RE: [OT] Car purchase by "Tony Smith" .

> > In this entire thread I don't think anyone has said 'why not get a > > bike?', be it motor, bicycle, or electric. > > There was a mention that motorcycles don't necessarily get > stellar mileage either. They are good, certainly better then > most cars, but not super good (bike mileages I see are around > 4.5-6L/100km, on the highway). > > That said, a bike is only an option for a VERY small subset > of commuters. For me a bike is mostly useless (from a > commuting standpoint). I disagree with the 'very small subset' comment, and so would many Chinese, as would many Europeans. Yeah, some people have special needs, or can rustle up enough of them to justify their car. With fuel at $20 a gallon, I wonder if their needs will still be so special. There was a study done in Sydney a while back that showed for trips under 10km, the bicycle 'won' (personally, I'd say motorcycles should have). Sydney is fairly flat, but very spread out (50 sqr km?). I'd say a fair chunk of the 4,500,000 million people here are within 10km of work. Electric bikes are become more common, and removes the 'arriving all sweaty & puffed' negative. I like the add-on kits, where the motor attaches to the bottom bracket, and uses the lowest chainring (not quite sure of the details). Has a removeable battery pack to you can charge it at your desk. Apparently my workplace does have showers etc, down on the mysterious 'Basement 3' level. Mysterious because the lift only has B1. Hmmm. My commute is about 15km, and I can do that in well under an hour, depending on how many grid-locked buses I need to dodge. Reminds me of the scene from 'Office Space'... And when I was a boy, I rode my bike to school every day in the snow, uphill both ways. Ok, no snow, but it was below freezing. And it WAS uphill both ways. And downhill, of course. Tony