…for NEVER HAVING TO PUMP ANOTHER GALLON OF GAS into a hole in the ground into which to pour money.
Seriously.
Folks nearby seem to think I’m going to be stricken, heart-broken, ripped-off, and agonized at my son’s making off with my Toyota Venza, and at the (amazingly short-sighted) docs at the Mayo Clinic issuing an edict that I must not be allowed to drive anymore.
Heh. If only, folks. If only!
This afternoon Mijito and I took an informal inventory of all the places I can reach on foot, without ever having to turn an ignition key, pump a gallon of gas, or dodge a fellow homicidal driver. Let’s see…
1. Albertson’s
2. Sprouts
3. Walgreen’s
4. Bookstore/video library
5. Computer store
6. Hair salon
7. Bus stop
8. Lightrail stop
9. Asian restaurant
10. Mexican restaurant
11. Church
12. Liquor store
13. Another hair salon
14. Vacuum cleaner shop
15. Variety store
16. El Rancho supermarket
17. QT store
18. Circle K
19. Auto repair and maintenance shop
20. Boston Market
21. Cricket Wireless
22. UPS store
23. Doctor’s office
24. Regional hospital, with emergency room
It goes on and on. There are more…I just can’t remember them all. Add the lightrail and the bus stops, and the marketing potential is endless!!
Seriously: Today we decided, after an eye-opening experiment, that the smartest thing we could do with that $34,000 rolling hole in the ground into which to pour money IS….to get rid of it.
No kidding. Today we reached the point where we agree that this old lady doesn’t need a car.
Nope. I live smack in the middle of Commercial Paradise. And right next to a lightrail line and bus lines that swoop down the city’s central corridor connecting the west-side bedroom communities with the mid-and downtown commercial districts and onward to Tempe, home of the vast Arizona State University. Thanks to transportation upgrades the city has installed over the past ten years, I no longer need a car at all!
Jeez. What does this place think it is? San Francisco? 😀
That’s what it was like to live in San Francisco after we came back from our ten-year sojourn in Saudi Arabia: you could go anywhere you wanted or needed to go and get any product or services you needed simply by using the public transit.
Well, amazingly, the central parts of Phoenix have evolved along those lines, too.
The Mayo docs want me to quit driving. Not because I’m any more of a menace on the road than my fellow homicidal drivers. But because I’m older than the hills and they’re scared of what I can do these days. 😀 Consequently — did you know doctors could do this?? — they have told the State of Arizona to nullify my driver’s license!
Can you imagine?
Well…what I can’t imagine just now is that I don’t give one thin damn about their arrogant little order. Because I can go wherever I want to go and get to whatever I want to do by train, bus, or taxi…for, ultimately speaking, one HELL of a lot less than it costs to own and maintain a car with a gasoline engine.
Over the past couple of weeks, the kid and I have run a de facto experiment: stashing the car at his place and leaving my garage empty. And to our astonishment, I’m getting everywhere I want to go or need to go in about the same time, without having to pour money into a car!
Wow!
If this continues for another two or three weeks, we’ll be selling the tank, and I’ll be getting around as though I were a real, live big-city girl.
I’m so glad to hear that getting by without a car is working out for you. I’d think it might be a relief in a way not to have to deal with homicidal traffic, though I guess there are still roads to cross as a pedestrian. But even so.
It sounds as though you have so many options within easy walking distance in the city. In an odd parallel, I have most things I need within walking distance, though much less variety. On foot I can easily reach two grocery stores (though Food Lion is a bit of a hike), the library, the post office, town offices, a pharmacy, a restaurant, a liquor store, and probably some other businesses I haven’t had a need for yet. The doctor’s office within easy reach isn’t accepting new patients, but county paratransit services can take me to the (small, by Phoenix standards) nearest city, where doctors abound.
Uber, LYFT, and probably taxi services are also an option, though one I haven’t explored because I live with other people willing to run most of the errands and schlep me around when needed.
I’ve said before that you couldn’t pay me to live in a big city, but I think a worst-case scenario would actually be living in the suburbs, with few to no businesses reachable by foot, few (if any) sidewalks, and no public transit.
I hope the heat and humidity break soon and make walking to th eplaces you need an even better option!