Is a Bike Faster than a Car?

On average, a bicycle travels about 1/4 the speed of a car, but you only spend 1/30 as much of your time earning it. Calculations will vary depending upon your unique circumstances.

Try the Commuting Cost Calculator

How much time do you spend earning the cost of a car?

Purchase price
Insurance
Fuel
Maintenance
Licenses
__________________Tickets__________________
adds to at least $.60 per mile

How much time/money could you save with a bicycle?

Purchase price
Maintenance
__________________Extra food__________________
adds to about 2 cents per mile

Lower Health Care Costs are a Bonus!

A bicycle can be faster than a car, especially during gridlock, if you count the time wasted earning the car.

Take control of your time. You can work for the system or you can walk around it.

Our ancestors did not drive cars. Most people alive today don't drive cars (thank goodness we can still breath). We don't need them either.

Why drag a ton of stinky steel and vinyl everywhere you go?

• Will you take responsibility for the energy you use to get around?
• Do you pay corporations to incite government to kill people for oil?
• Do you buy into a dysfunctional system of factories, insurance, cops, and car crashes?
• Wouldn't it be easier to walk and ride a bicycle?

Survive the Collapse

The economy is going to get much worse before it gets better. Here are some tips for survival.

• * Buy Local * Make sure that you can rely upon local people who use local resources sustainably to meet your needs, especially basics like water, food, and shelter.
• * Use Free Energy * Heat or cool your home, heat water, and dry your wash with passive solar energy. Get around by walking and bicycling. Encourage permaculture, a local ecosystem that supports your needs.
• * Don't Work Against Yourself * Refuse to spend your time or money supporting institutions like the US government or big corporations which work against the best interests of most of humanity.
• * Share Your Truth * Speak out to observe reality, envision collaborative solutions, and empower positive action.
• * Build Democracy * Support reform from the grassroots up to build institutions on inclusive consensus, establishing multi-party representation at each level of government, starting with the most local.

These five simple points outline a lifetime of work. Let us each dedicate our lives to the next seven generations of humans.

Living in Nature

For the last half hour we've been watching four blacktail bucks about twenty feet outside the dining room window. There were two with two points per side, one with four, and one with five. They sparred a bit, but for the most part the elder deer seemed dismissive of the younger two. At one point, the two big ones locked antlers for several minutes. They didn't seem to be fighting so much as scratching mutual itches. Periodically they would graze or lie down in the grass. They were completely unafraid of us watching them, even when we stepped out through the door for a better view.

There were jokes an innuendos about bucks outside Yaney's door (must be pheremones) and the exchange between young bucks and older ones. Michael, who's lived with Yaney for two decades, is twenty-six years older than Yaney and I are. We may lock antlers occasionally, but there's no anger to our sparring either.

Being part of a threesome is a relatively minor challenge of this transition. In fact, it's kind of fun to watch friends grapple with the concept that Yaney lives happily with both Michael and I. Polyamorous relationships are relatively common in Corvallis, but still unusual enough to raise an eyebrow or two.

I'm not yet completely moved into Yaney's house. My drumset is up in the basement, a big improvement over being folded up in my small room at Veggie House. Today we'll continue the process of cleaning out some of their accumulations and moving in more of mine. The psycho-spiritual adjustments seem to flow well because we're guided by love.

Reforest North America

It took riding a bicycle up the middle of North America to realize that the continent on which I grew up is under-forested. Looking for a tree to shade me from the heat of the Mississippi Delta in August was a memorable experience. Surely this lush area was thick with trees when the first European settlers dragged the first African-Americans into what is now a patchwork of treeless fields, mostly growing cotton. I wonder if any of the new arrivals bothered to learn how the first people lived before they made irrevocable changes.

As I bicycled through twenty eight of the United States, I regularly observed the impact of oil intensive mono-crop agriculture. These methods can produce amazing results in the short term, but over time they drive farms into debt and dependence upon volatile export markets. We've got a nation that can over produce GMO corn and soy, but can no longer feed itself. The Frankenfoods being grown across our nation aren't fit for direct consumption by man.

