This is a "Clean Air Vehicle?" It runs on gas, it requires large amounts of asphalt for parking, and it encourages driving for errands. Maybe "cleaner" than some alternatives, but cannot compare to a bicycle. Your bike is a true "Clean Air Vehicle."Hybrid cars. Some people love to hate them, mostly for how they’re driven (if only they’d get rid of that meter telling them how, if they roll through the stop signs and drive like Grandma they’ll get 53 miles per gallon instead of 48). OK, so they have one thing in common with bikes, but getting stuck behind two of them today and having that orange sticker staring me in the face that says “Clean Air Vehicle” while they’re burning gas running errands to the shopping center… I’m sorry but that’s just too much.
A “Clean Air Vehicle” shouldn’t burn gas! It probably shouldn’t even run on electricity. The only true “Clean Air Vehicles” are those self-propelled. Your bicycle is a true “Clean Air Vehicle.”
Besides the recreational/fitness aspects of cycling, you truly can use a bike to avoid driving. Today, I did a run to the bank before heading to the shop, and how much gas did I use? Exactly zero. How many square feet of asphalt were required for me to park my bike? Exactly zero. The air would be a whole lot cleaner if there were more bicycles used for shorter trips and fewer “Clean Air Vehicles.” It’s time for some truth in advertising. Or maybe a new advertising campaign for Chain Reaction!
3 thoughts on ““Clean Air Vehicle” that runs on gas? I don’t think so!”
Hey Mike,
I read that the average person works 2 hours a day to pay for their car; 4 minutes to pay for their bicycle. Your customers might find this interesting. It really puts in perspective the difference in shelling out a few more bucks for a superior bike/superior bicycle service versus the little thought given to adding a few extra thousand dollars on the price of a car for power windows or something else useless. I’ve found that Zipcars are a wonderful solution for people like me who use their bikes exclusively for transportation but occasionally would like to be able to bring home a keg of beer or a palette of toilet paper from costco or any of these other things which are impractical to carry on a bike.
have to agree with your rant about the pre-arse and its ilk, but must take exception to the notion that my bike is the perfect clean air vehicle. how was it manufactured? how’d it get to the bike shop?
also were it not for those petrol swilling things, the roads we ride our bikes on would be rutted cart tracks covered in horse manure.
so yeah, you have to take the bad with the good or the other way around ….
It’s true that a lot of resources go into the manufacture of a bicycle; it certainly doesn’t fit in with the “local” concept where you try to consume resources produced within a small radius of where you live. On the other hand, the bicycle requires relatively few resources down the road, as it were, compared to most any other form of transportation. And compared to cars, bikes require dramatically less infrastructure. So a bike might not be perfectly “clean” but I dare say the difference between how “clean” a regualar gas engined car and a hybrid isn’t nearly as great as the difference between that “clean” hybrid and a bicycle. –Mike–
Hey Mike,
I read that the average person works 2 hours a day to pay for their car; 4 minutes to pay for their bicycle. Your customers might find this interesting. It really puts in perspective the difference in shelling out a few more bucks for a superior bike/superior bicycle service versus the little thought given to adding a few extra thousand dollars on the price of a car for power windows or something else useless. I’ve found that Zipcars are a wonderful solution for people like me who use their bikes exclusively for transportation but occasionally would like to be able to bring home a keg of beer or a palette of toilet paper from costco or any of these other things which are impractical to carry on a bike.
have to agree with your rant about the pre-arse and its ilk, but must take exception to the notion that my bike is the perfect clean air vehicle. how was it manufactured? how’d it get to the bike shop?
also were it not for those petrol swilling things, the roads we ride our bikes on would be rutted cart tracks covered in horse manure.
so yeah, you have to take the bad with the good or the other way around ….
It’s true that a lot of resources go into the manufacture of a bicycle; it certainly doesn’t fit in with the “local” concept where you try to consume resources produced within a small radius of where you live. On the other hand, the bicycle requires relatively few resources down the road, as it were, compared to most any other form of transportation. And compared to cars, bikes require dramatically less infrastructure. So a bike might not be perfectly “clean” but I dare say the difference between how “clean” a regualar gas engined car and a hybrid isn’t nearly as great as the difference between that “clean” hybrid and a bicycle. –Mike–