I'm fortunate to have a bicycle Co-op in my city. It's a do it yourself workshop to fix your bike and upgrade parts when the time comes. The staff are volunteers and the bikes they sell are all donated. Great tuned up second hand bikes can be purchased for $50. I enjoy using top of the line 1990s technology in my commuter bikes which can be had for a fraction for the price of new bikes.

We are also lucky to have youtube with lots of tutorials which I wish I had when I was first learning.

I agree the relative maintenance of cars is much lower, but I equate the time it takes to clean my chain to be the same as stopping to get fuel for my car.

I'm not against cars, I just feel the cost of ownership is underestimated.