Reducing Transportation Emissions
Recently I wrote a post about reducing my personal carbon emissions to 90% of the average American citizen. Among the categories to reduce was the category of gasoline consumption. The average American citizen uses 500 gallons of gasoline per person per year. To be 90% below average would mean reducing my consumption to 50 gallons of gasoline a year. This project will be challenging, yet it is very important to do. It may show others that it can be done (while our government maintains that it cannot).
Our society is dependent upon the car. We shelter ourselves from the elements and from one another in the bubble of our car. We can hop in the car for a last minute trip to the store. We think nothing of driving 5 blocks for groceries, or we carting our children to school, appointments, lessons, and other overscheduled activities. How will I deal with reducing my consumption of gasoline? I will hang up my keys for a pair of shoes, schedule my activities, and choose what I want to do.
My first choice will be to walk. My choice is to walk anywhere that is less than 2 miles away. This will mean packing children into a double stroller for my errands. Fortunately, I love close enough to work (UMR – Galleria Mall), the Good Food Store co-op, and various other necessary places that I don’t see an issue with this. If the necessary transportation is further, then I will ride my bicycle.
I have begun to sort my activities and plan my days around where I need to go and how I will get there. I can no longer hop in the car and pick up an ingredient at the store. I now have to plan what I want and make the time to walk (or bike).
My children will not be participating in a myriad of activities this summer. It simply is not feasible to drive them from one activity to the next and then to another. Plus – they only have 50 miles each as well. They have to decide which activities are truly important. There is nothing wrong with having free-time to play. I wish the school near us would take neighborhood children (choice school). It seems sad that my children have to bus to a far away school and waste gasoline rather than walk a block to a school in our neighborhood. Yes – they are on the waiting list.
This challenge will force me to think my transportation choices. I would rather save my gasoline allotment for things that are important to me – such as visiting with friends and family who all live in places too far to walk.