If it was more ‘convenient’ to me, I would take public transportation to commute to and from work. However, to get to work by 8:00 a.m., I would have to commute 77 minutes (including 7 minutes walking and 23 minutes waiting). On the way back, it would take me 83 minutes (including 8 minutes walking and 24 minutes waitin) to get home. And this is if everything was running smoothly and on-time.
What’s my current commute using my gas-guzzler? 20-to-30 minutes to or from work–dependent on traffic and time of day.
Using public transportation is better for the environment because it decreases the number of vehicles on the road. Trimet, Portland’s transportation organization, recently reported having 9.2 million riders– using buses, streetcars, and the light rail transit– this past July, which is a 13.3% increase over last year’s figures for the same month. That’s pretty impressive. In fact, it’s so impressive that I’m seriously considering to commute using public transportation several times a week in order to do my part. After all, hundreds of thousands of people commute using public transportation daily in densely populated cities like Manhattan and Tokyo, where public transportation is as much a necessity as it is a sensible way to get around.
But this would mean adding 1.67 hours of commute time per day. Is it worth my while to lose those 1.67 hours of my precious time just so I can feel better about myself? Of course, some would argue that I’m not necessarily ‘losing’ that time; I can simply fill it with something else like reading a book or doing Sudoku puzzles or leisurely listening to music.
What do you think?
Would you commute via public transportation if it was readily available to you?
And, if not, why?
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