Public transport use it or lose it?

Hi sulu,
I use public transport, I also am able to drive, but I find it useful in that I dont have to contend with traffic or finding parking spaces.
Sometimes the buses are late and occasionally one is missed off, a bit frustrating. I am lucky in that I have an over 60's pass, but I do agree fares can be expensive.
I am on the North East coast, we do have extra buses during the School holidays, so I can get to Whitby and Scarborough using my pass. I wouldn't be able to afford the fares otherwise.
Love and hugs

I'm 25 miles from Exeter, sulu, and our little village here has a bus twice a week! It goes to Okehampton and comes back 2 hours later, so if you wanted to go further afield you would have to wait several days to get home again. Not much use for anything really. We're just hoping that at least one of us will always be fit to drive for at least another ten years, then we will have to move away from our idyll, I fear.

Can't afford to use public transport and won't get a bus pass for another 2 years, by which time they will have stopped them anyway I would imagine. Particularly miss using trains. Going off at a slight tangent, my daughter works two days a week in Nottingham. They are going to introduce a £200 a year charge for people parking their carsfor work within so many miles of the city centre. There is no way that my daughter can travel 20 or so miles to get to work without a car, and she needs the car at work to travel between different campus's. So she may have to pay this amount even though she is parked in the school's private car park.This is on top of reduced family allowance, increasing fuel bills etc etc.

Here in Queensland Australia I live in a suburb of a small city, and we have a suburban rail plus a bus service. I'm not keen on the bus service, but use the electric train all the time. We moved here in 1994, and at that time our railway station had one small car park for those who have to drive to the station. Now the parking capacity has grown about 10 fold, with three huge car parks at the other side of the track. This represents how many more commuters use the trains.

Australia is a bit like the USA in that almost everyone drives, and getting a license is a standard rite of passage at age 17. I loathe driving myself, and have given it up, though my husband drives and we have a little car. However, roads are congested and petrol is getting dearer, with capital city parking expensive, so people use the trains. They have just bought a load more trains, and increased the number of runs.

I feel I've done my bit over the years to support our public transport, having commuted to work for 15 years. Now I use the train to get to my U3A meetings. Trains are comfy, air conditioned, and even have a quiet carriage, the last one, where people talk quietly if at all and don't use their mobiles. I love them. I did a part time BA course at the local university, University of Queensland, and much of my study was done on the train!!

I just could not abide living without public transport.