I Tried Super Commuting: Here's How it Went (Super Commuting Part 1)
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- Опубликовано: 30 июн 2024
- Last summer, I interned at a transit agency... two counties away from where I lived. This gave me a new view on super commuting and got me thinking about how this phenomenon works. Follow along to see how it went!
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Sources:
www.soundtransit.org/
www.intercitytransit.com/
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Images / Videos:
Maps courtesy of Google Maps
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Instagram: @TheTransitBandits
Twitter: @TransitBandit7
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Music:
Animal Beast by SefChol (RUclips Music Library)
July by John Patitucci (RUclips Music Library)
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Inquiries / More Info: thetransitbandit@gmail.com
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Thank you so much for watching!
Written, produced, recorded, and edited by Zaref Anderson
lol. And I complained when I had 2 hour commute. I'm impressed!
It was a bit of a slog for sure, but I learned a lot and consider it a very valuable experience!
The 594 bus is amazing. I wish more people knew about it.
Agreed! It's a great off-peak option for Seattle-Tacoma-Lakewood!
this trip is a ton of fun! i had a crush on someone who lived in olympia and i bussed down there a couple of times early in the morning to be absolutely too nosey. couple great bike trails as well, some cool parks, few short hikes. lots of reasons to take a day trip down.
Absolutely, I love traveling to Olympia just for fun as well, great city to explore!
It’s amazing how many places transit can take us! I agree that having routes like the 620 run later would benefit, especially if plans change. Glad you enjoyed the super commute and internship!
Yes, it was definitely an adventure, and I learned a lot!
Haven't watched the video but damn, Seattle to Olympia sounds insane, even with the light rail.
I find this managable if it's not buses- possibly just because of travel sickness but also the buses are so slow and get stuck in traffic. I used to have a bus almost door to door from home to work but I traded it for 15min walk +metro+tram+15min walk so a lot more 'hassle' on paper but I enjoyed it so much more, it was normally faster (especially at peak hour) and was like 20c cheaper 😅 I went from being like 'I cannot go on like this'- genuinely thinking of quitting my job or moving- to being pretty happy with my commute.
That’s fair - modal preference does exist for a reason. Personally, I love the bus but I can get why you’d prefer trains. For this commute, you could in theory take Amtrak, although it would cost more and take around the same amount of time, but for some it can definitely be worthwhile.
a 10 minute commute for me is a bad day.
That was me most of the time with college! I get that though, it can be a slog
What a route
As easy as you made it look, spending 6 hours each office day on the road is just too brutal, especially during winter months when daylight hours are shorter. That's potentially a quarter of your life spent on buses and trams lol great vid tho many thanks (My commute takes around 2 hours each way and I do it 5 times a week)
Yeah, and something I definitely am hoping for is stronger regional transit lines to allow for easier travel on this corridor as well as other similar corridors!
Very interesting experience. I have a 16 mile (25 km) commute to go to work here in Vancouver. It takes me 35 min average driving my electric car. I would take me 1 hour and 30 min at least using public transit! I love your videos. (And I have to say, you are very handsome too!)
My gf did a commute twice a week from Hartford CT to NYC which with driving to the train station and taking the train is about 3 hours to go 100ish miles not the worst but it takes a toll after awhile
Yeah, it can definitely be a slog, that’s quite wild!
I met someone that lives in Oceanside and works in downtown LA. That is two hours on the train twice a day.
That's a long ride! I've been looking into commutes in that region and it definitely sounds like a long haul for sure.
@@thetransitbandit She just uses the time to nap before work.
@@pacificostudios I won't lie, I napped many times during my own commute haha!
My friend and I have taken the 550 and 594 and 620 and 62A from Bellevue just to see the only diverging diamond interchange in WA state in Lacey. On a Sunday no less.
The 594 and 620 are great in that they have fairly usable and reliable weekend service, something I've definitely taken advantage of myself!
I live in the Miami metro area. I take 2 buses, the MDT #17; then I transfer to the #77, which drops me right in front of my office. Total time one way is about 1 hr 1 min. That includes the walk from my apartment door to my first bus stop. My workplace is 8.2 miles from my apartment.
That's pretty interesting! What's it like to take transit in Miami? I've always been curious about Miami as a city
When I want to go to UCLA from Oceanside, CA, the trip takes four hours by bus, train, LRT and bus, in that order.
Wow, what a trek!
THE ONE MENTIONED !!!!!!!!!
I knew someone who did a similar commute every weekday for two years. Insane.
