quote:Wow - I must be from a different Baltimore than you are! I was under the impression Baltimore had especially terrible public transportation.
Oh, to be clear, I'm not from Baltimore; I live in DC. I do go up to visit Baltimore via public transportation at times, however, and had pleasant experiences using both buses and light rail to get around the city. I'm perfectly willing to believe there are areas of Baltimore that are transit-inaccessible, though (just like certain areas of DC). Like I said, living carfree definitely has its trade-offs, and one of those is having fewer neighborhoods where you can live.
quote:The bus thing is almost universal, I've found. There is usually not such a stigma against the train and subway systems, for some reason.
The buses I ride are ridden almost exclusively by people of color--and by that, I mean whole weeks can go by without me seeing a single other white person step on the bus. Overall system statistics for DC show that buses overall, unlike rail, are overwhelmingly ridden by minorities. I suspect some of the stigma comes from white people who are, to put it extremely politely, "uncomfortable" with this. I don't have a lot of sympathy for those people.
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In L.A., though, I see people on public transport about proportional to the mix of people living in whatever community I'm in. Maybe SLIGHTLY more "minorities", but not much different. And yet there's still that stigma. So here, at least, I'm not sure that's it (although it could be that public transport used to be more the domain of minorities than it is now, and the stigma has carried over.)
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My city lacks public transport so I feel like by the time I meet up with a bus, I might as well drive the rest of the way.
Posts: 2223 | Registered: Mar 2008
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Tara, just a tip with driving on hills with a manual, use the handbrake to keep from rolling backward when going uphill until you feel first gear grab, that's always helped me.
Manual transmissions are for driver's preference only nowadays. As for them being cheaper, only with some cars. I know Acura doesn't give you any kind of lower price for a manual transmission vehicle.
They really aren't that much more fuel efficient, especially on the freeway. The invention of lock-up torque converters changed all that with automatics.
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