[notStoicEnough]

Interesting. I know a lot of the statistics have been discussed elsewhere here, so I'll add two weak speculations -

Cars are pretty expensive to own and operate. Mr. Money Moustache is constantly railing against them - https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/04/22/curing-your-clown.... Agree or disagree with his approach to things, his blog is very much about high social mobility.

Secondly, walking is a pretty good way to force yourself to get exercise. I'm fortunate enough to work for a big tech company with a shuttle; I recently realized that taking the shuttle forced me to walk more than 500 miles a year just between the stop and my apartment. That's huge when I'm pretty unreliable about going to the gym. The shuttle also strongly encourages me to stay on a reasonable schedule - in before the last morning shuttle, out before the last evening one. I have to imagine that over time, this is also a pretty huge health benefit.

Edit: typos

[war1025]

I was thinking recently about whether it would be useful for people to start thinking of things in terms of $/mi instead of mpg. Would make it much more explicit that it costs money to go places.

Also as a bit of a side tangent, one of my big pet-peeves is people who state their mpg in best case scenario and not day to day. "Oh my SUV gets 45mpg cruising down the interstate." Yea sure it does. but overall you're still getting low 20s if you measure fill up to fill up.

[jdnenej]

That depends on the current price of petrol which changes often.

[war1025]

And the price of travel changes as the price of gas changes.

I was taught to check my mileage every time I fill up the tank. It would be just as easy to divide `cost / trip meter` vs `trip meter / gallons`, and would arguably give a more interesting number.

Mostly just an idea I had that I thought may be worth trying.