the pittsburgh pedestrian experience

Once again, I missed the ~8am 41’s. I know, I just need to leave the house earlier. So, because I am impatient and didn’t want to be late AGAIN, I tried to find a back-up plan for when I miss the bus that would still get me to the office near on-time. This day, I decided to try the T. I grabbed the 47 to Overbrook, figuring that it would get me close to Brookline. Oh, boy, was that an adventure.

I got off the 47 at the South Bank stop. Where, you might ask, is South Bank? I was there and I’m still not sure. When taking the stairs down from the train platform, I ended up on what looked like a paved trail in the middle of the woods. I followed this “trail” through a right turn until it dead-ended at Route 51(I have now learned from Google Maps that the trail is actually Ansonia Place). I was then forced to walk along 51 to Whited, where i turned uphill. I walked uphill to Jacob Street, to that uphill to Brookline Boulevard, and walked that uphill to my office for a nearly 2 mile walk. Did I mention that it was uphill?

Luckily, my day improved. Later on I succesfully, and on time, grabbed a bus Downtown and then walked to my Zipcar on Duquesne’s campus in order to head out to Latrobe for Steelers training camp (!).  I again had no trouble with Zipcar and only had to extend my reservation this time for 0.5 hour due to construction-related traffic on Route 30.

Today’s tally:

Walked: 4 miles
Bussed: 3 trips
Carpooled: 0
Drove: ~70 Zipcar miles

Tuesday makes me quite grateful for South Hills Junction. I didn’t use it for the better part of the first year that I lived in my house, despite being less than a mile away. The Junction is useful but it’s not welcoming. It’s hidden from the world in a valley, surrounded by Port Authority storage and maintenance facilities, and has limited and unsafe access. I actually spend a good portion of my time at work helping the neighborhoods surrounding the Junction to find resources to improve it.

Tuesday morning I was heading to work by walking down to the Junction with a plan to catch the bus. I missed the bus and while waiting for the next one, I got a text message from my co-worker suggesting that I change course and plan to head straight to my morning meeting (in Beechview, rather than Brookline where my office is located). This was exceptionally easy to accommodate at the Junction. I simply crossed the busway to the T tracks and grabbed the next 42 train to Beechview. Despite being on track to be late for work, I ended up being early for the meeting.

I think that this kind of multi-modal transit hub is extremely useful and I am grateful to have it in my neighborhood.

Tuesday’s tally:

Walked: 3.5 miles
Bussed: 7 trips
Carpooled: 2 trips
Drove: 0

Before I even agreed to participate in the Low Car Diet, I had planned a trip to Chicago to see family. As indicated previously, I decided to take a Zipcar on my trip. I drove about 450 miles each way and the trip ended up costing me $336.75, which is actually less than I expected. This being my first use of the Zipcar service, I found it easy to use and had no major problems.

I did have a bumpy re-entry though. It took me 7 hours, including stops, to get out to Chicago so I planned accordingly on the return trip, getting up quite early on Monday morning to get the car back time. Nevertheless, I failed to be punctual and had to extend my reservation two times (0.5 hour each) in order to not be late.

When I left the car in its spot and went to make my way home from the South Side, I had another trial and error experience, this time with the bus. I knew that the 51 -A and -C would get to me where I wanted to go so when the 51B came along, I hopped on with the assumption that it would get me to the same general area. However, the bus made a turn premature of my stop and I had to get off, walk, and find a A or C after all.

Long weekend tally:

Walked: 4 miles
Bussed:  6 trips
Carpooled: 6 trips
Drove: ~900 Zipcar miles

Today went pretty smoothly. I successfully utilized the transfer option on public transit (pay $2.50 instead of $2.00 and get a second trip within three hours of the first) for the first time ever; I actually used a transfer three times today. A bigger victory is that I wasn’t late all day. I was even early to work- that’s a minor miracle.

(This morning, this sign reminded me of the gas I don’t have to pay for.)

One thing that I learned to appreciate about the transit lifestyle today is the way you sometimes you have no choice but to take it easy. Waiting between buses can be annoying, in the snow perhaps, but on a beautiful day like today, I really appreciated the excuse to slow down, grab a smoothie, take in the city sights. I took some pictures while meandering through Downtown:

Now for a little piece on costs…

Today I reserved my first Zipcar. I have been planning to spend the weekend in Chicago visiting my aunt. Until the Low Car Diet came along, I was planning to drive my car out there, because it’s still cheaper than flying. When I committed to LCD, I still secretly wanted to drive my car to Illinois because driving a Zipcar would eat up most of my $500 credit. However, now that I am indoctrinated to the LCD, I can’t bring myself to violate the terms because, you know what, I can do it.

In order to minimize the cost of the rental, I am planning to leave at 3pm Friday and return by 3pm Monday so as to limit my rental to three days (i.e. 3 24-hour periods). With taxes that brings my estimated rental costs to roughly $227, according to the Zipcar site. However, the daily rental fee of $66 only includes 180 miles of driving. Thus, with my aunt’s house being about 450 miles from here, I am going to have to pay the overage charge of $0.35 per mile on both legs of my trip. This will push the cost of my trip up to the $400 mark.

