Alternate forms of transportation: THE METRO. In pursuit of a greener lifestyle I have begun to ride my bike to work and if I’m not summoning the energy I take the metro. If you happen to be lucky enough to work and live by the stops you owe it to yourself to start riding. You can map out the trips and times on the website at: http://www.metro.net/riding_metro/default.htm

So what’s so great about the trains you might ask?

1. The obvious, you save A LOT of money on gas. The metro website has an actual calculator to show you exactly how much money you are saving when you map out your trip.
2. LESS STRESS! What’s worse than having a long aggravating day at work and then have to fight packs of disgruntled road rage filled drivers to get home for an hour? Not much in my book! Having been a heavy commuter at least 2 hours of driving a day to and from work for many years I can happily say that the metro experience is completely amazing! Instead of high stress precautious driving, you can zone out, be in a mix of crazy people, listen to your favorite tunes in your headphones and read your favorite book. It’s a super safe atmosphere and there is tons of security everywhere for all you skeptical girls out there. And you might even meet new friends!
3. EXERCISE and Good health: If you happen to work in an office sitting at a desk all day working long hours like me, than you know that there isn’t much exercise going on in your life. By bringing some walking time into your life on a regular basis, you are being proactive toward being a healthier person. I’ve already felt a great difference and am siked to keep it up in my life.
4. Helping Traffic and supporting an LA Cause. Not only are you helping to take one car off of the roads, you are voting for a better LA by supporting a mode of transportation that is environmentally friendly. Less Smog, less Cars, and choosing a healthy form of transportation. Pat yourself on the back! By riding the Metro even one day out of the week, you are adding yourself to the legions of community and health conscious citizens of LA. Which hopefully will be even more recognized and get even more metro stops out into LA for those not fortunate to live by one at the moment.

Alternate forms of transportation: THE BIKE. This morning I rode my bike to work. This is a 14 mile jaunt for me. Some along the roads and mostly along the LA bike river trail. Biking is a totally cool niche in LA. Most of the trails are paved really well and my bike trail goes through Griffith Park which is really beautiful to cruise through. If you are looking for bike paths that might lie between your dwelling and work, check out: http://www.labikepaths.com/

For lots more info on biking events and resource links I really like this site:
http://la-bike.org/index.html

There is a really cool community of people in the bicycling realm and they have workshops, if you want to build your own bike, or trick it out so that it has all the bells and whistles you want. You can check this out at:
http://www.bicyclekitchen.com/who.html

There is a really cool article that was written on why biking in LA rocks here:
http://www.slate.com/id/2130978/

So Why bike in LA?
1. For all you skeptics out there that know how car congested LA is, then you might be concerned about biking next to cars. I say…Find the trails! Believe it or not, they exist! And then you won’t have to feel stressed out biking next to cars, which I admit is not so great. But the trails are amazing and they go for long stretches car free. If you happen to be on a road though, USE THE SIDEWALK. Because no one else does! In LA it’s a well-known fact that no one “walks” anywhere. Steve Martin did a whole bit in it in LA Story because it was such an absurd fact about LA. So get on the sidewalk if you feel uncomfortable next to the cars.
2. It’s GREAT for you! Talk about getting healthy and in shape, you’ll lose a ton of weight doing this activity and get your stomach and legs toned. I highly recommend it for getting in shape!
3. GREAT WAY to DESTRESS! It’s so easy at work to get wound up and stressed out. This is another fabulous way to take out your pent up energy and funnel it into a work out. I like to sweat out all the stress and take all the thoughts out of my head, plug into my music and get into an exercising rhythm. So for me it is a mental health thing too, because after I go biking, even though I’m physically tired, I feel really good mentally and physically which makes everything just a notch better.
4. It’s FREE. After you get the equipment of course. But after that, no gas to pay. Not much else to say here.
5. Helping Traffic and supporting an LA Cause. Not only are you helping to take one car off of the roads, you are voting for a better LA by supporting a mode of transportation that is environmentally friendly. Less Smog, less Cars, and choosing a healthy form of transportation. Pat yourself on the back! By biking even one day out of the week, you are adding yourself to the legions of community and health conscious citizens of LA. Which hopefully will be even more recognized and get even more bike trails out into LA for those not fortunate to live by a good bike trail.

And that’s my 2 cents for today!

::Alexis::
Senior Designer, NBC.com