How to Build a Conestoga Wagon
There are several possible directions to go now. It’s very likely that I will (eventually) get around to telling you tales of the city, but before that I want to close out this chapter. There are a few more stories to tell, phenomenons to ponder, and personal quirks to poke at. The vehicle for all of which is the Conestoga Wagon; namely, how and why I built it. Unlike the trip, with a natural taxonomy of one day = one post (more or less) the story of building will be a little more… fluid. In large part, because I didn’t keep any written records the way I did while traveling. I’m just going purely on photos. I’m not sure I can even nail down exact dates, as in when I began specific building processes, precisely how long they took, etc. My receipts (which I did save) could shed some light here, but to me this is less important. This is not a literal how-to. It’s just a vessel for more stories & commentary. And, likely, a few good laughs.
First, why.
Why would I —why would anyone— build their own u-haul? Just rent the damn thing. Right? Sure, if you’re you. But I’m me, and this is what I do. I make things.
My earliest conception of myself in any sort of skill/trade-related orientation was as an artist. That was very clear from early on. What I came to understand later was that I’m also a builder, an engineer, and an inventor. The term designer is a pretty good catch-all, though the popular conception of the term leans more toward style and placement (think graphic designer or interior designer). That part is there too, certainly, but I think I have in roughly equal parts an engineering mind and an artistic mind. So when I designate myself “designer,” what I’m claiming is the realm of artistic invention.
I remember when this definitional refinement first crept into my self-conceptualization, I was in Ezra Shales’ sophomore design class at Alfred University. Somewhere in the thick of studying Bauhaus I had an aha moment, I thought to myself “ohhhhh, I’m a designer.” Several years later, I traveled to Guatemala to learn how to build pedal-powered machines, which then led to outright inventing, filling in the picture even further “ah, I’m an inventor.” Moving forward, I’ll likely use the terms synonymously.
There are some important supplements to the why, not exactly caveats, but key pieces of information that make the internal logic of BYO u-haul perhaps more relatable and less peculiar. Maybe. I don’t know. You be the judge.
The first thing to know was I already owned the vehicle, and I owned it outright. The second thing to consider was that to sell it would likely have netted me just enough money to rent a u-haul. See where this is going? If I’d have to give the thing back at the end of it all, then I’m selling a vehicle to borrow a vehicle. Which is dumb. Why not just keep the vehicle? Especially since it’s already u-haul sized. I reasoned that it probably wouldn’t cost that much to build a simple water-tight shell on the back. Plus, it would be AWESOME. I love projects, I’ve always wanted to build a tiny home, I could live inside of it on the trip, and then when I got to the east coast I’d keep it. I’d have an asset, something I could either sell off, split apart and sell off, or keep, or whatever. Maybe I find that plot of land and plop my little tiny home right down onto it. At very least, it could live at mom and dad’s, and then I’d have a weekend adventure vehicle for epic camping. With the ladies. (Always, with the ladies, this one).
As with most building projects, I grossly underestimated both the costs and the time commitment. Sometimes there is a bit of naivety that accompanies overt optimism. I think this might be by design because if I had known how expensive and physically taxing it was going to be, frankly, I might not have done it. Of course, once I was in it, I was committed to seeing it through. I wonder if this is a modicum of the experience of becoming a parent. Maybe that’s why we’re programmed to have such hopeful blindness.
To be clear, I would absolutely do it all again. Even when I was fucking exhausted, sleeping 4 hours a night, and my hands were chronically numb I was loving it. When I made the decision, when I committed to this path, process, and project something incredible happened— everything I needed, as if by some magic, just showed up. The money, the encouragement (and patience) of my neighbors, the grace of my housemates, the help of friends, and the energy, my God, I had endless abundant energy. When I later described this inexplicable windfall of energy to a physician, he labeled it as a manic episode. Possibly, but I really don’t think that’s what it was. I’ve experienced manic episodes before and they are followed by a hard crash and depressive episode, a bit like a sine wave seeking equilibrium. There was no crash. Not to say that I didn’t need to rest, I did. Again, exactly what I needed showed up right on cue: limp mode. Courtesy of the blessed fucking diesel particulate filter.
