Machka 

My point ... nothing within walking distance. Most people aren't going to cycle that far.

Damien09

Man thats what i was thinking that would be like an average speed of 27-30mph for the 50 min -55 min time and like 450-500 watts average if it was perfectly flat also depending on weight. He must be some ex tour defrance to keep speeds like that.

Mobile 155

The origional distance is doable on a bike however. 26 miles in 91 minutes would be a recreational cruise of under 18 mph.

cooker

Can you say more about what you mean by "business model"? Usually you tout individual preference as the main influence which dictates the transportation choices and urban form - how does "business model" factor in?

cooker

I paid a lot to buy a house fairly centrally located in a large city so I could take the subway to work, and being able to bike was a happy by-product, triggered by a transit strike. For 20 years I had a 28 minute bike commute. I could have gone much faster, but since my commute in is mostly gently downhill, I found I could coast in at a leisurely pace without sweating on all but a handful of the hottest days. However we were financially strapped early on as a result of the location. A couple of years ago the office moved to a more distant site, now 45 min by bike, and fortunately still mostly downhill. I don’t mind the extra biking, but on days I take public transit, it is now a slightly wasteful 75 minutes. However, I do get to read standing up in the subway, or surf the net or clear work emails on my phone when above ground. It will pick up in a year, when a major disruptive construction project that impedes what should be my best transit route is done, and in two years, at age 65, I plan to start working part-time at home and doing more weeks of northern consulting, so I'll go to the downtown office maybe 30% less.

So my initial choice gave me the option to be car-light, or even maybe car-free if my wife had been okay with it, but it came with a big cost, and when the job moved, i was lucky I could still manage.

Roody

Was this the case with you, or just an imaginary example? Why do you bring it up? I feel you sometimes think it's your function to explain why more people aren't carfree or even discourage them from trying. Me, I'm more about finding ways to help people become carfree and encourage them and support them. For some strange reason, I always thought that was one purpose of this forum. Do you have suggestions or encouragement for people who are trying to find a shorter commute, preferably non-car?

I live less than two miles from downtown, which has huge office buildings as well as hospitals, major insurance companies and one of GM's largest auto assembly plants. But my rent is very reasonable. You need to look around to find good bargains and be realistic about what you will find in a given area. For some people who want short non-car commutes, the answer might be changing jobs rather than changing houses. As in any city, there are thousands of housing units within easy cycling distance of work, and hundreds within easy walking distance. It's just a matter of doing a little legwork to find them.

I think it's good to always be exploring your city on bike or on foot, so that you have good knowledge of the neighborhoods and the housing stock. You notice these things a lot more if you're walking or cycling, rather than zipping by in a car or looking at internet listings. On recent walks, I have seen more than a dozen nice looking rentals and houses for sale that were advertised only by a little sign on the porch. I probably never would have seen them if I had been driving, and they weren't listed on the internet.

mconlonx

It's more a lifestyle and culture thing than an economy thing. If it were only economics, a lot more people would be living car free. And some of it is about personal choice, but some of it can also be about things beyond our control...:

- I lived in a town and my job was 6mi away. I did the bike commute every so often, but did not make a habit of it. In retrospect, I should have, but it just was not on my mind at the time. Point is, very doable to have gone car-lite at that point in my life, even though I was married, two drivers, two cars. +Motorcycles.

- That company moved the office from town to a major city 75mi away. We had just built a house in town. Commute time via car was 1.5-2hrs; 2+ hrs if I parked at mile 10, took a bus to the city, and walked a mile on the other end, which became my commute method of choice.

- Life changes happened, and I moved to the city where a 7mi commute took 45 min by car, 40 min utilizing the subway, or 25 min by bike. So I started bike commuting on a regular basis.

- More life changes, and I moved back out of the city even further than previous -- instead of increasing my commute, I took a lower paying job I could bike to.

While bike commuting from a suburb, I thought I was really putting one over on most other people living in the city. Far enough out not to be paying downtown urban rent, close enough to bike, bike commute shorter than all other modes. Could not comprehend why more people didn't do it, but was not complaining about the lack of bike commuters -- if everyone started bike commuting, would we appreciated the resulting cycling congestion...? How would we deal with cycling traffic jams?

I think emphasizing the economy of bike commuting would go a long way toward getting more people doing it, but it will still be an uphill battle against cultural norms of the day.

Machka 

In many (most) cities the most expensive housing is downtown ... that's just common knowledge. And yes, of course it was the case with me.


It's great if you're the rare person who can live within easy walking distance of everything, but the fact of the matter is ... most people can't. And it is a bit glib and flippant to suggest that people should just move to be in a convenient location so that they can become car free. That's a change that people often can't make for a whole lot of reasons.

