Transportation editorial - Driving Solo
Getting Nowhere
Diehard singles, we commute, clog, stall, rage and refuse to change
I WALK OUT into the morning rain and face the day's first big decision.
Should I take the bus?
I only have to walk a block, stand under my umbrella and hope the bus is on time. I've got the exact change, so I'm prepared. My round trip would cost about the same as a gallon of gas. I wouldn't get mad at anyone on my way to the office. I'd praise myself for doing my infinitesimal part in reducing congestion. And today is a rare day: no outside appointments requiring me to drive somewhere.
Then, in the shelter of my porch, I picture transferring to another bus downtown, or walking a mile to the office. I consider that I pay — a lot — for a parking spot whether I use it or not . . . And maybe today is the day that elusive source will summon me. Maybe one of my kids will. Actually, I have never taken the bus before, so the uncertainty nags.
And there, 10 steps away . . . is my car.
Five minutes later, I'm gripping the steering wheel, wedged behind a truck and between two SUVs. Rain splats from above and spinning wheels roil spray from the pavement as we cross south over the Aurora Bridge. It's a herky-jerky grind, like hens doing a conga line, but we're moving. I feel guilty, but warm, too, lulled by a new CD, swaying wipers and synchronized brake lights.
Convenience is the drug that salves commuting guilt.
Transportation planners study volume and flows and bridging the blobs where people live and work. What does not fit so easily into their matrix is the human behavior of the lone commuter who, one by one, determines congestion.
Many years ago, transportation planner Cy Ulberg urged his peers to look beyond volumes and timetables and consider the role psychology plays in commuting decisions. He studied values and habits and beliefs and perceptions — like how you feel you've waited longer than you have for that bus or you wonder if it's already come and gone.
"People cannot be expected to gather all the relevant information, perceive it accurately, weigh it evenly and act without prejudice," he wrote in his report. "They distort information to fit with choices they have made. Once they make some choice, they have difficulty producing a change."
We make our choices on the black-and-white: convenience, cost, connections, but also on social realities of modern life like multitasking and parenting, daily patterns and habits, time and (personal) space. Sometimes, we let the environmental and political headlines of the day nudge us. Sometimes we aim for the common good, but often it must be at least partly about us.
I think about Ulberg's report as I drive solo into work. I'm not a road-clogger, I tell myself. My commute is only five miles each way. I often work from home and on weekends just to run counter to the grain. And I need my car. No good reporter hangs around the office; nothing happens there.
Still, my morning choice strikes me as a wimpy one. I look around and see everyone else is driving alone, too. I wonder why they can't rideshare and if their excuses are valid or, like me, they just don't want to get wet. The question is not why can't they rideshare, but why won't they?
AS DIRECTOR OF the Washington State Transportation Center, Mark Hallenbeck says congestion is not just a function of too many cars in too small a passage in too tight a window. It is also the sum of choices.
"Flexibility and convenience still far outweigh the costs of driving alone," he says. "People don't really feel the pain — even though they complain about it. It isn't so bad that they are really, actively looking for an alternative. And since they aren't looking, they don't know what the alternatives are." And he hastens to add, there aren't many good transit alternatives for suburb-to-suburb commutes.
Continue reading this story from the Pacific Northwest Magazine - Seattle Times:
Getting Nowhere
