-- Gale



JonIsaacs at aol.com wrote: Hello to all:
 
 Jim Baross reminded us that this is a cycling forum:
 
 "Gentlemen:
 I am not disinterested in this area of transportation issues, but it has drifted away from bicycling, right?
 
 Please consider that this forum is for bicycling information and discussions. I suggest and request that you consider responding among each other about transit discussions and/or relate your discourse on the SDCBC list-server to bicycling.... or find and/or start a San Diego transit discussion group."
 
 Gale made the following comment:
 
 "To specifically answer your question "Then exactly what does it depend upon?", the answer is "parking".  It depends on when parking for all the vehicles becomes an issue."
 
 To which I respond with a cycling specific answer:
 
 Parking costs and limited availability were a major part of my decision to turn in my  UCSD parking permit and cycle to work 5 days a week.   I think it was more the lack of nearby parking more than the cost but in the ~18 years since I made the change I figure I have saved about $15,000 in parking permit costs alone.  
 
 Another practical advantage of cycling was the predictablity, I could count on the fact that I could make the trip from Encinitas to my office at UCSD in 40-50 minutes regardless of the traffic situation.  In my car, when traffic was light, I could make the same trip in 20-25 minutes but even back then on a Friday or during the Del Mar Fair/Racing season, the car traffic would be stopped on NB 101 from the from Carmel Valley up to the top of Torrey Pines grade and that could take 45 minutes by itself with the entire commute taking over an hour.  
 
 I believe that when it is easier to ride a bike somewhere than it is to drive a car in traffic and find parking, then people naturally make that same decision I did.  In terms of cost effectiveness, dependability and easy resolution of parking costs/availibility cycling and walking certainly seems to have all other choices beat....
 
 Jon "keeping the focus here on cycling" Isaacs
 


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