Forty two hours per YEAR? I spend that much time in traffic in a month. And I live in Minneapolis.
The problems rise not just from delays. There are additional psychological stressors inherent in operating motor vehicles.
Drivers think like cars. We (I include myself because I recognize these conditions in me) defer to the needs of the automobile in ways that hinder our ability to make healthy, rational decisions.
• We craft our routes to assure we can park within close proximity to our ultimate destination. If we do not find easy, cheap parking we get annoyed, because we're forced to walk further to reach the destination, and because we do not budget time for the delay. Driving to park determines where we drive, and reduces the possibilities for where we end up going, in ways that, say, a riding a bicycle almost never do.
• We insist that because cars CAN go fast, that we SHOULD go fast, thus endangering ourselves and our fellow citizens. This unearned 'entitlement' cannot be exercised in metropolitan regions (where most of the cars are) because the roads are maxed out, and everyone wants to be in the same places at the same times. So our inability to go fast annoys us whether we are moving at normal pace or 'stuck' BEING traffic.
• Drivers think that public policy should assure we can get around quickly, conveniently and dependably. The physical reality of cities makes those goals difficult or impossible to attain. Drivers get angry simply because they recognize the world does not revolve around our desires. And that angers us again...
1
For most of my working life, my home was an easy bike ride away from my job. Even in bad weather, the commute was often the best part of the day.
2
@nuttree I bike most of the time……very good for the brain.
I am moving to Europe before the issues covered in this article and the GOP/Putin Axis deliver me to an early grave.
Better to be living a thrifty life full of art with a croissant in my mouth than draining my life away on a freeway listening to MSNBC on satellite radio detail the latest ravages.
I had this epiphany slurping rank and tepid Starbucks on a three-hour backup to the Bay Bridge last spring, and here I am.
6
If people were better drivers, driving would be less stressful. I drove in germany in heavy traffic and it wasnt a problem because people were predictable, attentive, and the traffic flowed. Considering how much we depend on driving in the US, we should raise the standards for getting a license and demand that all of us be better drivers.
6
Audiobooks
1
The L.A. traffic is abysmal that's why I moved away back in the 90's I thought it couldn't get worse but of course it has. Usually a commute is 2 hrs one way and that's a lot of time every week. Essentially there is no mass transit their buses take longer quite literally than walking slowly but the distances are relatively long. In essence California started to design cities for cars and only cars as far back as the 50's . Walt Disney was shot down when he wanted to put up a monorail for downtown but L.A. said no.
3
The subject of Los Angeles traffic cannot be addressed without mentioning that there has never been a serious effort to synchronize the traffic signals in the region. The concept remains alien to both elected officials and the government employees who nominally are in charge of regulating the flow of vehicular traffic.
The statistics as applied to Southern California traffic are and will continue to be meaningless until the signals are finally — if ever — brought into synchronization.
2
I have been a telecommuter for 19 years. It is heaven. No traffic. No commute (other to my home office). I have a view, a treadmill, a waistline and peace of mind. Sure, I miss having the connections with the people I work with but there is no gossip, no large gas bills (my car is 13 years old and still going). And I'd to think that I am helping in some small way to save the planet. No stress here.
5
In my earlier comment, I forgot to mention the best thing about commuting by motorcycle in Los Angeles: I didn’t have to listen to NPR anymore!
1
After 25 years of sitting in traffic on my DC-area commute, I changed jobs and have been taking the bus or metro plus a walk on either end. I love it, despite metro's ongoing shutdowns for deferred maintenance. I've joined a book club, am getting through an additional book every week or two, and have dramatically shortened my crossword puzzle time-to-complete. Don't miss the driving at all.
5
The worst is when there is a serious accident and an ensuing accident investigation. I do not, for the life of me, understand why the police aren't asked to direct traffic OFF the highway so that people can get to their destinations. It would be a public service to us. Another public service would be better lighting at night on all the roads, better street signs so people can read them without having to slow down to a crawl. The best would be to make housing more affordable so people aren't forced to live 2 hours away from work to have a decent place to live that's affordable.
4
If the best solution we can come up with is self-driving cars, I find myself wondering what happened to human creativity. We can do better.
I have had the incredible good fortune to have worked from home for nearly 19 years. My biggest work problem is finding a time of day to speak simultaneously with people in Europe and Asia. Given that, where should I be?
It's not a perfect solution, certainly. Odd things can happen. I, for example, have had the experience of running into someone I had never met at a conference and realizing not only did I know this person from hours of telephone conversation, but that I had hired him and he reported to me. I recognized his voice. It was kind of like a family reunion and a trip to the twilight zone all in one.
I agree that a certain amount of face time with colleagues enhances organizational effectiveness and cohesion. But companies spend very little time thinking about how this best occurs or how much is needed. In my experience, companies are happy to have some telecommuting staff if it saves money on office space, and loath to promote face time if it involves travel cost. This is the same focus on short-term earnings that is the bane of corporate America in so many other ways.
I suspect that we will find better ways to organize work, including commuting, only through trial and error, rather than from first principles. But I think we stand a better chance with that mythical beast, corporate flexibility, than with self-driving cars.
2
Self driving cars would be then, a boon, to health. The stress of traffic is the constant collision avoidance, you never glide or just get in a rhythm of flowing through the scenery and anticipating the next curve of the road, its constant brake-gas-brake-gas.
As someone fortunate enough to have a car, that while not self driving, does manage the braking for me, i can say it reduces much of the traffic stress to just let my legs rest and let the car take over the following of the car in front of me.
@john johnson jr
Self driving cars will have a downside though. People will live further from work because now their commutes are "less stressful" thus increase VMT, and decreasing the amount of time they spend with family, friends, and in their community.
Also, IF self driving cars are done correctly, they will be essentially gridlocked once in an urban setting due to the number of other cars, pedestrians, cylcists, etc.
Real benefits will be made when transit (the truly efficient way to move) is taken seriously in this country, people live closer to work, or accept the consequences of living 30 miles from work (IE: not expecting free flow traffic conditions the whole commute through a city).
This article describes one reason why rural and small town residents who are facing an employment crisis are reluctant to gamble everything and move to the city. The daunting cost of housing is another. Also, jobs, even in the city, are sometimes difficult to find.
It's true that people who live in small towns or in the country don't have the amenities of cities, like large concert venues, unlimited shopping, and clubs and restaurants. But we don't sit in traffic for hours, either.
I'm just saying, everything's a tradeoff and we all work to make our lives better wherever we are. I would love to see America invest in mass transit, like trains.
7
@Madeline Absolutely spot on!
Travel to other countries where you see a small town where you can take a 30-60 minute train ride into a big city. We simply don't have that in this country on a widespread scale.
You're never going to get everyone to agree to live in high density locations, but if you can provide the suburbanites with a quality alternative, you can really reduce the number of miles driven in the city and reclaim some land for enjoyment, not driving.
Once on the way home from work I opened my eyes and realized of the other fifty people on my subway car, all were asleep, or at least resting with eyes closed. I've never felt so connected to my city, to my fellow human. I've never felt anything like that while driving.
5
On the bright side, LA traffic allows for a lot of podcast listening.
4
Traffic occurs because people who drive do not pay for what they get. They externalize the true cost of their coice onto society: traffic, pollution, noise, road maintanence, and, of course carbon/climet change.
A carbon tax would force frivers to pay the true cost of driving. Take that money and put it towards transit, low-income housing, or heck, just refund it as a tax credit. The problem will be SOLVED.
9
A wise person once said to me, "You aren't in traffic, you are traffic."
26
Try ride a bike.
5
The bicycle, a machine which can save this planet.
Use one. Just try it. It will change your life for the better.
10
Look at all those cars - a scene repeated all over the planet. There we have a major factor in global warming.
4
Audio books are a godsend. I enjoyed many dozens of them during my 45-minute commutes before I retired. Good music CDs are fun, too.
I'd sit in Boston traffic belting out one song after another with a big grin. Other drivers probably thought I was nuts! But they were suffering and I was enjoying myself. I couldn't change the traffic, but I could change my reaction to it.
5
I don't see any studies about how stressful it is to commute via transit (bus and vanpool), only ones for single occupancy vehicles. Often transit is sitting in traffic as well.
I would be interested in seeing that information.
4
@vacciniumovatum Yes. I normally take a train which of course is immune to traffic, but ended up on a bus recently during rush hour and it was maddening. I enjoy Netflix on my train commute but could not concentrate on what I was watching while I was on the bus, since I was too focused on the fact that it took 20 minutes to move one block. I felt like a hostage exactly like I would in solo car.
1
@vacciniumovatum It's not stressful and being stuck in traffic as a passenger is much different than as a driver.
1
@mckillio I live in Chicago, a city like many others in America which has done VERY little to speed up bus traffic, and trust me, it's stressful to sit on a bus stuck in traffic. I made the mistake some years ago of taking the bus on a night where there was some big entertainment event happening, and was delayed for my date by about 40 minutes. I avoid the bus as much as possible and only take it when necessary or when I have more free time. It's so sad that so many cities don't realize how much more efficient it is to move thousands of people via bus than allowing single occupancy vehicles to dominate.
3
Don't forget the back pain and skeletal stresses that arise from sitting in a single position for an hour or more each way, every weekday.
7
How much would someone be willing to pay to avoid wasting time in rush hour traffic. This is not a rhetorical question. For several years now drivers along the I-95 corridor in Miami have had the option of traveling for free in the congested lanes or pay a toll to utilize separate “high speed” travel lanes. Since the tolls are based on the laws of supply and demand, the sliding scale toll rates increase as traffic congestion increases. In theory this makes travel in toll lanes faster than the the free lanes.
For a few years before I retired, I chose to travel in the toll lanes and calculated the cost of the time saved during my 48 mile one-way commute. On average, I would save 15 minutes a day at a cost of around $10. That translates into a rate of about $40 per hour saved. Fortunately for me, I had the income and happily paid that price. None of my fellow coworkers chose to do as I did, and most people that I’ve talked to about this arrangement disagree with the logic.
2
@Paul M
Ah yes, the rich person lane, which solves nothing other than raises revenue.
Instead, ask "why do I live so far from work?" and "Why hasn't anyone provided a reasonable alternative instead of forcing all of us to use the same mode at the same time at the same place?"
2
My husband and I are currently relocating away from one of the fastest-growing regions in the country for a handful of reasons, a primary one being the time spent in traffic at almost any given hour of daylight. I can easily comprehend the health effects involved.
7
We moved in order to reduce our commute times and to be closer to family. My commute to work changed from 45 minutes on a good day to 20 minutes on a bad day. We downgraded our home in order to do this, but we are still in Dallas proper. I'll take my mental health over a bigger and shinier house any day!
