Car v public transport

[Vitamin c]

I did the maths regarding getting rid of my car and using public transport, my car costs without repairs roughly £2500. A year to keep on the road that would get me a hell of a lot of bus and train rides .

Unfortunately I live rural and have little access to public transport.

How would you get on ?

[Ara]

We recently moved (at last) and one of my requisites was that public transport was available as our last place (much loved, sob sob) was in the middle of nowhere and a car was a necessity for everything as there were no supermarket deliveries etc due to the difficulty in getting there, 5 miles to the nearest postbox, 10 miles to the surgery - you get the picture. Now, I can just "nip" to the postbox, walk to the local village shop which is very well stocked and there are 5 buses each way per day to the nearest big towns. Even the closest supermarket and the surgery (unfortunately a well used place these days) are only a mile's walk away in the nearest small town.Why can't I persuade Mr A that we only need one car now?

[Frnc]

I once worked out that the cost of running a car is about double what you spend on petrol. But that was a few years ago, not sure how much petrol has gone up. Of course a lot depends on how much you spend on the car and how old it is. Personally I don't have one now, but I live close to public transport at the centre of a suburb. I do have the ability to carry a lot on my bike if I need to. It has front and rear racks and I have four panniers. I think the total volume is 70 litres. Plus I could put stuff on top of the racks.

[Kiwififer]

Where are you?

I’m Edinburgh, my monthly bus pass costs £60, that’s unlimited for 28 days. That is however Edinburgh where our bus service is superb. I still have my car though, I used it twice last week and it was only to nip to the shop.

If I lived more rural, I would probably stick to the car though.

[GillyBee]

Fo anyone the questions are:
How often are you travelling? How many of you are travelling at once and do you need to transport "goods"?
We have good public transport here but transporting the amount of shopping and DIY goods we get though would be a problem on the bus. Likewise the transport tends to all be in one direction and is not so good for some of our regular activities only a few miles away that take a couple of hours to get to/fro via the public options.
Bike would solve the second but assumes you are fit and well enough to cycle ten miles without needing a trip to A&E afterwards.
We have considered use of the train for some activities but miltiplying the price by 4 makes it look a lot less appealing.

[Frnc]

Fo anyone the questions are:
How often are you travelling? How many of you are travelling at once and do you need to transport "goods"?
We have good public transport here but transporting the amount of shopping and DIY goods we get though would be a problem on the bus. Likewise the transport tends to all be in one direction and is not so good for some of our regular activities only a few miles away that take a couple of hours to get to/fro via the public options.
Bike would solve the second but assumes you are fit and well enough to cycle ten miles without needing a trip to A&E afterwards.
We have considered use of the train for some activities but miltiplying the price by 4 makes it look a lot less appealing.

Amazon Prime, get your DIY stuff delivered 'free' I use the Prime Video as well. For groceries, you can get a big shop delivered for £2.
Ten miles cycling is quite far if you're not fit, it's what I do when I ride, but it took a while to build up to that. Of course to some people, 30 miles cycling is nothing.

[Vitamin c]

Any views on the new scheme in Oxford only allowed to use car twice a week outside of a 15 minute walk area £70 fine if you use car more .
I believe the state is dipping its toe into public opinion here if Oxford sits back and takes it something similar on its way to you very soon.

[Sneddle]

Pushing cars off one road is just going to push them onto another.

[pseudonym]

Any views on the new scheme in Oxford only allowed to use car twice a week outside of a 15 minute walk area £70 fine if you use car more .
I believe the state is dipping its toe into public opinion here if Oxford sits back and takes it something similar on its way to you very soon.

Just for us though right? Politicians and higher up executives not included

[PreppingSu]

We can't quite stretch to using public transport. OH is a community nurse so needs use of a car so we have run two cars for over 15 years now. However, due to an ankle fracture I haven't been able to drive and he has been taking me to and from work, showing us we could manage with one car. A BIG saving for us.

The trouble is, in my area, the bus services are being cut constantly, so it would probably be too much stress to rely on them to get to work etc.