But when he moved, Gill soon came to believe that the trouble of owning a vehicle outweighed its utility. Between the cost of gas and insurance, not to mention the everyday hassles of searching for parking or worrying about dings, dents and break-ins, he realized that having a car in the city was, simply, "a pain in the ass."
The city has long had something of a fickle relationship with automobiles - not surprising, considering that the core of the city was laid out more than two centuries before Gottlieb Daimler stuck an engine in a stagecoach.
And now, thanks to a still shaky economy, rising gas prices and a newfound appreciation of Philly's walkable (and bikable) streets, living without a car is an increasingly attractive option - something a lot of residents have figured out. Nearly a third of all households in the city don't have a vehicle, according to the Census Bureau's 2009 American Community Survey. At the same time, only about 60 percent of city residents get to their jobs via an automobile, according to census data, a figure that is lower than for all but a few other cities. A quarter of Philadelphians commute via public transit, and nearly 9 percent walk to work - figures that are among the highest in the country.
"A lot of people are [living without a car], whether it's convenient or not," said Alex Doty, the executive director of the Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia. "You can certainly get along fine without one. There are neighborhoods where it's more convenient not to have a car, and it's certainly cheaper."
To be sure, not all of those people have chosen to live a carless lifestyle; a sizable number of Philly residents simply can't afford an automobile. Even so, in Houston and Phoenix, both of which are comparable to Philadelphia in population and demographics, only 1 percent of households go without.