12
I left California - and my job - due to the stresses and health issues I suffered as a result of a long commute. I changed my hours to 6-3. Not much difference. I still had to leave by 5am to not get stuck. And going home was miserable. I have a plug-in hybrid so could use the commuter lanes, and didn't add to the pollution of an idling gas guzzler. But enough was enough. Even retired, I realized there really was no "window" of non-commute time anymore.
5
It took me decades to realize that commuting, even by public transportation, was bad for my health for durations longer than 30 min, in unnatural lighting, underground. Still I prefer it vastly to the alternative:
It took me only a few months of driving to determine it was the worst thing I could be doing, at the 2 critical periods of the day: barely awake in the morning, arriving already stressed at the office; returning at the end of the workday, tired, hungry, and trying to focus on the road and traffic.
12
Growth in Charlotte is such that traffic in our area has increased by 60,000 cars daily. Thanks to this article I don't feel bad about my general disinclination to get more involved when the involvement requires tedious drives and sharing the lanes with increasingly preoccupied drivers.
2
Public transportation is better than any car — whether driven or autonomous. The best cities of the future will be ones with robust public transportation systems. This is why places like LA will never be great cities and everyone loves European cities. Urban planners: please design places that are walkable and have great public transportation! It’s better for people and the planet, plus it’s so much more enjoyable.
21
When I visited Peru, people didn't have cars but a minivan came by to pick them up to go to and from work each day for a couple dollars. Here's hoping that Americans will give up single occupant driving as automated shared vehicles become available. Carpooling would lessen traffic, lessen stress and be better for the environment as well as costing a fraction of owning.
9
@Gr8bkset Light rail trains, bus rapid transit, and rail are even better than carpooling!
3
We need to improve mass and alternative transportation infrastructure. Robert Moses was the worst thing to ever happen to this country's roadway designs.
15
During my days hauling containers around the Northeast, my commute to from work was the entire BQE and Staten Island Expressway and my rule when I got home was to leave me alone until I had a couple of brewskis...it worked for me.
9
Not to worry. The mode of transport will no longer matter. In the near future, commuting will be a breeze. Of course, very few people will be doing it since very few will have anywhere to commute to. The capitalist system will drive inequality so high that maybe only 10% of people will have a job serving the 0.01%. The rest will have all the free time in the world to scrounge for food. No worries about commuting.
9
Public transportation. The answer is public transportation. Where is public transportation in this article? We need to develop our public transportation systems.
30
When I sought out a house to buy, I told my real estate agent that being on a regular transit line was required and that I would not consider houses far from transit. I wanted to cut my carbon energy uses, and driving less is a good step forward. When I moved last time, my walk to the bus stop is even shorter. I use Spokane transit for nearly all of my commutes to and from work, and though the trips are 20 minutes more than an automobile trip, I read or otherwise get a break from driving. I also use the transit for many other trips about town. When in other cities, I prefer to learn and use public transit, and most times am quite satisfied. I think that a good deal of the driving we do is out of habit, and habits can be redirected.
18
I've walked to work for the last three jobs I've had (over 22 years). I think it is now a condition for employment for me. I figured out that I get an extra hour a day over most people.
11
If anyone knows any of the Koch brothers would you please bring this article to their attention.
They seem to be working to destroy public transport from some misguided idea, or maybe to protect Koch Industries.
9
@cphnton The Koch Boys sell asphalt and they sell other petroleum products. Gasoline-powered cars idling by the million on asphalt roadways is heaven on earth for them.
3
I cannot find a comment from someone in the Houston area. Guess we’re all driving and can’t safely post.
My car commute has been 47 miles one way for about 30 years now. In that 30 years many freeways have been built and rebuilt. Added lanes, added toll lanes. Still the commute can be from 35 minutes (early Sunday morning or Christmas) to the more average 1:15 hrs up to the occasionally maddening 1.9 hrs...
I rent a miniwarehouse mainly as a garage for my 4 vehicles. In Houston if you don’t have a viable vehicle, you are not viable. It sucks. There is a nascent light rail system that serves a tiny sliver of the petro metro. And the bus system is not terrible. But if you’re a “county-wide” gig worker, the mass transit doesn’t allow for anything but a strict schedule.
Wish it were different...
14
Just reading this article helps de-stress this commuter; at least somebody cares enough to recognize this colossal waste of time, human energy and resources that highway traffic represents.
Please, speed up a solution!
Or at least an improvement.
What we miserable commuters wouldn't give for relief from this twice daily misery!!
7
I had a half hour driving commute for 10 years and got sick of it. I now live about 2 minutes from work. I don’t know how some people drive commutes that take hours sometimes with traffic. The problem is also a lack of quality roads in many places. The current road infrastructure dates back to the 1950’s basically. Traffic is also a result of the dismal failure of the US to invest in and build high speed rapid transit, like the bullet trains that so many countries have now. France, China, & Japan all have high speed rail. Americans think the Acela is high speed rail at 125 mph. The French TGV goes 200 mph. The Acela is a joke in comparison. And unlike the ‘old’ days of American greatness when we a ‘can do’ attitude, today it’s a ‘can’t do’ attitude. All you ever hearths why we can’t build high speed rail. This type of thinking must change.
16
If you live 2 minutes from work, why are you driving there? You could probably walk there in 15 minutes or bike there in 5 minutes, save the gas and exhaust, not “be traffic”, and get a little exercise and down time.
The numbers don't add up. 42 hours is less than an hour per week. That's only 12 minutes per five day working week. That's nothing. There are lots of people who spend an hour per day, five per week, 260 hours per year.
8
@Des - or more. I spend 90+ minutes both ways on public transit (RTD) in Colorado. Unfortunately the design of the "express" buses is so uncomfortable and narrow (and clearly designed for six-foot-tall men) that you can't do anything but try to avoid being crowded by your fellow rider in the next seat.
3
I commute to 2 offices for work. One is 5 miles and the other is 42 miles. My blood glucose for the 5 miles commute is under 90 mg/dL when I get into work. On the 42 miles commute, it's 110 mg/dL. The higher BG number indicates that my body recognized that I'm under stress and therefore my liver is infusing glucose into my blood as a response. Just saying.
12
We Americans created an unhealthy environment after WW-II. The birth of the suburbs without substantial mass transit. The idea that one must own a car and travel solo to and from work. That you have to move further-and-further from your workplace in order to have a nice place to live. Where you have to spend lots of time and money to maintain your private castle isolated from the others who aren't like you.
Add to the list in the article, long hours of almost no physical activity, high calorie foods that you eat-on-the-go, endless meetings (with provided snack foods), long days, high pressures at work and financial pressures at home.
Little wonder that the millennials, who observed their parents now eschew driving, live in cities, walk to work, or use mass transit, don't want to live in the suburbs, and try (albeit not successfully) to achieve some kind of work-life balance.
The American Dream that was sold to the parents of the boomers turned out to be a nightmare.
28
@George N. Wells
Looks like you watched Adam Ruins Everything... ;) All good points!
3
Atlanta traffic rates up there with the worst of them. My 26 mile commute takes an average of 90 minutes each way. Even Google doesn't seem to be able to make sense of it: rush hour commutes are almost always *at least* 30 minutes longer than quoted. And I have little hope for improvement so long as the well-to-do wring their hands at extending train service to the suburbs for fear of it bringing "the wrong element". Our cities are being strangled by lack of public transport engineered to sustain the property values of the rich.
13
Is it possible that the optimal arrangement for a society is a multitude of medium sized-cities that compete with each other as near-peers and produce tolerable and mostly predictable commutes?
Instead we seem to favor empowering a few mega-cities whose congestion and oligopoly status lead to abusive employment, transportation and housing arrangements paired with unresponsive governance for many of their residents?
11
@Alan
I agree with this idea. Utah sort of does this by having multiple hubs along I-15 which goes north and south through the more populated areas. You have SLC as one hub, 20 minutes south you have another HUB that consists of 3-4 towns known as Silicon Slopes where most of the Tech jobs are but not all, 20 minutes south of that you have the Orem and Provo areas as yet another hub with a variety of work. This gives people a chance to live east and west of these areas for a decent commute and makes it so traffic along I-15 isn't terrible all the way through, just in certain sections.
My commute is about an hour just because the area I'm in is gorgeous and not overly crowded. It's offset by the fact I work from home twice a week and this works out perfect for me.
1
@Alan I could not agree with this more. Short of teleportation there is no way to efficiently move the number of people that work in NYC or the Bay Area. There is simply too many people. I don't understand the obsession people my age have with living in cities with public transportation when I can live somewhere affordable, get to work in 15 minutes and have access to more entertainment options than I could ever possibly need. Pretty much any metro area with over 1mm people has just about everything anybody could ever want or need.
Observations of metro Atlanta traffic, from my perch in Duluth: it is getting worser and worser (yes, folks, worse than worse - worser). Until recently, I tried job hunting and going off for interviews. If the GPS aps said it would take 30 minutes to get to my destination, I left 60 minutes before and just made it in time. "Rush hour" commute times seem to run from 5:30 to 10:30 am and 2:00 to 7:30pm or longer, therefore many employers are now adding "must live within 10 miles of our office" or some such distance/time limitation. And the ultimate "What the???" is the new super interchange currently under construction on 285 and GA 400...the roads will be widened, homes and businesses demolished (or values drastically reduced because the highway is just feet away), and more crazy drivers will be zoomin' up and down the roads...Me? I'm looking for a smaller, quieter, less traffic town to call home.
8
There’s a lot of road rage in crowded ski lift lines on holiday weekends. It isn’t just confined to commuting. Think grocery checkout lines, stadium restroom lines, etc. People get frustrated with humankind.
10
"If you’re crawling along in traffic and are late to an appointment, but are allowed to take a nap, play video games, watch your favorite TV show or sip on a cocktail, will that reduce your stress?"
As a train commuter that can partake in all of these activities while commuting, I still find the experience much more stressful than not commuting at all. Is the train more relaxing than driving, generally yes. However I would much prefer that technology gives me all tools necessary to work from home so that I only have to commute when necessary.
Perhaps a better question would be, how much better would traffic, pollution, stress get if everyone were to work from home 1 day a week?
14
@Steven Technology would permit a lot of us to work from home if our bosses weren't punitive Neanderthals who think we won't work unless their boots are on our necks. The current Victorian attitude companies have toward workers is what prevents these advances.
23
@Terrils
It might be that influence paired with a very modern paranoia about data and intellectual property.
