When the Going Gets Tough, the Green Go Shopping?
My three-year old son has a remarkable penchant for elevators and escalators. To us they are conveyances, tools to get us from one point to another. To a three-year-old, they are magic carpets, whisking him up and down to places exotic – like the second floor. We can convince him to go nearly anywhere if we can promise him that part of the excursion involves taking an elevator. Trips to the pediatrician? No problem, the office is on the second floor of a building with an elevator. Take him with us when my husband and I have tandem chiropractor appointments (the family that adjusts together….)? Between the elevator trip to the third floor and the cute receptionist who prints out coloring sheets from the Nick Jr. website, he’s as happy as a clam.
We live close to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum’s Udvar-Hazy Center, a huge hangar museum with historic aircraft and spacecraft ranging from a replica of the Wright Brother’s first aircraft, to the Enola Gay to the Space Shuttle. We’ve been taking the Littlest Pundit there since he was six months old. His favorite part of the trip has nothing to do with the really cool, shiny aircraft. It’s the elevator ride to the observation tower where you can watch planes take off and land at Dulles International Airport. The observation tower itself is only good for a few minutes of entertainment, despite the jumbo jets passing by. It is ALL about the elevator ride.
If my son could live at a Hampton Inn with an elevator, I think he would. Not only does it have an elevator, but each suite comes equipped with sliding doors in the room that he can pretend is an elevator when mother and father are too busy to escort him on the real thing.
See, I do not live in some hip, urban center where every building has an elevator. Unlike my apartment-dwelling New York bretheren, I don’t ride an elevator every day to go to work or go home. I live in suburbia. Elevators are a special occurrence. So it goes without saying that a large mall, replete with multiple elevators and escalators is about as close to heaven as one gets as far as my son is concerned.
On rainy mornings when there wasn’t much to do, and mommy was feeling a wee bit cranky, I thought nothing of saying, “Let’s go ride the elevators!” A trip to the mall on a weekday morning isn’t such a bad thing as far as crowds go. And really, honestly, though I consider myself to possess a black belt in shopping, I am not one of those women who buys lots of stuff. I am capable of resisting the urge to acquire unless it is something that I really need and is perfect for the appointed task. In fact, I hold off buying things as much as I possibly can. All this is to say, that walking around a mall for the sole purpose of using the elevators and escalators seems as natural a use of my time in a mall as any other.
It is quite possible that I have indulged my son a bit too much on the elevator thing.
Now, he’ll get in these moods, where the only thing that will make him happy is a trip to visit an elevator. And it would be my luck that he would hit one of those moods on the weekend that the mall is most likely to be crowded beyond belief with shopping fools who have had their souls sucked out by American commercialism. And I am just tired enough from the foo and wah of a turkey-based holiday that brings together all of the worst parts of extended family togetherness, and it is just rainy and cold enough, to think that maybe, just maybe this isn’t a bad idea.
Which is how this morning, I found myself piled into the family vehicle with my husband and son, headed for the mall with no intention to actually shop for anything.
And it is also how I found this:
Did I mention that as part of reducing our carbon footprint, my family vehicle is a hybrid? Now, I have seen special parking spaces reserved for pregnant women. My grocery story even reserves spaces for parents with children. And of course, parking lots are required by law to make space for the handicapped. But this was a new one. Suddenly, my choice of a more environmentally friendly car warrants a privileged parking space.
As the beneficiary of a newfound semi-exclusive privilege I can’t say I mind. And here in the land of suburbia where there are still more than a few idiots driving Hummers (yes, really…saw one at the grocery store last week), none of the three available “hybrid spaces” were taken. Sad, really. But the lack of consciousness of my neighbors (or their not having bought a new car recently) is apparently my gain.
But I have to wonder, why do this? And does it help? Am I more likely to buy a hybrid vehicle if I know that owning one will give me special parking privileges at the mall? Am I more likely to shop at the mall knowing that as the owner of a hybrid vehicle I get special privileges? Is there something demographically speaking about hybrid car owners that would make the mall management want to cater to them? I simply don’t know the answers to these questions.
All I know is that it just got a little easier to indulge my son’s elevator habit…..and I don’t know if that helps, either.
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Comments
I, too, find the reserved hybrid spaces create a dissonance. Glad for you, though.
I go there often just to walk, window shop and get ideas for future buys. On top, you get your exercise. I usually take the stairs though as I outgrew my infatuation with elevators and escalators at about age 10.
Nice story.
Thanks
Your comments are dead on.
good post
Suzy
I have one concern about our newly emerging green world, tho. And it applies to hybrids as well as anything else. What I see is the coming of a new disparity, a new class system, if you will, between those who are "green" and those who are not. Those who are green will be at the top of the pecking order and those who are not will be looked down on. But there is a problem with that.
