The True Cost of Commuting • Hacker News Board

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#161

Post by stouset » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 2:31 PM UTC

gcb wrote: post #149

stouset wrote: post #68

It's amazing how many excuses people manage to come up with for how it's impossible for them to follow this kind of advice. Turns out, it's impossible up until the point that you just shut up and start doing it. Sweating is only a problem for most of you because you're unhealthy and overweight. You're overweight because you get no exercise. It's okay: I was too. Then I started cycling to work and lost 50lb. Now sweat…

i'm pretty sure that if you do not sweat after a 20min ride that covers 7.5mi, you should seek a doctor. Urgently. ...or you are luck to live on the top a hill and work in a dried lake bed.

Apologies. I unintentionally mixed some numbers. My typical ride was 30 minutes, on a route with few traffic lights. That's an average of 15mph, which is pretty tame.

20 minutes was my _record_, with me hauling ass as fast as I could possibly go. And for the record, I was drenched. But I brought a change of clothes and had a quick shower that day. :)

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#162

Post by cafard » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 2:48 PM UTC

heresyforme wrote: post #115

I did a quick search through the comments, but didn't see anyone mention crime and schools. Believe it or not, there are start-ups in the Southern states and they tend to be in the cities (New Orleans, Baton Rouge LA, Jackson MS) where crime is pretty bad. If you have children, the public schools are pretty bad, so you'll want to send them to private school which will run you 6-10K per child. The only alternative is…

There are plenty of bad schools in the US, and always have been. As rbranson remarks, in some places this has to do with racism. In others, it has to do with generally low expectations.

But yes, schools are a big deal, and often a deal-breaker on living close to work.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#163

Post by cafard » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 2:51 PM UTC

A point I would make is that employees are often at the mercy of the employer for the length of the commute. I knew a man in the Four Corners area of Montgomery County who had a quick commute to White Oak. The EPA relocated his office to the Crystal City area of Arlington County, changing his commute from 10 minutes to 45 minutes on a good day. BRAC just pushed a whole lot of jobs down to Fort Belvoir and quite a few more over to Bethesda Naval Hospital.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#164

Post by tomkarlo » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 3:40 PM UTC

cletus wrote: post #27

The problems with long commutes all revolve around home ownership. People want big houses on big yards. Most can't afford that close to work, which means they make the economic choice to trade the commute time for that "dream". That's fine but the problem is that government subsidizes that dream to a ridiculous degree. Urban sprawl has a huge cost in infrastructure, largely borne by the taxpayer. Low-density urban sp…

I don't want a big house with a big yard. I grew up in Manhattan and I'm perfectly happy in an apartment. Yet in San Francisco, despite sky-high rentals, there's a shortage of rental apartment buildings, apparently because the city restricts their construction and height.

And then they wonder why people move out of town as their families grow - SF has one of the lowest proportions of households with small children of any city in the nation.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#165

Post by abalashov » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 4:58 PM UTC

stouset wrote: post #160

abalashov wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sweating is only a problem for most of you because you're unhealthy and overweight I don't know about that; body chemistries are very different. But more importantly, it sounds like you live in a place with reasonably cool, dry air. Some of us don't have that privilege. It's good advice, don't get me wrong. I myself lead a largely carless life in -- of all places, rather improbably -- downtown Atlanta, and walk about…

Actually, I live in Atlanta. It's really not as bad as you think — cycling generates wind, which keeps you cool. You don't have to expend more energy on a bike than you would otherwise on your walk. So if you can manage to walk without sweating, you can likely bike it without issue. I agree with the body chemistry bit, though. Some people just can't do it, one way or another. But for the majority of people, it's just…

So if you can manage to walk without sweating

That can be a quite challenge most months out of the year, and I'm in fairly good shape. But I walk quite faster than most people (can't really help it). Even in the winter, I just feel cold from the chilly wind while simultaneously sweating inside my coat. It's the quintessential "clammy" experience. This area of the country absolutely sucks, climactically, although not quite as badly as Houston, where I lived for a while.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#166

Post by ShabbyDoo » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 5:45 PM UTC

xxpor wrote: post #130

ShabbyDoo wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"missed the last bus in" This is the problem with small cities' public transit systems. Temporal flexibility is limited compared to driving one's self to work. Need to stay late? You'll be staying all night, or your spouse must come pick you up. Other issues (observed as a lifelong Clevelander): 1. The elapsed time savings of using public transit is often quite negative (compared to a city like NYC where it probably…

Where in Cleveland do you live? The RTA is very good for getting downtown or to University Circle (and possible Ohio City). Unfortunately the jobs have all moved to around 271/480. I did the 48->7 reverse commuting from Shaker Sq. to Highland Heights when my car was in the shop last year. Let me tell you, that sucked. Nearly an hour and half vs. 30 min driving. And there's only 1 bus the entire day that took the spec…

