Poll: What percentage of your total career commuting days was done in a car?

[Walt34]

Post-education it was always a company truck or later on, an employer-furnished car. I seem to recall riding my bicycle one time when both my car and the employer's car were in the shop, but the weather was decent and it was only ~10 miles so not bad.

 

[arky]

For the last 23 years of work (1984-2007), my commute did not hardly vary. Twelve miles of lightly traveled roads which took ~15 minutes. Really can't complain. Rode a bike a handful of times just to say I had.

 

[jjquantz]

...

No problem, really, because in real life most peoples' opportunities to walk or bike are not limited to just going to work and coming home.

This is an interesting statement to me because I find that, in retirement, I just don't care to ride my bicycle around for exercise even though I used it as my primary means of commuting for probably 10 of my w*rking years. Biking to w*rk was the best part of my day during that time. Probably 80% of my lifetime bicycling miles are commuting miles.

Thanks to everyone for responding. It didn't surprise that most people were solo commuters. It was a little surprising to see the distribution tend toward the bi-modal (all or nothing).

 

[ABQ2015]

I probably rode the city bus about 20-30 times in my 30 year career. Usually because my car was in the shop and a few times because I had broken my wrist and was told not to drive - instructions that I soon ignored. Riding the city bus was a truly horrible experience. And the commute time was similar to Rodi - almost a mile to walk to/from bus stops each way and one transfer required for a 10 mile commute to work.

 

[sengsational]

I answered wrong... When I first read it I thought it said company car.... not your/company car...

I never had a company car - so I voted 0%. Should have voted 91-100%.

I carpooled - but used my car (coworker was a 1 car family - so this allowed his wife use of the car and he gave me $ towards gas.)

San Diego's public transit system is pretty lousy. I looked at taking the bus. To go the 6 miles (by car) I'd have to
- walk 3/4 mile to the bus stop. Ride 5 stops then change to a different bus. Transfer time was about 30 minutes. Then walk 3/4 mile from that bus stop to my work. I estimated it would take 90 minutes minimum.

I did the same thing, lol!

 

[Ronstar]

....Also, it's no fun to arrive at work drenched and knowing you have a formal meeting later that day.

Very true. We installed a shower in the men's restroom when we bought our new office in 1996. Worked great for me. I'd ride my bike to work, shower, and change into clothes that I had brought to the office on a previous driving day. Worked great until we sold out to the younger guys and they remodeled the restroom, taking out the shower. That was the end of biking to work.

 

[nash031]

The only reason my answer isn't 100% is I ride my bike to work avg ~ once a week.

 

[Winemaker]

My minimum commute for 35 years was 45 miles one way, 90 round trip obviously, longest was 130 miles round trip. I rotated shifts, sometimes weekly, biweekly, or 4 weekly. However, I was in management, so I did know when I was coming or going.

All in my own vehicle, slayer of over 8 deer, and totaled 1 once during an ice storm. Never late because of transportation issues.

Funny story for me anyhow. I volunteered to pick up a co-worker at 8:00 pm to report at 11:00 pm during a blizzard; I left at 7:15 pm to pick him up. We actually followed state salt/plow trucks for 42 miles. We arrived at 11:50 pm; the superintendent wisecracked " You're late". My co worker said " It was his fault because he drove ", pointing at me. Six foreman were relieved because the two of us even showed.

 

[jIMOh]

OK, since today seems to be rather poll happy day and there was a thread on how your kids get to school, here's another poll on a somewhat related topic.

Since there has been some discussion on some of today's polls about methodology, I'll try to be complete:

1) I'm talking about your post-education w*rk commute experience,
2) The gold-standard methodology would be to consult your complete commute log for your entire w*rking life (we all keep one, right?) and divide the number of days you drove to your w*rksite divided by the total number of days that you traveled to your worksite.
3) Acceptable alternative methodologies include wild-a$$ guesses based on your fast fading memories of what it was like to go to w*rk.

Remember, these are "commute-days" so one 2 hour drive in a car is equal to 1 commute-day and a five minute walk to the office is also 1 commute-day.

Computing....

I'm pretty firmly in the 10-25% range. I really only had 3 or 4 years out of 30 where I was regularly driving to w*rk. A few other years I drove some fraction of the time, but for half of my career I was able to walk/bike/public transport to work essentially all the time.

I have two answers
one involves airports
and one does not

 

[HFWR]

My minimum commute for 35 years was 45 miles one way, 90 round trip obviously, longest was 130 miles round trip. I rotated shifts, sometimes weekly, biweekly, or 4 weekly. However, I was in management, so I did know when I was coming or going.

All in my own vehicle, slayer of over 8 deer, and totaled 1 once during an ice storm. Never late because of transportation issues.

Funny story for me anyhow. I volunteered to pick up a co-worker at 8:00 pm to report at 11:00 pm during a blizzard; I left at 7:15 pm to pick him up. We actually followed state salt/plow trucks for 42 miles. We arrived at 11:50 pm; the superintendent wisecracked " You're late". My co worker said " It was his fault because he drove ", pointing at me. Six foreman were relieved because the two of us even showed.

You've just described my version of hell...

 

[Walt34]

One guy I knew was in the police K-9 unit and they called right after a blizzard wanting him to come to work. He said there was no way, he couldn't get out of the driveway let alone drive on the roads. They sent the helicopter for him because he had the bomb-sniffing dog.

Some days ya just can't get out of it.

 

[eytonxav]

The 35 mile commute between home and office, through two major highway construction projects, and contending with the nut jobs on the road in the metroplex is what drove me to retire, otherwise, I might still be working.

 

[Walt34]

The 35 mile commute between home and office, through two major highway construction projects, and contending with the nut jobs on the road in the metroplex is what drove me to retire, otherwise, I might still be working.

There was a thread a few years ago on why people retired and it seemed the majority retired for one of two reasons: Either bad management or awful commutes or both.

 

[eytonxav]

There was a thread a few years ago on why people retired and it seemed the majority retired for one of two reasons: Either bad management or awful commutes or both.

Its funny, after I retired there were several sr management changes, and many of my former co-workers told me that I left at just the right time