1
Volume is of course the main component of traffic tie ups but much of it has to do with accidents and fender benders, much of which can be avoided through slower speeds and a lot less tailgating. The technology exists for rigorous enforcement of variable speed limits to assure that traffic proceeds at an orderly pace. The necessary legislation should be passed by this vaunted progressive NYS legislature to allow for the installation of speed cameras along every foot of New York City and surrounding area roads. These cameras might be programed to capture and punish vehicles following others too closely, with particular wrath for those resulting in rear end collisions. It's time to put public safety and, as the article demonstrates, public sanity before driver immunity.
5
I commute 40 miles each way to my job on Long Island, NY. Each drive lasts anywhere from about an hour and 15 minutes to two hours. If there's rain, forget it. I hate it, but there is nothing else I can do - there are very few jobs in my field where I live in eastern Suffolk County, and I can't afford to live where my job is, in Nassau. So, I'm stuck with a ridiculous, wasteful commute. It makes me crazy, thinking of all the things I could do with an extra three hours or so in my day, not to mention how unhealthy it is to spend so much time in a car and then a workday at a desk.
30
NYC gives Amazon.com billions of dollars which could have been used toward fixing the subway and public transportation systems.
And if they don't do something about the homeless and abuse of public transportation, the potential riding public will stay in their cars.
14
@Steve
I wonder if Amazon will charge employees for parking like they do in Seattle. My older sister has to commute in and then step over the homeless on her way to her "debatable" fancy job where she pays to park.
3
@Shannon - I'm a liberal, Democratic Candidate support, but truthfully, nobody, but nobody can handle the homeless problem. Not the former Governor Jerry Brown, the new Governor, Gavin Newsome, or the Mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti.
Kamala Harris, former attorney General of California, now a senator is running for President.
Being President is easier than solving the homeless problem who are really urban campers taking advantage of the system and now burdening a society in general and destroying small businesses and public parks and urban transportation systems.
8
To me there has never been any doubt that the invention of the gasoline-powered internal combustion engine enabling large single passenger vehicles has been the most destructive creation of the human race, and one that will lead directly to our extinction.
14
I grew up in NYC and Long Island. But moved to the Rochester NY region 50 years ago. Rochester is a small cosmopolitan city with lots of amenities. We have "Rush 10 Minutes" instead of rush hour. You can get to the airport in less than 30 minutes. We know how to handle heavy snow. Public transport costs $1.00 a ride. We had a subway at one time, but got rid of it years ago (No L Train fiasco!). Weather can be nasty in winter, but great in summer. Ahhhhhhhhh.
12
News flash: this article says nothing at all any sentient being who commutes in California does not already know. Stats are nice backup, when there is time any space to read and assimilate. However, there is not time to do so, between the commute and resultant coping mechanisms, be it meditation, yoga or tears.
8
Stuck in Nashville’s horrendous traffic? Remember to thank the Koch Brothers and their “network” for all the stress and toxic pollution you are enduring.
15
Cities are places where lots of people work and live in close proximity. That means the space per person is small. Cars are big; you cannot fit a lot of big things in a small space.
Yet despite the obvious geometric problems, we have foolishly attempted to cram more and more cars into cities where they simply do not fit. We need to stop designing in such an automobile centric way.
32
this article, while important, understates the problem and its impact on commuters. yes, the domestic violence and road rage components are not to be ignored, i think a focus on the personal health issues would have been more impactful.
heart attack risks rising, high blood pressure, anger, adrenaline surges, and on down the line.
I retired early from my profession, in Atlanta, as an attorney. my commute was not to a fixed location but rather whatever Courthouse I had to be in that day. So my commute could be 15 miles or 100. 25 years ago when I started, the 15 Mile commute was a Breeze. In my last year, 15 miles was an hour. I stop taking cases in outer counties because they were unreachable. The longer commutes we're taking me up to 2 hours and that's just to get to the destination and doesn't Factor the stress of doing the job.
from my office to my house was 8 miles and that could take from 30 minutes up to 2 hours.
I was miserable and headed directly for a heart attack. Thankfully I was able to retire and move to a healthier place in North Carolina. 20 years ago, Atlanta had two million people , now it's over 6. Atlanta has an embarrassing public transit system and has not added one Highway in the 20 years I lived there.
in the morning I'm not at Full Throttle from the moment I open my eyes to when I get home. I hope but others are able to adjust their lives and not suffer long-term health consequences just because of commuting. i know i saved my own life.
29
I just switched jobs for a shorter commute by a couple of miles, the difference is my commute is now in a small city where I can take back roads and it is a lot less stressful and doesn't take on the unpredictability that my old one did. I would have loved to move closer to my old job or my current, but I cannot afford it. It is another sneaky way class privilege infiltrates our society.
12
Commuting by car to a sedentary job nearly killed me. I suffered from pulmonary emboli after working a job in downtown DC and commuting from my home in the Maryland suburbs. This happened after a tyrannical boss reneged on an offer to let me work from home. I went to my doctor with what I thought was a URI and it turned out my blood oxygen was so low I could easily have died. I spent days in the hospital and more time - it has now been over a year - fighting for my workers compensation rights. It is a terrible price to pay to support one's family. There are numerous articles in medical journals published about this being a fairly commonplace occurrence. Surely, there should be some kind of public health warning to make the public aware of this serious health risk associated with commuting to work.
15
Telecommuting from rural NM to clients in NY and CA for the past 12 years seems to have worked pretty well. A little lonely culturally but otherwise good. Did gain some weight I wouldn't have if I was still walking everywhere in NYC.
8
Getting rid of toll plazas would help to speed traffic and cut down on air pollution. Right, Chris Christie? The technology exists to collect this loathsome tax without the aid of humans with attitudes worse than the most officious border guard.
4
I used to travel 2-3 hours a day for my job, then I moved where I could walk in less than 10 minutes. Best thing ever.
23
@BDubs
I know. I've walked to work for the last three jobs and 22 years. Its great.
4
I know the same holds true for mass transit commutes on deteriorating systems throughout major metro areas.
16
@Bobby Boulders
But at least you have the ability to read a book or newspaper. For me, the most difficult aspect of the commute is the attention required to drive the car, what with the starting and braking over and over again. It's quite enervating.
1
@James K. Polk Not if you can't get a seat and are being stuffed into a subway car like a sardine, plus have to push people out of the way when getting on or off.
6
Job volatility is a big issue here. I generally try to live within 20 mins of drive from my work and I purchased my homes accordingly. But as job change becoming more frequent in uncertain economy and increasingly mad management practices (lack of leadership coming up from our education system and growing cronyism due to that), people are forced to change house and accept longer commute time.
11
Mass transit is a good idea that is now failing in the SF Bay Area. The BART system, built in mid-1960, is now crowded during commute hours, dirty and a homeless haven. In addition, crime on the trains and in and around the stations is driving, pun intended, middle class users off the system and back into their cars for safety reasons.
24
This is why I’d pick the subways any day over the LIE. No matter how bad the subway is, once you’re in your destination borough, you can get out and walk, take a bus, a bike or a cab. There’s always a way to manage a bad subway ride. You’re not going leave your car and walk away on the LIE for example. This is yet another reason we need to pour money into subways. I’d rather live anywhere in the city than in the suburbs.
12
When I moved to northeast Putnam County I committed to a roundtrip commute of 117 miles each day and did it. One winter day Governor George Pataki closed the interstate. I drove a mile from my house to the train station. For the next 15 years I never drove to work again !
16
I've been commuting for the last 5 yrs... in the last TWO yrs I have put over 80,000 miles on my car. I try to get into work extremely early in order to supplement my work/hr efficiency so that I can get out of work a little bit early in order to beat the rush.
There are literally days where I leave work after workers are finished at my jobsite and I sit in traffic for 3 hours to go 50-60 miles. Traffic is absolutely miserable and I've only noticed it getting worse throughout the last few years. My commute can literally be 5 hrs a day if I don't leave my house by 4:00 AM. I don't know why this article acts like it's an affordable option to live in a city when middle-class people are literally being driven out of them due to absurd rent prices & taxes. One can only hope that autonomous cars are really close to being affordable and an everyday thing. Can't wait until I've got "enough experience" for some corporate exec to hire me within a company that performs major construction work close to home.
11
I retired 3 years early because of time and stress related to my daily commute. 37 miles that could take 50 minutes or 3 hours depending upon the time of day, weather conditions, construction or road accidents.
In the last few years before retirement, I used to dread getting up in the morning and having to do the morning commute. Then at the end of the work day, I had the same dread going home. It was exhausting trying to plan the best route and avoid getting in an accident by all the other crazy overstressed drivers.
Items that could help with worker’s commute would be not scheduling construction during morning and evening commute times, better real time traffic information so people could use alternate routes, banning cellphone use except for hands free operations, and actually enforce the banned cellphone laws, have everyone be required to do yoga before they get in their cars to drive back and forth to work, and finally get out of the left lane if you are not going to do the speed limit.
I am very happy in retirement and even like getting up in the morning.
8
The article failed to mention the main factor that created all this traffic: governmental policies. We've been investing in roads for decades with relatively little investment in rail or other mass transit.
As several comments have noted - it's a matter of choice. We can choose where we live and work. I understand that not everyone has that mobility - in the end we all make our choices. Living and working in situations that involve a long commute is a matter of choice.
18
I'm a subway commuter in New York, on our mostly awful subway system. The worst day in the subway is generally better than the best day in a car (which I no longer own, thankfully). I have noise-cancelling headphones and always have something to read. My fellow subway riders are way noisier than the no-one with whom I would be sharing my car (if I had one; see above) but the blissful abdication of responsibility for the 45 minutes I'm on the train makes up for that. If I leave on time for work and the train is delayed, that cannot be my fault, can it? (And when my emailed MTA update tells me that my train is delayed, I leave a little earlier, to compensate.) I tell people I don't have the temperament to drive in New York, and it's true; my mood and my blood pressure cannot take it. Everyone should just thank me for not being in traffic with them.
40
Employers are to blame for not encouraging their staff to work from home. We are a hyper-connected world and there is simply no need for people to be going into the office every day.
33
@mjb you are 100% correct. The backwards-looking company that I work for has just announced that it is cancelling all telecommuting arrangements and everyone will have to be in the office daily no later than 4/1. In Atlanta gridlocked traffic. I have a virtual team spread out across the country and internationally; going to the office daily to interact with my team the same way I do now makes zero sense. Waste of my time.
14
Our market system depends on an expanding population to create ever increasing demand for the goods and services that employ us all and add to the fortunes of investors. Decreasing, or even stable, populations lead to falling values for real estate and lower sales for all the economic activity that goes into creating new households.
