Doohickie

Boss: "Hey Paul, funding for your project was pulled."

Me:

Boss: "Don't worry, I've lined up another job for you, but it's in another building.

Me: [checks map... only 7 miles from my house!] I haven't ridden my bike in forever... I wonder if I could make it to work?

The rest was history.... I commuted about 2/3 of the time when my one-way distance was 7 miles. Then I took a new assignment and it's up to 17 miles each way. I only commute once or twice a week now.

SouthFLpix

The price of gas was approaching $5 a gallon, and we had just moved to a new building with limited parking facilities. In fact the parking was so limited that if you did not show up early you might not find a spot. Also, if you went out for lunch you risked losing your spot for the rest of the day. We were encouraged to carpool, but being more of an individualist I decided to ride a bike instead. It was a great decision.

Seattle Forrest

Enjoyment.

Telly

The straw that broke the camels back was searching for parking at my work which sometimes meant going around for 20-25 minutes at a time.
But even before that, I always wanted to commute to work since it's only a few miles, the climate in Athens is pretty much dry throughout the year, and it's an excellent excuse to exercise (being a Clydesdale).

Consularrider

Riding a bike for transportation has always been part of my life, some years more than others. This time around it's because it's a lot more fun than public transit and a lot cheaper than driving. Oh yeah, did I say it's a lot of fun to ride my bike and I have to go to work anyway?

RaiderInBlue47

Always wanted to for fitness and fun, but thought the only route was the shoulder of a US Highway. Yikes.

Never realized how easy it is in my town. Google maps is a great thing!

douga

A car I owned for 10 years finally died about 6/7 weeks ago. I couldn't afford a new car so I decided to start biking on an old rust MTB I had in the garage. I'm a programmer, so I sit all day - and would carry a lot of side jobs so I sat all night as well. So it had been at least 5 years since I had any kind of real exercise.

After making up my mind I scrapped up enough to buy an entry level road bike and a few things I would need to make it work (rack, etc). I haven't even been commuting 2 months yet and already I'm disappointed if I have to miss a day (like today). It only takes me about 10 minutes longer than it used to by car and I think as I get in shape more I'll close the gap even more.

I don't know why but I love doing errands in the morning on my bike. Cutting across from place to place - sitting at the ATM drive through on my bike...Don't know, just feels good to be different from everyone else.

Plus I work for a local government that has a "green" emphasis, and I'm the only one that commutes by bike - and now I've got some of my co-workers talking about it.

bluefoxicy

Jaguarundi

Why not commute? It combines exercise, fun, helping the environment, and saving money. With all of those things, driving just doesn't make sense. Commute ftw!

Jaguarundi

jdswitters, I love the idea of rewarding yourself with new bike goodies. Personally I'm tempted to purchase things all the time that I probably don't need, and I have a hard time evaluating when I do or don't need them. So I'm going to use your idea. Do I really need to upgrade my pedals? If I'm riding every day up hills, yes, I do.

Igo

Me too. Two workouts a day, recreation AND I still have the rest of my life intact.

And it was 108*F on my commute home just a few minutes ago. I did great. I'm so happy.

Igo

My kinda story. Think I'll go out and buy a LHT frame this weekend.

SactoDoug

I decided to commute because I don't want my ass to get as big as my chair at work.

mikeinroch

+1

It's the only way I'm going to get significant amounts of exercise without having an impact on my family life. It helps when your commute is the perfect amount of workout without taking much time (6-8 hilly miles).

mtalinm

boyohboyohboyohboy my favorite topic. here comes a long post for sure...

i live in the suburbs. I had driven to my job on the outskirts of town for 4 years, then I got a new job in the heart of downtown. Driving was pretty much out of the question, so I started taking public transportation. this involved driving 2 miles to the train station and paying $5 to park.

it seemed ludicrous to me to pay $100 per month to park just two miles from my house, so I bought a bottom-of-the-line bike and started riding to the train station. I hadn't been on a bike in years, and I was a sweating shivering mess after scaling the (mild) hill on the way home.

after a couple of months of that, the hill was no biggie and the bike had paid for itself from not parking. I started to wonder if I could maybe bike more than 4 miles per day. so one day I drove halfway to Boston, parked my car at the tip of the southernmost bike lane, and rode the remaining 6 miles. and survived!

after doing that a couple of times I started to think I could do the whole 13 miles. at first it took me an hour and 20 minutes because I'm (still) fat and (formerly) slow. I stuck with it though, and now I can do it in less than 50 minutes...which is faster than public transportation and driving unless you get really, really lucky. in the best case driving takes 35m, so it's only another 15 to ride, plus it's a good use of time whereas driving just makes me angry at the other M*******s.

I love bike commuting because it is the first meaningful athletic thing I have done in my entire life. I didn't even make J.V. basketball. But I rode 5,000 miles last year.

