Getting to work fueled by good food

Terri Elioff, woman who
gave up her car

Podcast of interview with Bike Commuter, Terri Elioff 

 Terri Elioff gets from home to the office on a bike. She goes everywhere on her bike, even to gala evening events -- in heels.

Her decision to give up driving a car benefited more than just the charity who received her vehicle as a gift, it also had a positive impact on Elioff's pocketbook. By her calculations, Elioff says she saves thousands of dollars by not owning a car.

"I found myself driving to the community center to work out, and I thought to myself, why? Wouldn’t I get a better benefit if I walked to the community center, or if I rode my bicycle to the community center?" Elioff says.  "So, I ride my bike to work every day and I ride it home, and if I do nothing else, I’ve gotten an hour of exercise.”

Elioff was quick to note, she has not given up cars completely. Her friends have cars, and her daughter shares a car with her when needed. In addition, Elioff is a routine Zipster through the car sharing service Zipcar, which lets her use a car for about $10 per hour. Occasionally, she will rent a car, taking advantage of rental specials from commercial agencies that can be as low as $9 a day.

She traverses the city on one of three bikes, including a Mixte Bike, and is sometimes seen pulling a trailer or using saddle bags. “You’d be amazed what you can carry on a bicycle,” says Elioff.

For those considering becoming a bike commuter, Elioff suggests looking for an alternate route to get from home to work that might be the most bike friendly.  She suggests weekends or any non-work day as the best time to try out a new route. “Plan your route when you don’t have to be somewhere at a certain time,” Elioff said.

Elioff bikes no matter what. She’s even tried biking in ice -- something she says is not very pleasant.  When inclement northwest weather hits, Elioff recommends bike fenders that can be permanently attached to the bike or just snapped-on when needed. Her last piece of advice? “Have a good rain coat.”

And what does Terri Elioff do with all that money she saves? Why, she eats well, of course.

How do you get to work?

Are we creating a bridge or a fiasco?

"This is not a bridge project," began the Bridging the Gaps event. "This is a light rail project with some other things thrown in for political cover."

Saturday, the first sunny day of the season, an eager, albeit light, audience ambled into the auditorium at LifePoint Church. When attendees settled into their seats, the event launched with a non-edited approach to bridges, tolls, politicians, government entities and vendors.

Tri-Met was held up to scrutiny using Tom Sawyer-esque comparisons. Their participation was described as an enterprising boy chomping on a crunchy apple, while everyone else paints the fence, i.e., Tri-Met intends to pay for nothing on this project, including pieces planned for the their side of the border. Yes, Washington State's responsibility includes funding the connecting pieces inside Oregon. The project's funding was described as 'novel.'

Light rail received a bashing. Tom Hann, from We The People, noted, "As long as rail is part of it, it is never going to be a cost effective alternative." He raised up other options: update and repair the I-5 bridge, consider third, fourth and even fifth bridges. Additional river crossing points were pointed to as making sense for the long term. "They incorporate redundancy into a system" that will need more than two options when earthquakes occur.

Tolls were uncharacteristically embraced. "Everywhere else in the economy user fees--pay as you go--is the way the economy works." Speakers also were quick to note, that tolls only makes sense, and are only beneficial to consumers, when consumers have choices.

The audience clapped at the video “CRC: Project cost comparison,” featuring third bridge proponent David Madore. Madore's final video question, "Is the CRC Project sky high or what?" elicited audience chuckles.

Madore's second visual, a virtual rendering of a proposed 192nd Avenue Bridge, gave him the opportunity to dispel the anti-bridge label that the media has pegged him with. “I am for a 192nd Ave Bridge," he stated. He encouraged the audience to take action. "The solution is for us to get engaged. We cannot leave it to those who want to come in and only sell services. We are the customers. We need to participate in the solution." His solution proposed that private industry be tapped to build bridges, saying they build "much more effectively than government."

Joe Cortright, known for the Cortright report, talked about the cost of the project. "Closer to $10 Billion," and not the $3.8 to $3.9 Billion that’s been widely discussed. "The initial price, $3.9 Billion, is only realistic if you could presumably walk in and buy the bridge, or pay for it outright." His PowerPoint showed the CRC project is predicated on very large borrowing, on tolls, surcharges, fees to operate light rail, and the cost to correct critical choke points inside Oregon, such as those at the Rose Quarter.

A project that involves extreme complexity and must pass through the political hands of eight government agencies was boiled down to its simplest terms during an animated feature (embedded above). Children's voices combined with flying seagulls gave a birds eye view of the Columbia River and the two current bridges. The description of the light rail train traveling no faster than the cars stuck in track erupted in chuckles and claps from the audience.

While a sunny day burst with warmth and frenzied activity outside, a half dozen more speakers and one country singer engaged the group that sat in the dark auditorium. The not to be missed moment, was the numbers person. The longest spontaneous applause and loudest hoots came during the forensic auditor's presentation.

When was the last time an accountant made you want to stand up and clap?

Video of the event will be available mid-week on couv.com.

Editors Note: The author is employed at couv.com, a corporation owned by David Madore.

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What makes amplifying local voices classic?

Twitter followers will soon see the following message: The Classic Community is out!

For some time I've been keeping a Twitter list, adding to it when I remember, of people who've met me. I recently pulled the list into a feed, added the #VanWA hash tag, and created the The Classic Community.

I see your tweets, I read your blogs, but it still amazes me the subtle items I miss that I wouldn't have seen had I not created this aggregate.

The template to build this collabortative effort is available through Paper.li, a project of SmallRivers. Their website notes, "SmallRivers is a privately held startup incorporated in Switzerland (Lausanne) and located on the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology EPFL campus." Paper.li allows us to gather content that is relevant to us and share it with the community that we find important -- Twitter, our blog audience, or those who share like interests by category or topic.

It's a simple concept to thrive on content that other's have created. Advertising is slipped in to monetize the brainchild for the founders, and the visual rendition is engaging. We can now read, "Any Twitter stream as a daily newspaper."

And this 'newspaper' comes without pay walls.

Have you started a Paper.li aggregate? What do you think about gathering other's content and serving it up with a monetizing strategy, not for the content producer, but for the one who creates the tool?

The Swiss company who created Paper.li, SmallRivers,  can be found on Twitter as: @smallrivers.

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