Now you can understand why I wanted to cheat. It just seems absurd to pay $400+ for a trip that would cost $170 for gas and tolls in my own car. In this case, though, I am lucky to get getting the whole trip for free so what do I care? It’s just tolls for me, baby. The lesson here is that if you wanted to go car-free and depend on a car-sharing program for auto transport, you would probably want to look into flying somewhere beyond a three-hour radius of your home.

Going with Zipcar for my Chicago trip not only makes the most sense for me because the LCD promotion pays for my whole trip, but because I get to stay true to my commitment to explore the low-car lifestyle in a complete way. Furthermore, I get to drive cars that I never have before. For my trip to Illinois, I have rented a Honda Civic hybrid. I am exicted about driving a Honda (the best car there is) and a hybrid (limit those fossil fuels). This is gonna be fun.

Today’s tally:

Walked: ~2.75 miles
Bussed: 6 (for the record, “bussed” includes incline and T trips as well)
Carpooled: 2 trips
Drove: 0

Wow. Day Two was rough. I had a lot to accomplish today and not having a car made it more work than it used to be. The challenge for me continues to be timing things correctly (knowing me, that is no real surprise).

Today started off well when I got up extra early to catch the bus to work. However, I dawdled too long when getting ready and missed the bus by just a few minutes. That meant that I had to wait about 40 minutes for the next bus and I was late for work (again).

Around lunch time, I traveled by bus to Downtown and that went smoothly. After work, I took the bus home and I had no problems but my bus had a little run-in with a woman’s car. That caused a bit of a delay to my trip- about 20 minutes.

After a brief stop at home, I headed off to an appointment in Shadyside. Because I am impatient and because I like the exercise, I decided to walk Downtown and catch a bus from there. It’s simpler too, to take only one bus (I am still working up to a transfer). The problem with this trip was that I left the house way too late- at 6:30pm for a 7:00pm appointment. It was already 7 by the time I made it to Grant Street. I scuttled over to the Busway to wait for the EBA. Thank goodness for the efficiency of the Busway; I made it to my appointment at 7:30pm. Though late, it could have been worse.

(the nice view from the Busway)

After my appointment, I made a quick stop at the Whole Foods for some dinner and then headed west to make my way home. I stopped at Negley and Centre to wait for the 71A. Then I got curious as to when I should expect it so I tried looking up the schedule on the Port Authority website using my Blackberry. Unforunately, neither the PAT website, nor the Google Transit site, are accessible by my Blackberry’s browser. I was nearly defeated when I was inspired to download the Google Maps application to my phone. Great scott! That was the solution I was looking for and more. With Google Maps on my Blackberry, I can use GPS to find my exact location and then search directions from that point to anywhere else; directions are provided for travel by car and by TRANSIT. AMEN. I highly recommend this.

Today’s tally:

Walked: ~6.25 miles (Whew! I am tired!)
Bussed: 7 trips (to work, Downtown, home, Downtown, Shadyside, Downtown, home)
Carpooled: 1 trip (to work)
Drove: 0

Busy day!

The day of initiation into my new, low-car lifestyle began like any other weekday. That was a problem. I woke myself at the usual time, leaving myself just 10 minutes for the drive to work. However, if I was to turn in my car keys at the Low Car Diet event at noon, I would have to take the bus to work because I wouldn’t be able to drive home. Thus, I was late for work.

My options are outlined as follows. In order to get to work at 8:30am…

…by car, I leave my house at 8:20am.

…by bus, I have to leave my house in time to catch the 7:54am 41D, or the 7:59 41G, at South Hills Junction, which is a 3/4 mile walk. Alternatively, I could catch the 7:50am 41E at the stop directly across the street from my house, which is supposed to get me to the Junction by 7:56am (in time for the 41G), but that would cost an additional $0.50 for the transfer and cut my exercise. The 41D and 41G get me to the office in Brookline at 8:10am and 8:12am, respectively, before I am required to be there (the 41G requires a 1/3 mile walk from the bus stop to the office, which adds a few minutes). The challenge is that the next 41 doesn’t come to the Junction until 8:41am, which would obviously make me late.

I have consistently driven to work. It’s obviously faster, and certainly more convenient, but it’s also cheaper. Yes, it really is. My calculations are as follows:

My 2003, Ford Focus ZX5 gets approximately 20 miles per gallon in city driving conditions (yes, I realize that this is quite poor and, yes, I am ashamed to own such a gas guzzler). The drive from my house to my office is approximately 3 miles. At $4.00 a gallon, give or take a few cents, it costs me $0.60 to drive each way to work. That significantly less than the $2.00 each way that the bus requires.

Ok, back to yesterday.

Here is my total travel tally:

Walked: ~3 miles (to work, to zipcar event, to lunch, to home, to kickball)
Bussed: 3 trips (to work, to zipcar event, to home)
Carpooled: 2 trips (to bar, to home)
Drove: 0

That’s pretty “low car.” Not bad for my first day.