Originally published in the February 26, 2008 edition of The Lantern. It is posted here unedited.
It’s no secret that going green is hip these days.
In an age of hybrids, bio-fuels and everything organic, it’s hard not to be conscious of our energy use and how it impacts the environment – as well as the smugness that comes with being eco-friendly.
Columbus and Ohio State have both been actively pursuing sustainable living ideas for citizens and students, whether by implementing new policies or by retro-fitting old ones. But one solution to energy conservation that seems most obvious is often the hardest for us to buck: We need to drive less. And several Columbus companies are taking note.
The Columbus Dispatch reported Saturday about a program that pays workers $1 each time they walk or ride a bike to work and 50 cents each time they carpool or take the bus. EcoBucks, the ironic name of the Wisconsin-based program that recently migrated to the Buckeye State, is paid for by participating companies and answers the question of how we reduce the amount we drive – by offering incentives not to.
“Our goal is to improve our own health and that of our community,” Douglas Morgan told the Dispatch. As a managing partner of a downtown law firm that recently implemented the program, Morgan said his workers responded immediately to the offer.
Is it not ironic that lawyers, who arguably don’t feel the sting of rising energy costs quite like the rest of us, are the first to act on an initiative like this? I’m sure it’s not the $20 a month that motivates them. And why would a company pay out of its own pocket when there’s no tangible benefit in return? Ken Leinbach, creator of EcoBucks, seems to know.
“Biking or walking to work enhances the connection between mind, body and spirit,” he said in a release from the Milwaukee Urban Ecology Center. “Healthier workers are happier. Happier workers are more productive.”
I’d say the same for students, who needn’t worry about driving, parking and the price of gasoline – which seems to rise with the rate of tuition.
But for us it’s easy. For the most part, we live, work and go to school in a campus area small enough to walk and easily navigated by bike or bus. It’s when we graduate and move toward the sprawl of suburbia that we truly become dependent on transportation. But I’d rather know now how I can help out later.
Judging by the always-full bike racks on campus, Columbus’ overall bicycle culture and the Mayor’s commitment to public transportation, we’re making positive strides in reducing our dependency on oil by finding other ways to get from here to there.
I know several professors and university employees who ride their bicycles or walk to work, weather permitting, and I’m sure I’d know a lot more if the university offered something comparable to EcoBucks.
Think about it. The opportunities for wordplay abound: We could call it EcoBuckeyeBucks or simply E-Bucks, or my personal favorite, Brut Bucks (see: Shrute Bucks).
In its most-basic form, the idea of how we use transportation gives rise to some philosophical questions: Why do we drive so much? It is because we need to go places and at rates higher than in the past. Why is everything so far away from each other then? It is because our society has developed into communities of houses, and we drive to malls and grocery megaplexes for the things we need.
It might be cheaper with the housing market already in shambles, but we might well make up for it in fuel costs and traffic-induced stress levels, some day.
In the meantime, my bicycle is my third leg. Chances are it will stay that way until it costs 20 cents a mile to ride, like my car does.
