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Opinion: Reflections on car-free month

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By Jack Minore

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

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At our last SAGE (Safe and Active Genesee for Everyone) meeting we discussed the concept of going a full month without once using our cars. My immediate reaction was that it was impossible, impractical. I reflected a bit on the concept and it brought back memories of my childhood. Why it would have been quite easy then even though it would be very difficult today.

I grew up on the near north side of Flint, 129 W. Genesee St., just a bit south of Max Brandon Park and between Detroit Street (now Martin Luther King) and Mason Street.

It was a nice middle class neighborhood with an interesting (unheard of today) mix of wealth and professions. My dad was a tradesman in the auto plants as were several men on my block.  But there were management people and professionals all around us. My family physician lived just a few blocks away as did his adult son, also a doctor. There was a judge at the end of the block and a grocery store owner and another merchant, a police officer, a postman and the widow of an electric service company employee. Teachers, a principal, an attorney and a chiropractor all lived in the immediate area.

The mix is not really as important as the neighborhood amenities, but it's the mix that is important to reflect the land use changes.

From my home I could easily walk to three full-service grocery stores, my dentist (who also lived in a home attached to his office), my doctor, two barbershops, a small diner, a pizza place (dine-in or take-out), a furrier, a hardware, two bars, two dry cleaners, a shoe repair shop, a bank, two gas stations, a "dime store" and a few other assorted businesses. These were all within six blocks of my home.

The bus line was just half a block from my house, so getting across town or to downtown was easy. My dad rode the bus to his job at "Chevy in the Hole."

My elementary, junior high and high school were within about five blocks of my house. I could also have easily walked to the Flint Technical School. A Methodist, Lutheran and Seventh Day Adventist Church were within easy walking distance and a Presbyterian Church was just a few blocks further, still within easy walking distance. Max Brandon Park was nearby. The ball fields, track and tennis courts at the school were open and available for use nearby. In the winter there was ice skating at nearby Max Brandon and Iroquois parks, which also had open ballfields for pick-up football or softball games, kite flying and other informal games and activities.

We all walked. We all used the bus regularly. Virtually all kids rode bikes. Obesity was unheard of. Fitness was the norm, and we basically didn't even know it.

As I recall, we took the car out of the garage about once a week to do the "big" grocery shopping at the neighborhood A&P — about 12 blocks away in a little shopping area with its own array of neighborhood businesses — a drugstore, bar, barbershop, dry cleaners and a gas station. Some weeks to splurge, we would drive to Third Avenue Fish and Chips for Friday night dinner.

I don't mean to imply we didn't drive the car. We went to West Branch to the cottage most summer weekends, usually Friday night to Sunday night. But most of the time we actually walked everwhere.

What happened to change all that?

Two things changed in our society that altered our lifestyles very dramatically.

We became a society segregated by economic class, and we abandoned our communities for relatively isolated subdivisions.

As a result, many in our society moved to the "country," onto those acre or larger lots with no sidewalks and some distance from the nearest stores, schools, barbershops, etc.

The stores followed.

We no longer catered to neighborhoods but to much larger geographic areas. More kids had to be bused to school — fewer walked. Most folks could no longer walk to the grocery store — they had to drive.

The same was true for every other business.

Gas stations located on busy intersections — preferably next to a free-way. Restaurant chains saw the value of "big-branding" and eclipsed the little neighborhood diner. Churches abandoned little neighborhood missions for the areawide megachurch — with a big parking lot, of course. Neighborhood groceries became neighborhood party stores. The freeways, largely built in the late 1950s and early 1960s, contributed substantially to the urban flight and to the destruction of much of our farmland.

And, of course, we quit walking. Most families became two- or three-car families that used the cars every day instead of one car that was used relatively infrequently. As a society we became lazy and, some would argue, fat. The economic disparity in our cities led to less safe cities. That, in turn, led to less walking, less active play outside, more concern about use of our parks and a whole variety of habit changes that contribute to our obesity and to our dependence on cars.

In short, a car-free month would have been a "piece of cake" (no pun intended) when I was a kid. Today, it would be a huge challenge for most of us.

Let's resolve to do more walking ourselves to increase our empathy for all who must depend on life without a car and resolve to look harder at land use planning in the future.

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Jack Minore is a retired teacher, former long-serving city councilperson, former legislator and active in a number of political and environmental groups — notably the Flint River Watershed Coalition and Friends of the Flint River Trail. Jack was in the original group that formed East Village Magazine.

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