Anyone chosen to go car less?

1finny said:
That got me curious so have had a look.
I can hire a car for the month of Jan for £500. Can also get a day rate of£82 in Jan.

The average cost of owning a car (everything included) in UK is, apparently, £3500 o_O
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Another thing to be aware of when hiring a car is that they don't always charge you for weekend days. Also consider pick up times and drop off times.
When I was hiring for a weekend I would pick up at 13:00 on a Friday and drop off at 12:00 on a Monday and this was equivalent of one day hire as they charged based on working days. I only realised this because I once missed the drop off time by a couple of hours and I had to pay one extra day hire which doubled the cost of the hire. They explained this when I queried it.

So hiring over a weekend is a lot cheaper than hiring during the week. Or at least this was the way Enterprise charged their hires circa 2018
 
I haven't been to Teesside for a while but on occaisions when I visited without a car, it seemed like the public transport was designed to discourage anyone from using it. Example: just missing the bus at Morrison's in Redcar to go to New Marske, I walked to the train station, got a train to Longbeck, then walked a mile up the hill to NM. I got there before the bus that I'd missed, which had been meandering all over Redcar East.
 
I started driving late in my 20s so I got by for a long time without but I was in a good sized city with decent transport. Most importantly, I had housemates, friends and wife that did drive so I could get away with not owning a car but I was relying on others. If everyone had been carless like me or would have been fast less practical. There was no grocery shopping then which is the most obvious regular occasion where a car is needed. I played golf regularly and golf courses are rarely conveniently placed for public transport.

Even with the good public transport in a city I really hated how much time I spent stood in the cold waiting for buses/trains. Even on regular bus routes. I had a bus stop just across from my house and office which had a bus every 10 mins but they never turned up at that interval. It was always 3 or 4 of them at once and then buying for 30+ mins.

I could never go back to relying on public transport. The convenience of the car is so much better value than even a good public transport service that I would always pay the premium of having a car even without the added benefit it brings for getting to difficult to reach places at specific times etc
 
1finny said:
That got me curious so have had a look.
I can hire a car for the month of Jan for £500. Can also get a day rate of£82 in Jan.

The average cost of owning a car (everything included) in UK is, apparently, £3500 o_O
Click to expand...
Is that over the course of a year? Because I've just found out my car has costs me £5000 in depreciation alone this year
 
When I lived in San Francisco we didn't have one for the first year, and just had a Zipcar account. However that doesn't give you the freedom that owning a car does as you'd be constantly checking the time to see if you needed to get the car back and how far away you were from the return station.

We got one, and used in probably once a fortnight maximum, but it did give a sense of freedom knowing you could go anywhere whenever you want without relying on someone else.

Not having a car now we live in the UK isn't really feasible, even though we try to walk into town for most things, or get the train many places, simple things like taking our little girl to nursery on cold mornings is where we use it most.
 
Never had a car and I'm 36, thought about it but it just seems a lot of faff and money when I don't really need one. Maybe for convenience but it's not worth it. Maybe I'd do the hire car if I did.
 
I try and use the car as little as possible, I much prefer to walk everywhere,
I do go to the post office every day with my parcels but I just stick them in a Rucksack I do about 5 miles all in
I did smile to my self a month or so ago when I heard about one of the latest health crazes its called " Rucking "
Basically going for a walk with a Rucksack.
I always knew I was a leader rather than a follower :)

Rucking
 
Redpete said:
I try and use the car as little as possible, I much prefer to walk everywhere,
I do go to the post office every day with my parcels but I just stick them in a Rucksack I do about 5 miles all in
I did smile to my self a month or so ago when I heard about one of the latest health crazes its called " Rucking "
Basically going for a walk with a Rucksack.
I always knew I was a leader rather than a follower :)

Rucking
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Go ruck yourself. ;)
 
How do I get out of Newton under Roseberry without a car? No pavements beyond the village, the road is way too busy to risk using a bike, no busses, no shops. When walking the dog I regularly witness cars going at speed AND overtaking in a 30mph area. Thankfully I don’t live on the main road.

A car is a must in isolated semi-rural communities.
 
1finny said:
Thinking of ditching the car early next year when I don’t need one for work.

Just wondering if anyone else has done this?
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According to the last census quite a lot of people in urban Teesside tbh, not many farm yackers though.

Second image is 2021 census data for England & Wales as a population cartogram (each hexagon a fixed population).

1702450515873.jpeg
20231213_064018.jpg
 
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