Way to go ...

Do you own a car? Can I ask you why?

I ditched mine last year. Gave up on paying coupla hundred bucks a month on insurance, anywhere from three hundred to five hundred a month on gas, and between hundred to two hundred dollars in parking charges, and say around a hundred bucks a month either budgeting or paying for maintenance, oil changes, brake liner replacements etc ... and if you really want to do the math, depreciating about six hundred bucks a month, every month over five years on the lease/purchase price ...

So whichever way you add it up ... you'd end up with a minimum bill of at least a thousand bucks every month if you own a car right?

Contrast that with what I pay every month ... okay last month I spend all of 150$. That's with driving to work a few times a week, shopping for groceries at least once a week, visiting with friends, going out for dinner, taking in a show, going for French classes twice a week et al ...

And that's without any of the hassles normally associated with driving. Parking? No problem. Guaranteed parking spots in the best parking lots anywhere around Toronto. Insurance zip zilch. Gas likewise nada or if you prefer hearing this in French rien.


But after paying all this money, you go for a weekend to Montreal. Or for a week in Berlin. Do you think you'd be able to use your car on these trips?

Right!!!

Whereas imagine owning a car in most every city. That's after paying zero dinero in membership fees. And either .38 cents a minute or 15$ an hour. or 70$ for the day. Everything included. yes I do mean everything. Gas, insurance, headache free driving. No matter where you are. And no worrying about returning cars where you picked them up from. You could pick it up in North York ... and drop it off in China Town. Or Vice Versa. And never have to pay a penny in parking if you'd want. And no worrying about mileage. Unlimited miles ...

You pay .38 cents a min or 15 bucks an hour. You can pick up the car where you like. And drop it off wherever you like. They have parking lots on most every street and they're pretty much de rigeur in those Green P parking lots you find all over the place. So finding a car or a place to park them is suddenly not a problem any more. They are ubiquitous. And the cars are small enough that you can compete with scooters for parking. And it comes with a built in GPS, cards for parking garages, and fuel cards for fuel, and it's using smartcars which are both environmentally friendly and fairly cool as well ...

Check out this company. It's called Car2Go and I've long since stopped using cabs to get from point A to B (this works pretty much all over downtown as well as a bit outside Toronto as well), stopped using Transit for short trips (this works out cheaper than the 3$ you'd pay a trip), and it's great for getting home

Yeah before you ask, I'm still a member of Zipcar, and also have Autoshare. And I still rent from my friend Ali at U-Rentals who gives me cars for 9 bucks a day plus taxes et all which adds up to 15$. So yeah I've done my fair share of checking out car share options. And I vote Car2Go as the way to er go :) Unless of course you want to showcase your bling in an Audi. Or a BMW. For 10$ an hour. Yeah then ZipCar looks like a sexy option. Or you need a moving van by the hour. Then AutoShare. They each have their tradeoffs and good points. But over all for me at least Car2Go wins

The reason I'm writing all this? I came out of my class tonight. Expected it to be the same pleasant evening that made me walk the half hour to class. But this is Toronto, and so in a couple of hours the sultry evening had turned into a blustery, shiver me timbers kind of night. Normally this would call for a cab. Or a train ride down to Christie pits and then a ten minute walk back to home. Or a couple of transfers via streetcars to get to my house.

Instead I walked two seconds to the parking garage next to Alliance Francaise. And then I got into a car there, and five mins later was outside the Green P half a block to the east of my house. Doorstep to doorstep in eight mins flat. For a total of 3$ and change ...

Yeah, this is how I roll these days. Time y'all started tripping this way or what?