Without a Car - Day 6 and 7 (weekend edition)

This weekend I took public transportation to a faraway (1500 miles south) city. I am still following the rules because I didn't bring my car with me! and I took public transportation to the airport. This trip involved a 20 minute walk to the Red Line train, a 20 minute train ride to the Silver Line Bus, a 20 minute bus ride to the airport, and finally a 250 minute plane ride. Saturday was for traveling, Sunday was for jetlag/workweek recovery.


I plan to go car free in Boston next weekend.

Without a Car - Day 5

TGIF. I made it through the work week without a car and I get to go on vacation next week.

Today was a normal commute (bus to and from work), plus a lot of walking in the evening (look at the map below).


View Larger Map

Without a Car - Day 4

Over 50% of the way through my car-free week.

My challenge today was to take a picture of something I usually would not see if I was driving. I made the collage below. Counter clockwise starting with the building: (1) one of the three tall apartment buildings overlooking Alewife and the Fresh Pond area, (2) road sign that I usually don't have time to read/understand, (3) the T symbol outside Alewife, and (4) a large bird which might be a turkey.

Without a Car - Day 3

Day 3 of not using a car went smoothly.

I walked to Kendall Square (mystery time + 20 minutes), hopped on the [insert workplace] Shuttle (45 minutes), went about my [insert] work (8 hours), walked over to the gym (15 minutes), played vball (60 minutes), walked to the bus stop (20 minutes), took the bus back to Cambridge (45 minutes), rode the Red Line to Harvard Square (20 minutes), ate a double peanut butter bacon cheese burger with salad at Charlie's Kitchen while watching the first 1/4 of the Celtics Game (1 hour), walked to the Hair Cuttery (1 minute), got my mullet removed (30 minutes), and walked back to my apartment (25 minutes).

Below is a picture of the empty bus that I rode home on, although if you look closely there might be a person sitting in one of the front seats. It's dark so I can't tell.

Without a Car - Day 2

I survived Day 2 of not using my car.

Last night I took the Purple line to Waltham so that I could vote in the morning. In the morning I realized that I had to find a way to work without using my car. I thought of 3 options: (option 1) Take the Purple Line from Brandeis to Porter Square (20 minutes), then the Red Line to Alewife (15 minutes), then the Bus from Alewife to Lexington (45 minutes) for a total of 1.75 hours according to Google and taking into account the time standing around for the public transportation, (option 2) walk from Brandeis to Lexington for a total of 2.75 hours according to Google, or (option 3) carpool with my Dad down 95 for a total of 20 minutes. I took the road more traveled with option 3.


Following my work day I took the Bus from Lexington back to Alewife in Cambridge. The walk back to Huron Village took 20 minutes and I was able to snap a photo of typical traffic that I am usually stuck in.

Without a Car - Day 1

Day 1 of not using my car.

My inbound work commute involved a cold walk from Huron Village to Alewife (20 minutes), waiting for the Bus (15 minutes), then taking the Bus out to Hanscom Field (30 minutes). This inbound commute usually takes me 30 minutes by car, 20 of which are for the 1.5 mile drive from Huron Village to Alewife. My outbound work commute involved taking the Bus back to Alewife (40 minutes), hopping on the Red Line and riding to Porter (15 minutes), then transferring to the Purple Line and taking it to Brandeis (25 minutes). I have to be in Waltham to VOTE tomorrow morning, so I decided to do that commute tonight instead of tomorrow morning. Usually, I would have done this commute by car, and it would probably cost me the same in Gas and Time.

Latitude 42: Tech For Transit

A few weeks ago the Livable Streets Alliance told me about a chance to go car free for a week by participating in a research study put on by Latitude on the future of transit in metro areas. The long term goal is to help create better urban transportation experiences and a more sustainable transit system. I was also offered a chance to discover my city in new ways and a 1 in 10 chance of winning an iPad.

Some of the rules for entering include:

• Must use car regularly (no car-share members)
  
• Must live and work within the Boston metro areas
• Must be able to carry out normal, everyday activities without a car by using alternate transit methods (walking, biking, public transit, ride-sharing, etc.—anything but driving)
• Must be available for the study (willing to not drive a car at all) from Monday November 1st to Sunday November 7th
• Must be willing to participate in surveys and interviews before, during and after the week of the study

Over the next week I will be posting my progress in a private Facebook Group and here at this blog.

Weekly Lunch Menu From My Work

This is an actual lunch week menu from my work for some week last November. They had an efficient way of using steak.

Monday: BBQ Steak
Tuesday: Beef Fajitas (Steak from Monday cut up)
Wednesday: Steak and Onions (Steak from Tuesday cut up more)
Thursday: Meatloaf Wellington (Steak from Wednesday ground up)
Friday: Chop Suey (Reused leftovers from the week)

Road Signs in Massachusetts

How to read Road Signs in Massachusetts

Stop - Yield if you want
Speed Limit - Speed Minimum
Speed Minimums - ?
Merge ---> Stop
One Way - If you want to go the other way, just put the car in reverse
Lane Markings - Drive wherever you want

I knew the Hadron Collider was a bad idea ...

How did this sinkhole happen? Global warming? Experiment at CERN gone wrong? Accidental divide by zero somewhere? Someone forgot to pour foundation? Giant sandworm from Arakis? HAARP at work?

A better question is where did all the stuff go? The bottom looks empty.

An even better question is how do you fix this? Throw all your municipal trash in it as a convenient landfill option? Can they just put a large metal plate over it?

Mavizen TTX02 Electric Superbike

First motorbike in the world to ship with integrated IP connectivity. Runs open source Linux with USB for peripherals. Where can I buy it?