The "Active" Part of Our Transportation

As my daughter and I began our experiment to be car-free, a friend asked if I would be keeping track of the walking and bicycling that ensued. I indicated that I would.

Full disclosure: I am a trip-tracking geek.

There are a number of tools and apps out there to measure steps, miles, speed, elevation gained -- you name it, it can probably be tracked.  My personal favorite is Endomondo, and I use it regularly.  (I promise not to go crazy with product placements.)

So, the more appropriate response to my friend would have been that I will probably be able to write a book -- or at the very least, a blog post -- on how our activity levels have changed as a result of living car-free.

I think it is universally well-known that people who live in urban, transit-friendly cities and communities experience higher levels of physical activity. This is no great revelation, right? If it's easy to walk to a destination -- store, restaurant, work -- people will be more inclined to do so. And if you rely on transit, you're inevitably walking or bicycling to and from stops.

The CDC has recommended physical activity guidelines for both adults and children for "healthy" living. A very small percentage of Americans attain those recommendations, but I can very easily claim that living car-free makes it very easy to not only attain, but surpass, them.

We have been sans car for a little more than six weeks now, so I have enough data to see how our lifestyle change has impacted my physical activity.  In summary, when we still had a car, I averaged 60 minutes/day of walking, hiking or bicycling. That average has doubled to two hours/day, and I have eliminated the hiking or mountain biking that used to factor in to my daily average. That two hours/day simply reflects "active transportation."

In terms of mileage, I used to average 3 miles/day, mostly walking, with a long recreational bike ride on the weekends.  As time goes on, I'm watching the average daily mileage increase, and right now it's about 10 miles/day. The long recreational rides on the weekend no longer occur, but I'm on the bike daily. Sometimes it's just a roundtrip to school, but on weekends, errands can easily rack up 10 miles or more.

These increases have occurred organically as a result of just walking to bus stops, from bus stops, or bicycling to school, stores or meetings.

The result: I am definitely feeling stronger, getting more muscle definition and slowly losing weight. I'm eager to see what the longer-term effects will be.