It's not feasible for everyone, but between grocery delivery services, telehealth, etc - if you work remotely anyway, it may be surprisingly feasible to get rid of your car altogether and only Uber/Lyft as needed, at least until robotaxis expand into your area at a fraction of the price of traditional ride-hailing apps.

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raw_anon_1111 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

I work remotely, my gym is downstairs as well as a convenience store with some fresh (overpriced) items, a bar and an (overpriced) restaurant.

My barber and grocery store is a $9 Uber Ride each way. So I could get away with a car easily where I live now. My wife and I have been down to one car since Covid.

But when I was in the burbs if metro Atlanta where everything wasn’t so close, it would have been over $100 easy going from one side to the other or basically anywhere besides the grocery store.

My car insurance is only $176 a month for my wife and I. It doesn’t make sense not to have a car, even if you include the minor maintenance on a car that would be hardly ever driven. Even at a theoretical $400 car payment + $176 in insurance, it still easy to come out ahead.

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asdff 4 days ago | parent [-]

Only a $9 ride in 2025? What is that 1-2 miles? Just bike.

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raw_anon_1111 4 days ago | parent [-]

Yes because it’s completely safe to bike everywhere and how would I bring the groceries back?

I live in a tourist area where there are a lot of drivers causing the prices to be low. I noticed it in Las Vegas too.

The only reason I know is I use Uber to run errands close by when my wife has the car on the weekends.

	▲	globular-toast 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		> Yes because it’s completely safe to bike everywhere and how would I bring the groceries back? Pannier bags. I did this for years. Before I got panniers I filled a big camping rucksack and cycled, but I wouldn't recommend that. Use a small backpack in addition to panniers if you have to, but having just the panniers feels the best. However, in terms of safety you are unfortunately right. I didn't have a car so I went everywhere by bike but I was essentially a third class citizen in many places. Felt like I could just get wiped out and nobody would even care. There were no people around, only cars. I hate cars, so I had to get a car too :(

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wibbily 4 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

That's worse? I don't want my car to track me, I'm def not going to volunteer that information to Uber.

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anonym29 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Your car is tracking much more than rideshare apps even can. Uber, Lyft, whoever gets point to point trip information, maybe audio recording in the car. Modern personally owned automobiles are getting everything, all the time. It knows when you're home, when you're not, many record all audio all the time, some are recording video, some are tracking your sexual activity in the car.

At this point, I treat rideshare like public transit: I assume I'm being watched, but I get to skip the permanent always-on tracking for the other 99% of the time that I'm not in the car.

Also, if you own a car, the state knows where you're going and when, per ALPR systems. With Uber or Lyft or a robotaxi, there's a layer between my personal information and the state. It's not an insurmountable layer, as rideshare / robotaxi services can always be subpoena'd, but adding a layer of extra work for the state is a net gain to my privacy.

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anonym29 4 days ago | parent | next [-]

Also, for what it's worth, you don't have to use same service on each leg of your trip, you don't need to have it pick you up at your front door, and you don't need to have it drop you off at your exact destination. While for some people, these are admittedly imperfect improvements (you can't really effectively conceal your destination as easily if it's, say, an airport, there's also absolutely nothing stopping you from calculating the cost of your full trip with an equidistant destination, ordering a short trip (not to your final destination), and offering your driver a reasonable amount of cash to take you the rest of the way. Uber/lyft themselves are con artists charging riders WAY more than they pay drivers anyway. You can get away with paying a fraction of what the app would charge you, paying the driver way more than they would otherwise receive, and cutting the parasite (the multi-billion-dollar corporation providing zero value after connecting you with a driver) out of the middle.

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Marsymars 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

There are still 2025 model cars where you can just pull the fuse for the modem and telematics module with no real ill effects.

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asdff 4 days ago | parent [-]

Can you pull the fuse for the stability control? For the radar brake that gives false positives? For the damn steer by wire and throttle by wire?

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Marsymars 4 days ago | parent [-]

Clearly you’re not actually interested in a modern vehicle regardless of capabilities, so I don’t think that there’s any real point in detailing which of those things can be disabled.

	▲	asdff 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		What capabilities are gained from having steering in 8 bit instead of a direct linkage?

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raw_anon_1111 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

That’s a lost cause between tag readers and if you carry a cell phone.

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Acrobatic_Road 4 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Then you have to carry a phone, which is even worse.