I am an overprivileged, overpaid Australian

…so I am planning to buy a car approximately two seconds after I return to Canberra.

I’ve been looking at cars (and car loans, but that is another entry entirely) and after looking at the low end of the market, with all the teeny tiny little vehicles, I am still pissed off that Australia doesn’t have proper public transport or a decent rail network or less polluting cars or that system where people just use plug in cars to get around town (you know - you don’t own the car, you pay to use it for a short time and just drop it off at one of many depots).

I mean in 2004 when I bought my first car, there was no way I could afford a Prius, the only hybrid car I knew of available, and there were questions about its green credentials anyway because it was still new. I ended up with a Hyundai Getz, for many good reasons and it was a great little car, but one of the reasons was that it had a relatively low emissions level.

5 years later and nothing has changed except there are now more alternatives Australia should and could be doing rather than letting private car ownership tootle us along merrily on the road to hell!

Anyway, I thought I should look at other cars in the small car class, but I haven’t seen any reason to deviate. I looked at Mazda2, Toyota Yaris (Yes I know you love yours Amanda), Ford Fiesta and Honda Jazz. Of them all, the Fiesta was the one I thought I’d be maybe best with… except it’s quite a bit more expensive than a Getz.

I’d love to not have to own a car, given I probably don’t need one to get to work, but damn. You can’t get anywhere at night time or anywhere other than city centres using the bus system, at least not without ridiculous lengths of time.

Any opinions? I might start a discussion on Facebook.