Shifting from the US to Europe modified my journey habits for the higher

This article was written by Scott Shepard is VP Global Public Sector at Iomobon The Urban Mobility Daily, the content site of Urban Mobility Company, a Paris-based company that drives the mobility business through physical and virtual events and services. Join their community of 10,000+ global mobility professionals by signing up for theWeekly newsletter for urban mobility. Read the original articleHere and follow them onLinkedin andTwitter.

The automobile has shaped my life since I was born. You see, I was born and raised in Los Angeles. Regardless of the tired stereotypes, it’s true, LA is a predominant auto culture and that is reflected in music, art, cinema, and even cuisine.

After spending my early years in Southern California, many of my formative memories were captured in the confines of an automobile. I can still remember the weekly trips with my parents who traversed the LA freeway network from Pasadena to Culver City to visit my relatives.

I would also play amateur navigator for my dad in those years before my teenage years, as his work in auto insurance included driving across the Los Angeles area. Indeed, this emerging role has sown the seeds for my future career as a cartographer. I would help my father find customers all over town, all with the help of the Thomas Brothers Guide.

Time passed, and I ended up going to college on the east coast in Vermont. These years in the foreign country of “New England” were also dominated by the automobile. I have learned the trials and difficulties of driving through ice, sleet, rain and snow in more than 4 seasons (this includes the “mud season” as a separate season from spring in Vermont).

With a bachelor’s degree in geography in hand, I realized this native Californian just wasn’t fit for the 4+ seasons, so I made it back to the west coast. This time I moved to San Diego and completed my degree in urban planning. I met my wife in San Diego and started a family. But this is where the automobile’s influence on my life really began to take shape.

At that time, in my early 30s, my career and my commuting began too. I would spend an average of at least 30-45 minutes in my own car at this point, driving every commute to work. While it seemed fairly manageable at the time, it began to affect my mental and physical health.

My wife and I moved to Northern California to be closer to their family, and this is where the real fun begins. We bought our first house on San Francisco’s East Bay, and I now have a mix of driving and transit. That meant I traveled 1.5 to 2 hours each morning to Oakland and San Francisco. While I was determined to reduce the percentage of my time in the car, my trips actually escalated to a “monster commute” typical of Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. That meant half of my two-hour commute to work was stuck in traffic and the other half was spent on a light rail system (BART) that got me to the office.
As you can imagine, those 4 hours of commuting a day put even more strain on our lives and families. At this point I downsized and started looking for opportunities that would allow more teleworking but require frequent domestic travel.

Fast forward four years ago and our family decided to move abroad to Lisbon as my wife is Portuguese and is pursuing a PhD. My condition for moving was to continue our breakdown by only owning one car. Although this was received with skepticism, she agreed, and it has been our happy arrangement ever since.

It is obvious why we should only own one car in Europe, as availability and access to public transport and shared mobility offerings are ubiquitous. However, our decision was also a deeply personal one, based on years of endless and unhealthy commuting.

Now that we’re in Europe, I walk everywhere, own a bike and use public transport and micromobility as much as possible. Although COVID has interrupted my international travel and overemphasized my teleworking activities, this is an arrangement that will remain. Since my first few years were spent in the car, I would like to regain this time with more active forms of mobility for the environment and my health.

Do electric cars excite your electrons? Do e-bikes make your wheels spin? Do self-driving cars bring you all to charge?

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