Is private vehicle ownership still worth it? A comparison.

COSTS: Canadians e.g. spend in average between $8,600 and $13,000 a year for a car.
Depreciation, insurance (ø $1,680 in Vancouver) , gas ($1.42 a litre, aprox. $2,000-3,000 per year), licencing and registration fees, maintenance ($500 - $700 in the first 5 years; after higher). On top, not covered costs for accidents plus parking and traffic tickets.

For $8,600 a year = $717 a month = $23.6 a day, anyone can have 10 bus/metro rides a day or simply use 59 minutes of car sharing in a Smart or 43 min in a Mercedes CLK of Car2Go. Yes, every day.

TIME: faster point to point rides than taxis, car sharing, bus and bike. But pretty much equal or even slower in total, considering traffic jams, slower lanes, looking for parking slots, going to gas stations, cleaning/washing your car and administration of insurance and maintenance.

COMFORT: only real advantage, but also causing often an increase in personal weight. People who use public transport, weigh significantly less (ø -3 kgs men; -2.5 kgs women) than people who drive to work by car. (study by British Medical Journal, 2014).

RISK TO DIE: plane (0.1) is safer than train (0.15) is safer than bus (0.2) is safer than car (6) is safer than bike (30) is safer than pedestriants (38) is safer than motorcycle (45, dead per billion driven passenger kilometers

RISK TO INJURE/KILL SOMEBODY: no risk in busses, planes, trains; some risk being a pedestriant or cyclist, higher risk being a motorcyclist, higher risk driving a private vehicle; higher risk driving a rented vehicle

DRIVER`S HEALTH: The driver of a car is exposed to 1.5- to 6-fold higher concentrations than a pedestrian or even a cyclist. If a cyclist absorbs about 2,670 μg / m3 of carbon monoxide, the driver inhales 6,730 μg / m3 on the same route in a modern car.

EMISSIONS: private bicycle beats bikeshare beats metro/train beats bus beats car sharing beats private cars beats taxi

My conclusion: Private vehicle ownership is from yesterday, especially in big and modern cities like Vancouver, where are already plenty of less stressful alternatives (train, bus, carshare, bikeshare, taxi and hopefully soon Uber).

Photo: Global News

Text: Thomas Lorenz

Created 11/2017