But in our urban/suburban city states, and especially those that can only expand in one direction because an ocean or lake occupies the other, we are already at the limit of the number of people who can comfortably move between work and home from 7-9 am and from 3-7 pm. As this article makes clear, we are headed for massive, population-wide mental and emotional pathologies.
Falling birth rates will help, as would reducing immigration, but we desperately need to address the problem of making a market system work at a time when the population is declining.
Japan? Got any answers for us?
12
About seven years ago I changed jobs (and in effect, careers), leaving what was then a well-paying track that required 3.5-4hr/round-trip commutes. My attitude towards getting in the car was much like the behavior of a cat being placed in a cat carrier: slinking avoidance, fear, aggression.
I took a pay cut off about 30% - but given that the time spent commuting was about 900 hours over the course of the 'work year,' my earnings per hour working & the attendant 'getting to work' schlep actually had me coming out ahead.
After the deaths of my parents I realized we only get 24/hr/day, and spending a sizable amount of that time behind the wheel - if I had other alternatives - was not how I wished to live, audiobooks or not.
78
The "soul sucking commute," it's horribly prevalent and this description comes from Sarah Williams Goldhagen's book.
Design, culture, and place figure prominently. All that asphalt is quite a departure from the garden city and boulevards....and now instead of "food miles," there should be IKEA miles...online shopping, plastic, and "CHEAP..,"no craftsmanship here...
3
This article emphasizes the toll on individual commuters.
I cannot understand why businesses themselves don't raise holy hell about these issues. Bad traffic, accidents, poor roads, etc. are huge productivity sinks. How many work hours are lost? How many meetings are postponed? Why does management not step up themselves, as Microsoft is doing with housing in Seattle? Why does management not put pressure on federal and local legislators? There was recently an accident on the NJ Turnpike that happened at 3AM. The resulting traffic delays last until at least 10 o'clock in the morning. Why? In these times of instant video and photography, what takes so long to investigate? I get it when there is hazardous material. But why can't the cars in a fender bender just be airlifted out of the way and let traffic resume? There must be more modern ways to handle such logistical problems.
9
Congestion based pricing looks promising. Just happened on this recent video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8krKFX_UD8
Must be in zeitgeist
2
What about investing in Mass Transit systems? Better trains and busses to connect large cities? Many of other developed countries have it...is it really that much to ask for???
Many Americans are forced to buy a car because that is the only reasonably way to get to work. Hence why there is more debt total in car loans than mortages now.
46
I miss commuting by train. I don’t read as many books.
19
I don't understand people who move to the suburbs to have a yard. They end up sitting in traffic a couple hours a day so they are lucky to ever see said yard in the daylight. And weekends are spent driving themselves and everyone around them nuts (yes, and vice versa) mowing and leaf-blowing and whatever else crazy nonsense yard owners do.
The last thing anyone needs is a yard!
As far as kids playing - the local park is the much better option. You don't have to maintain it and your kids might make some new friends. Win-win!
32
@Will.
I'm not sure that city dwellers who move to the 'burbs are looking for just a lawn. I expect they're looking for more affordable dwelling space and probably better public schools (the payoff for higher/property taxes).
31
@Jackie-I think a lot of them are. They want privacy, space, one bathroom per family member (at least), yes, better schools, but also, and I see you're from Hamden and hope this isn't insulting, more control over their neighbors.
7
@Will. A yard is really quite valuable. I would prefer a shared yard but those are hard to find. I need a garden to teach my son how food grows, to get him excited about vegetables, to teach him food preservation and to save money on groceries. Also, a yard allows him to play outside while I cook, do laundry and work form home. I do not have time to take him to the park for even 1 hour daily, the minimum recommended amount of exercise he needs. A larger food storage area allows for a deep freezer so we get cheaper food. I would prefer to have all of these things available in an urban shared space arrangement but most of the family oriented buildings I have seen are tailored to small children, lack storage space, garden space and are still really expensive. Why did I not study urban planning and architecture so I could help fix this situation?!? And I agree the crazy size of many yards, amounts of plain grass and HOA rules can be ghastly. Not to mention the houses with more bathrooms than bedrooms and trucks that outsize my apartment in NYC. I know some folks need those but I sure see a lot of them.
7
Lets all thank the Koch brothers for their funding of programs to kill mass transit. Another win for them and their wallets at the expense of the rest of us.
79
@JG and not just them by the way. Earlier in the 20th century the auto companies did their part as well to kill mass transit. Of course most of the executives and higher ups in those companies don't have the commutes we do. Therefore, in the time honored tradition of thoughtless rich people who don't bother to care about how their policies or wishes affect others, they haven't had to live with the results.
1
I abhor traffic so choose to live in a small condo 15 min from work, and 5-10 minutes to everything else I need.
15
@Annie I wish I could "choose" to live so close to work, but that is economically impossible for me and everyone else I know!
14
@Red Ree Precisely. I tried it. I lived in an absolute dump in a terrible crowded neighborhood at an exorbitant rate for the privilege of a miserable half-hour commute in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Now I live in a pleasant neighborhood in a comfortable house, and the price I pay is a miserable one hour commute. The difference is I don't hate my home.
Carbon tax. Congestion pricing. Upzoning. Comprehensive mass transit.
Otherwise: AUDIOBOOKS!!!
4
An underwhelming article. The steadily worsening state of traffic and long commutes has a lot of interconnected causal factors, none of which are mentioned here: poor urban planning, sprawl, poor public transit, cultural biases against alternative transportation methods, excessively high housing costs in urban centers, etc. Instead the "solutions" presented are "stress management" (i.e., this absurd situation is not going away, learn to deal with it) or self-driving cars (i.e., more technology solves everything ... which, by the way, it usually doesn't.)
52
Hey NYT. Have you been paying attention? Rail is the new thing. The Chinese are big into railroads and are now experts. States in the USA are taking notice and are building commuter rails, like Texas, California, Florida, et al. (that et al. is quite numerous)
Think of the health benefits of walking to and from the train stations, the reduced stress of no gridlock hassles, Automatic train control is soon to be nationwide, but not quite yet, so people will be more secure from random train wrecks caused by sleeping, phone texting, dope smoking train drivers.
4
Good jobs are the cities.
Safe homes and schools are in the suburbs.
Folks drive to survive.
All this talk about young Americans moving into the cities is silly.
Yep they may for a few years and then when they meet their precious children, they move out.
Dirty , bad, dangerous schools , and neighborhood crime, send them out to the Burbs.
So they drive.
23
No. First, most Americans live in suburbs out of inertia and fear as most of them rarely left their highly segregated small suburban worlds while growing up and even as adults, they live in constant fear of "the others". Second, most Americans cities are very expensive. Suburbs are segregated by race. Cities are segregated by money.
8
Live near your work. This is easier said than done especially if one is puppet (working for someone other than yourself). If you are a puppet, just rent and never buy so you protect your ability to move at will for job changes. Put your money in stocks instead. You will do well.
8
When PC’s hit their promise was to eliminate paper, and give us more time. Supposedly to enjoy life. Self driving cars... will lead to just working in a car. George Jetson would not approve. Spacely Sprockets however will Love the idea.
13
How much do people enjoy sitting on gridlock while on the bus, or sitting on the runway in a plane? Sitting in traffic in your own self-driving vehicle may be a bit better, but not exponentially so.
6
With multiple problems caused by trafic, there's not a single fix. But non-fossil-powered cars, trucks, buses will remove some of the problems, whether the vehicles are powered by battery, fuel cell or hydrogen, since on-road emissions would be zero for electrics, and would be water vapor for the other two.
Better respiratory health for people in the vehicles and those living near roads. Quieter operation. Less waste in fuel. Vehicle owners will be saving money on maintenance, too, since the electric power train is so much simpler than complicated internal combustion power trains.
There'd still be dust including rubber and metals from tire wear, but overall pollution would decline.
Before anyone trots out the "but coal power pollutes" argument, note that coal use is dropping very quickly nationally; now provides well under a third of all electricity nationwide; and the number of states that produce even 50% of their power from coal are a distinct minority. And the fraction will decline from now on.
Look at the different states by their current power generation mix. You'll be surprised at some of the greener states (hint, look in the wind belt). You'll be unsurprised by the heavily coal-dependent - they're burning their own product.
https://afdc.energy.gov/vehicles/electric_emissions.html
Cleaner air, less engine noise and smell while stuck in traffic won't make the ride faster, but it will reduce a bit of the stress.
2
Lose the car and cycle to work. If you are too far: move. If there is no safe, separated infrastructure: demand it. By riding, your commute becomes your daily work out. You arrive at work -- and back home at the end of the day -- energized. You save enough money for an awesome bike AND an international holiday every year. You have been brainwashed into thinking that driving is the default. Don't think so? Next time you watch TV count the car commercials; next time you pick up a magazine, count the car advertisements. Grab a brain and lose the car, you'll live longer and happier.
15
@Brian Grover, I could not agree more. At some point, it is also a matter of personal choice and initiative. We need to stop demanding costly solutions that only reaffirm our addiction to the automobile. My commute (in NYC) is only 6 miles or so, I never in my life owned a car, and I almost never even take the subway. Bike riding it is!
3
I've never owned a car, and have zero interest in owning one.
Regular maintenance, inspections, break-downs, insurance, parking, shovelling out a spot, traffic jams, other inconsiderate drivers, etc.
I'd be so stressed out if I drove around this city. Heck, just being a passenger in a taxi, or on an MTA bus, and witnessing one selfish driver after another. Just that makes me so angry, and that's just in the very short time I'm sitting in a bit of traffic.
So many drivers don't use directions to give you advance notice of a turn. Very selfish. On highways, some cars speed and zip in and out of lanes, thinking it a 'thrill'. On small outer-borough streets, cars think nothing of double-parking, and even leaving the car UNattended. If you don't like it, tough luck...you'll have to just wait until there's a chance for you to Navigate Around My Street-Hogging SUV. Cars parked in MTA bus stops (yes, in MTA bus stops), with drivers pretending to be totally oblivious that a bus is trying to pull in behind them.
People have become so utterly lazy, entitled, self-centered and rude. I'd be all worked-up on a daily basis, having to deal with such drivers. SUVs are now a scourge on our streets, blocking the views of drivers in 'normal-sized' cars. Pedestrians can't see beyond SUVs when trying to cross. SUVs are a perfect example of consumerism... everyone believing they now can't get along without some massive vehicle to hold all their 'stuff'.
19
Consider the lungs of all those stuck in traffic inhaling vehicle exhaust. The pollution created doesn't stay in the traffic lanes. Electric cars fueled by renewable energy is the way to go. This should be done in tandem with improved mass transit.
