This past week I made the trip down to Washington DC to see the inauguration of the 44th President of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama. I had what I believe may have been one of the greenest inaugural trips out of any out of the owner. Instead of driving I carpooled with a friend who was already driving her Honda Civic Hybrid down to the capital. I think we only consumed 10 or 12 gallons of gas for the round trip. While in the capital I utlized one of the nation's better metro systems, I rode both natural gas and hybrid electric buses, and, when I wasn't too exhausted from standing out in the cold all day Tuesday, I made the one mile walk to and from the metro to the apartment I was staying at. Including gas, tolls, and metro fare I probably spent $50 on getting from Pittsburgh to DC and around DC. That's not too shabby. If you don't mind walking once in a while, and if you rely upon a car sharing service like Zip Car when you must have a car, living a car free life in Washington DC is very easy. Besides having hybrid electric buses I noticed that the district had a number of different electric vehicles for security and maintenance. Below is a picture of one of the electric security vehicles I came across while in the National Mall. Like this EV, DC was definitely 100% electric during the inauguration weekend.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
My Green Inauguration Trip
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4 comments:
Living without a car in DC is definitely possible, and often preferable. I lived there for two years without a car, and being free from worrying about parking, gas, and insurance was amazing. The metro system gets you where you want to go and if you wanted to go somewhere outside the system, the Zip Cars are ubiquitous.
Although I would never pick DC over Pittsburgh, we could learn a thing or two about transportation from it.
I lived down in the DC metro area as well, but I moved back to Pittsburgh because, despite our transit shortcomings, the people are much nicer here. The only reason to live in DC is if you are working for the federal government. With the hope and promise of the Obama administration I know of a ton of people from Pittsburgh and other regions across the country who have applied to work for his administration down inDC.
What about the "greenness" of what you ate? Just wondering....
Well, I didn't eat any Kobe beef that was shipped all the way from Japan. I only ate out once, at a thai tea house place in DC's Penn Quarter district. I don't know if I would consider that green but it was one of the more healthy options in that part of town.
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