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Commuting? Have you done the math?

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Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#51

Post by rayiner »

incision wrote: post #48
rayiner wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those systems are extremeley limited in terms of coverage relative to Metro North/LIRR in NYC or Metra in Chicago. A huge amount of the residential development in northern VA is out in Fairfax County, and that area is just now getting a Metro line. Moreover, the metro stops in Vienna, Fairfax, etc, are god-awful. They're built in the middle of the woods so you have to drive to them. A sensible rail system needs to ha…

>Those systems are extremeley limited in terms of coverage relative to Metro North/LIRR in NYC or Metra in Chicago. A huge amount of the residential development in northern VA is out in Fairfax County, and that area is just now getting a Metro line. Moreover, the metro stops in Vienna, Fairfax, etc, are god-awful. They're built in the middle of the woods so you have to drive to them. A sensible rail system needs to h…

You asked why people don't take the Metro or MARC/VRE. I explained that it doesn't go to where people want. Having to use two modes, driving then rail, is a huge deal breaker. From where I used to live, I'd have to fight through route 7 traffic for 20 min to take a 35 minute train ride, or I could just keep driving for another 45 min. When you factor in parking the time saving is nothing. Yet in the NYC metro, I live as far away as I did in DC, and can easily walk to the train. As a result, something like 10x as many people use commuter rail in the NYC metro per capita. And Westchester isn't exactly super densely populated. It's just smartly designed, unlike the horribly sprawling DC suburbs. You have walkable little towns of 5,000 people served by a rail station instead of the cluster fuck that is Fairfax County.

Traffic is god's punishment to northern Virginia for letting subdivision developers basically do all the urban planning for the last 50 years.

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#53

Post by Osiris »

When I was offered a job earlier this year, the salary was substantially higher than my current salary, but that was not including the extra expenses I would incur.

My previous job I worked from home and traveled by air. My travel to the airport was covered by mileage reimbursement. Basically, I never paid for gas for work.

In my new job, I new I'd have a 25 mile (1-way) commute, coming to $160+ a month in gas. That took $2,000 right out of the higher salary.

On the same note, when I moved from the Bay Area to Denver, I stopped having to pay $140/mn in BART passes and worked from home instead, which was a nice savings in both money and time.

However, I did enjoy my time on BART. I had my laptop out the entire time working on code, except when I was unlucky enough to have to get on at Embarcadero and not get a seat until El Cerrito.

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#54

Post by nmridul »

twp wrote: post #22

Reasonable math. Personal anecdotal support: Daily commute is 1.5 hours each way by public transport. 75% of that time is useful. Net result is 5 * 2 * 1.5 = 15 hours spent sitting on the train each week, of which just(1 - 0.25) * 15 = 3.75 is wasted (mainly in changing from one vehicle to the next). This, superficially, doesn't sound so bad. My employer is understanding so I travel outside rush hour so I always get…

It depends on how many times a year you have to ship things to your home. And even for them, I try to have it scheduled around the weekends. Going to supermarket is another thing, but I mostly purchase the stuff during weekends. So very rarely I have to make a purchase during the weekday. And those are things that I try to get from the nearest convenient store.

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#55

Post by fitandfunction »

Yup. I've done the math. I think this math is a large determinant of the property values in dense cities (SF, NYC, etc).

For a few years, I took the subway (BART) from Berkeley to SF. In theory, I could have used that 45 min commute to do something useful. In practice, I spent most of it standing, packed in like sardines.

At first, it was hard to justify the huge increase in living expense by moving from Berkeley to SF. But the move decreased my commute from 45 min on public transportation to a 10 min walk.

Totally worth it.

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#56

Post by pwthornton »

rayiner wrote: post #51
incision wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Those systems are extremeley limited in terms of coverage relative to Metro North/LIRR in NYC or Metra in Chicago. A huge amount of the residential development in northern VA is out in Fairfax County, and that area is just now getting a Metro line. Moreover, the metro stops in Vienna, Fairfax, etc, are god-awful. They're built in the middle of the woods so you have to drive to them. A sensible rail system needs to h…

You asked why people don't take the Metro or MARC/VRE. I explained that it doesn't go to where people want. Having to use two modes, driving then rail, is a huge deal breaker. From where I used to live, I'd have to fight through route 7 traffic for 20 min to take a 35 minute train ride, or I could just keep driving for another 45 min. When you factor in parking the time saving is nothing. Yet in the NYC metro, I live…

I don't get why anyone would live in the DC region and not live near a rail station. I don't see the allure of NoVa outside of Arlington and Alexandria.

NoVa is getting a bit better with some town center developments in Fairfax, but it's quality of life is far behind other jurisdictions.

I live in Montgomery County right by a red line station. I have the good suburban schools, relatively low crime, plenty of stuff to walk to and an easy commute into DC via the metro (or buses). I just don't get the people in the DC region who spend hours upon hours commuting in cars. Yes, we Marc and VRE aren't the same level of what some other cities have, but we do have rail service and metro is one of the top public transportation systems in the country (second most used behind a much larger city).

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#57

Post by Danski »

barrkel wrote: post #20

Consider taking up motorbikes, especially if you can legally filter / lanesplit. What would otherwise be dead time can be a whole lot of fun. Traffic makes it far more interesting.

It takes me 7 minutes to get to work in the morning and I wish it was longer so I could spend more time on my bike.

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#58

Post by mashgin »

I was travelling from Leuven to Antwerp everyday for ~1.5 years. During the 1 hour ride each side I worked on my laptop and used my phone's 3G. It was mostly fine, except the signal kept dropping as soon as the train was out of populated areas. That was annoying. I wish there be 3G coverage properly everywhere first instead of getting LTE/4G to big cities.

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#59

Post by erjiang »

A__MJ wrote: post #27

I've actually had a different experience with commuting. Even with the downsides you can make a lot of use of that time for a finite time period. Things I've done with the time (which otherwise would have never happened): -Used Pimsleur I-III to learn some Mandarin, and more importantly, HOW to learn a new language(/other things). Spoken Mandarin is less intimidating than westerners think, and the grammar is simpler…

Unrelated to topic, but for Mandarin you should check out chineseclass101.com. They have some cliched advertising, but they have a lot of audio lessons that range from zero to quite advanced, and the lessons themselves are much more entertaining and "real-world" than Pimsleur's imo.

Also, flashcards using Anki to memorize vocab and characters are effective, but not something you should be doing while driving!

Re: Commuting? Have you done the math?

#60

Post by xyzzy123 »

Evbn wrote: post #35
LeafStorm wrote: post #11

One of my coworkers and I both live around the same area. I commute to work via bus, he drives (occasionally we carpool, but our schedules are different most days). He doesn't understand why I would take the bus when it's a fifty-minute ride via bus and a twenty-five-minute ride by car. However, I can use the time on the bus to catch up on email and news (I'm paid by the hour, so no point in working on the bus if I'm…

Does your bus go door to door the moment you need it? My to/from/wait time for the bus is longer than drive time.

Which is even less fun in windy or rainy conditions :(

Even when there are bus shelters, often such effort has been put into making them uncomfortable for the homeless that they offer no protection from the elements at all.

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