Think about it ... can you just pack up and move to a different place? Suppose you were transferred to a hospital on the far side of Toledo ... would you be able to pack things up and go there? Or would it be more convenient and cost-effective for you to stay where you are, at least for the time being.

Sure, if you care about being car-free or car-light, you will of course make every attempt to select the best possible place (seems to me, I started a thread about that: https://www.bikeforums.net/living-car...lace-live.html ) ... but even then, it may not be possible for a family to select the perfect place because, again, the fact of the matter is that people don't necessarily all work in the same location.


I am much more supportive of less dramatic changes ... the small steps we can take. Encouraging people to walk to their local grocery stores once in a while instead of driving all the time. Encouraging people to park in one location and walk to all the shops around, rather than driving to each and every one, and trying to find parking outside the front door. Encouraging people to use public transportation where available.

tandempower

I was thinking about this today and wondering whether commuting time could somehow be factored into work time. Obviously employers aren't going to want to pay people more for longer commutes but, on the other hand, maybe pay levels could take into account the proportion of one's work week spent on commuting. That way, someone who works a 50 hour week and spends 10 hours commuting could get paid the same as someone working 45 who spends five hours commuting, only the person working 45 would make a higher hourly wage because they are more productive per hour spent on work.

I'm not sure exactly what benefit it would have to denote wage levels in this way but it would create an incentive for shortening commutes. Of course, it could also create an incentive to drive instead of biking or walking in situations where doing so would take less time, but if commuting by walking or biking could be reclassified as a fitness/leisure activity, then it would shorten people's commuting time to bike/walk closer to the official starting point of their commute, which would be where their bike ride or walk/jog/hike ends.

tandempower

By closing more roads/lanes to motor-traffic.

In the absence of corporately-funded media, the cultural shift would occur more easily. Automotivism is built into so many social-cultural norms and economic marketing plans that get reinforced by media representations of identity and lifestyles.

"Free your mind, and the rest will follow" - En Vogue 1992

Roody

Yes, there are circumstances that are well known to make it difficult to be carfree. You're not the first person to notice this. But I choose to focus on solutions to those problems, both immediate and long-term. I don't see how listing a lot of things that make it difficult is useful for the forum or for those who come here for advice and encouragement.

mconlonx

Uh-huh. And how do we commence with eradicating corporately-funded media influence on socio-cultural norms...?

loky1179

Yeah, 25 miles in 50 minutes is reasonable. There are plenty of stories of people riding like that.

I'm guessing this was your neighbor?

delcrossv

Except on the 41, 25 miles is 50 minutes is not really believable. The fastest TT'er in our group can do 40k (25 mi) in 52 min or so with 1 turnaround. IIRC that's like 360W sustained for him.. I'm in my 50's and somewhat overweight and can do 40k in a little over an hour in a TT (but I have a very fast recumbent). Commuting? With traffic? Maybe 18-20 mph if I were pushing it. Add in stops, hills etc, or riding a road bike, and the average goes down of course.



Here, there's a lot of reverse commuting (live in the city, work in the 'burbs). So the commute is bad both ways.

Mobile 155

Cooker:
I was talking business model in dress and social functions for the higher paying positions. I stopped riding a bicycle when I moved into an office position that had a dress code and close contact with fellow workers and customers.

I stopped riding my motorcycles when I got in mid management and the dress code required a tie.

At that point not only were there office appropriate wardrobes but standards for meetings and customer presentations.

Customers do not expect you to arrive for a meeting or for a business lunch on a scooter even if in some countries it would be acceptable.

For several years one company even provided some managers with cars or at least paid for the gas. But they wouldn't provide a scooter or motorcycle. They did pay well however.

chasm54

I cycle-commuted 29 miles each way for a year or so. It was a slightly hilly route. It typically took me 1 hour and 40 minutes, I could get it under 1:35 if I pushed it a bit. My workplace had showers and facilities to store a change of clothes, which made it practicable

I've probably never been fitter than I was that year, and I really enjoyed it. But the fact is that most people couldn't accommodate that, it's physically very demanding to ride 300 miles per week at a decent pace. And whatever one's mode of transport, spending well over three hours per day commuting is a big chunk of time.

Dahon.Steve

New Yorkers have some of the longest commute times in the nation. Everyone I talk to who does not live in Manhattan are spending an 1.15 to 2.00 commuting each way to work! My commute takes 1.10 hour each way to commute by bus.

Quite frankly, I don’t care because I’m sleeping for 1.0 hour! Let me tell you, it really makes a huge difference once I arrive I’m refreshed. I may have had a bad night sleeping but that extra hour of sleep on the bus really makes a difference. I also take another 15 minute subway ride and guess what I’m doing? Sleeping! LOL

By the time I arrive at work, I had an extra 1.20 hour of sleep. Now if I had to drive or ride a bicycle, that time would have to be spent totally focused on the road. Having been a bike commuter I prefer the way things are today.