The Conversation: Public transit tradeoff – Speed vs. cost vs. stress

The bike guy did his 20 mile commute in 65 mins!

The Conversation: Public transit tradeoff – Speed vs. cost vs. stress
Hosted by Daniel Weintraub
Published: Sunday, Sep. 13, 2009 - 12:00 am | Page 1E
Last Modified: Sunday, Sep. 13, 2009 - 10:10 am

http://www.sacbee.com/740/story/2177009.html

Join the conversation: What is your commute like? Please use our
reader forum to comment on this issue.

With public transit in the Sacramento region charging more and
offering less thanks to budget cuts brought about by the down economy
and state spending decisions, The Bee's editorial board decided to hop
on a bus and a train to take a quick pulse of the Regional Transit
system as it struggles to stay relevant.

We wanted to see what it's like these days to ride transit into
downtown Sacramento from a suburb. We chose Fair Oaks, with a starting
point on Madison Avenue in front of Bella Vista High School. We sent
Ginger Rutland, a member of the editorial board, to ride the bus and
light rail from there to The Bee's offices Wednesday morning.

But we didn't want to focus on the transit system in isolation. So two
other members of the board joined Ginger on her commute, using
different modes of transportation. Pia Lopez drove her 1998 Buick
Century. Daniel Weintraub rode his bike.

Read how these three residents, whose normal commute to work is less
than 10 minutes, handled a rush-hour commute from Fair Oaks and what
they learned from the experience:

• RT commute: Even with new higher prices, public transit deserves
consideration

• Bike commute: Chickens at one end, traffic at the other; bliss in
between

• Car commute: The fastest of the three commutes took 46 minutes and a
certain degree of stop-and-go exasperation

On Sep 15, 7:52*pm, Ablang wrote:
The bike guy did his 20 mile commute in 65 mins!
http://www.sacbee.com/740/story/2177009.html

Fast but not impossible. He's not a regular commuter and he's
participating in something of a race. Also looking at his photo
and reading his cycling costs it looks like we're seeing a fairly
highclass sports cyclist here, not Joe Reporter with a notebook in one
hand and a cigarette in the other. Also I doubt if he's carrying the
standard laptop, change of clothes, etc that a lot of commuter
carry. He's in racing mode.

• RT commute: Even with new higher prices, public transit deserves
consideration

This sound like an amazingly poor bus service. One mile to a bus stop?
No tranfers? Possibly no dedicated bus lane?

Argh, no wonder it took the poor man to long, Subtract the 15 minutes
to get to a bus stop and the trip is not so long.

• Car commute: The fastest of the three commutes took 46 minutes and a
certain degree of stop-and-go exasperation

Sounded like fairly good commuting conditions but I'd be just as happy
not to drive it and the cost seems high, not unreasonable just
expensive.

I wonder how representitive of the local commuters is the 20 mile
commute? I would have thought that 10-12 miles would have been more
lilkely but perhaps the Sacarmento commutes are long on average.

John Kane Kingston ON Canad