5
@an observer-electric cars just move the pollution to a different, usually poorer, neighborhood. We need truly renewable energy to make them a better bargain: solar or wind, or, and I'm not alone in suggesting this, ride a bike. Of course, mass transit is way more efficient than motorized individual transit (i.e. cars) and we should have it upgraded and installed, like, yesterday.
3
So driving autonomous cars does not require any situational awareness for the person using the car?
2
@dlb There are five technology levels for autonomous vehicles. At level five, there is no need for the "driver" to stay awake.
I'm sure I spend more than 42 hours a year stuck on a stalled train or an MTA platform waiting for a train that is too full to enter. Still, I'd rather deal with vagaries of the 'Failing MTA' than LA traffic, or traffic anywhere.
GM sold Americans a bill of goods when it touted the automobile as the superior means of transportation. What a sham. GM swiftly ripped apart LA's mass transit infrastructure while everyone's eyes were glued to the shiny new vehicles on offer on the television.
Cars, especially those millions carrying single passengers, aren't good for anyone--not the land that was decimated to make way for highways, the neighborhoods torn asunder to accommodate them, or the bodies, simmering with frustration, imprisoned in them.
Let's get over the notion of the automobile as a simulacrum of American freedom and demand mass transit now, from sea to shining sea.
19
Commuting like anything else in life has the good, the bad and the ugly.
Some people love commuting, many tolerate it, some hate it.
When I started to work, I loved the commute, when I was about to retire I hated it.
It is the duty of gov't and to some extent business to make the commute as pleasurable as possible or at least not onerous.
2
Wait what? The author’s conclusion-solution to the oppression caused by cities built for autos rather than humans is... robot cars?
How have we gotten so stuck in a highway, car sewer, individualistic transit mindset? Streets should be made for people - walking people, biking people, and public transit that does not require individuals to invest tens of thousands of dollars in a vehicle of any sort.
This is how to enhance physical, mental, and planetary health.
23
I live in the metro DC area where my round trip commute has lengthened to four hours round trip, including traveling on the Metro at least half the way. I cannot afford to live any closer than I do, so I am moving to a smaller Midwestern city where I can afford to walk from my downtown apartment to work. My DC employers offered "flexible" hours: start at 8:30 or 9:00. When I asked for a 10 am start time because the traffic is so much better, my request was denied. There is no doubt that all those hours commuting have harmed my health and my outlook. I'm hoping that I can salvage both once I'm out of my car.
17
@Gregory
I had a heinous commute for 10 years (even though I was not driving during rush hour), and figured out how to get to my work via Amtrak and foldable bike. It's still a shlep, but one I now actually look forward to bc it affords me downtime to look out the window, say hi to regulars on the train, read, whatever; and then to get some riding in, too. My mood was lightened after the very first day I train commuted, and it has stayed that way. I really think it will for you, too!
10
My solution has been this: I live in a town I don't love, but which is large enough (100K people) that I'm not losing my mind, in a decent house that cost $140K. My commute is 8 minutes to a job I can tolerate. 4-6 times a year I fly to all the places I'd love to live and do all the things I love to do. Last year I spent about $8K doing that. I figure that over the next 20 years, it's still better than buying a $300K house somewhere "nicer" only to have a 60-minute commute to work and no money to do anything.
50
Good for you! I did the same thing. I have to physically be at work for my job and was burning out with the commute hours. I finally gave up the more prestigious work location for a 15 min commute and 4-10 hour work days (which still end up being 11) but I get a whole extra weekday off for errands and dr appointments. Life is too short to be stuck in the stupid car.
2
Bikes are great, but in Los Angeles, it's darn scary. Try sharing the road with vast amounts of cars with drivers either hypnotized by traffic congestion, or multi tasking. It's literally putting your life in your hands.
16
People who commute by bicycle find less stress, not more, in driving instead of riding to work.
1
Huh? I commuted solely by bike for many years in Boulder, CO, which has its own unique brand of traffic congestion. Are you suggesting that on the rare occasion that I drove (yes, I’m one of the 99% of bike commuters who also owns a car) I found it LESS stressful? I would beg to differ.
8
Like thousands of others, I work in a high rise office building in downtown Ft. Lauderdale, and commute from a more affordable, smaller city directly north. My office is 19 miles from my front door, but my commute home is over an hour. There is no practical way for me to get to my office on public transport. The purported “commuter” rail line, Tri-Rail, has a stop near my home, but does not stop anywhere near downtown Ft. Lauderdale, the center of commerce for Broward county (any beyond), and has no mono-rail extensions to downtown. Instead it stops in an unsafe part of town, away from all (legal) commerce and jobs. It is too far to bike to my office, but anywhere is too far to bike in a South Florida in the summer if you don’t work in a gym. So, I-95 is my typical route, and it’s terrible. The commute gets longer every year as there is more and more traffic. A light rail line that had a stop where everyone works downtown would be a game-changer for me and thousands others, not to mention for the environment. But, though I’m decades from retirement age, I know it will never happen for me because Florida lacks the political will to invest in any worthwhile infrastructure (see our recent overpass bridge collapse causing multiple fatalities).
21
The fact is that many people voluntarily subject themselves to this when mass transit or housing closer to employment is available.
1
If it were free to fly, someone would be sitting in my lap on every flight. We know the capacity of the freeway and should just price it and reinvest the proceeds.
We can quadruple our freeway capacity. When going at the speed limit, we keep at least 3 car lengths between cars. When not at the speed limit (ie, in traffic), we go about 25% of the speed limit. Selling "seats" on a lane to automated cars capable of staying within a few inches of the car in front is the answer. The technical problem is much easier than automating cars on city streets.
Mass transit with all its stops and travel to and from end points is a waste of a precious, limited human resource: time.
2
Fair enough, Mr. Frakt. Now explain why we choose to do this to ourselves.
And part of that query should address why so many choose to live in gigantic, crowded metro centers. Even with perfect "mass transportation" funneling huge numbers of people around leads to unpleasant delays, and stress.
4
Umm, population growth (or explosion, if you tend towards the sensational), anyone?
That’s why I moved away from the Colorado Front Range, which is experiencing similar traffic congestion to that depicted in California. Life is so much better now I can’t even begin to describe it.
Name one problem we face as a society which is solved or improved by increasing population. I rest my case.
11
Commuting is definitely stressful. We don’t need a study to point that out. I live now close to a good public transportation system albeit in a smaller 1600 square foot house for four people. We have a large park in front so the kids can run around. We gladly traded in a big house in the burbs for a smaller house in the city, walkable or bikable to literally everything. If I’m lazy and want to take the train to work it takes me 15 minutes including the short walk to the station. This city has invested in public transit so that trains come often and is not in the US. I don’t miss driving at all. Saves me money too.
6
Walking or biking to work are great ideas. I hope, however, that the author is not suggesting it as a solution for traffic problems on the LA freeway system. I don't think that would reduce anyone's stress.
2
I retired a few months ago after spending more than 15 soul-crushing years on the Southern California freeway system, traveling daily from my home in Pasadena to my job in Orange County. The exhausting daily grind took a toll on me both physically and mentally. The stretch of the 405 freeway from Long Beach to Costa Mesa, designated recently as one of the busiest in the country, was particularly brutal; it is now experiencing even more gridlock because Cal Trans is spending millions to widen it to allow even more cars to fill up each freeway lane. Given the advances in technology, it makes no sense for employers to continue to be inflexible when it comes to allowing their employees to telecommute, rather than insisting on outdated daily "face time".
29
Important article, but mostly for all it left out. Population density stress, including the rise in stress hormone levels due to driving in traffic, is killing us now through all of our diseases of civilization, none of which are found in traditional living hunter-gatherers (who don't experience traffic, among other modern stressors). So, any serious study of automobile stress will need to measure salivary cortisol levels, which has only rarely been done. Elevated cortisol levels are correlated with ALL of our deadly diseases and are an established feature of the stress response. Stress R Us
14
To cut down on cars forget congestion pricing, congestion pricing is a way to add revenue, it won’t cut congestion it will add funding. People don’t commute because mass transit is not a priority, roads are. In 26 years of commuting by mass transit into NYC nothing much has been improved for me, nothing! Penn Station added some stairs from the platform to the station! That was great, now it only takes 5 minutes to get upstairs instead of 10. Service cuts on NJ Transit trains. Replacement buses that had poor seat design. They did add express buses to answer for growing demand, but the PABT is a spruced up disaster in terms of bus flow, the cars often zip pass the bus lane, plus both terminals are once again homes for the homeless and hustlers (which stopped in the late 90s until 2013). I can drive in 30 minutes to the city but mass transit is a minimum twice that. Even in rush hour I can match or beat mass transit and I live in an inner ring suburb with trains and express bus service. If mass transit was clean, safe, quick and affordable 90 percent of the public would take it, but that means it would be a money losing business, (like the roads).
12
@DJM - Your argument is actually in favor of such proposals, as the problem is largely at former Gov Christie's feet. He has largely starved the transit system to lower taxes, leaving NJ with problems. It's much the same with NY, as the Republican legislature, hostile to a liberal Mayor, underfunded the subways and prevented congestion pricing. If it wasn't for those malignant politicians our transit would be much better.
6
I commuted by car from eastern Queens to downtown Brooklyn for over thirty-six years. It got worse as the years passed, both because of increased traffic and reduced tolerance as I aged.
That said, most days it was better than the alternative of a mass transit commute of a bus and two subways, and almost always faster.
Commuting is the price we pay for living in a large city, but in return, we receive greater opportunity and higher pay.
It didn’t kill me, but I certainly don’t miss it.
3
@Kayemtee Eastern Queens is a part of the city with less housing density, which is why public transports don't work well. No surprise commuting became worse and worse.
1
Yes, some employers are allowing their employees to work remotely, but only for some employees. Last year I worked in a law office as a legal secretary where I supported 5 people who could all, and sometimes all did simultaneously, work remotely. 100% of my work was on a computer because the company had gone paperless. But could I ever work from home? No, because company policy said non-exempt employees just could not.
Here in Boston I cannot afford to live downtown, so my commute is 1.5 hours each way. Make employers pay for that time as work time, the same way they have to pay for training and staff meetings, and they will let way more employees have flexible hours and work from home privileges.
95
@Claire
The reason employers don't allow non-exempt employees to work remote is simply due to the immense liability imposed by the government and court decisions against employers.
Specifically, a non-exempt employee needs to clock-in/clock-out or have defined start/stop times. Without that, employees can file claims with NLRB and claim that they worked overtime or extra hours without compensation.
