AnnO'Neemus said:
Hmmm, yeah, he can pick and choose. But given -- according to the article -- that his wife his Welsh, and wants their 14-month-old daughter to grow up a Welsh speaker, I'm not quite sure how that could have been achieved in the environs of Oxford.
Needing to live in a Welsh speaking environment rather limits one's choices to living in Wales, doesn't it?
And particular parts of Wales, at that. While Welsh is compulsory in all English-speaking schools, it's a long way short of bringing someone up English/Welsh bilingual. And - perhaps not coincidentally - the bits of Wales where Welsh is spoken most extensively are the less densely-populated bits, and tend to be in the North. If Monbiot's moving to live somewhere near Machynlleth, he's going to be in a place where buses generally run on a two hour headway (and tend to take circuitious routes!), as will trains from his nearest railway station. Services and resources are miles away, particularly if he's any distance out of Machynlleth.
I live in Pembroke, which is a town that's probably about the size of Machynlleth, though somewhat less isolated. However, if I didn't have a car, the simplest shopping trip would be a nightmare - our local shops aren't particularly well-provided, and only open 9-5.30, so I'd never be able to shop during the week. Getting to work would involve an hour and a quarter's train journey for the 35 mile trip, or a similar time spent on a bus (the train takes a particularly roundabout route from here to Carmarthen). If I missed my train (or it was cancelled, which is a regular occurrence), it'd be a two hour wait to the next one). The doctor's surgery has just been closed and consolidated with all the others in Pembroke/Pembroke Dock, so it's now about two miles away: easy enough on foot if one is healthy, but perhaps not ideal if you're seeing the doctor about an injury or are feeling slightly unwell.
We actually have two cars in this household, which I think is ludicrously profligate, but it is perhaps a measure of how necessary a car is to anyone who lives in a rural area and needs to work. I have thought long and hard about how we could consolidate our car use down to one, but it's simply not possible: unless Ms Pembrokestephen and I start working in the same place, or at least doing regular 9-5 hours, 5 days a week (not a luxury most counsellors enjoy) so that we could do a "work run", the logistics of getting us both to work in a single car are intractable.
So I fully understand George Monbiot's position: it simply isn't possible to live in a rural area like West Wales and rely on public transport.
I am sure there is more, albeit not perhaps classical public transport options, that could be done in rural areas to encourage people to opt out of car ownership, but I also think that the way that car ownership is taxed and managed - big upfront non-usage-dependent costs like road fund licence, insurance, MOT - mitigate against the idea of ownership of a car for very occasional use. I suspect that car club type ideas don't work too well in rural areas, either, because of the relative lack of density of population.
Round here, we need better buses that go from hub to hub more quickly, and don't cost an arm and a leg. Similarly, trains need to be competitive - it is only marginally more expensive, once I've driven the 30 miles to Carmarthen, paid to park, and got on a train (even
with my student railcard) to go to university by car than it is by train. Those train (and bus) services need to be reliable - if you're going to run on a two hour headway, then anyone with any kind of choice is not going to tolerate being left at a bus stop for an additional two hours too many times before reaching for the car keys. It's also no use having a train/bus service that starts at 0800 and packs up for the night 12 hours later - which is definitely the case here.