Sounds like that would get old pretty fast, but must’ve been an adventure!
I'm curious about the timing/pricing compared with Amtrak Cascades, since that goes between Seattle and Olymia-Lacey.
Time: About 1 hour 20 minutes. Price: About $20 each way. Considering the need for local transit from the U District to King St. Station and from Lacey to ICT HQ, the time savings isn't worth the expense.
I definitely considered Amtrak, but to me it didn’t justify the cost. It would be a marginally shorter trip for much more money, and taking local transit from the Amtrak station to the office would take nearly an hour anyway, so for me it was much easier and cheaper to take the bus - the bus also had better frequency. That being said, if I ever missed the last 620 to Lakewood, I would’ve had Amtrak as a backup which would’ve been nice.
Wow. I always wondered how long it would take to get to Olympia from Seattle by transit. I wish there were more transit options to Olympia from Seattle. I also wish the Sounder was more frequent.
Yeah, it would be really great to have better Sounder service - fingers crossed it happens soon!
My commute is usually 2.5 hours from New Haven, CT to Manhattan in NYC, via Metro-North (75 miles). My boss commutes from Montauk Long Island to NYC 2x a week via LIRR in 3.5 hours. (118 miles). 😩
Wow, those are both really impressive commutes! Quite wild to hear about.
Long rides in transit are actually fairly common even in cities that are way more transit friendly. For example, the residential town of Odawara is a 90-minute one-way trip by limited-stop commuter train on either Odakyu or JR East trains back to central Tokyo. No wonder why you see during commute hours the use of commuter trains with way more comfortable seating than what you normally get in commuter train service.
For sure, makes sense! It’s always nice to have extra comfort on those longer trips
I was wondering if you could take the Sounder but saw that their earliest trains aren't that early (and surprisingly the route isn't much faster than bus -- highways can be efficient!)
If there were more reverse-peak Lakewood trains then it would be possible - it’s definitely possible, even easy for a peak-direction commute though!
I like your videos, have subscribed. I've considered riding public transit SEA-OLY-SEA one day, but just for fun, not for commute (yikes).
Please tell me, 1:37 WHAT BRAND WIRELESS MICROPHONE/HEADPHONE are you using? I am sick of buying cheap ones & finding the headphones adequate but the microphones absolute junk.
Thank you, glad to have you onboard! Seattle - Oly on transit is a lot of fun, definitely recommend it, and Oly is a fun city to explore by bus - it also helps that Intercity Transit is totally fare-free, so you can get around the city pretty easily!
As for my headphones, they're just the standard Apple EarPods that used to come with iPhones, I believe you can still buy them from Apple stores though!
fascinating, in 2018 i would commute 90 minutes from sammamish to dt seattle for school, and it was a pleasant sleepy ride on two busses.
i’ve since moved to texas and commute 70 minutes between dt dallas and dt fort worth on light rail and commuter rail. (my work is in fort worth but that city is unlivably unwalkable)
i much prefer the seattle commute, there’s just some peaceful sleepy vibe it has
For sure, I love commuting in Seattle
I'll usually drive to a MARC station near Baltimore to get to DC for work every day, but the days I've taken the bus to Baltimore Penn Station, then the MARC to DC, then the bus to work, it takes around 90mins all-told for abt a 40-mi commute, but that's nothing compared to this monster lol
That’s still a super commute, quite wild!
I wish this was possible where I lived
It's ironic that you literally commuted to the Olympia train station, but you had to ride a bus all the way.
I did go to Lakewood Station, but the Olympia Amtrak station is unfortunately in a farm field in Lacey, so I didn't go there.
I came to realize how terrible the supercommute was when I did it for a summer job from my Orlando suburb to Universal Studios. So miserable and slow. If I had a missed transfer, I would have been royally screwed too.
Yeah, sounds like quite the trek, glad you don’t have to do that anymore!
@@thetransitbandit definitely haha now I just take a single 25 min light rail ride to work
@@GirtonOramsay Used to live in Orlando and the public transit there is quite awful.
Forget the content....you're super cute!
Why not take Sounder train to Lakewood?
I would've if I could! I was traveling in the reverse-peak direction, and while Sounder does operate a few reverse-peak trips, the majority are only between Seattle and Tacoma, and I needed to be in Lakewood for my bus. There is one reverse-peak Lakewood train in the morning, but it would've got me to work at either 10 or 11 AM, and I usually tried to start work at 9. I did take it to work once though on a more chill day where I came in late!
I just weighed this up is $$$.