My takeaway was this:
We are capable of more than we know, and when we align ourselves, when we choose a direction of purpose and passion, the universe conspires with us.
Let’s start at the beginning.
Why did I own a boxless box truck? Why did I own it outright? That’s already kind of weird.
The story of the truck is a long one. I’ll try to condense (like that’s even possible for me, lol) because I’m far more interested in telling the stories associated with the actual building.
The shortest version:
Free money was rained upon me
I found an incredible deal on a Sprinter in great condition
I bought it
And had no idea what to do with it. Actually, that’s not true, I had lots of fantastical ideas about what to do with it. But I’ll come back to that.
So where did all this free money come from? How was I so lucky?
When I first moved to Oregon in ‘09 I’d been told about a state government program that gave grants to low-income people to start businesses. I later learned that it also gave money for home ownership, college, special medical equipment, and cars. I filed that away, hoping that I’d have a reason to utilize it somewhere down the road.
Fast forward to 2016 and I’ve got this idea that I need to do a trip, and film it. Not sure where, or why. But it needs to happen. Somehow I come to the idea that a drone is involved. That then morphs into the idea of becoming a drone-pilot for hire. A road trip and drone footage. Then I talk to a friend who’s a professional videographer, runs his own production company, and he poo poos on my plan. But! He lights a fire under me for making a show about human-powered machines (HPM). I’d watch that all day, he says.
Around the time that I’m thinking I need to start a drone business, I enroll in the required classes for the IDA program (the Oregon free money). I had no idea when I started that in 2016 that it would be almost 4 years before I would complete the program and receive my grant (I’m not slow, that’s typical). In those four years I went from planning a drone business (torpedoed by friend), to a HPM show (torpedoed by wishful thinking), to deciding to go to Cornell for grad school (torpedoed by Covid-19), to buying a weird Sprinter truck thing that I wasn’t quite sure what I would do with. Thankfully, the people at the local non-profit administering the grants had seen it all before and were very patient and accommodating with my amorphous life goals.
The deal was that it was a 3:1 matching grant— I save $2,000, they give me $6,000. Clearly worth the wait. The ideology behind the program is to foster savings discipline among the poor unwashed masses. That’s a big part of why it takes literal years, they require a minimum savings period of at least one year after you’re enrolled (they don’t tell you that the waiting list for enrollment is several years long, however). And guess what showed up just in time to cover “my” side of the grant? The pandemic stimulus checks. Thanks Obama.
I mean, I’d been saving money slowly and steadily over the prescribed period, the stimulus money just back-filled what I’d already shelled out, and then some.
It had been a long time since I’d owned a vehicle. My relationship to car ownership, not unlike social media, has been checkered. As a kid, I could not wait to drive. My brother, embarrassed by the dinky car his father Denny gave him (his boyfriends were driving Lamborghinis), handed it off to me when his dad insisted it leave the yard where Paul had abandoned it. It was a formerly bright, now faded, yellow 1991 Subaru Justy. It was tiny. And had no A/C. And I LOVED IT. I didn’t care that it was a semi-forced gift of convenience, I was just thrilled to have my own car at age 16. I was lucky, and I knew it.
Not mine, but this is exactly what it looked like, minus the matching canary hubcaps:
Going from a housebound, ride-dependent child, to a semi-autonomous, free-wheeling, adolescent was a quantum leap in empowerment. It also marked a high degree of trust on my parents’ part. Granted there was a lot of checking in required, and it helped that I was (still am) a very forthright and honest person, but looking back I can see that this was not just a leap for me, but for them too. They had no idea if I would actually go where I said I was going to go, pick up who I said I would, or not do all of the things that parents generally fret about. That’s a lot of letting go.