Until the law and case law are changed, working from home will be mostly for exempt employees.
Sad, but that is what lawyers and government officials in place like California impose. They are on a crusade to classify contractors as employees and to force as many people as possible to be paid extra hours and overtime.
4
For thirty plus working years I never really dealt with rush hour traffic but worked every rush hour operating commuter trains.
I don’t know how you people do it on the road.
16
At no time in human history has it been less necessary to aggregate jobs and places of business in close proximity to others of the same type. Finance no longer must be near Wall Street. Insurance need not be anywhere near Hartford. And so on. Ironically, it appears that the various tech behemoths and their followers, who should be the most flexible, are the most like lemmings.
34
@From Where I Sit
A large body of economic research shows that you are simply wrong about this. Great positive externalities arise from "clustering." (Google and Amazon know that their employees will be far more productive in a big city.) See the work of Harvard's Michael E. Porter.
The ongoing commute disaster can only be addressed by a combination of land use and transportation policies.
Public policy/regulatory changes that might reduce aggregate time spent commuting and the associated pathologies follow.
1) Require employers to offer remote work options to all employees for which remote work is feasible. The "feasible" part might be tricky, but many employers currently limit remote work for permanent employees to one or zero days a week without regard to the feasibility of remote work.
2) Require employers to charge for parking. Most employers offer free parking, which subsidizes congestion. For more on this see "The High Cost of Free Parking" by Donald Shoupe.
2) Make all congested highways toll roads. Some method for decreasing the economic impact on low-income workers forced to live in distant, lower-cost sprawl would be required.
4) Create a clear and comprehensive regulatory environment for housing developers. Do not let neighborhood complaints delay or block housing construction that conforms with the regulations. This probably requires state-level laws.
10
@Benito. Employers charging for parking is a nonstarter. With our lack of comprehensive public transportation, most Americans have no choice but to drive their cars to work. Charging them to park would essentially be a cut in pay.
5
Unfortunately this discussion omits a major reason why so many Americans have long, stressful commutes - the increasing cost of housing and gentrification in places like NYC, SF, Seattle, Austin, etc.
More and more housing is being gobbled up by affluent tech employees, pied a terres for wealthy people, investment property for the international wealthy etc and thus more Americans forced to move further from jobs.
Discussion about commuting cannot omit the issue of housing costs and displacement.
138
@LS .... however, when it comes to NYC at least, most of those driving cars in and out of the city live in Westchester, Jersey, CT, out on the island, etc. Not exactly poor folk who were 'displaced'.
Those who are truly displaced from their former NYC nabes? You'll find them taking multiple buses/trains to get to their jobs.
9
@LS I agree that you can't talk about transports without talking about housing, and therefore displacement. But it is a bit too easy to blame the rich, the "international billionaires", or even the "affluent tech employees" or the "hipsters". These are either distant people noone ever meets, or fuzzy categories that are easy to hate, and therefore easy to scapegoat.
Maybe part of the blame also lies on the "normal" people who didn't want more housing to be built in their area. Try to build more housing close to where people work, and it's not the billionaires that you hear complaining that it will actually increase congestion.
If we build enough housing close to where people work there won't be as strong of a competition for housing there, and less losers that will have to live far away.
4
@Lisa
Westchester, NJ, CT are not uniformly affluent areas. Lots of poverty too. Yonkers, Newark, Bridgeport are not wealthy areas. Examples of non-wealthy people who drive in (some car pool) from pretty far away due to housing costs and unreliable mass transit: janitors at luxury buildings, building cleaning staff who work at night, nurses, NYC Corrections guards and many more...
10
Unfortunately, there is a lot of ingrained antagonism and at best, apathy, towards mass transportation and cycling in this country. While we are, finally, building more infrastructure in both areas, it is peanuts compared to what is necessary and decades behind where it needs to be to have a chance at making a real difference in our current situation. Car culture one, and with it a sad lack of vision for other ways to move people. Well, now you get what you have here...
23
@Hmmm I find it literally stomach-churning, how entitled, short-sighted and pig-headed so many car-owners are. Multiple cars per family, and often SUVs at that. They demand free street parking, park on the street in front of their homes, have another car in their driveway, and at times, will even park overnight Across The Sidewalk (yes, I said Across The Sidewalk - not an uncommon sight on Steinway between Ditmars and 21st Ave.) These same car-owners also have garages, but yet, there's usually no car in the garage because it's full of 'Stuff'.
Cars plow down residential streets, and turn corners without even slowing down. I've had cars pull in or out of their residential driveways without even considering that at that very moment, a pedestrian might be on the sidewalk. On Astoria side streets that have back access roads where homeowners house their cars, they pull out of the 'blind driveway', right onto the sidewalk without slowing down.
I recently saw a very insightful, profound comment someone made about car culture in the US. Cars are the only Personal Possession that people 'expect' local government to accommodate on Public Streets. Name one other personal possession where citizens use Public Space to STORE the possession? How many of us small apartment dwellers, with no cars, no garages etc., would love for the city to allocate space on the street for us to have our own small gardens for e.g.? Wouldn't THAT be a great use of public space?!
56
@Lisa
If own a car you pay a yearly registration fee or in some states a yearly property tax on your car. That doesn't entitle drivers to inflict some of the discourtesies you've described. Buy by the same token people pay for roads with taxes and registration fees.
If citizens want to pay for small gardens in the form of taxes and registration fees they need to petition their local representations for the right to do so.
4
won
In a utopian scenario, we would all utilize a robust public transit system that made our lives healthier and happier. Quite unfortunately, the proverbial toothpaste is out of the tube. We live in an automobile-centric society, where many of our cultural touchstones involve purchasing and operating cars. Watch a football game and witness the inundation of advertising describing how the right vehicle will make us happy. We need, of course, to push public transit, but what is more urgently required is to prepare for the transition to automated vehicles which, if effectively administrated, would greatly reduce the number of vehicles on our transportation pathways while still satisfying the personal desire to have the comfort of sitting in your car. This shift is unlikely to be adopted by boomers, who, while adolescents in the 1950s and 1960s, achieved their freedom in private vehicles and who still associate adulthood with car ownership. But a driverless society removes the need for personal cars and creates the space we need to have our already-built infrastructure suddenly seem sufficient instead of being overburdened.
4
@Matthew Thomas
Many boomers are realizing that they can’t and don’t want to continue driving forever. There are many reasons for this, including decreasing night vision, decreasing ability to adapt to the driving environment when it is busy or unpredictable, increasing frailty. I’m a fan of public transportation, ride services like Lyft, and walking.
1
The door to door drive is just over 30 minutes for me. I did not like the stress of driving in traffic so I accepted my employer’s offer of a free bus pass for forfeiting a parking pass. From bus stop to bus stop is 30 minutes; the connections add more time. I decided to incorporate a walk and not wait for connecting buses. This has been my commute style for 17 years with the exception of 3 years when I biked the route.
The commute is a little longer and the perks are better. I am able to work on the bus. In the morning I take a stop that allows me a 30 minute walk along a greenway. I arrive to my work place relaxed.
In the evening I often opt for the 20 minute walk home from the bus terminal.
I realize my choice doesn’t work for everyone but I removed one car from the congestion and improved the quality of my life.
May we all find our own way to a better planet and a better us.
110
@Katchup
I have a question that pertains to mass transit safety: are there seat belts on commercial and public buses and commuter trains? If so, is it required that they be utilized? This increases the safety of all passengers, not just the person wearing the seat belt. In RI, you can get fined for not wearing a seat belt in a car, but as far as I know, no such rules exist for public transportation.
Attention to this would make me much more comfortable with using mass transportation.....
3
@Katchup
Well played, my lord.
1
@Wants to Use Public Transportation
No data to back me up, but I'll bet the rate of injury or death to public transit riders is much lower than that for automobile commuters, even with their seat belts buckled!
The easiest way to reduce stress when you are stuck in a linear parking lot is to park. Turn off the engine (Unless you need the air conditioner) and relax until there are 2 car spaces ahead. With the engine off you and the car are at rest and stuck but less stress. Modern cars will turn off there engines at a stop to save gas.
Trying to hurry makes no difference when the slowest cars control your progress. The alternative is to leave early, avoid rush hours, or do not drive. Stay at home, use public transportation, or bicycle. Electric bikes are easy to use too.
3
I no longer visit Los Angeles due to what is now virtually perpetual gridlock. I do, however, use LAX for international flights. I commute 65 miles a week locally on my bicycle. I have nothing but pity for the zombies who commute daily ensconced in their mobile sarcophagi.
21
There is too much cross trafficking of commuters living too far from their jobs, especially here in SF bay area with numerous bridges. Should companies pay extra transit fund fees for employees who drive long distances to their workplace?
2
The article states than time spent in traffic costs, on average 42 hours per year, which seems like a very low estimate. That works out to +/- 50 minutes per week, divided by 10 commutes. In other words, 5 minutes per commute. Would an extra 5 minutes really drive people to road rage?
I'm not a commuter now, but on my last commute--only 10 miles--I could count on being delayed by more than 5 minutes with 100% certainty.
4
Now retired, but I was fortunate earlier to be able to commute 14 miles each way by bicycle from southeast metro Denver, through Cherry Creek State Park. Right in a major metro area were deer, red tail hawks, magpies, and occasional coyote. It does wonder for the soul.
Most of the commute was on concrete bike path, not shared with cars. While I did not do this daily, I could choose the days I would do it.
I think more people would benefit from increased bicycle/pedestrian specific transportation options, and it would most often be at less financial cost than more lanes of traffic, and clearly safer for the walker/rider. ( Think Netherlands ).
With the increased availability of electric bikes, longer and less sweaty commutes would be feasible and beneficial for the environment too.
If you can, try it.
10
@Mac
Two problems with bike commuting.
In many areas of the country the weather is often not conducive to biking.
In many areas there are no safe bike lanes and one must take one's life into one's hands and contend with distracted drivers who are not particularly sympathetic risking great injury or even death.
4
I take Metro North, and then have a 10 minute walk to my office. On average, it probably takes about the same amount of time as driving but is less stressful. But, we desperately need to invest in the infrastructure that carries our trains — some of the bridges are so old, the trains need to decrease speed for safety. I believe if we could make public transport a little faster, a little more reliable, and a little more pleasant, more people would use it instead of driving. It’s less convenient, sure, but beats the alternative.
