"There are many people who regard walking from place to place as "dead time" that they resent losing." Interesting choice of words. Walking is a big part of my recovery from cancer treatment, and I look at it quite the opposite from "dead" time. I view every hour I walk as one extra hour I will live, so it is very much "free" time to me, time to live that doesn't count against against my lifespan. I walk about 30-60 minutes a day, to work and back, and while it has a purpose and a destination, I vary the route every single time and keep an awareness: what am I going to learn this time? I love it.
Awesome. Myself, I'm taking baby steps. And by baby steps I mean a bicycle. I decided that I'm going to bike to work this Spring and Summer. It will be much more enjoyable. The absolute hardest thing to do is going to beeaving the garage on my bicycle and not my motorcycle on a sunny Summer morning. It's a bit less than two miles away, so it isn't that far at all.