Originally Posted by
Darth Lefty
I'm fortunate to have a commute with a lot of possible variety.
- I can take it part-"gravel" which has a 1-mile fire road and a 0.1 mile trail in addition to mostly MUP. This is the minimum distance commute at about 5.3 miles. It probably minimizes the commute time and gets the bike dusty.
- I can take it all on suburban streets and paved MUPs. This is about 5.8 miles if I travel on a major artery and it minimizes elevation changes.
- Or 6.3 and a little more up-and-down if I stick to MUPs and suburbs.
- Probably half the commute, maybe more, is paralleled by single track. This is obviously the least efficient thing to do. Not just because it's on dirt, but because to stay on the trails I need to add distance and up-and-down. But is it the most fun?
I've been taking the first option lately. What would you pick? How would you choose by leg or by season?
I'd probably take the suburban streets and MUP for my ride in to work, and then take the singletrack and gravel for my trips home most days. I miss have even the tiniest amount of singletrack anywhere near my commute now that I've moved to the south end of the city. At least when I lived in the north end I had a whopping half a mile of tame singletrack behind the zoo, but it's silly how much I enjoyed being able to take that. If I had the option of doing 4 miles of singletrack I'd jump at it, for my trips home. I'm used to a one hour (~10 hilly miles) commute anyway.