Here's an interesting website about hybrid gasoline/electric cars.
It includes a petition to automakers to ecouage them to get more of
these much more energy efficient cars in the showrooms.
http://www.nrdc.org/earthsmartcars Driving a car is almost certainly
the most ecologically destructive and dangerous thing most people do and
it's darn difficult to avoid. In the suburbs where I grew up there was
almost no public transportation and few people used it unless they
commuted downtown. I know even when I visited my brother in Portland
Oregan a few years ago, (which has a well respected public
transportation system) going downtown and back was easy but getting to
other parts of the city could take hours.
In the rural part of New England where I live there is no public
transportation to speak of and people with limited resouces/disabilities
have a hard time getting around. When the grocery store in the town of
5000 where I live closed (within 2 months of a larger chain store
opening up 10 miles away) many low income/elderly/disabled people were
left in the lurch. I hate all the driving I end up doing but I don't
really like the noise, traffic, crowds, mistrustful atmosphere of the
city. It's hard to imagine how I could regularly partake in the outdoor
activities that keep me in touch with the natural world such as hiking
and canoeing without a personal car. I drive a 1986 Subaru station
wagon which gets 27-30 miles per gallon. I hope some day I can afford
an electric or hybrid car when there are cheap used ones available and a
reasonable number of mechanics around who could fix them.
It seems very unlikely that the government will subidize public
transit for small towns. A large part of my job supporting
developmentally disabled adults is driving them to and from their homes,
our office, their jobs, stores etc. We often can give several people a
ride at a time but it adds up to tens of thousands of polluting miles
per year. Only a small percentage of public buses are adapted to
load/unload wheelchairs even in the big city. It's a real shame the
auto/petrol industry has such a strong influence over modern society.