68
Two days last week I was stuck in horrible traffic jams due to a stalled car and then a minor accident, but both happened in the middle lane of a five lanes, and traffic was at a standstill. After finally getting off the highway, I meandered my way to work, stressed out and late. And, this was two out of five days in one work week. It happens all the time in San Antonio. One day, last fall, I was stuck so long in a traffic jam that when I finally was able to get off the highway, I headed home since I was so stressed out and took a sick day. I wish there was a better way to commute but there isn't. The buses are in the same jams and the city voted against a train system years ago. So, I sit, sit and fume along with many other drivers. Not a way to start a day, not at all.
83
This is largely a self-inflicted wound. Urban sprawl, because of its low densities, exclusive zoning, and concomitant distances, cannot be served by highways alone, yet that is what taxpayers generally demand. Very high car ownership rate and one passenger use makes a bad situation worse. The low densities make public transit unviable. No city has ever solved congestion with more roads. Congestion will always rise to a level of tolerance.
But the American dream is a quarter acre lot in a leafy cul-de-sac with at least one car per adult, within walking distance to nothing.
As with many sources of stress, congestion is a price that people are willing to pay, not for the job, but for the suburban lifestyle. I have known a lot of people who don't have a problem paying that price - time sitting in the car is time they don't have to deal with the kids.
59
@Stevenz I agree. I think the problem is that people want to live a lifestyle, but can't accept that when everyone wants the same it doesn't work anymore.
The suburban dream would be nice if more people stayed downtown and used public transports instead of being your neighbor who also drives to work.
Living in the city would be nice if more people lived in the suburbs or just didn't move to the area at all.
Instead of wishing that people weren't there, we are better off accepting the sacrifices involved in improving the situation. From more money to public transports to increased density.
14
@Stevenz
And long range this is a problem as people age out of driving and find themselves stuck in a living arrangement that was wonderful when they were younger and had no issues driving but becomes extremely stressful when they no longer can drive safely.
18
@White Buffalo. Right. It remains to be seen how the market responds to a huge demand for a new kind of living arrangement, especially when cheap land - necessary to make housing for older people affordable - is even farther away from the centre of things.
2
Most people who commute in automobiles don't realize how much less stressful mass transit can be (a good study might be to compare NY subway commuters with local automobile commuters). There's time to read a book or paper, people watch or simply to be quiet and ponder existence. In traffic there's always the potential for an accident if you're not on high alert. There's always someone cutting in front of you or you're in the wrong lane to get where you are going, etc., etc., etc. And while driving, there is no one to share your frustration with thus adding to the emotional charge.
The sense of power and independence that is the automobile's promise is greatly hindered during heavy commutes. It is now considered appropriate for car manufacturers to promise that your vehicle will bypass traffic congestion, per recent Acura and Nissan TV ads. I'm guessing that in LA where the heavy commute is in every direction, most commuters could swap jobs with someone working closer to home and make everybody a little less stressed.
17
@John V
Public transit commuting can be much less stressful -- but only if the system is reliable. For many years I commuted on a train to center city Philly. By the end of my commuting experience, it was taking me 2 hrs each way to complete what should have been a 25 minute commute. Coming from Chicago, where my experience with commuter trains was entirely different, it was not only unexpected but a huge dollop of stress. Also was in a train wreck on that line which caused permanent damage to my face and caused the loss of many teeth. Train wreck was due to the operator being high on weed, and people died.
So you are right, I always appreciated the opportunity to work on the train, and I was very glad both not to have to fight traffic and parking plus that commute built in a walk from the train to my places of work which was also welcome and healthier, but our refusal as a society to put in the investment necessary for upkeep on the systems put in place decades ago leads to some very frustrating consequences for people determined to support public transit.
2
@John V That is so true. A 45 minutes commute by train is 45 minutes of free time. Train arrives 10 minutes late? That's 10 minutes more of reading or even watching a movie (which many people will do once home anyway). You can even learn a new language!
45 minutes by car, you sure get a seat and whatever temperature setting you want, but that's also 45 minutes of people insulting each other and honking for whatever reason...
1
@John V Job swapping. That's a pretty innovative idea. We need an app for that.
An overlooked health issue related to long commutes is being forced to sit in one position which wreaks havoc on your hips and lower back.
When my company moved to a new office last year my commute went from 40-60 minutes round trip, to 1:30-2 hours.
In addition to the loss of time I have had to spend $ at PT trying to undo the damage to hip flexor muscle and lower back. It would help if more companies had flex time so not everyone is arriving and leaving at the same time, which would help alleviate traffic and stress for everyone.
21
Retired now, so no commute. But from 2002 to 2015, I lived (still do) in a suburb 20 miles (and at least one hour) north- east of downtown Los Angeles. After about a year of that commute, I got a job in a city about 20 miles east of LA. Because of the north-south axis, and depending on whether I took surface streets or the freeway, I was between 12 and 20 miles away from work. But either way, it was 20 minutes because I was going against traffic. That's the primary reason I stayed in the job as long as I did. And the city I live in (founded in the 1880's) is small and walkable so when I'm at home, there's also no traffic issue. I realize I'm very lucky to have been able to avoid the traffic for as long as I did. I know people with houses way bigger than mine who have two hour commutes (one way). I don't see how you can survive that.
9
I like how more urbanization and technology is an answer instead of simply not living in major cities and having a more evenly distributed economical zone throughout the country. The journal Science published a paper in the last two weeks about how urbanization is terrible for public health and disease spread (communicable diseases love the high population densities of cities). We should stop feeling the need to move our entire population into small areas and entice companies to move to different areas.
13
@Dr. Trey The problem is that companies move to cities partly (sometimes mainly) because of the pool of potential workers there, as well as for other very good reasons. Subsidizing companies to make choices that are sub-optimal in terms of efficiency is a policy that can easily cost a lot for little impact, and while such policies have been implemented all over the world (including in the US), they have been mostly unsuccessful.
Also noone is moving anyone anywhere: people move to cities because they want to, and they too have often very good reasons.
It is possible to have big cities with large populations where there is still working infrastructures (including transports) and enough housing. What is physically not possible however is to have cities with large populations where everyone leaves in a house with a garden and drives to work. And we have to stop trying that.
9
You should see the TEDtalk by Jeff Speck about walkable cities. He would suggest the best way to reduce your ecological footprint it to live in a city, “and the denser the better”. We preserve environments by not building energy inefficient suburbs. We make transit systems work when we live densely and plan for that density effectively.
11
@Bob Robert
Unfortunately we are subsidizing companies to compound already existing problems while making decisions that they probably would make without the subsidy -- like the recent decision of Amazon.
3
I live in flyover country now. My commute is a 15 minute bike ride on a recreational trail along the Allegheny River. I arrive at work exercised and in a peaceful state of mind. I used to live in Chicago and in Philadelphia, and believe, I don't miss it.
9
Los Angeles has the worst traffic, yet from the picture we can see that it has large road infrastructures, with a 2x4 motorway. Maybe it has to do with urban sprawl?
It's easy to see how in a big city where companies (ie where people work) tend to congregate in certain areas (usually downtown), infrastructure needs tend to increase exponentially with urban sprawl: the more people are moving in, the more people are living far away, so the more they use roads.
Increase density, and suddenly public transports are more viable (because more people live by each station/bus stop), and cycling (or even walking) becomes an option for more. Even though many people seem to think that increasing density means more traffic, more density means most infrastructure cheaper).
7
@Bob Robert Maybe in theory, but not in reality. Angelenos don’t take public transportation. I drive, or if I can, I’ll walk or ride my bike, but I haven’t been on a bus in a decade. The only time I took our rail system was when the red line first opened and they gave free rides.
People (other people, not me) do take Uber and Lyft, which adds to our traffic woes. My HS students take them, some won’t take the bus at all, and they have no money to begin with. Little by little we’ve gotten greater density, but also much greater traffic.
4
@Carol M There are a lot of reasons why Angelenos don't use public transportation. None of them is written in stone.
What is for sure is that in a city that is sprawled, public transports cannot be as good as in a denser city: buses will be too expensive, run not often enough, or will require a lot of walking, but you can't square that circle.
Conversely once you have enough density and you can run a public transit system that is affordable, runs often enough that you don't have to plan each move, and with stations that are conveniently located, then people start using it a lot. That is what is happening in most cities, or at least in their denser core.
5
@Mark Gardiner is absolutely correct. I commuted by motorcycle from Venice to downtown L.A. for years. I arrived at work in a completely different frame of mind than on the rare occasions when I had to drive my car — i.e., frustrated, angry, late. I have split lanes behind CHP and LAPD motorcyle officers. The CHP issues guidelines for safe lane-splitting. Commuting by motorcycle may not be for everyone, but it sure beats commuting alone in a Chevy Tahoe inching along at an average speed of 8 m.p.h.
8
Disappointing that the final paragraphs want to pin hope on self-driving cars. Technology is not always the answer, and most certainly not for urban planning questions. Let's all be honest that the US has a dismal record on urban planning as compared to many first, second and third world countries. Why isn't urban sprawl mentioned even once here?
Our high esteem of individual wealth seems to blind us to solutions in our own best interest. I am very glad that the article raises awareness. We need more of this.
84
Interesting read, traffic is inevitable especially during rush hour going and coming from work. You can still be productive while stuck in traffic, I listen to audio books to my favorite new books, news. It is all about mindset you see the glass half empty or half full. This is part of my every day life, I can choose to pessimistic or rather choose to be optimistic. I choose to be positive because theres so much more in life than traffic !
8
Extreme traffic congestion is a horrible and completely unnecessary consequence of the "8 to 5" mentality of our working lives. Sure, let's just all show up at the same place at and same time day after day. Yet, the solution of staggering hours of work for classes of work, say retail, government, manufacturing and so on, could be implemented and refined with the cooperation of employers. Then, thousands of single passenger auto's wouldn't be completing for the same space at the same time. It's just too bad it's just that easy to ease the problem.
27
@MMB
It would also make public commuting more pleasant as one would not be stuck standing on jam packed buses and trains, subways, etc. and encourage more public support of public transport as one would not have a situation of empty trains, subways and buses through most of the day and crowded ones during the couple of hours each morning and evening of rush hour.
1
@MMB
"Rush hour" in LA these days is 6 AM to 10 AM, and 3 PM to 8 PM. Not many people want to get up at 4 AM, or work until 8 PM every day.
3
Health costs of traffic include respiratory exposure to chemicals and particulates from exhaust pollution, particulates from wearing tires, and chemicals from other mechanical or fluid components of vehicles as they cycle through stages of heating and wear. It is now clear that some of these pollutants enter blood vessels and the heart, potentially contributing to vascular diseases. Some pollutants are also likely carcinogens.