But I was a pretty responsible teenager, I never drove my car intoxicated (though I did once drive my sister’s boyfriend’s Corvette while drunk at age 15, lol). And I kept my word about where I was going and who I was with. So I got to drive a lot, and it brought me great joy. I loved (still do) exploring without a specific destination. My friends and I would regularly play the “get lost game,” in which we’d take turns picking a direction until we were so far out and turned around that we had no idea where the fuck we were. Then we had to figure out how to get back. This was pre-GPS and smartphone. And, of course, we didn’t consult a map. Where’s the fun in that?
This love affair continued for two-ish years, until the build-up to the Iraq war. A personally defining moment came when, then Vice-President, Dick Cheney was to headline the dedication of a new Wharton building on Penn’s campus. A protest was scheduled and I skipped school (with my parent’s knowledge and consent) to participate. After a few hours of marching and chanting things like “no blood for oil” I then returned to my car. I stood there, just staring at it. The cognitive dissonance grated on my conscience and I could see that I had a choice. Either I could continue driving or I could continue to protest. But not both. I decided to give up driving.
The insurance company had no faith in my promise not to drive and so I had to surrender my license. I think I transferred the title of the Justy over to my parents (or maybe it was already under their names?). The car sat parked for a few years, occasionally getting used by my dad, until my sister claimed it as her own. I think my parents thought I would change my mind and want it back. It pained me not to use it, I missed my aimless driving, I missed the autonomy and bump in status that came from driving myself places, especially to school. So, now I had a conundrum, I couldn’t drive, but I also couldn’t go back to the school bus. Too retrograde, too undignified— I had tasted freedom and would never go back. Never, I say! So what was I going to do? The most logical and efficient solution would have been to ride a bike, but it literally never occurred to me. This is especially ironic given how central bicycle technology would later become in my life. Instead, I walked everywhere.
I was hit by the slowness of it. Suddenly, distances became much greater. Of course, they were the same, but we don’t measure distance in distance. We measure distance in time. The store is 15 minutes away. How far is it to your folk’s place? Two hours, and Jake had to pee three times!
What was a principled and stubborn stance, eventually gave way to the blunt reality of our built environment. I held out for as long as I could, but demands on my schedule (especially with extracurriculars) made it increasingly challenging to manage the now 2+ hour roundtrip commute to school. And at times my folks fought me on it. They were overall very supportive, but I think it freaked them out more than me driving. There was one night, I remember, pitching a political event to a group of possible donors at one of their luxurious Chestnut Hill homes. I was ready with my MapQuest printouts, about to embark on the two-ish hour walk, after dark, through Philadelphia, when my mother insisted (via landline) that she come get me. But mom, my principles! You’ll undercut my bonafides in front of these progressive bigshots! She wouldn’t budge. Dad, back me up, you have a lengthy history of liberal protest and outrage. Nope. Should have planned better, Matt.
Again, bike! Why did no one suggest a bike? Why did it never occur to me?
Probably because I was posturing, signaling my virtue. To take a stand against the bad thing (driving/the war) I swung as far to the extreme as I could. Making it as personally inconvenient as possible was, in fact, the point. How could I trade the lives of humans, our soldiers and the Iraqi people, for convenience? To those around me, the signal of self-imposed “sacrifice” was received, understood, and lauded. The respect I got from my friends, their parents, my parents, my teachers and school administrators was substantial. I’ll show you Dubbya.
Except I didn’t.
The war commenced. We protested. It continued. I walked. It continued. I organized events and registered hundreds of people to vote. And, still, it continued.
Disenchantment, powerlessness, frustration, outrage, defeat.
