Sunday, March 26, 2006
A little bit more car-free
This past week, I made a small step towards car freedom. I reduced the insurance coverage on my car to “leisure” coverage. The idea of my car being labeled “for leisure” isn’t something I’m particularly fond of, but what it means is that I pay less for my car insurance because I put less than 10000 km/year on it. Part of it is a promise to myself to not use my car very much, but the other part is to avoid paying the insurance company for a risk that simply doesn’t exist. They got a big payoff from my low mileage over the past 11 months.
This saves me $10/month, which is peanuts compared with how much I make for the insurance company. The reduced mileage that comes from driving once per week on average must translate to a reduced risk by more than 7 or 8%. Maybe I’ll have to shop around in the near future.
Since I’m already practicing living without my car for most of the time, the biggest change could be that if I don’t feel up to riding to work, I’ll be more likely to take the subway/bus. And if I’m going on a long trip, my car will definitely stay parked. I’ll either carpool or take the bus or train.
As for full car freedom, I see my costs as being fairly minimal right now. My car is old, in good shape, paid-off, gets good fuel mileage, and sits parked for free. I feel satisfied with this commitment to have my car on the road as little as possible and keep my bum on my saddle as much as possible.
This saves me $10/month, which is peanuts compared with how much I make for the insurance company. The reduced mileage that comes from driving once per week on average must translate to a reduced risk by more than 7 or 8%. Maybe I’ll have to shop around in the near future.
Since I’m already practicing living without my car for most of the time, the biggest change could be that if I don’t feel up to riding to work, I’ll be more likely to take the subway/bus. And if I’m going on a long trip, my car will definitely stay parked. I’ll either carpool or take the bus or train.
As for full car freedom, I see my costs as being fairly minimal right now. My car is old, in good shape, paid-off, gets good fuel mileage, and sits parked for free. I feel satisfied with this commitment to have my car on the road as little as possible and keep my bum on my saddle as much as possible.
Darren J 3/26/2006 04:44:00 p.m.
1 Comments:
Hey, congrats man. Good to read this. There's a lot of freedom in not owning a car and all the costs associated with it, as I'm sure you know. See you at 6.