16
It’s certainly a great boon for the fossil-fuel extraction and refining industrial complex, automotive manufacturing and servicing and road construction industries — perhaps as much as 25% of the nation's economy if not more — supporting pure waste on a mind-boggling, stupendous scale. Waste of time, human and fuel energy, the increasingly unhealthy atmosphere certainly — and many, many millions of hours’ lost productivity annually. Unprecedented inefficiency at many different levels.
Mass behavior that we accept as normal, even acceptable, should be seen for what it actually is from an historical perspective: profoundly abnormal, aberrant, destructive to our civilization, and self-destructive.
40
@Steve Singer
One alternative is redesign of communities so that workers walk to work.
Historically in France, farmers lived in villages in abutting masonry houses without lawns and walked to their fields. They enjoyed bakeries, butcher shops, bistros, and churches.
25
@5barris - I'd read something related in an interesting book "Infrastructure: A Field Guide to the Industrial Landscape" by Brian Hayes.
He noted that in Europe, a farming community would be a cluster of homes with fields radiating out. In the US, especially beyond the "western frontier" in colonial times, the farmhouses all stand alone.
According to Hayes, this can be blamed on Thomas Jefferson who dictated a rigidly linear landscape in the Land Ordinance Act of 1785.
But also note that "historically" means the French landscape was being set up back when a very large part of the population were farmers, before mechanization kicked in.
3
Silicon Valley has "flexible work hours", so staff engineers roll in around 10 and work until 7-8PM. You miss some of the worst commute traffic, but you get home, eat, and go to bed... and gain a lot of weight.
After gaining about 50 pounds, I "volunteered" to work as a field engineer, working at customer sites in large cities where I could take public transportation, and walk. I lost the weight.
Same work hours, but a much healthier lifestyle. We do need to step back as Americans and decide if the house in the 'burbs, and life in the car, is really worth it.
52
@OSS Architect
Important point here about the weight gain risks with long commutes.
But what's striking about so many comments--people choose to live in the 'burbs because costs of living in cities closer to their jobs is prohibitive. What's needed: affordable housing and reliable, clean mass transportation.
3
One way to escape that feeling of helplessness in Los Angeles traffic is to commute by motorcycle.
Motorcyclists cut commuting time by traveling between the marked lanes. (Although California is the only state that allows 'lane splitting', the practice -- better known as 'lane sharing' or 'filtering' is used throughout the world.)
American motorcyclists have long argued that lane splitting should be legal in the other 49 states, too. Although many car drivers imagine the practice to be exceptionally dangerous, the practice has been studied and it is not more dangerous to riders than staying the the traffic column.
As a group, we motorcyclists (yes, I'm one of them) have done a poor job explaining that -- while lane splitting obviously helps us get where we're going much faster -- every time a vehicle is taken out of the traffic column, all the cars get where they're going a little bit faster, too. Lane splitting saves everyone time, and people who commute by motorcycle usually don't use a whole parking space at their destination, either.
The ability to drastically reduce that "toll to psychological well-being" is available to anyone who wants to learn to ride. Whether you would consider a motorcycle for yourself or not, allowing others to lane split actually helps everyone get where they're going with less time.
12
@Mark Gardiner - The toll isn't really reduced as motorcycles greatly increase the risk of death and injury, i.e., "motorcyclists' risk of a fatal crash is 35 times greater than a passenger car." More realistic options would be moving closer to work, changing the mode to walking or bicycling, and working remotely.
11
@James Igoe I'm acutely aware of the higher risks faced by motorcyclists, although our per VMT injury rates are fraction of those incurred by bicycle commuters, which seems to be a transport mode you approve of.
The point I made was that lane splitting is not any more dangerous -- indeed can be safer -- than staying in the traffic column during stop-and-go traffic.
And as many California riders will attest, that psychological toll is far, far lower. I used to commute from San Diego to Hollywood -- I drive I made exactly one time before vowing that I would never, ever do it again on four wheels. People who commute by motorcycle do take additional risk, you're right about that. But the reward is arriving in far better psychological shape.
Ask any rider.
10
@Mark Gardiner I can't tell you how many times I've almost hit someone lane splitting on an L.A. freeway because I did not see him/her until that bike was right next to or past me. You may be a mindful splitter, but many are not.
22
While commenters indicate public transit was an antidote, it has its own delays, many even much worse. As seen on the Seinfeld episode with Elaine, your fellow commuters are right in your face. No, close proximity does not make you more understanding of your fellow man or woman.
When I commuted, the answer was leave for work early and leave for home late. You get a lot done at work in extra time, but more importantly, you de-stress the commute. That factor has got to be worth a few treadmill sessions.
6
You destress your commute and stress your family.
4
The 30 minutes you give back translate into 15 minutes longer commute and 15 minutes of decompression so as to nottransfer your stress to family and employees. How does make sense for anyone concerned?
retired now, I can put up with the occasional congestion because it is a one-time event.
While I understand the impatience and stress from congested commutes, I don't feel that sorry for the commuters. Many chose to live where there would be a significant commute (I moved to walking/easy biking distance from my job) and/or to a location with limited transit opportunities, and/or they chose to drive even though there were transit alternatives, likely in the more congested areas. So they contribute to the problem of which they are also a victim.
10
@Barry Schiller I was able to do the same thing, in reverse) -- get a job where the commute to work wasn't too bad. But not everyone has that option. There are other considerations, perhaps the biggest one being a good school district for the kids.
8
@Barry Schiller Yeah. Why can't all those Midtown restaurant workers just live in Murray Hill? They have only themselves to blame.
4
@Barry Schiller
I paid a premium to live a reasonable distance from my workplace only to have my office moved one hour’s commuting distance away in another state. Twice. Both times the new commute precluded the use of my favorite methods of commuting: walking and cycling.
2
So why don't our brilliant politicians study where people for each corporation live and work, and do more too encourage businesses to locate jobs closer to workers. It seems clear to me that most business location deciders do not care about the time and cost of employee commutes. Put jobs and shopping closer to where people live would save taxpayers billions on roads and public transport and help keep the environment cleaner too.
9
@rogerJones Twenty years ago, my wife's job was in a 6 story office building 4 miles from our home. Ten years later she worked for the same employer and we lived in the same home, but her job then was 12 miles away because the employer decided to move its employees to a suburban office park. By last year, her job was 23 miles away, because her same employer decided they needed a "campus" with a sprawling lawn and vast parking lots, farther out into the suburbs, miles from any transit lines. She is now retired and happily recovered from her ridiculous commute.
As a regular either bike or public transit commuter, speaking from personal experience, years of run ins with cars can take a toll in one’s psyche.
I’ve been hit by numerous cars (only the first time while I was doing something illegal) and had a run in last week with a car that almost creamed in a crosswalk after running a super stale red light that is still making my hands shake.
It starts to harm mental health terribly. And that doesn’t include the constant aggressive behavior that doesn’t involve in a close call or injury. I don’t always know if the physical health benefits are worth the mental health detriments. I hope that groups like Texas A&M might consider researching these topics too and not just focus on the mental health detriments of driving.
22
The ability to work remotely can be a big enhancement, particularly for those with long commutes. It's not for everyone, but it can greatly enhance productivity and feeling of well-being. I recently reposted an article touting how tech employees are both more productive and more satisfied when they have the remote work option. Granted, this is not always an choice for roles that require face time and presence, but for many - currently, I am spending 60% of my time coding - it could personally reduce the need for transportation and clothing costs, and for companies it could reduce turnover and site costs - people can share desk space - as well as make some more productive and happier.
Granted, it is not for everyone. A study looking at personality traits conducive to remote work found that autonomy and stability were associated with having the least stress working from home. I'm sure there are other views, differences dependent on the level of extroversion, tech-savvy, and independence, etc., as well as aspects of the physical environment, but regardless, it would certainly go long way to reduce problems of commuting.
27
Several thoughts on this article:
1) Teaching people to "manage stress" blames the victim of the larger context which features steadily worsening conditions that insidiously increase stress over time.
2) Our elected officials neglect the expensive infrastructural remedies to the transportation crises of the major metropolitan regions in favor of glitzy "amenities" like the multibillion dollar tiny stretch of the 2nd Avenue subway line.
3) Americans need a spiritual conversion back to valuing the common good so that they will take public transportation, carpool, and participate in other actions that reduce the problem. It is a bad sign that major car makers like Ford have turned away from small cars and concentrate on behemoths that pollute more and cater to the American craving for individual power rather than collective good.
171
@Rodrick Wallace How can you expect to modify behavior towards "the collective good" when the president is completely egocentric and cares nothing about the country?
The planet is locked in a pitched battle against 29% of the American public and a handful of Rs. Excise the rot out of our political system and "the collective good" will return like the days of Eisenhower and Kennedy.
8
I have long been aware of the negative emotional effects of commuting, the worst was 4-hours total, but once I moved closer to Manhattan for a job in the WTC, my quality of life improved radically. I recovered 3 hours of my life, and I could enjoy life and dating in Manhattan. Not only that, but my commute became much more pleasurable, with a short walk to the PATH, and once in Manhattan, 5 minutes up into the building. Since then, I've been lucky to have easier and easier commutes - I now live in Manhattan, and my employers been located here - and over the past ten years they have been decreasing from 35 minutes to 25 minutes, and now 15 minutes. It's even been healthier as I walk to work, as opposed to being stuck in a seat, inert, although I feel my recent walk time is a bit too short. Added to that, I enjoy part-time remote work, 1-2 days per week, and again, a pleasure, but the lack of walking to work means I need to compensate a bit to maintain a decent activity level, upping my weekly workouts from 4 to 5.
16
In my opinion, "Competitive Commuting" is the major contributor to stress while driving. If we all adhered to the 'every other car' concept when merging, if we kept up with traffic, if we attempted to leave the left lane open for faster drivers and the right lane for those entering and exiting the highway, traffic might move more smoothly and help reduce the number of stressed out drivers. Leaving early doesn't hurt either!
70
Yes! Running the ‘every other car’ scenario through fluid dynamics models shows that it is an optimal traffic pattern for lane closure. Now try convincing the person in the next car who has hung his/her entire self-worth on not letting another car get ahead of him/her.
10
@DMS and Capt Al ....
My commute From Danbury to the South Bronx is almost 140 round-trip. I would love it if DOT would put up signs that explain exactly what you are advocating for! Zipper Merge baby!
2
@BronxTeacher
Yes!!! Zipper Merge!
It's taken years of traffic engineer written op-eds in the LA Times, but it finally paid off: in the last two years or so, Los Angeles pretty much completely embraced the zipper merge.
And, oh baby, does it make a difference. Shaves sooooo much time off of lane closures. And, because so many people are doing it, the few who don't get it are pretty much forced into it by the herd.
1