Mirror Signal Manipulate

With the price of petrol in Britain now being over a £1 a liter and the combined price of yearly road tax and insurance not far short of £600 and of course the annual MOT test to finance as well, this is shaping up to be the most expensive 12 months of my 29 year motoring history. Its not just me, of course. Millions are now finding themselves in the same situation and a fair few of them like myself are beginning to question exactly how much longer they are going to be able afford to keep a motor vehicle on the driveway at all. My first car back in 1979 was six years old and cost me the grand sum of £60. Add to that an MOT that cost me £10 (including a set of wiper blades and a sealed beam unit) then three months road tax that came in at £17. That turned me into a fully fledged, legal motorist for less than £90. Admittedly that was almost a fortnights wages for me back then, but I very much doubt you could achieve all that with your average two weeks wages today unless you happen to be Elton John. Although my Austin 1300 was nowhere near as fuel efficient as its modern day equivalent, a whole gallon of petrol only set you back 65p so it wasn’t really an issue and as an extra bonus if you bought four gallons at once the service station normally gave you a free wine glass as well.

Motoring was fun back then and people loved it. We had no speed cameras or carbon footprints to worry about and there were loads of proper transport cafés around that fried proper chips and served a decent pot of tea. Sadly during that first year my car developed a slight suspension problem that eventually resulted in the front wheel falling completely off one Saturday morning. It quickly became obvious that a repair wasn’t an option so a decision was made to tow it off to the local scrap yard. Luckily a good friend of mine worked there at that time so after about 10 minutes or so and 40 quid lighter, I found myself driving back out of the same yard in an even newer Austin 1100 and as part of the deal I was even allowed to return the following day to swap the front seats and steering wheel from my old car. If that’s not a match for modern day recycling schemes then I don’t know what is.

That golden age of motoring has now come to an end of course. Both the environmental and financial issues are literally increasing by the day. The modern message to drivers is that you either make the effort to squeeze five workmates into your car or you leave it at home altogether and catch a bus or train. The problem I have is I work on my own like thousands of other people and there is no mode of public transport that can either get me in to work in the evenings or home in the mornings. If these lunatics think for one minute that lard arsed fortysomethings like me who have been driving to work for almost thirty years are suddenly going to jump on a mountain bike and cycle for twenty miles they have another think coming I´m afraid. Its time these various groups realized that no amount of extortionate taxes are going solve this issue. The bottom line is that my local privatized public transport services are never going to cater for the likes of me. They are run purely for profit not people who start work at 06.00hrs. As things stand we have little option but to pay every penny they squeeze out of us motorists. They know only too well that millions of folk like me still have to drive to work every day. It makes my blood boil that what used to be such a pleasurable experience has been turned on its head to become nothing more than an expensive irritant.

Does anyone agree?

Or am I over reacting

So its over to you then……

SoapBoxTwo, being driven around the bend…

MY TWO CENTS..........by SB1

OOOOHHHH.....its a tough one again, and this time

I´m a bit on the fence. I happen to believe there are too many cars on the roads of our world and being the owner of two of them makes me a bit of a hypocrite in this sense, but I walk and use public transport as much as I can to the point that I have not used my 2nd car at all so far this month yet and don´t see me having to at all. In fact I have put the equivalent of a tenner in gas in it three times this year according to my receipts. I can see SB2´s point of course, he isn´t in a unique situation either. Public transport rarely functions efficiently unless it´s city based. You can understand them not putting a bus on at ten minute intervals through the Cleveland Hills for example, but I´m sure they could customise a town bus service to cater for SB2´s predicament. Anyone up for a mini-bus club? Could be a good idea – it would certainly help cut down on emissions, may lead to more people abandoning their cars and make the roads less congested and follows that SB2 could tootle down country lanes in a Morris Marina Convertable with his picnic packed, waving a cheery hello to the Famous Five while his big ends clatter the fillings from his teeth. Who knows, he could make the radial and cross-ply mix fashionable again........