Cutting trees and burning petroleum have also begun to change the global climate. Reversing this problem will take everything we've got. The American way of life is going to have change if humans are to survive. How else will we convince three billion Indian and Chinese people not to follow in our footsteps?

A reforested North America could be a delightful place to live. Calculate the savings if your hometown grew all the fruit and nuts it consumed, rather than importing them. Productive trees won't eliminate trade, but will allow us to save transport energy for the highest priorities. Even with global warming and high quality greenhouses, most North American communities won't be growing their own latex or ironwood.

I've got faith in trees. They absorb the carbon responsible for climate change. They also moderate the immediate climate impacts, by shading us, capturing precipitation, and diverting winds. Mangroves can prevent damage from tsunamis and hurricanes, while any locally appropriate forest can shelter a diverse healthy ecosystem.

So what are we waiting for? If you own property, go to your local nursery and learn how to enhance its value by planting a broad selection of the best producing trees for your location. Talk with the people who own the land around your home. It's likely they'll let you improve their land with young trees.

Please don't stop there. We're all going to have to work together to reforest North America. Visit your city council to discuss a Permaculture in the Parks Proposal. Lobby your federal representatives for tax credits for tree crops. Start gathering seeds and growing young trees. We've got a lot of trees to plant!

Post Election Blues

The image from this election that sticks with me is both major party candidates endorsing a $700,000,000,000.00 bankers' bailout that was overwhelmingly unpopular among the rank and file of both parties. I understand mail to Congress was running 9 to 1 against the bailout, but our leaders were bullied from the top down into accepting this massively stupid measure. Overpaid executives lobbied for fewer regulations, then ran their businesses into the ground with unwise business practices. Why should our great-grandchildren be expected to foot the bill for their ineptitude? We could just say "sorry; you lose." It's not like these guys are going to be in a soup line if they stop getting exorbitant salaries. Gee, they may have to sell the guesthouse. My heart bleeds.

But in reflection, this isn't the first time the major party candidates have agreed on something unpopular. Like war, for example. Overwhelming numbers of Americans are opposed to foreign military adventures that kill innocent people who have never been a threat to us. But election after election, the candidates who dare to speak truth to power - like Dennis Kucinich or Ron Paul - are marginalized, while those who toe the line for the war machine are promoted. When will we cry out "Enough!"?

What does it mean when both parties are cooperatively steering us away from popular will? Our country has the best politicians that money can buy. They've sold us down the river to please their bosses from the most profitable industries ever blessed by favorable governing - munitions, pharmaceuticals, prisons, insurance - and let ethics be damned. Who pays the piper calls the tune and an increasingly narrow group of capitalists control the means to buy government. Nobody is steering the ship of state as short term profits for campaign contributors become the driving value.

So what are you going to do about it? Well first you'd better reach out to your closest neighbors, especially those of the other party. Listen to their concerns, encourage them to share their most inspired visions, and decide what positive actions you can agree to take together. Recognize that your community is not split between two political poles. You are not just conservatives or liberals. You have a broad diversity of opinions, and there is strength in diversity. Celebrate your differences.

This country will survive when we get past the squabbling over contentious hot button issues and focus on building a system that adheres to our shared values. We will not be divided and conquered by the two faces of the Central Party. We will build a sustainable multiparty democracy from the grassroots up. Please contact me if you're not sure how to advance our common cause today.

End Global Warming & Oil Wars

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Help Build a Bike Co-op with No Cost to You

Please spend a couple minutes to cast a vote for this idea, so we can win $10,000 to start the Bike Co-op.

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When they confirm your membership go to http://ideablob.com/ideas/2408-Corvallis-Bicycle-Co-operative and vote for us.

Then you can enjoy exploring this interesting web site as much as you like. Maybe you'll even submit your own idea and ask me to vote for it.

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