We Refuse To Title This "Car-less In Seattle"
Seattlest spent a couple years in Seattle without a car and it wasn't really that bad. Buying liquids at the store was the #1 problem. When you go to QFC and buy OJ and a half rack plus a few other odds and ends it doesn't sound like much, but it's a bitch to get home. We were the sole member of our household at that point, though, so not having a car shouldn't have been much of a problem. Alan Durning of Northwest Environment Watch is a family man with three kids so when he says he's going car-free it actually means something.
Above is the Durning family Volvo, obviously wrecked. Instead of replacing it he's decided they're going to go car-less in Seattle and rely on Nike, Trek and Flexcar for the time being. We're interested to learn how this turns out. It's been six weeks or so since the Volvo died and apparently the Durning family has yet to suffer a major transportation breakdown.
We're only six weeks into this new lifestyle, so I don't want to make too many conclusions. But so far, what's surprised me haven't been the moments of inconvenience (I expected those). It's been two unexpected pleasures: more little adventures every week and fewer backseat arguments to referee.
Seattlest has backslid a little since our heady car-less days. Currently we're part of a two-car household, but it's not inconcievable that it could go down to one. None might be a stretch. We're rooting for the Durnings, though, and we're very interested to hear how things go so we'll be watching the Cascadia Scorecard site. With that in mind, we did see this week's South Park where everyone bought hybrids and a giant cloud of "Smug" wiped San Francisco off the face of the earth and thought it was hilarious. So far Durning's Smug emissions seem to be at acceptable levels... Any wagers on how long they last without a car?