The last people to join the green revolution as it applies to automobiles will be the same people who are now the last people to join any new breakthrough technology. They are now usually called working class people, poor people, or, if you are a sociologist I guess you would call them disadvantaged people.
But it is they who will least be able to afford to go green. They will be the ones driving the old gas guzzlers because those one time - not so long ago - preferred cars will become the cheapest used cars, ie: the cars and yes, the pickup trucks, that poor folk can almost afford. Actually they already are the cheapest used cars you can buy and we are just starting to convert the fleet of US owned cars to more efficient ones.
Those families, the working class poor disadvantaged ones, won't have the credit to buy a new hybrid; they will buy from Rent-A-Center auto equivelants like J. B. ByRrider, pay 20% interest on an old clunker, gas guzzler because that is the only credit they can get; and they can't save enough to pay cash because they have to eat; and they can't afford not to have a car or a pickup because they have to get to work so they can work to eat.
This country really needs to get a handle on where the poor will come out as we move forward with all our new, and admittedly necessary, green improvements. If not the poor will end up where they have always been in our society: screwed.
Monte
I totally understand your son's fixation with the elevators. I had a romance with escalators as a child -- the highlight of any mall trip (and, sadly, the nearest one available was 50 miles from my home). Nice post!
Now I work at home, sans elevator, so when I do go to a building that has one I get in and ride up and down all day long.
Not really. But I like the idea.
In America, with new technological breakthroughs they are not shared with the masses for cheap. In Japan, the auto industry has flourished because they have honor and pride. It's from the top down and back up again. Pride. Where the American autoworkers put their pride into the workmanship of cars, the heads of the Big Three have not. If Honda or Toyota comes up with something that benefits the entire country of Japan, they don't gouge their countrymen and women. They share it with them.
In America, like with Hybrid technology, they make sure we pay out the ass for it, even if it doesn't cost a damn bit more to produce.
That is what sucks about our de-regulators, they never "urge" industry or corporations to "do the right thing".
You're right Monte, how is middle to lower America supposed to do the right thing with purchasing a Hybrid car when they can't afford it? I applaud families like Liz' that purchase Green with great intentions. I feel for everyone who would, but can't.
Magic!
rated, of course
Michael Rodgers -- nope. no Hummer parking. I think I'd have puked if they had.
Greg -- okay now I feel a little less self conscious about the whole elevator thing.
Suzy, thanks.
Monte, I share your misgivings about how the green revolution is definitely taking on a "have and have not" quality to it. Because a lot of the greening of our lives is going to boil down to technology, it's going to by its very nature involve money. The important thing is going to be taking the "moral" veneer off of greenness. Otherwise, as you say, suddenly being too poor to afford something becomes a moral failing as opposed to evidence of a nation whose moral obligation to the poor needs better attention.
Saturn, the funny part here is how frightened I was of escalators as a child. I was seriously afraid I'd get stuck in one.
Monique, O'K, my nephew lives in Manhattan. For him, elevators do not offer any magic. They are merely a part of life. I am not so sure that's a good thing.
(real green for the masses)
Those "Hybrid Parking" signs look like they could be in Cobb, Gwinnett or Peachtree City, Georgia--three other rich, white suburbs of a big city (Atlanta) that routinely fight the expansion of public rail projects out to their exclusive areas (which aren't nearly as exclusive as $100,000 median income Fairfax County, Va.)
From what I've heard, rail is coming to Tysons' Corner, but there is still controversy about when and what type...
To be fair, bus service to Tysons' is available--but as someone who has personally taken a bus to Farifax County (and then been stranded and forced to hitchhike back), the routes aren't the most convenient or reliable.
The interesting thing about the rail to tysons is that some of the fight is also environmental -- the principal argument is whether to do overland rail or a tunnel.
And they are trying to get the Metro out there. It's just a question of paying for it.
Maybe your son recognizes the elevators as some sort of portal? He's still young enough that he might not have forgotten his "before." ;~)
Frankly, I prefer escalators over elevators, mostly because you don't usually have to wait for them, and because the view is better, and I'm less likely to be sideswiped by a backpack or have my space invaded by a leaky iPod or a cell phone conversation.
Also, the elevators in the building where I work need some serious therapy. One in particular. I have named it the passive-aggressive elevator. Often, it will not stop on a requested floor, but will pass it by, which is why some of us have learned to punch in more than one floor. And when it does deign to stop, it won't open the doors unless you push the button again, as soon as the light goes off. They're old, the building is old, and they constantly being serviced or repaired. I don't think they could be replaced, though. They seem small compared to newer elevators.
I'm wondering what your son's fascination with elevators and escalators will look like when he's older.
