As a teenager in Red Ken’s London I took every advantage of the free public transport; I bussed it and tubed it everywhere, and when I was old enough to drive a clapped out Mini, still used the Routemaster and the underground more often than not.
Moving out of the capital to college, I had an ancient bicycle, the kind Miss Marple perched on, upright and heavy, requiring enthusiastic peddling to gain a respectable speed. I hated the hills and detested the rain, but the bike was never nicked and I could rely on it to take me exactly where I wanted to go.
Next, I went back a few eras and learned to ride a horse. I lived on a farm with a riding school; a buggy was built and in fine weather it was horse and cart to the butchers and the pub.
It’s a different team of horses though, here, now, in Devon. If you don’t drive and have a car, you are at the mercy of someone who does.
Take a train? There used to be a line from Plymouth to Exeter, passing through Okehampton, but the railway was demolished in 1968. Hop on a bus? If it’s Tuesday you can head off to Bideford, and come back again, which is reassuring; or three days a week you can hitch a ride to Okey. No hope of getting there before 10am or leaving after 3pm, so it’s not what I’d call a viable travel to work option. Mind you, Devon Wheels2Work will loan a natty scooter if you’re finding it difficult to get to your paid toil; surprisingly the country lanes aren’t yet riddled with them.
A Ring & Ride scheme for the disabled, frail and elderly enables them (and possibly me in years to come) to shop and use local amenities, and a community car scheme run by saintly volunteers can get you to the doctor.
For everyone else with a scheduled life and jobs to go to there’s the Fare Car, taking upright, well-organised, pre-booked citizens to work and back at the end of the day, £5 return. Phew; getting your head round the options and non-options is a lot more complicated than it used to be.
So, that leaves me and the mobile majority of country folk over the age of seventeen, with non-standard schedules and busy lives, completely reliant on the car. And for farmers it’s not just about transporting yourself; trucks, pick-ups, utes, crew-cabs, 4×4’s, whatever they’re called, it’s as vital a bit of farming kit as the tractor (which could, I suppose, also take you to town at a push, although parking might be interesting). I have to nurture my ageing “Chelsea tractor”, with its increasing tax and fuel burden, so that I can cart around livestock feed and farming bits and bobs without stuff dangling precariously out of a small car’s window, boot or sunroof, and to tow the trailer to the abattoir or pick up new stock. Round here the 4×4 is not so much a lifestyle statement as a workhorse.
Published in The Landsman October/November 2008 Issue10
