...or women I suppose. Every time I ride by a bus stop and see a 20-something year old young guy waiting for the bus, I wonder why he's not riding a scooter. Calculating the costs of my scooter vs using a bus pass, I found that the numbers were pretty much the same.
SCOOTER:
$3.60/tank every 5 days = $21.60/month (obviously varies depending on usage)
$12 insurance (full coverage including theft)
$50 financing (personal loan from a credit union)
That adds up to roughly $84/month
BUS PASS:
$62 for Muni only
$82 for all SF public transportation services (not sure if cable cars are included). This one's a bit more practical since it can get you pretty much anywhere you need to be. Similar and comparable to the convenience of a scooter.
CONCLUSION:
So the difference in cost is $84 (scooter) - $82 (bus pass) = $2. Wow, that's not very significant at all! There is at least one advantage of using the bus of course. There's no need to find/pay for parking. You can do other stuff while on the bus and it's definitely safer.
In terms of convenience though, the bus falls behind the use of the scooter. I'm wondering why more people don't ride scooters in the City. Are people really concerned about their safety? They ought to be, but for some reason I don't see others being concerned as a primary reason for holding back on using a scooter. Perhaps the list is one of a combination of the following:
1. Too girlie. Only chicks ride scooters
2. Don't know how to ride one
3. Don't have a license
4. No reason to have even considered it (don't have friends that ride)
5. Misunderstood cost of the scooter holds people back (personally financing takes care of it. No down payment need and costs are recuperated in less than 2 months and that's only b/c of the cost of the gear - not the scooter itself)
6. Parents
After riding the scooter, I just can't imagine ever taking the bus if I have access to the scooter. There's really no reason. I can leave whenever I want. It's typically faster to get to wherever I need to go (including the time to park and walk to wherever I'm going) and parking costs are usually nothing if non minimal (5x less than parking spaces for cars).
SCOOTER:
$3.60/tank every 5 days = $21.60/month (obviously varies depending on usage)
$12 insurance (full coverage including theft)
$50 financing (personal loan from a credit union)
That adds up to roughly $84/month
BUS PASS:
$62 for Muni only
$82 for all SF public transportation services (not sure if cable cars are included). This one's a bit more practical since it can get you pretty much anywhere you need to be. Similar and comparable to the convenience of a scooter.
CONCLUSION:
So the difference in cost is $84 (scooter) - $82 (bus pass) = $2. Wow, that's not very significant at all! There is at least one advantage of using the bus of course. There's no need to find/pay for parking. You can do other stuff while on the bus and it's definitely safer.
In terms of convenience though, the bus falls behind the use of the scooter. I'm wondering why more people don't ride scooters in the City. Are people really concerned about their safety? They ought to be, but for some reason I don't see others being concerned as a primary reason for holding back on using a scooter. Perhaps the list is one of a combination of the following:
1. Too girlie. Only chicks ride scooters
2. Don't know how to ride one
3. Don't have a license
4. No reason to have even considered it (don't have friends that ride)
5. Misunderstood cost of the scooter holds people back (personally financing takes care of it. No down payment need and costs are recuperated in less than 2 months and that's only b/c of the cost of the gear - not the scooter itself)
6. Parents
After riding the scooter, I just can't imagine ever taking the bus if I have access to the scooter. There's really no reason. I can leave whenever I want. It's typically faster to get to wherever I need to go (including the time to park and walk to wherever I'm going) and parking costs are usually nothing if non minimal (5x less than parking spaces for cars).
No comments:
Post a Comment