We've got wheels!

When Brad and I moved to Boston last summer, we had made the (rather difficult) decision not to bring either of our vehicles. We live in Boston proper (i.e. not even a little bit in suburbia) and have excellent accessibility to public transportation. We did some preliminary calculations and decided it might be more economical to use public transportation and Zip Car, as needed. 

Truly, it did work quite well for us last semester. We could get anywhere we needed to. The Boston transportation system (called the "T," which is short for MBTA: Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority) is laid out rather well and isn't too hard to navigate. However, here were a few of the obstacles we encountered:

1. The costs do add up faster than we'd hoped. Because we live close enough to Boston College for Brad to walk or take the FREE BC shuttle, we don't use the T often enough to justify buying a monthly or semester-long pass. If we lived in a place that required him to take the train to school, we'd be much more cost-effective in T usage (um, definitely don't read that sentence as me complaining about the fact that his school transportation is F.R.E.E.).

2. Since we don't have a monthly pass, our option is to load up our Charlie Card (read: metro/train/bus card) with money for the fees. Trains are $2.00/ride and buses are $1.50 (free transfers within a 2-hour period). Just to go to church and back home each week set us back $8.00. Not a ton of money, but it definitely adds up. 

3. Going to the grocery store becomes complicated. Our closest grocery store (not counting drug stores/convenience stores) is about a mile away. It's a nice little walk...on the way there. We walked it often. Coming back, however, (you know, when you're laden with groceries) is uphill. My 32-week self was starting to struggle with that part. Also, winter isn't the most fun time to be trekking. The distance and up-hill-ness also limited how much we could purchase at one time (kind of like when I lived in Ukraine...only my store was much closer). Not a huge deal, but a "simple" grocery trip could easily eat up more than an hour. Oh, and taking the train isn't terribly efficient. It didn't bring us close enough to our apartment to do us much good: the uphill part is after you get off the train. So, another $4-$8 dollars down the drain...with a hill left to scale.

4. I began having recurring terrors about going into labor and having to take the train or a taxi ("Woman gives birth in back of Cab"...no, thank you) to the hospital. Maybe that's not terribly rational, but it was a really terrifying prospect to me.

So, we (Brad) began tallying up the costs of bringing one of our cars up. I should mention that both our vehicles are paid off, so that's not a cost we needed to factor in. What we were spending/would be spending in T fees and what we would spend to bring a car were not so different that it outweighed the convenience factor of having a car. Plus...we're going to have a baby soon. Pretty sure having a car will make that easier, too.

So, after Christmas, we drove my car (affectionately referred to as Hondy by my family) back to New England. We got her registered with the state (she had to get Mass tags...sad...I saved her Alabama one, though. She's a southern car.) and got our on-street parking permit. 

Which brings me to the new set of cultural adjustments we've been making. Parking. Sheesh. What a pain. We don't have a parking space (much less a parking lot!) that comes with our apartment. We are at the mercy of find-the-nearest-on-street-spot available. Sometimes, that means we can park right in front of our building, and sometimes that means we park two blocks away in front of some other building (kind of like we are right now). It's also all parallel parking, and LOTS of people take great liberties with how adept you're going to be at inching out of the 1/2 inch of space they've left you. Ask me if I plan on driving anytime soon.

Answer: I don't. I don't need that kind of blood pressure right now.

Despite that, we've been grateful for Hondy already, for church and the grocery store. And Brad's trip to the bank (which can easily take close to an hour on foot/by T). We still love the pedestrian lifestyle and have walked to a few places (one that was 2 miles away AND uphill) since being back. We don't plan on giving up walking entirely, by any means (Brad still walks to school), but we are SO grateful for the options having a car provides. 

So, to all our visitors who came when we were carless: I'm sorry. Why don't you all plan to come back for a do-over? We'll still take the T in for the downtown historical stuff (parking down there = nightmare), but church and whatnot will be so much easier. Please? Give us another chance.