Let me first of all say, that I firmly beieve that you are entitled to your opinion. However, I don't agree with it. I think that the automobile is and has been a wonderful thing. It boils down to the single word - "freedom". Go where you want, when you need or want to without meeting some schedule set by someone else. If I can't have oil, then I still want some other energy source because I don't want to use mass transit systems. I like my car, truck etc.
Now, don't get me wrong, I think folks who commute long distances daily are goofy. I tried that for a while and it did not take me long to realize that I did not want to commute across the city daily. I have moved my office several times in the past 28 years and all but one move has been closer to home rather than further away. I could see my house from our office building if a local hospital was a bit shorter. I could walk to work but I don't and I don't want to. Much of my driving is to the lake and that is a 350 mile round trip. I have done that 6 times now since mid May. There is no train to that location and I would not want to ride it if there were. Sometimes I go Friday night and stay to Sunday and sometimes I go Saturday morning and stay to Monday. I am usually hauling something out or back. Come October, my travels will drop off to almost nothing but this time of year I put quite a few miles on. I'd love something more efficient and less expensive to run but my thoughts in that direction have been somewhat stymied by the rising price of diesel oil. A smaller truck wouldn't help much and a Honda Civic with a trailer does not really turn my crank so for the moment, I just carry on with my existing vehicle and hope for better times. Randy -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Rolf Sent: Monday, July 14, 2008 2:06 PM To: Mercedes Discussion List Subject: Re: [MBZ] Let the oil flow! You missed the point I was trying to make. We need to change how we travel and where we travel to. Trains were allowing poor people to move a lot earlier than the car and still do in most 3rd world countries. Interstates were a noble idea but poorly implemented when it came to urban areas. Based on the Autobahn, we pushed the interstates through major cities instead of around. This was done for two reasons, class (race)icism and laziness. The Autobahn never, ever runs through a city, forcing people to get on to surface streets to go inside the city ring. The 70's saw a heavy growth in Interstate growth, and mostly poor urban areas took most of the hit. The focus was on transporting the individual to an from work without forcing them to travel through the poor urban areas and be reminded of the differences that exist in our society. The reasons Mom and Pop's couldn't compete was the debasement of the village concept being used to develop the suburbs. It wasn't the fault of the Mom and Pop's it was the fault of the developer and the consumer. Mom and pop's always provided better quality, the big boxes survive on undercutting quality to provide a cheaper price (and in doing so often put the manufacturer out of business). To an extent we need to go back to the trains and the village lifestyle in order to allow us the niceties of taking the family car on vacation. Give a little take a little. We have a lot to learn from Europe, they already have 8/gal prices and seem to go on holiday a lot more than we do. -Rolf R A Bennell wrote: > Do you really want to go back to a time when most folks never ventured more > than a few miles from where they were > born (unless driven out by famine)? The car and the interstate highway is the > reason why many of even the poorest > folks have traveled America and beyond. How can that be a bad thing? Bring > back the Mom and Pop stores and watch > the prices rise. Little places like that may be more of a nostalgia thing > than anything else. If they were > efficient they would still be here but they cannot stock the variety that the > big places can. The reason they have > faded away is they couldn't compete. Some view that as sad and in a way it is > but the malls and the big box stores > have brought variety and price that wouldn't otherwise be available. You > don't know how lucky you are. All I have > to do is to drive to Grand Forks ND which is about 70 miles south of the > Canadian border and everything changes. > Places like Menards routinely stock stuff that I have a difficult time > finding in Canada. The reason is that people > can and will drive in for a significant radius to get that choice. The volume > permits pretty decent prices and in > America there is reasonable competition. We are more likely to be stuck with > high prices because there is less > competition in Canada. I recently bought a wood chipper / shredder. It is > made in the USA and I was able to buy it > for half of what it would have cost me to buy it locally. I think if we go > back to the romantic days of mom and pop > stores with their friendly local proprietors, we will also have a whole lot > less choice of product and a whole lot > higher price for what we buy. I know there are a lot of folks who will say > that is just rampant consumerism and > that people like me don't need a wood chipper so what does it matter but that > was just a recent personal example. > Somewhere there are folks who work for the company that made that chipper and > it did not come from China. > > Randy > > _______________________________________ http://www.okiebenz.com For new parts see official list sponsor: http://www.buymbparts.com/ For used parts email [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe or change delivery options go to: http://okiebenz.com/mailman/listinfo/mercedes_okiebenz.com