It has also turned me into a minor celebrity at work. I think people are stunned that I do it as a fattie, though I've lost 40# I could stand to lose another #100. (Yes, I wear loose clothes over the bike shorts for the sake of the community.) one of my coworkers has also started biking to work, and others are thinking about it too.

also, although I don't do this at all for environmental reasons it keeps the lefties in the office from prying too much about my right-wing politics :-)

also it saves a ton of money. Driving costs about $10-12 in gas and $4 for parking each day; the train is even more expensive with the subway transfer and parking figured in.

and it is way fun, great exercise, sometimes there's very nice scenery too :-) I'm hooked

bored117 

Got a new job... would be 90 miles round trip by driving in one of worst So Cal traffic route with not even surface street shortcut available. So.. 3hrs+ of drive and adding toll + gas... it was costing me about $1000 a month to commute.

Decided to give it a go with train+bike mix and cost time to commute is 4hours+ but I am asleep for about an hour of that time, much more relaxed, healthy and "saving" about $750 a month. (okay, in reality it is more in line of couple of hundred of dollars of saving as I allocate myself about $400 a month for bike related budget now) Arguably, I could possibly add $30 a month or so for not having to get gym membership and saving even more hour by not spending time working out separately.

Overall, simple math of win/win situation. And... I got hooked

busted knuckles

I was mountain biking on a pretty regular basis, winter hit us pretty hard and I could not get my truck out of the driveway. I started commuting then. It has been 3 years now, about 30 lbs lost. Hooked.

KD5NRH

Did multi-modal in Dallas a few times when I missed the bus, but I don't recall ever riding all the way to work or any other errand more than ~2 miles away. I did ride to some SCA fighter practices in a couple of parks on the White Rock Trail, though.
Back when we lived 6 miles out of town and only had one working car, my wife got caught up with something in town and wasn't home by about two hours before I had to be at work. She'd left her cell phone at home, so I couldn't be sure she wasn't stuck. I had a choice between taking my chances waiting, walking 8 miles, or airing up the tires on the old Ironhorse AT20. (I guess I could've called around for a ride, but asking people to drive out there at 10PM and haul my butt to town is something I reserve for real emergencies.) I got out the pump, got it going, soaked the drivetrain with spray dry lube and started pedaling. By the time I passed her on the road, I didn't feel like trying to stuff the bike into the Mazda, so I just kept going.
Repeated that a couple more times when the weather was nice and the car wasn't, and now that I have a much nicer bike and 2-3 mile each way commute, I do it whenever the mood strikes me.
The Ironhorse, minus handlebars, is still sitting on the back porch right now, (and I think the bars are in the garage) and I'm really tempted to get some cheap wheels to keep studded tires on for it. I would have loved to have that option during the 3 days of ice we had last winter; roads nearly empty, very little wind, and the ice was just hard enough that cars without chains (which nobody has down here; that was about a once-per-decade storm) couldn't get a grip at all in areas that hadn't been salted or sanded. I skipped a lot of errands after having to lever and/or rock my Blazer out of a couple of low spots. It would have been priceless to cruise past the rednecks that got too brave in their jacked up 4WDs.

gtragitt

I was traveling so much for business that I wasn't able to ride my road bike as much as I wanted. I figured I could get some more miles in by riding to work whenever I wasn't traveling

Rhodabike

My present commute is too short to be considered exercise, so I would have to say that my main reason is that it's faster (MUCH faster) and less frustrating than the bus. Riding home at the end of a long day is decompression time, and sometimes I add a lap or two of a 5k loop on to the end.
If I drove to work I'd be paying $40 a month for parking.

bautieri

Because it's fun.

xtrajack

I started to save money on gas. I rediscovered the fun. Now I do it because I enjoy it. I feel better mentally, physically and emotionally than I have in years before I started riding. The cheapest therapy ever.

tarwheel 

I was already cycling a lot when I started commuting, but always struggled to squeeze in rides on the weekdays. I also work in the environmental field, and was very conscious of the energy-saving and clear air benefits of cycling, so I kept telling myself that I really ought to bike commute. So I decided to try bike commuting on "dress down Fridays" to see how it would work out. I quickly got hooked and started adding more days, now up to 4 days/week on average.

The most important factor for me is that bike commuting makes it much easier to ride more and is much more enjoyable than driving. However, the other benefits are also important -- conserving energy, preventing air pollution, improving my health and fitness, saving money (ha!), losing weight. When I am tempted to wimp out and drive to work, it's easy talking myself into riding when I start thinking of all the reasons why I choose to cycle.

tessartype

End of February this year, I was about to start a new job. While scouting ways to get there, I realized the only bus-route to work comes once every 30 minutes, takes 20 minutes through tiny streets and detours, and then leaves me with 5-10 minutes of walking from the station. By bike, it takes 10 minutes on my decent bikes, 20 when cruising at below-sweating speeds on a city-bike. Decision made.

Even at my current (horrendous) state of spendings on bikes - the seemingly-cheap-and-simple fixed gear conversion ended up costing more than a brand-new frame - I still save enough on bus-money to justify that purchase in 8 months. Soon, I'll be fit enough to justify adding a high-end carbon weekender to my stable - don't think I'll ever need a car, the way things are going these days.

Since then, the only time I was late to work was when I got stuck in traffic on my way home and couldn't leave on time for work.

nelson249

Great story, thanks for sharing...