Come On In, The Water's Fine

I like to say that I have one foot planted in my old, energy intensive life, and one foot in newer, more sustainable waters.

Yet a few events are conspiring to pull my foot from the sustainable pool. As much as I'm personally trying to do things better, I think I only have one big toe in...perhaps halfway up the metatarsals.

First: Elk Grove's E-tran. Elk Grove incorporated as a city several years back, and one initial action was to separate from Sacramento Regional Transit (RT) and go on their own. Well, for whatever reason they decided to buy a refurbished fleet of hybrid busses. I say 'whatever reason,' as if a couple of 'green' busses somehow make the rest of the city's asinine low density sprawl OK. In any event, the busses broke down on the freeways, 4 of them caught fire (or rather, thermal events), hot in the summer and cold in the winter, and they were all pulled from service after 33 months. Their expected service life was 12 years. The costs, future and present, are going to seriously disrupt the level of service we currently have. I don't know what the costs are. I don't know what the disruptions will be.

Second: The looming fight. I blogged before about how my wife and I will fight about offing one car to get a scooter. Well, the fight is on! All weekend we argued over selling the Honda, until it finally ended with "Fine, then we're not getting a scooter." That's just the first battle, not the war. I have no idea how the war will be waged, who will capitulate, or who will offer reparations.

Third: SMUD. My employer has been located in the same place for God knows how long. But suddenly, within two years of my coming here, there's a plan underway to move the service yard (with all the bucket trucks, spools of cables, transformers, etc.) to a larger location and in the process, operations will move with them, and that includes me.

We need another 9 acres, apparently, on top of the 22 we already have. There will be no way we will find a 30+ acre site anywhere near quality public transportation, or even freeway close. The current likely suggested site is near the Granite quarries out near Kiefer and Watt. Probably a good mile to two miles south of light rail. And that's just a proposed site. They could easily decide on some other location like McClellan, Foothill Farms, Rancho Cordova, or Citrus Heights.
Six years and counting until this new home is established. If I'm lucky, it will be more like ten years, the way SMUD moves. But then, because it's fuckering up my sustainable action plan, I bet we fast track this in four years time! Just my luck.

As much as I like my current job, I will jump ship and move into some new area in customer services (which will still stay in our present location). I would rather do that than be forced into automobile commuting again, no matter how much less I'd make.