Car-free and Carefree
By Sergio De Freitas Gomes, Squeaky Wheels Board Member
A Week Without Driving is October 1 - 8, 2026. I haven’t owned a car in several years. When my spouse and I moved to her hometown in Germany, the choice to be car-free was easy. There were two grocery stores within 500 meters of where we lived and a couple more within a kilometer. Practically every amenity could be easily walked or biked to. We even had a pleasant pedestrian-only city center. If we needed to go anywhere further, there was a train station a short 5-minute bike ride away with both regional and long-distance high-speed trains. We didn’t live in a big city, this was a small rural town of about 60,000 people and typical for Germany.
When we decided to move to Washington our goal was to emulate our German lifestyle as much as possible. Neither of us love driving plus the greater Seattle area is expensive, so if we could cut the cost of a car + insurance we’d save a lot of money. Since the USA is obscenely car-oriented, much research was required to decide where exactly to live. The tool close.city was indispensable. Define the amenities important to you and the tool color-codes city blocks based on the travel time to the furthest selected amenities. We narrowed potential cities to two neighborhoods, one in Seattle and Winlow in Bainbridge. Both had everything we wanted. We landed on Winslow.
I can’t say much for the rest of the island but living in Winslow without a car is easy. It’s relatively bike-friendly, there are two grocery stores nearby and all the other basic amenities. The abundance of trails and little shortcuts through neighborhoods are a delight. Everything is close together and the city planning seems to be more rational than in other parts of the island. It reminds me of other pre-WWII city centers in the USA so I’m sure we mostly have historical circumstances to thank for this. While I do appreciate some of the improvements I’ve seen in infrastructure, the city doesn’t seem to have much urgency in implementing their plans. I also wish they were a bit bolder. Winslow Way should be pedestrianized between Ericksen and Madison, or at the very least be made into a shared street. Also, a pedestrian/cyclist bridge over the 305 between Winslow Way and High School Road would be awesome. Overall though, Winslow is certainly not a bad place to be a cyclist or pedestrian.
All of that being said there are some downsides to not owning a car here. We live in a famously affluent area yet many roads do not have bike lanes or sidewalks. As much as some people here would like to ignore this fact, we do live in Kitsap County. Public transit connections around Kitsap are abysmal unless you are a commuter going to very specific places during commuting periods. Taking a bus to Silverdale for a doctor’s appointment would take about 2 hours if you’re lucky. I’ve occasionally tried to take the infrequent bus to Kingston to visit family and sometimes it doesn’t show up. Luckily, there is the ZEV car share service based out of city hall. Yes, we do end up deciding to take a car once or twice a month. If the bus service was more frequent and reliable we wouldn’t need to, but for now that’s just how it is. I hear that there might be more foot-ferry connections at some point but at the speed things happen here, I’d be lucky to experience that in my lifetime.
Not owning a car in Winslow is straightforward and convenient. If you live in Winslow and haven’t tried going without your car for a week or two you absolutely should. We should push for faster and more ambitious infrastructure improvements to get people out of their cars. It’s better for our health and planet! Try to go car-free for a Week Without Driving, October 1 - 8.