Simon, Thanks for your response. I understand what you are saying, and a year ago I would have thought something very similar. But I'm beginning to realize more and more each day that we - our community, our country, this world - is not going to get anywhere fast with small steps. As much I talk about the need for individuals to make the steps they can to live with less of a footprint, holding an event which promotes driving can *seem* like a good step, but it still promotes driving. Gas is $3.699 here, and I'm 99% certain that it will continue to increase (it went up 15 cents in two days last week) indefinately until we find ways to stop relying on it. While alternatively powered vehicles sounds like a great step towards reducing our impact, it's still an incredibly heavy impact. I used to drive my car at 23mpg, and now I drive it a 40mpg. Sounds like a great increase, but it's still using gasoline, and it's still relying on foreign wars, and it's still a contributing reason why we have such catastrophes as Exxon Valdez, and it's still a contribuing reason why ANWAR might one day be exploited for relatively low amounts of oil. So sure, driving more efficient cars is better than what we have now, but let's stop taking small steps when a giant leep is what we need.
Since that area has more car enthusiasts, they should be targeted even *more* towards finding solutions towards becoming a car-free society. Anyone who thinks that we should still be putting money into "greening" how we drive needs to take a step back and look at the larger issues at hand. We had a good time in the last century driving around in personal vehicles, and that era is coming to an end. Is it a perfect event? No. Is it one step toward a slightly better world, reaching out to a lot of people who aren't already in the conversation? No. It still promotes driving new, energy intensive to make vehicles that require batteries or new propulsion systems which are more expensive, relying on our expensive road systems, and completely neglects the need to move away from the problems I outlined above. Andy Goodell _______________________________________________ For more information about sustainability in the Tompkins County area, please visit: http://www.sustainabletompkins.org/ RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [email protected] http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org
