Carpooling in Hungary

There are Park and Ride car parks around Budapest. Parking is free. The one I use is Kelenföld but it's always full up unless you go early or late.   Public transport in the city is pretty good and you can go pretty much anywhere without taking the car if you have plenty of time.

I am not aware of any car pooling in the countryside where I live.

Everyone now has a car. And they use them. Alone.

But it gets worse. In my small local village I have even seen people drive their car a very, very short distance from their house to the little village store to shop. I feel like I am back in LA.

klsallee wrote:

I am not aware of any car pooling in the countryside where I live.

Everyone now has a car. And they use them. Alone.

But it gets worse. In my small local village I have even seen people drive their car a very, very short distance from their house to the little village store to shop. I feel like I am back in LA.

That goes to my beef of a lot of the narrower country HU roads not having pavements (US: sidewalks) or separated cycle paths.   That also occurs in some smaller towns/villages.  Some of the roads around here I would not even cycle on let alone walk.  Some pedestrians have no choice but they often walk in the same direction as the traffic rather than towards it.  Very dangerous.

fluffy2560 wrote:

[
That goes to my beef of a lot of the narrower country HU roads not having pavements (US: sidewalks) or separated cycle paths.   That also occurs in some smaller towns/villages.  Some of the roads around here I would not even cycle on let alone walk.

Rant---

Wait for it... it gets worse where I live.

The government added a higher road tax for trucks on many roads. To avoid the tax, very large trucks now take smaller roads. Near where I live. That makes cycling not only more dangerous, but the roads have been beaten apart now from the heavy trucks. I have noted a signigicant degradation of roads where I live because of this. Which makes it even worse.

Also, there is a bike road, in some places, but it is "questionably" maintained. There are many areas where grass is growing over edges, narrowing it, and making using it in peak season also a problem as two way bike traffic is not easy.

But, wait, it gets even worse....

We also now have a lot of SUV "wide" sized cars in Hungary where I live (Nouveau riche have come into the area in the past 3 years). And many of the existing "roads" on the hill here are not wide enough to walk along if a modern wide wheel based SUV comes along. And yet, some of those roads are actually listed as "hiking paths" by the National Park and Government. Some of those same roads are located in hill cuts were there is nothing but a hill on either side. I have had to literally climb up a slippery dirt hill to avoid a passing car (many do not even slow down), because the nearby property owner (new owner, and not living here full time) recently cut down all the vegetation, which was earlier protecting the hill from erosion from rain et al.  so they could get a better view of the lake.... for the three days they are here each year.

We did notice a carpooling add on one of the HU language sites, may of been Varta.hu?
We for a split second thought, yes we can drive to balaton and take at least 2 or 3 others in our car and let them pay for the petrol.
Gave up on the idea within a few moments however...
We hate to hang around waiting for people who may or may not ever show up to the meeting spot on time etc.
I tried to carpool in Hawaii with a fellow co-worker.
Her car was broke down and we worked 90 mins away from Hilo in the same beauty salon.
I would pick her up once I traveled down the 25 mins it took me to get down from the mountain where we had a home.
I used to wait and wait for her to show up at our meeting spot.her husband was to drop her off .
We had to hit the road by 7:30 am to get to the shop by 9 am when it was suppose to open up.
I am the sort who likes to arrive at least 15 mins early to get myself together.
One day she was nearly one hour late, I waited like a fool for her.
She said sorry one of her kids couldn't find his slipper( flip-flops.
That was it, I told her she would have to find another ride to work .
It was weird because the salon was so far off and we lived in the same town, made me feel stupid to try and help her out.
She soon quit the job, in many ways I missed her but was also glad I was off the hook with giving her rides.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

I tried to carpool in Hawaii with a fellow co-worker.

This not an atypical story.

I love the idea of car pools, but human nature eventually intervenes, and then reality hits. Hard. Badly. Often on the day you really needed to be on time....

I prefer Van Pools. They are a paid service. I used one for years when still living in LA. Paid services are much preferable to the "kindness" of people when you require regularity.

If one is laid back and can accept things "whenever" then shard services are fine. But, IMHO, not so much for timely transportation.

Yes at the time there was no bus service or Uber in Hawaii and hard to find a good job as well. Had to drive over 90 mins each way to work on the other side of the Island.
Nice lady but later found out she became a heroin addict, I gave her many chances but I had to stop helping her when she was ruining my rep. by being late for work and keeping clients waiting.
People seem to always try to take advantage.

Marilyn Tassy wrote:

Yes at the time there was no bus service or Uber in Hawaii and hard to find a good job as well. Had to drive over 90 mins each way to work on the other side of the Island.
Nice lady but later found out she became a heroin addict, I gave her many chances but I had to stop helping her when she was ruining my rep. by being late for work and keeping clients waiting.
People seem to always try to take advantage.

I don't think car pooling is a thing in Europe.  I don't know anywhere I've been at work in Europe where they do that.  Probably because public transport is more easily available at a reasonable cost (not including the UK) and the distances are much shorter.  The lifestyle is different too - people tend to stick in the same place and live closer to work - even within cycling distance which would also be my ideal.  My neighbour in Austria would rather take a lower paid job to stay in the same area.  The UK is different, there's always been a commuting culture but usually it involves going by train to the city.   I did it for a couple of years but the costs were horrendous. 

Apparently there's a heroin dealer within a just a few km of anyone anywhere in Europe.  My eldest HU Fluffyette was asked if she wanted some "pills" by one of the senior kids at school.    They then try techniques like saying it'll help you get more friends and so on.  Kids in that "dark teens" age are very susceptible to manipulation.   Who knows what those pills are - gateway drugs maybe?

I used to "pop pills" in high school, speed was my thing, 10 pills for a buck. Used to skip my lunches and use the money for pills instead. My mom used to freak out because I was losing weight even though I was not ever overweight, had a complete stop to my female cycles for over 6 months, mom again freaked out, she thought I was having a baby!! Funny cause I never even kissed a boy at that time!!
Anyways, yes, I called up my old boss in Hawaii and she told me our friend had gone down hill, she was the mother of 4 too.
Hawaii is like that, either you make it there or you go down hard. My good friend who has lived there for over 40 years has one son who is a doctor in Honolulu and the other, well they need to work so hard in their senior years to pay for his treatments in Cali for drug abuse. He is in and out of clinics all the time, really sad.
Her ex-husband I knew, we used to work out in the same Hilo gym, nice half Japanese guy who had his own reality co. Well sad to say my friend who was off Island at a work thing, she was a social worker in fact, was gone when her one son found their father dead in bed from a drug overdoes. So hard to believe he did that, he was on the outside a real normal straight serious guy.
Not sure which son found their dad the one who is also a druggie or the doctor, I am afraid to ask her and bring up old hurts.
I know my older sister used to try to get me to smoke pot when I was 12, didn't do it in fact I told my eldest sister who of course told our mom and I was not allowed to hang with my sister for a a few years, about 2 years time. I used to visit her in the summers since she lived on a ranch with horses and sat with her firends while they got high,not my thing to do, would rather ride a horse then take Horse!!
Good to have serious talk with your kids, my school mate did herself in when we were 33 years old, she was always taking drugs in school, I mean heavy downers she got from her mom and granny. They both were so out of it everything i visited their home that they never noticed she was helping herslef to their stash. My friend was super smart but did dumb things. We shared a BD and every time that day rolls around , remember her, my other friend who just died last month passed on my BD as well... I give up on BD'sOpps, what does this have to do with carpooling?