Boulder came up with the "alternative vehicle" spaces awhile ago. It's always such a tease. You see the empty space on a crowded morning, and you think to yourself, "This must be my lucky day!", only to then be greeted by a metal sign that sends the blood flowing to your face and the age old embarrassment of getting something wrong. These signs scream discrimination and I'm contacting the ACLU first thing in the AM.
(Once in a while I'll see less-expensive vehicles in those spots, but they usually have special tags that seem to make them an exception to the expensive-vehicle-only limitation. It's nice that rich folks are sometimes willing to share with the less fortunate.)
When the going gets tough in 2008--the people who have the money to buy hybrid vehicles aren't nearly as affected. So why not shop?
I did enjoy the parts about elevator riding though.
I have to weigh in on the hybrid parking though, and the whole unfettered love-of-hybrid thing in general. Monte Canfield not only made a good point, he said something few people are brave enough to say, which is that you generally have to have money to be really green, and that "greenness" is often more of a measure of relative wealth than of relative environmental awareness.
Personally, I like to see the spots nearest the store reserved for those folks who have difficulty walking from their cars for whatever reason. The rest of us, whether we can afford a hybrid or not, can walk.
Also, I'd like to point out that there are hybrids, and then there are hybrids. There are truck hybrids which -- while laudable for getting significantly better fuel economy than their traditional truck brethren -- still consume plenty-o-fuel. Some "traditional" gasoline engine cars get better fuel economy than some hybrids, and some people who drive hybrids use more gas than people who drive "traditional" IC engine cars. I'm more than a little perturbed that we seem to be judging people on their greenness, or rather, their *perceived* greenness, when the car you drive is only one measure of how environmentally concerned or environmentally aware you are. (Also, driving habits matter. You can take a vehicle that's rated for a certain mileage by the EPA, and get significantly less miles per gallon of fuel used if you have a lead foot and are fond of jackrabbit starts.)
In other words, I think a non-hybrid small car (one that gets more than 30mpg, like a Saturn Astra, Ford Focus, Honda Civic, or VW Golf) should qualify for "environmental parking upgrades" before a hybrid full-size truck does.
Maybe we should make people carry cards around that specify their carbon footprint, and then use our carbon footprint number as a multiplier for every purchase. That'd be "fair." In other words, if you drive your Toyota Prius 100 miles a day and park it in a 4-car garage attached to your 4000sf McMansion, you have to pay more -- for everything -- than your neighbor who lives in a 1200sf rowhouse and drives his full-size Silverado 12 miles round-trip to Home Depot twice a week.
I once pointed out to some of my friends and neighbors that, rather than obsess over minimizing their own carbon footprint (which is already small, given the choices we've made to live in cohousing -- feel free to google it to find out more about it if you're unfamiliar with the term), they should volunteer their time and money to help some local families who live in 100-year-old houses with leaky doors and windows button up their houses. I don't think anyone appreciated my input, but I remain convinced that this is the right approach -- i.e., not spending all of our time and money navel-gazing and patting ourselves on the backs for "buying green," but helping those who can't afford to help themselves. A lot of people -- and I mean a *lot* of people -- not only can't afford to buy green, they can't even afford to *live* green.
I hope the Obama administration addresses this issue. It can be addressed (although not completely solved) with judicious use of tax credits and incentives, and also through private programs like Habitat for Humanity aimed at insulating and winterizing old houses. But it probably won't be.
There's a organization in Massachusetts that does this for some folks who can't afford it themselves, I think with help from state and/or federal funding. Saves taxpayers money in the long run, given that (I think) it mostly helps people who qualify for heating assistance.
I have always marveled at what a child will fascinate him or herself with when left to their own devices. A wooden spoon and a pot can occupy them for hours.
Re: Green Parking Spaces
Green is trendy. Everyone seeks to jump on the bandwagon. Those parking spaces advertise their conscientousness to green issues. Given green practioners in general and hybrid drivers in specific are largely affluent people with discretionary income, such a pitch makes a lot of sense.
Eco-imagination anyone?
I now want to visit the Smithsonian, I could watch airplanes take off and land all day long. Is it in DC?
When I was finishing my theater degree in the 90's I got a gig with several other of our design tech staff and students to put up the holiday decorations in Tyson's. We'd go in after the mall closed and work until about 6 am. My job was to drive around a 40 foot boom lift on the second level. The lift allowed me to reach all the way to the highest points of the mall skylights to hang all the lights, chandeliers, angels and whatnot. OMG, I had so much fun. Up. Down.Up. Down. Look up next time you go to Tyson's, you'll see how high it is. Wheeeee!
Our tech director was even more of a nut case than me. He operated the 60 foot boom lift on the ground floor. His basket had a hydraulic leak and kept tipping over, so he strapped himself in with climbing gear. Every once in a while the basket tipped over without warning - and he'd laugh hysterically.
Very fun post - I can fully empathize with the Littlest Pundit.