title: Divorce Your Car! : Ending the Love Affair with the Automobile
author: Katie Alvord
description: A long-time advocate for transportation reform, Alvord prefers getting around on anythingAher own two feet, mass transit, bicyclesAbut a car. In this affable history-cum-how-to, she tracks the dramatic, negative impact of automobiles from the early days of the 1900s to the present. Among the evils are severe pollution levels, high rates of death and injury in car accidents, a decline in other modes of transport and sprawling highway development. Meanwhile, some cities around the world are in fact quite friendly toward nondrivers: Toronto has a great subway system and encourages bicycle riders; Copenhagen and some other cities have "free bikes" that allow people to leave a deposit and borrow a bike; San Francisco has pedestrian-only roads. Perhaps the book's best section is the last third, in which Alvord offers detailed, practical advice on how to avoid using a car, along with lists of the benefits of doing so. Walking around, for example, helps reduce stress and prevent osteoporosis. Crime rates go down in areas with increased pedestrian traffic. And the average speed of a commuting car (22 mph) isn't much faster than that of a bicycle (10-20 mph). Even for readers who are not ready to permanently abandon their auto, this book provides a wealth of ideas for unbuckling the seat belts and enjoying the fresh air. (Aug.) <BR>Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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  Copyright Information
  
  
  
  
  
  Copyright © 1996 by Lawrence Watt-Evans. This edition copyright © 2003 by
  Lawrence Watt-Evans. All rights reserved.
  
  
  
  
  
  Published by Wildside Press LLC.
  
  
  
  
  
  www.wildsidebooks.com
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Dedication
  
  
  
  
  
  For Julie—  
  
  
  of course.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Chapter One
  
  
  
  
  
  Her car was gone. Amy Jewell had looked out the front door and seen that the
  curb was empty, and had stepped back inside and closed the door.
  
  
  
  
  
  Her car was gone.
  
  
  
  
  
  That had come as a shock at first, but it shouldn’t have. After all, she had
  left it out front months ago.
  
  
  
  
  
  It was hard to realize that it had really been months, that it hadn’t all been
  a dream, that they hadn’t somehow returned to the moment they had left.
  
  
  
  
  
  But it had been real, and it had been months ago that she had parked her car
  out front of Pel and Nancy Brown’s house in the expectation of being safely
  bac