I may or may not have changed anyone else, and I certainly didn’t alter the course of history, but I learned some valuable things. Walking everywhere was an instructive exercise in going against the grain, a lesson in systemic inertia. It was also an important reality check. Long ago, the US made the decision to bet on the personal automobile, and then continually doubled down on this dubious decision. At one point the United States was on par with our European counterparts for public transportation, but powerful corporate actors decided for all of us that we’d become a nation of automobiles. In 1949 GM, Standard Oil & Firestone Tire were literally convicted of conspiracy for monopolizing the American street car companies and then ripping out all the lines to replace them with —you guessed it— GM buses, using Firestone Tires, running on Standard Oil. Great for business, bad for our communities.
(Yes, that’s a real image. From 1950’s Minneapolis.)
The push for an automotive culture also came from President Eisenhower in the aftermath of WWII. His first-hand experience observing the wartime advantages of a highway system in the German theater convinced him of the need to replicate such a system in the U.S. Furthermore, the GI Bill, and subsequent government guarantee of cheap loans, spurred a massive deployment of car-centric suburban housing across former farmland. Industry, turning from its war footing, churned out mass-produced homes for a few thousand dollars each. Levittown and the cookie-cutter suburbs were born. We won the war. Gas was 27 cents a gallon. This was our victory lap.
In the intervening years, much effort has been put into maintaining these civic planning models and the echoes of that very specific post-war version of the American Dream. Predictably, every time there’s a shock to oil markets and “pain at the pump” the interest in robust & efficient mass transit renews (as it will soon with the knock-on effects of the Ukraine invasion). And equally predictably, when the pain subsides we revert-to-the-mean and resume RVing and SUVing. At this point car ownership is fully fused to the American Psyche. What sums up contemporary American rugged individualism better than off-roading through a rocky mountain stream?
Rubicon, that’s fitting.
And, look, I get it— I love driving. And I love my big ass, dual axel, diesel truck. All the more because I had a hand in completing it. I am so glad that I got to have an epic cross-country adventure, and I would absolutely do it again. Moreover, the rig really spared my sanity in the depths of the pandemic. When everything was shut down, and hardly anyone was available for anything in-person, being able to escape was… invaluable. Getting out into the woods, taking old logging roads and playing the get-lost-game by myself kept me engaged, present, and alive in a painfully lonely time. (To be clear, nothing had been built on the frame yet, it was just a very odd, large, naked vehicle).
But even with my weekend warrior pandemic escapades, I balanced its usage. I continued to ride a bike to work daily, and only leaned on the car for commuting on very rare occasions of running late or in one extreme case when there was a forest fire and days of thick poisonous smoke. It was definitely a concern of mine that buying the vehicle would become a slippery slope into daily driving. Thankfully, I had been commuting by bike for so many years that it was a well-grooved habit. I generally enjoyed my rides and was happy to retain the daily commute, even in the rainy PNW. And that was the middle ground I’d eventually come to: compassion and understanding for the need for automobiles, coupled with a quiet, unadvertised personal commitment to maximizing the green of my own transport.
Over many years I’ve tried out different versions of car-lessness, car-lightness, and car-righteousness. Immediately out of college I bought an old diesel Mercedes with the romantic, and foolish, notion that I would run it on bio-diesel (again, with the naive optimism! Oi). Having done exactly zero research on the topic of biodiesel, or the 300D Turbodiesel vehicle, or any kind of competitive pricing, etc. I just bought the damn thing on a wing and a prayer. And I never even got to the bio-diesel piece of it. Instead, it got stuck in the vehicular purgatory of Uri, a dysfunctional alcoholic, turkey-breeding, Russian diesel mechanic, who was more interested in the comedy of commanding his dog to “fetch” turkeys than he was in fixing my car. This guy had jack shit to do, and yet, months in he still hadn’t fixed my car. When I called him out on it he said, “Why you talk like I am youngest of five son and you are father?” Because you’re an irresponsible shit Uri, that’s why. I didn’t actually say that (but I wish I had). The diesel went from the purgatory of Uri’s shop, to the purgatory of an abandoned house on W. University st., to the purgatory of Nadine’s sister’s barn, and eventually to the purgatory of the dump. Never once did I brew biodiesel.
