Okay, I’m going to regret this, but it’s been a weird week at work, I’ve drunk too much white wine and spent a slightly surreal evening with my kids and some veh veh nice posh people in a beautiful garden in Blackheath.
My colleague (and partner of my friend Dan), Kirsty Reid, has written an article in The Guardian about how their car was nicked and trashed and they couldn’t really afford to replace it, so they didn’t.
And hey, it turns out that living in London you can sort of get by without a car. But then you sort of need a car some times too.
Gee, life is confusing, isn’t it?
I reckon if you added it up you would save money by just hiring a car when you needed one. You could get a big one for going camping and a small one for doing the shopping. Obviously it’d only work if you had a good hire place nearby. Kirsty obviously doesn’t.
But it’s not just about money. It’s always better going by public transport with children than driving; the journey becomes part of the adventure rather than just a tedious stage to be got through. It’s more expensive but it’s a much better quality of experience. In fact, if you consider the train or bus ride as just that, a funfair ride, it’s actually very good value for money. The views are excellent and educational and there are no height restrictions.
my aunt uses a rental service – streetcars or something – that you book on the internet, and go and pick up from designated parking spaces dotted around London. She has this electronic key gizmo that lets her in and charges her for use. Cool huh?
I have lived in London for twenty years (Tottenham, Leytonstone, Edmonton and Clapham) and have never even thought about buying a car. Well, okay, I thought about it once, but it was a Daimler V8 that belonged to Michael Mansfield QC and that’s more than just a car.
Meanwhile I’ve written three books while riding on public transport.