[UnserMannInK]

True, the price tag might buy you a second hand car. But if you factor in the maintenance cost of cars it comes in cheap in comparison. I’ve just had to replace the clutch in my car (~2200€), whereas having the whole transmission (all sprockets and the chain) in a bike fixed is around 250-300€. Less if you do it yourself.

And being able to do it myself feels really good, I couldn’t agree more!

[getwiththeprog]

For the price of registering a car for one year in Australia, one can buy a really awesome bike new.

[mianos]

With insurance you get get two. Of course if you have two, that's not enough. I think the correct number is N + 1. Everyone says Sydney is the worst place in the world to ride a bike, but, it's still better than any other form of transport for a short distance.

[drdo]

Do you have some exotic luxury car? What kind of clutch costs 2.2k euro?

[fho]

It's not the clutch ... It's 100+ €/h for a skilled worker who replaced that clutch.

[bluescrn]

Post-inflation labour cost most likely. The clutch will be a small fraction of that.

[UnserMannInK]

Nothing exotic, a Peugeot Traveller van. The spare parts were 700€, rest was labor. Took a whole day to take apart the transmission/front axle and put it all together again.

[btach]

Ugh, that is why I have always done my own car work. Many potential downsides, but for me the upsides have outweighed the downsides.

[enneff]

Not to mention fuel.

[stavros]

Right, but you realize that comparing a bike to a car is a bit ridiculous, right? They're for very different use cases.

[UnserMannInK]

I agree. But if the use case is „take one person for a <10km commute“ then the comparison is fair.