Again, not mine, but same make, model and color:
You don’t hear about biodiesel much anymore and for good reason. Turns out it isn’t really all that much better for the environment, emissions-wise. The stuff is difficult and messy to make, not to mention dangerous: it requires caustic chemicals and is, literally, explosive. The old diesels everyone was snapping up, despite the prevailing wisdom at that time, were not actually better vehicles that “last forever.” Instead, like any old car, you can keep it going for as long as you want, you just have to continually replace shit. And on a Mercedes… that gets expensive fast. So, while it was fashionable, it was decidedly not sustainable: financially or environmentally. I wasn’t the only naive, well-meaning environmentalist to become disillusioned with biodiesel and alternative fuels writ large. The EROEI (energy returned on energy invested) was always negligible, to the extent that some biofuels are a net energy loser, meaning that it takes more energy to make them than you get from them. This unfortunate fact is often papered over with large government subsidies and greenwashing, especially in regard to ethanol. And then there’s also the fact that they are simply a lesser product, which from a strictly utilitarian standpoint, makes them pretty unappealing. Biodiesel in its pure form will wreak a slow havoc on the insides of your rig, mostly gumming up your fuel lines and disintegrating your seals. Ethanol gives you worse gas mileage than regular gasoline. And no commercially available engine (other than for race cars) can even run on pure ethanol: it’s alcohol. Even using the lowest blend, E10, is bad for older vehicles. They simply weren’t designed for it. And yet we keep blending it into our fuels, despite the dubious environmental benefits and the deleterious impacts to our vehicles. My Sprinter, for instance, has a big warning label stating to never use biodiesel. But in Oregon, as in many states, you don’t have a choice— it’s blended into all of the consumer-grade diesel. I understand the political saliency of this decision and the good intentions that were behind it, but our optimism needs to be grounded in reality. Wishful thinking can get us into some real trouble, because when we erroneously, and narrowly, focus on things that aren’t working, we pass over or neglect the things that will work.
With transportation, there is no greater example of this myopia than the current fad of electric vehicles. And, again, I get it. I would love to have a Cybertruck, it’s fucking cool. Hell, I’d love to have one just to impress my nephews. And the ladies. (Always, the ladies). But EVs don’t actually solve anything. Let’s examine the logic:
I’m helping to solve the Climate Crisis by driving my Electric Vehicle because my EV is good for the environment.
I’m helping to solve the Climate Crisis by driving my Electric Vehicle because my EV is emission free.
I’m helping to solve the Climate Crisis by driving my Electric Vehicle because my EV is powered by renewable energy.
I’m helping to solve the Climate Crisis by driving my Electric Vehicle because my EV supports Vehicle-Grid Integration.
I’m helping to solve the Climate Crisis by driving my Electric Vehicle because the market forces will drive the innovation of the battery technology needed for our future zero-emission electric grid.
Sounds good. Feels good. But how accurate are these assertions and assumptions?
My EV is good for the environment— this kind of nebulous statement is the worst of the justifications and is almost circular in its logic. When people say things like this, they’re virtue signaling without any kind of real understanding of what goes into manufacturing an EV. Which, to be clear, is totally understandable. If you’re not directly involved in it, or have researched it, why would you know? You wouldn’t. But that doesn’t mean that you get to claim “no harm done.”
My EV is emission-free— this is hands down total bullshit, and anyone who claims this is either being duplicitous or just doesn’t know any better. EVs aren’t emission-free, they outsource their emissions. Your EV is running on electricity generated elsewhere, usually by natural gas. This changes depending where you live and the mix of inputs into the system, but in the US, it almost always means some amount of natural gas (or coal), increasingly, via fracking.
