On my education blog, I wrote about the Rainsberger-brand of political activism: supporting causes that aren’t necessarily personal, but which are in keeping with personal goals or philosophies.
That post was prompted by the attempted railroading of our beloved Zenn car by various levels of government.
Unlike the contradiction in my volunteer work for the “Ontario Federation of Teaching Parents” (being neither a parent nor currently residing in Ontario), the contradiction in our support for ZennMotors (as a car-less and license-less couple) is a little more complicated.
I’ve always, ultimately, enjoyed the fact that we couldn’t own a car even if we wanted to. (You know, the whole pesky not being legally allowed to drive, and all.) I do think that some of the hype around alternative fuels, alternative transportation and alternative energy hides the root problem that too many of us just plain use too much.
Being car-free is a statement in and of itself. So, how do I reconcile that with the fact that it looks like we’re finally going to buy a car?
On an individual level, there’s little doubt that NOT owning a car is better for the environment than owning a car — any car, even the kick ass cityZENN that we’ll buy in Fall 2009 (or whenever it finally does roll off the line).
Looking at the bigger picture, though, I can’t help but think that owning this car might be the best thing to do.
It would be unrealistic of me to think that large sections of the population are going to go completely car-less, as we have always been. Our car-less lifestyle in which we
- (a) use fewer resources
- (b) plan every shopping trip very carefully and never just “run out for one thing” and come home with a dozen things we didn’t really need
- (c) generally never buy more than we can carry
- (d) use public transportation guilt-free knowing that we can BOTH sleep, read or just generally tune out
- (e) never worry about insurance or the rising costs of gas
- etc. etc. etc.
. . . is almost always met with a cute “oh that’s quaint” pat on the head. “But we could never do that.”
But, when we tell people about the cityZENN, everyone’s excited! (Yes, we’ve discovered that the company is not (yet) publicly traded because several people have even wondered about buying up stock in the car, in addition to the car itself.)
And, although we live a car-less lifestyle (in that we deprive ourselves of ownership) it’s not entirely accurate to say we live a car-free lifestyle. We do use cabs and take rides from others when the situation arises.
While we have long since determined that a taxi lifestyle beats car ownership in the personal finance arena, the truth is that most of the taxis we take are gas guzzlers. (Props to the ‘peg for having hybrid taxi fleets — more often than not our Winnipeg taxis are hybrids, but we’ve yet to take one anywhere else.)
Our friends and family haven’t crossed the chasm into hybrid ownership. (Unless they’re just saving the “good” car for special occasions!) So, our car experiences aren’t particularly environmentally-friendly; they’re just minimized in frequency.
I have to think that owning a cityZENN for those situations might just tip the scales environmentally. I think, come 2010, our goal should no longer be, “I never want to pay for gas,” but instead, “I never want to ride in a car that uses gas.”
We’re past the stage where we finances have to be the primary concern. Although, we can never forget that it was a lack of car ownership (and similar financial thinking) that helped us achieve our current financial position.
I think it’s our responsibility to support this revolutionary product, this Canadian company and champion the cityZENN. Although it might seem like a step backwards for us personally, I think the effect is negated by the huge step forward this car would be for others.
So, tax-time permitting, next week we write the Manitoba equivalent of the G1 driver’s license!
And Dad can take Joe on driving lessons in Oshawa at the end of the month.
Fasten your seatbelts . . .
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