alt Hacker NewsIf you watched the video. The point is that it was something like a 2 and a half hour commute via public transport, it was much shorter while driving. It isn't a "super commute" if you are travelling less than an hour.
A commute in a car that less than an hour isn't niche.
The public transport commute was definitely a super commute, so that's the starting point.
And yeah, that's one of the things to take into account when choosing both a residence and a job.
If you don't have a direct connection (ideally) or very good transfers, yeah, it's going to get ugly quick.
I found a comment on Youtube particularly poignant for this type of problem:
> I worked 7 miles away in Redditch for 18 years, for my sins. The 16 minute journey by car took 45 minutes at rush hour, so I experimented with buses which took an hour and a half, needed two separate tickets from different bus companies, and didn't allow me to do any overtime. I took up cycling and once fit the journey only took 24 minutes.
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Which leads back to my original point: let's all campaign for better public transportion infrastructure, for more dedicated bus lanes, for more bike lanes, for more walkable neighbourhoods, for less car-only infrastructure. Let's give people more options.
Because while there are tons of anecdotes against public transportation, for example, the numbers reveal that it's badly needed and used by millions and millions of people wherever it's available and the coverage and frequency aren't completely unusable. So demand for public transportation is there.
Cars should be there to "plug" the gaps where public transportation, cycling, walking are not valid options. Not be the default as they are in many places.
Let's optimize for 80% of the population first.
Oh, nice side effect: once all those sardines are neatly packed in buses, trams and trains (or on top of bikes) they're no longer on roads so people who do have to use cars have much faster and relaxed commutes.