My EV is powered by renewable energy— maybe. Again, this depends on where you live and what’s being fed into your local grid. If you’re in the Niagra Falls region congrats, you lucked out, and you get all the hydropowered gold stars. If you live in the Dakotas, well, then it’s partly wind and partly fracked natural gas. Maybe with a little nuclear stirred into the mix. But I buy renewable energy credits! Okay, from what I understand you are, at best, helping to spur investment in renewables, and at worst you could be getting duped by these companies while they sell the RECs to you and the energy to someone else. Regardless, unless you are off-grid and providing your own electricity, it’s impossible to say with complete certainty that your vehicle is running on renewables.
Futhermore, the promise of renewables is… murky. The documentary Planet of the Humans is a good primer in the complex challenges associated with transitioning to renewables. A timely illustration: Germany, Austria and The Netherlands —which have invested billions in renewables— are now reverting to burning coal. This is especially shocking with respect to Germany, in part because of how loudly it’s championed its Net Zero goals, but especially given how all-in on renewables they have been. For decades, Germany has been a world leader in investment in renewable energy technology, particularly wind. But the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, and the resulting energy squeeze, laid bare an undeniable reality for the Germans: it’s just not that sunny or windy in Germany. As renewables have failed to meet the demands of the German economy it has become increasingly reliant on Russian natural gas as a way to “de-carbonize” its economy and meet all those lofty Climate goals. Again, very understandable move. Natural gas not only generates electricity, it’s also an incredibly versatile industrial input and can be turned into all kinds of products like plastics and pharmaceuticals. Lastly, and this is a big one, fossil fuels are far more efficient (esp. nat gas) at heating than renewables will ever be. Because thermodynamics. (You know this if you’ve ever used an electric space heater). The Germans need natural gas to heat their homes and there simply isn’t enough surface area in Germany to cover in solar panels to make up for that. Many have criticized the Germans (including themselves) for their reliance on bad-actor Russia and its bounty of natural gas, but the truth is that they didn’t have a choice. And, frankly, neither will we when it comes to “getting off” of fossil fuels.
My EV supports Vehicle-Grid Integration— this is one of the smarter responses. Part of the challenge of renewables, unlike with traditional generation, is that the energy created does not necessarily synchronize with the demands. Both a spike in demand, and a spike in generation, can cause the grid to crash and blackout. Countless scores of engineers are attempting to figure out what to do, in particular, with excess capacity. How do you store it effectively? How do you do it at scale? The responses range from pressurizing underground salt caverns with air, to stacking towers of concrete blocks, to decentralized battery storage, which is where vehicle-grid integration (VGI) comes in. In this kind of a storage arrangement your vehicle’s battery can be used to absorb some of the excess capacity, hold it, and then release it as needed. This kind of managed, bi-directional charging seems most appropriate for fleet vehicles like school buses, or company vehicles, with predictable usage patterns and long periods of non-use. It remains to be seen how effective, or not, this will be with a personal vehicle that the owner will want (reasonably) fully charged for use at a moment’s notice. Of course, for a childless remote employee with fewer demands for vehicle use, a suite of incentives could be offered to maximize the storage potential of their particular vehicle. Interesting concepts to ponder… time will tell how well or not these bear out.
Market forces, battery innovation, etc.— to me, this is the most compelling of all the arguments. It’s one that a Tesla engineer made to me during a chance encounter at Whole Foods. Given the system as it is (though, not necessarily as we’d like it to be) there is, potentially, significant value in throwing lots of money at private innovators to pursue these kinds of advances. The benefit would be the iteration of increasingly powerful, long-lasting, inexpensive batteries which could soak up all that excess energy, and thus balance the equation. Certainly seems like a noble and worthwhile pursuit. The Tesla engineer was certainly convinced of it. But even this goal is questionable. Consider the following:
Cobalt
Lithium
Neodymium
Praseodymium
Dysprosium
Terbium
Gallium
Hafnium
Zirconium
Cerium
These are some of the rare earth minerals required to manufacture EVs. While not necessarily rare, many of these materials are geologically consolidated, and closely guarded, in unfriendly regions with significant human-rights abuses, like China or the Congo. Furthermore, as we enter into an era of increasing disorder and supply chain chaos, increasing our reliance on hard-to-access materials from hostile countries is a risky proposition. Of course, the vision here is that innovation will allow us to, eventually, leapfrog these dirty or problematic materials altogether. In fact, to do so in the very same way we’re attempting to leave behind fossil fuels and our reliance on Middle Eastern autocrats. It would seem, for now at least, we’re simply trading one set of autocrats and exploitation for another.
