From: emily
Date: Sat Jul  5 14:27:20 EDT 2008
Subject: 

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From: ryan
Date: Sat Jul  5 15:40:01 EDT 2008
Subject: cha-ching!

My office is moving next month to Swan and Broadway, and it will be possible for me to ride my bike there using neighborhood streets. So I'm seriously thinking about that. I've been driving slower. On weekend trips to Benson I drive 65, sometimes 55. I've noticed that other people are driving slower on the Interstate too. It's a 45-mile trip so I try to make as few as possible... that means carefully planning what materials and tools I load in the truck, what I hope to accomplish, and camping out instead of driving back into town. It currently costs about $25 per round trip to drive a loaded truck to our property and back. We already pay attention to combining trips or planning more efficient routes when we drive. When we shop we stock up in a few trips rather than make a bunch of little trips. Or we don't shop (which makes it easier to prevent items in the fridge from camping out in the back until they evolve into sentient beings). iTunes movie rentals have been dangerous. We don't have to drive all the way to Casa Video to rent strange films. We are driving less but I don't know if that's saving us any money. I vote for light rail. Not just one line down Broadway either. I think every major street should have a tram line. Since the rising gas prices affect food as much as everything else, I'm thinking more about growing food. One of my coworkers wants to plant a victory garden. Then I think about the climate we live in and what it looks like to grow a garden here. I think the only reason so many people live here is because nobody has to grow their own food! No, I don't think gas prices are going to fall. Maybe dip a little but generally I believe they are going to continue to go up. I predict major changes in the way our culture operates, in the way we do agriculture, in the way we do distribution and travel. We can make more fuel-efficient cars or find alternative transportation, but we are still dependent on petroleum for energy, manufacturing (like plastics), and fertilizer.

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From: Patricia
Date: Sun Jul  6 16:07:18 EDT 2008
Subject: something to ponder

just to give you a little perspective: When I left Germany in 1991, the current gasoline price was around DM 1.60 per liter. At that rate, $4 per gallon translates into DM 0.80 per liter.

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From: kimc
Date: Sun Jul  6 16:44:28 EDT 2008
Subject: why not....

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From: Suki
Date: Mon Jul  7 00:23:55 EDT 2008
Subject: Could be good

In the long run, I think it would be good for places like Tucson to be less gas-dependent. It seems to me the city lacks a lot of culture because it has been built on a vehicle-based structure. Very little infrastructure is planned with pedestrians or cyclists in mind. This reduces the amount of interaction that happens between strangers & acquaintances (because we're all in our cars) and the amount of local identity that is built. If we were forced to create neighborhoods where businesses/jobs/stores/houses were close enough to reach without gasoline, we would have a much more interesting local society.

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From: MaryKay
Date: Mon Jul  7 22:21:13 EDT 2008
Subject: The Positives

From: ryan
Date: Tue Jul  8 01:13:48 EDT 2008
Subject: silver lining?

From: eric
Date: Tue Jul  8 02:13:20 EDT 2008
Subject: this world

From: Karen
Date: Wed Jul  9 20:03:00 EDT 2008
Subject: Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes...

Generally, the less discretionary income you have, and the longer you have to commute to get to work, the more you're feeling it! Since my job is 18 miles one way from where our trailer is, and his job 11 miles away, we've been feeling it. Jeremy's boss/friend Jake recently hired another friend of theirs, Matt, who lives at Craycroft-I-10, even further away than Jeremy. They're carpooling twice a week. I was carpooling with J twice a week when I was teaching... swinging a bit out of the way to drop him off and pick him up again. So we'll reinstitute that again when I'm back at work, I'm sure. There are obviously nice relational benefits. The environmental benefits are big, too ;-) We have been using my Civic whenever possible instead of his PT Cruiser because it averages at least 8 mpg more. Even with Civic usage, carpooling, and thoughtful errand combining... (the nearest store of any kind other than a Circle K is 1.5 miles away) we are spending at least $250 a month on gas, yikes. I see a couple of silver linings: people being less wasteful, which is a huge problem in our culture. This is obviously better for the environment, which was always important to me even before the financial incentive. The relational connections are cool, too. But you have to put up with greater inconvenience. We sure do value convenience in the U.S.! There would need to be a huge culture shift. For example, stores will need to become smaller again, and walkable. I don't need to have an entire aisle of cereal and mountains of produce to pick from....just give me something fresh I can walk to. If public transportation could get me to work in an hour (I wouldn't even count walking time to and from the stop in that hour), I would use it in a heartbeat. I've been thinking about the moped thing, too! I've only ridden one once (behind someone else, in France). I don't think it will happen soon, but I'm fantasizing about being close enough to my job and errands that it would make some sense. When I was a little girl in Iowa, I loved riding the half mile from our house to the grocery store. I'd like to do that again as part of my routine someday.

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