who here has the longest journey to work?

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prompted by the fact it took me TWO AND A HALF HOURS to get to work today when it should only take 90 minutes max. after the tube derailments at the weekend i knew things would be chaotic. but there were TWO burst watermains on Marylebone Road, AND an accident further down involving a motorbike (possibly it slid out of control after hitting the flooded road but this was a little bit further up so don't know). the traffic lights at Edgware Road were doing that thing they sometimes do of going green for 10 seconds but red for about 2 minutes. my bus was diverted and then terminated at Angel so i walked the rest of the way. amazingly my boss wasn't in so i kinda 'got away' with this absurd tardiness.

usually it's not that bad though...so does anyone here have to spend more time getting to work? chris b to thread perhaps?

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 20 October 2003 11:59 (twenty-one years ago)

maybe this could be 'who here HAD the longest journey to work' i.e. tell me of the time it took you an insane amount of time to get to your job due to unforseen circumstances beyond your control...

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Man, I saw the motorcycle accident just after it happened - it was really gruesome! - but my bus was going the opposite direction. Didn't know about the watermains, though.

I make sure I have pretty good commutes now.

Longest I ever had was just over 2 hours every day. I lived in Astoria, Queens, and worked in Newark, NJ. I had to take two subways trains and the PATH with a 15 minute walk at either end. Phew! I read a lot, though. Fortunately, it was a reverse commute so I always got a seat.

― kate (kate), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:05 (twenty-one years ago)

my longest ever on average was St Albans to Waltham Cross via Potters Bar - 2 hours each way roughly.

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:10 (twenty-one years ago)

today - left the house at twenty five past seven, walked into my office at ten past nine, this is pretty much average, on a good day it can take me an hour and a half - this would be the perfect journey. It has taken me much much longer, like the three hours it took me to get back on a Friday night a few weeks back. And we won't talk about the famous snow day.

― chris (chris), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Actually, I just realised that for one summer, I was living in Albany and working in NYC. I didn't do it every day, and often I stayed overnight at a friend's, but my total travel time was three hours each way!

― kate (kate), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:13 (twenty-one years ago)

When it was snowing in February, It took me 3 1/2 hours to get home where as it usually only takes me 1/2 an hour.

― Pinkpanther (Pinkpanther), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Taking sides: single 3 hour train ride to work vs 90 minute (provisional) trip involving numerous buses and trains

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:22 (twenty-one years ago)

my average is around 80 minutes, but when i lived in arsenal and there was a tube strike it took me 3 and a half hours to get in, and 4 and a half hours to get back home

― charltonlido (gareth), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Two summers ago I had about two hour communte, the last 40 minutes by train or so. Now I got a 20 minute subway ride and thats about it.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:30 (twenty-one years ago)

when there's a tube strike - I don't even bother

― chris (chris), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:36 (twenty-one years ago)

i live two miles north of where i work.

― Kingfish (Kingfish), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:50 (twenty-one years ago)

October 2000 - a couple of weeks after the Hatfield crash and the morning after severe storms and flooding across the south-east: took four hours, 25 minutes to travel from Crystal Palace to Welwyn Garden City. I should've given up at Tulse Hill. That journey was an average 90mins, rising to over two hours each way in the immediate wake of Hatfield.

― Michael Jones (MichaelJ), Monday, 20 October 2003 12:57 (twenty-one years ago)

Right now I live about 7 blocks from work.

At one point, though, I was living way out in northeastern Queens (where I grew up) and commuting to Union Square, basically, which was a 2-hour bus-plus-two-subway-lines trip. Which isn't so bad, except it was a part-time job -- 2 hours (and, like, $2.50) each way for four hours worth of work. It was crazy, but it was also my first job and lead to a fulltime job eventually....

― Casuistry (Chris P), Monday, 20 October 2003 14:11 (twenty-one years ago)

me. i've been travelling for 40 years & i still haven't got there.

― outlawed electrical & thermal weapons (24 hour troubleshooter), Monday, 20 October 2003 14:28 (twenty-one years ago)

My present commute takes 45 minutes to an hour under normal circumstances, because I have to change buses. One bus route doesn't run very frequently. The other is scheduled to run fairly frequently during rush hour, but because DC rush hour traffic is so bad, it's way off schedule. Coming home it's not uncommon for me to wait 30 or 40 minutes (the buses are scheduled to run every 10 minutes), only for one bus to arrive, which is so packed that it doesn't even bother to stop. Then I have to wait another 10 or 15 minutes for a bus that maybe has a little standing room.

The real insult is that my current workplace is perhaps 4 miles from where I live. If so much of it weren't up and down a series of hills, it would probably be more time-efficient to walk. I may not have the shortest commute, but I probably travel slower per mile than anyone else here.

― j.lu (j.lu), Monday, 20 October 2003 15:04 (twenty-one years ago)

I may not have the shortest commute

I may not have the longest commute...