So... 6 hours each day x 5 = 30 hours @ $50 an hour (what I could be earning if I was working rather than sitting on a bus) = $1500 per week.
It would be cheaper to have moved over the summer and rented your place in Seattle.
I pull out my laptop and hotspot on the train so I'm earning. Because my transit timetable doesn't get me to the office much before 11am and I have to leave at 3pm to make the last bus. I've done the super commute once: four hours each way including waiting for transit using two buses and two trains. I might do it again later this month. They shut down my local office during pandemic so now my closest office is 200km away. They do put me up in a hotel overnight so it's not right hours of travelling in the one day!
I doubt most students could find short-term jobs at $50 an hour and he also did he only did that once a week.
Let me clear a couple things up - I live in a University area, so subletting in the summer is incredibly difficult. While rent in Olympia is cheaper than in Seattle, it would probably have cost me more than what I was paying, especially since I wouldn’t have been able to commit to a 12-month lease. I was not paid even half of $50 an hour as an intern, and was actually paid for a portion of my commuting time, as my boss saw it as a valuable opportunity for me to learn more about transit. And as others mentioned, I could be somewhat productive during my commute as well. So while there would be a compelling argument to move to Olympia if it had been a longer-term or higher-paying job, in my situation the commute definitely made more sense.
1:00 "once or twice weekly ventures into the office" taught you a lot about taking long distance trips on a regular basis.
Regular basis to me would be five days a week for several years. Then you would know what it feels like.
To me, it was an introduction. I acknowledge that there are people who have to do it more often and for longer, but I don’t believe that invalidates my experience.
Man 3 hours to go 60 miles that's absolutely bonkers. That's a very strong argument for personal motorized transit.
that's a very strong argument for express commuter rail service
@@heyitstobias Assuming there is a large number of commuters that would take it, I agree. But if that's not a very commutable route, that money on transit is better served elsewhere.
@@Mike__B
Then maybe, city planning should take this into account and plan where they put housing and industry.
Instead of allowing developers to go all british empire on the map.
Also, if everyone had a car, that route would still take 3 hours even in a car, look at LA traffic
Or you know, build actual commuter transit options that cover arterial routes so a 100km commute isn't 3 hours.
@@anivicuno9473 Lets not jump to conclusion that a guy who wanted to do a summer internship type of job and didn't want to move for just the summer translates into housing and industry is just bonkers.
Yes, if everyone had a car, if everyone had a car, everyone isn't doing that 3 hour commute every day.
It’s an argument for stronger regional transit. There have long been discussions of a Sounder extension to Olympia, which i would strongly be in support of. Additionally, considering the traffic volumes on I-5, there would certainly be demand for more transit on the corridor. My commute was just one example. Unfortunately, commutes between Thurston, Pierce and King Counties aren’t all that rare, and do need to be accounted for with our transit systems. My next video, going deeper into my commute reflections, will further explain some of these ideas.
Okay then... let me introduce you to myself. 414 was a Gillig Phantom which burned its ass by Ft Lewis. The TBD was my answer to Tim Eyman and RTID. And I have a lot of spirituality within me. Tell Kathy that I have a problem with trolls and need them squished Site 2 style.
What?
@@rowenadebenham7821 Something you wouldn't know about. Old Intercity Transit (pre-countywide, 1989-90). Initiative 695, which decimated transit funding as well as road maintenance and public safety funding. If your last name is Benham, tell the ghost of Monte that datura is a spirit drug for me. Park Lake Homes Site 2, now known as Seola, and someone from Portland who knows me.
That’s terrible, a car would’ve probably taken 1 hour
A car would’ve been about an hour and a half each way, but even if I’d had the ability to do that I would’ve preferred my transit commute personally - I’ll explain more about that in my next video!
Lol 2.5 hrs to travel 100km what a god damn joke. It's worse than a developing country because it's a legitimate waste of money. Even a moped is better. You should have a direct bus route. Anything else is crap and designed to only cater to small commuters and the vehicle industry.
It was definitely not ideal, but a direct bus route wouldn't help. I was the only person making my commute, so a U District - Olympia express bus wouldn't really help LOL. However, I do think that this shows the need for better and more frequent regional transit lines!
@@thetransitbandit So you don't think people with cars do the same commute as you?
@@norbertmayer7005 There are definitely Seattle-Olympia reverse commutes, but as you'll see in future videos my philosophy isn't necessarily to run commuter peak-hour buses - I personally believe creating transit systems that can be used efficiently all day, all week are more important.