I live in Hudson, so public transit will never help me much. I used to live in University Heights, a suburb which grew up after the RTA lines were laid out. Ironically, I have been working in Chicago during the week for the past few months and have been getting by a combination of public transit and taxis. $150/mo parking in the condo complex where I am renting coupled with $20/day-ish downtown parking makes a $8 taxi ride a bargain (not to mention the $2.25 bus fare). It also helps that iGoCars (a non-profit zip car competitor) has stationed a car right outside my building.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#167

Post by roc » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 7:41 PM UTC

dasil003 wrote: post #143

emu wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The majority of comments on this post are of the form "his analysis is wrong, because it doesn't take into account factors x, y, and z". That's great --- we're having a civil discussion about the merits of his argument. Linking to his blog post in this way is tantamount to implying that the commenters on this thread are "complainypants", which I find quite rude. If that wasn't his intention, then he certainly could h…

The post he was responding too wasn't any kind of civil or even logical discussion. It just said his examples and analysis were borderline garbage with no justification.

Which is a fair point. I actually had originally drafted a much longer reply which included additional problems with the figures and comparisons [1].

But after about 10 minutes I realized that the author wasn't making a financial argument from the numbers, he was making an emotional argument with hand-waved numbers for garnish. And that, despite my interest in the issue and agreement with his conclusion, it simply wasn't worth that kind of time.

[1] e.g. $200/20,000 miles for car costs beyond oil/gas/tires is laughably low; ignoring parking/toll costs in the no-commute/used-car case; considering lost time in the commuting case but not lost-personal time in the no-commute case; assuming financing in the commuting case and savings for a used car in the no-commute case; ... generally just considering worst-case for the commuting case and best-case for the no-commute case in almost all things

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#168

Post by dlikhten » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 7:51 PM UTC

I just calculated the cost of me owning my car. I don't commute to work via car, I pay a bit under 300/mo pre-tax for an express bus to/from work at about 25-45 minute ride.

My wife has been doing bike commuting to work whenever possible.

Hard to get my daughter to her pre-school without car.

Ok so here goes, in 2 years when my lease is up:

I will save $5500 on my car payments + insurance (NYC). I will then save probably another 3-4k or so on gas costs... So that's about 8-9k give or take.

From 8-9k, subtract about 2k in car needs. We will have additional expenses that are met with a car like taking kid to doctor that is not easily reachable. So a cab here or there (eh its not expensive) and renting zipcar here and there.

We already shop fresh direct so it wont change our shopping too much.

So thats about 6-7k that I save per year. That means I can pay about 500-580 more for an apartment. Or just buy an ipad every month, or just save that money for future needs. Maybe spend an extra 1-2k on transportation needs a year. Basically cars are expensive. Incredible that people would work for minimum wage and still commute like this, its unthinkable.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#169

Post by dlikhten » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 7:56 PM UTC

gcb wrote: post #148

melling wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a couple of places in the US where there is enough population density to make mass transit work. Unfortunately no one wants to spend the money to improve it. Train and bus travel is painfully slow. Commuter rail travel, for example, averages about 30-40 mph, at best. If that doubled, people could commute from "great distances", or simply live 40 miles from a major city and have a 30 minute commute. Is the p…

rail is a chicken-egg problem. why would i take the train for longer distances if my destination will not have buses/subway? i will need my car there anyway, so i might just skip the train and drive.

See the construction plans for a high-speed train from staten island to manhattan (nyc). It should make going from SI -> Manhattan take about 20-30 mintues saving an average commuter about 20-40 minutes per ride. Gets a ton of cars off the road, thus making the other commutes faster, less cost, etc. Commuting in NYC is quite problematic.

Re: The True Cost of Commuting

#170

Post by HeyLaughingBoy » Tue, Oct 11, 2011, 8:57 PM UTC

prodigal_erik wrote: post #127

HeyLaughingBoy wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to both change the way we think about what "mass transit" is and spend more $$$ advertising it. I live in a rural area about 40 miles from Minneapolis, the largest city around here, pop. about 400k. Normally it would take me well over an hour to get there during rush hour, but I recently discovered that there is a bus that can do it in 22 minutes if the schedule is to be believed. The buses can drive on the s…

I must be misunderstanding something. A bus that covers 40 miles in 22 minutes would be doing 109 MPH the whole way, even on the shoulder.

I live around 40 miles outside the city. The bus station is approx. 20 miles from the city. Since it doesn't have to stop (the HOV lanes around here are usually open) 22 minutes is reasonable.