I don’t make these points to moralize or to shame anyone; I’ve been there too. If you want to drive a Tesla, or a hydrogen Toyota, or a biodiesel Vanagon, by all means, just please have a realistic perspective about it. And, speaking from personal experience, it’s a thin excuse for sanctimonious grandstanding. You aren’t saving the world. Car-righteousness serves your ego, not people or the planet.
Wait, but then what kind of car am I supposed to drive?
And that’s the problem— we’re asking the wrong question.
The question isn’t how can we alternatively fuel personal automobiles, it’s how can we do away with the need for personal automobiles?
That’s where car-less and car-light come in. Having experimented with both I can say that there isn’t a perfect solution, everything has its trade-offs. Car-light, which is having a car, but minimizing its usage with a mix of public transit, walking and biking is probably the most approachable alternative for most. The advantage is that you retain your vehicle for when you really need it, but augment its usage with less energy-intensive alternatives, maybe even sharing it amongst several people or families for maximum impact. The downside is that you are still paying for the fixed costs of the car: car payments, insurance, and regular maintenance; all of which make the per-mile cost of the car more expensive.
Car-less is just like it sounds. You have no car, you take public transit everywhere, or walk, or bike. The advantages are environmental, clearly, but also financial and health-related. I’ve saved tens of thousands of dollars by not owning cars and just biking everywhere. It sounds hyperbolic, but it’s accurate— the average car costs approximately 10K per year to own, fuel, and maintain. I’ve also stayed in decent physical shape just from riding a bike to work every day for years on end. Not like jacked or anything, but healthy and energetic. Great for the heart and lungs, not to mention mood-enhancing. The disadvantages are that you are perpetually dependent on others for anything vehicle related, which can feel infantilizing at times. Of course, if you make enough money to shell out for occasional car rentals or Ubers that can ameliorate the minor embarrassment of always having to ask others to help you.
To allow myself as much flexibility as possible I’ve made the conscious decision to live in urban settings that are walkable and bikeable, and/or have decent public transportation. Being stuck in rural America without a car, I can say from personal experience, was only possible because I was living in community and could rely on others to give me rides or loan me their vehicle. Otherwise, it’s a completely untenable situation. And now we’re back to America’s love affair with the automobile. I don’t have the numbers, but I have to imagine that a high proportion, probably the majority of Americans live in places with little to no public transit options. So, you’re either obligated to own a car or you’re leaning on friends and family. Which, again, adds to the understandable impulse to seek out some kind of alternatively fueled personal vehicle.
It seems that, long-term, the better options (neither of which are simple or quick to pull off) would be to encourage and incentivize more dense, mixed-used housing development and to make a huge national investment in rebuilding our rail and light-rail systems. Rail boasts an energy efficiency significantly greater than personal vehicle use. Even better than railways are waterways, and America is blessed with an incredible system of navigable waterways, more than any other nation. But we hardly use them anymore because of antiquated legislation that was intended to spur American shipbuilding, but instead halted investment in water transport altogether. Any investment in energy-efficient transport should prioritize the re-development of America’s neglected waterways. A robust system of mass-transit, augmented by occasional automobile usage, in dense, mixed-use, walkable/bikeable urban spaces close to navigable waterways. That’s it, that’s the answer.
End scene.
P.S.
I promise next time I’ll say more about, you know, building a Conestoga Wagon. And I’ll refrain from ever promising brevity again. Geez Louise.