― j.lu (j.lu), Monday, 20 October 2003 15:05 (twenty-one years ago)

Don't hate me, but I only live a 10 minute walk from work.

― jel -- (jel), Monday, 20 October 2003 15:15 (twenty-one years ago)

usually it's not that bad though...so does anyone here have to spend more time getting to work? chris b to thread perhaps?

Actually now my Long Beach <-> UCI commute is about 45 minutes on average. Maybe 35 minutes in the evenings. I usually take PCH all the way, so at least the view is pretty.

Longest commute I had to make was 85 miles one way from Westminster to Westlake Village which took about 2.5 hours in the morning and just under 2 hours in the evening. Fortunately that only lasted about a month and a half.

― Elvis Telecom (Chris Barrus), Friday, 24 October 2003 22:38 (twenty-one years ago)

Seattle to Redmond is a slightly infamous commute for many.. what makes it more infamous is that taking two buses and a shuttle is only marginally longer than taking a car, because buses get the carpool lane, and 95% of the cars don't. That said, there was a shitload of accidents this past Wednesday, and it took me 90 minutes to get home.. so i don't win the longest award by any means, but it still fucking wore me out.

― donut bitch (donut), Friday, 24 October 2003 22:53 (twenty-one years ago)

anyway, on average my commute is an hour each way on bus/shuttle... by car, it's anywhere between 20 minutes and 90 minutes, each way. It just "depends" Public transportation tends to be a little more consistent for my tastes.

― donut bitch (donut), Friday, 24 October 2003 22:54 (twenty-one years ago)

I had a two-hour-ten-minute commute both ways for eight years or so.

Coming in, this meant a walk to the Bay Shore train station; then either a LIRR train to Babylon or Jamaica, and then another to the Flatbush Avenue terminal in Brooklyn; then a subway ride into Lower Manhattan and a walk to the World Trade Center. Going home, a subway to Penn Station; a train to either Jamaica or Babylon, then Bay Shore; and a walk home. (The reason I didn't come into NYC via Penn Station was because the route through the Flatbush Avenue terminal was about five-ten minutes faster. Honest.)

Now that I live in NYC, it's walk-subway-walk. About forty minutes.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 24 October 2003 23:04 (twenty-one years ago)

Actually, I LOVED traking the LIRR, accidents and delays notwithstanding. I could read or better yet nap on the train very very easily.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 24 October 2003 23:05 (twenty-one years ago)

twice a week, i have to go from NYC to Philly and back. that's between an hour-and-a-half and two hours. my regular commute is 35 minutes.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Friday, 24 October 2003 23:17 (twenty-one years ago)

If I could drive to work it'd take maybe 15-20 minutes allowing for traffic. But I have to walk 15 mins to get to th tram stop, sit on the tram on Chapel st in traffic for 20-30 mins then either walk another 10-15 mins at the other end or get a second tram. Usually 45 mins to an hour all up, and I'm only 2 suburbs from where I live. So annoying.

― Trayce (trayce), Saturday, 25 October 2003 03:34 (twenty-one years ago)

fucking hell. and i thought walking for an hour was a drag.

― The Lady Ms Lurex (lucylurex), Saturday, 25 October 2003 08:08 (twenty-one years ago)

for me its abt 70-80 mins. bus to station, train and tube. I get through a few books this way.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Saturday, 25 October 2003 08:13 (twenty-one years ago)

public transport sounds very inefficient. i used to drive 50 miles(lake orion, mi to ann arbor, mi) one way to school and it took me barely over an hour. now i ride my bicycle, it takes me 5 minutes.

― keith (keithmcl), Saturday, 25 October 2003 16:48 (twenty-one years ago)

i used to drive from Silverlake (L.A) to Irvine, but I don't do that anymore. It took a long time.

― Orbit (Orbit), Sunday, 26 October 2003 05:19 (twenty-one years ago)

public transportation can be a hassle and inefficient. on the other hand, driving can be just as much a hassle and inefficient, when you factor in traffic and road-work (both constants in NJ, at least). then you also have to worry about gas, insurance, parking fees, etc., when you have a car. so it works out about the same, time-wise. provided that where you need to go is accessible by public transport, of course.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Sunday, 26 October 2003 05:25 (twenty-one years ago)

one month passes...

Before, I had a summer job in Tennessee while I was living in Alabama, which was almost exactly a one-hour drive each way. Going home was always rougher, though, since I caught lots more traffic.

With my new job, while I'm waiting for everything to fall into place so that I can start work 'downtown', I'm out here in this office in suburban BFE and with the subway and the drive it's about 75-90 minutes each way. I'm not really willing to discuss the costs associated with coming out here and going back every day, either.

As a side note I have had Talking Heads' "Don't Worry About The Government" stuck in my head on and off for nearly 2 weeks now.

― TOMBOT, Thursday, 4 December 2003 17:25 (twenty-one years ago)

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