Originally Posted by
CompleteStreets
I've always been curious to know how much rain pants cost on a per-trip used. If for example the pants cost $100, but only get used 50 times before being discarded/lost/stolen, well that's $2 per use. Not a great deal. If, however, the pants cost $50 and get used 200 times, that's $0.25 per use, which is much more reasonable. I'm finding that even in the Pacific NW rain pants are not a necessity on most days. Oftentimes the rain comes and goes and thus on some "rainy" days, even days with a 100% chance of rain, it may not be raining during my commute. I doubt I'll be using my rain pants more than 40 times in a given year. Possibly as few as 20 times/year. So here are my questions:
1. How many years did you get out of your last pair of rain pants?
2. What caused you to replace them?
I bought a good pair of goretex rain pants for commuting and quickly got rid of them. Honestly, wearing a good pair of wicking shorts and good shoes is the best, as your legs are naturally waterproof, better than goretex. When I get to my destination, I switch to dry and warm pants kept in my commuter bag while the quick dry shorts dry.
So for me, I spent 150$ on these pants, and wore them twice, and now they are my ski pants and camping pants.. nothing more.