I’m on the brink of a car-lite transition. By selling a car, we would be better off financially by about $4,000 right away according to the blue book, and then enjoy steady savings when it comes to gas, maintenance, and parking. We aren’t all convinced of the practicality though. How about going car lite without selling a car right away? That’s the test, and our goal is to start next week. For $56, Valley Transit issues a 30 day ride card, and I’m buying it with gas money. It only takes 16 days of round trip commutes to become cheaper than the single ride fair costs at $1.80 per trip. That’s a pretty good bargain if I stay committed and keep the car key hanging on a hook. The great thing is, I won’t care as much about gas prices.

We don’t have the best funded transit system in the nation here in Appleton, WI, but we do have bus coverage. This took a fair amount of looking at bus schedules and routes to figure out. I’ve requested the information packet that the transit center offers commuters. I plan to ride my bike 1 mile on residential streets, catch a bus that carries me to the transit center in 5 minutes, and transfer to the bus that takes me 10 miles to the town where I teach. There, I’ll be pulling my bike off the bus 25 minutes later and ride another 20 minutes to work. A bit tight for preparing a first hour class, but at least I’m not sitting in traffic while class starts. All told, pretty close to an hour to travel what I could cover on my bike in 45 to 50 minutes if the roads weren’t icy. But hey, it has taken me over 45 minutes to drive with traffic backed up on the HWY 441 bridge cutting deeply into the gas mileage. It took about 80 minutes to commute by bike through the snow, so a dependable hour commute will be sweet and provide some added reading time!

But what if I have to go in to work early? I can ride 2.5 miles and catch the first bus that runs between towns and be at school early enough for a staff meeting or host a make-up swim session for a group of students. This time of year, I’m pretty sure the racks will be free on the bus. The return trip may have a bigger say in what I actually do on a given day due to other obligations. It is disappointing that another bus isn’t running the Neenah route so that a departure happened every half hour. Here, they alternate bus routes with schedules offset by a half hour, and there is another trip from my work town that goes to Appleton’s West side, but both routes leave at the same times:(  It just links with another route that takes me into the transit center a half hour later. That means, if I miss the bus, then the bike and I will complete the trip in less time than it takes to wait for the next one. Now, it’s time to adjust the fenders so they clear the studded tires I ordered for my bike…