How about this? Would this be defined as "progress"? Then why is this lifestyle the one the majority of Canadians/Americans aspire to?Think you have it bad? Try a 240-km commute
December 08, 2007
Tim Harper
BERRYVILLE, Va. – With West Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains and bucolic farmland still virtually in her rear-view mirror, Lori Forrester wheels onto Route 7, her target fixed, 120 kilometres southeast.
A quick left. And then she stops.
Pastures of green have given way to taillights of red...
...Research by David Dinges, chief of Sleep and Chronobiology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, shows that the work commute is squeezing Americans' sleep.
When he and colleague studied why Americans are sleeping less they found, to their surprise, that the extra waking hours were not spent on leisure, in front of the television or with family, but sitting in the car.
"The more time people spent commuting, the less they slept,' he said. "The other activities did not relate to sleep time.''
It is also known that a lack of sleep, fewer than seven hours a day (or more than eight hours) also leads to obesity and risk of heart attack, diabetes and stroke, he said.
While that doesn't mean that lack of sleep is killing people, it plays into other factors that might.
It could mean that long commutes mean more fast food, he said, but that has yet to be proved.
"What's really going on here is that we can't do anything without getting into our motor vehicle and going somewhere,'' he said.
Beyond the health risks of sleep deprivation, there are also psychological dangers.
Dinges says fatigue leads to more risk-taking on the highways, likely adds to road rage and general "emotional deregulation'' which leads commuters to expect greater rewards for their time.
Alan Pisarski, a commuting consultant and author of Commuting in America, said there is still a significant economic advantage if your housing prices are cheaper in the exurbs, even with transportation costs going up.
"You have something you wanted, something you have always valued,'' he said.
"But how do you get to enjoy this thing when instead of being there, you're sitting in a car?''
4 comments:
But the lemmings continue to want to move further and further away not only from their work places but from their entertainment sources as well. I have no sympathy for them. In fact I lament them because when I do have to travel the same roads I am also caught up in their stupidity. Include higher taxes for infrastructure and it gets my blood boiling.
The hilariouis thing is that those who are in these predicaments are there because of their own choices. But at least they live in cookie cutter houses with 4 cars in the driveway, a boat, a camper etc. all to keep up with the Joneses. Lemmings, all of them to the detriment of our society.
That's the thing that makes me laugh, Dave. when I mentioned to my old coworkers how nice it is for me to be a ten mnute bike ride/25 minute walk from work, the first words out of their mouths are usually something to the extent "...well, it's kinda hard to ride your bike from Kingsville", as if someone is holding their family hostage at gunpoint, forcing them to live there.
It took me around five years to get in the living situation I am in now. I made a conscience decision as to the locations of my workplace, my home and my entertainment districts and ended up keeping them within a 10 block radius of each other. It's not that hard if you make it a priority. Now, everyone thinks that I just "lucked out". Gawd!
I have friends who live out in the county and while I agree with them about all the wonderful reasons county living is better, I simply can't justify effectively pissing away 6-8 hours in total a week sitting behind the wheel of a car just to get to work and back. Not to mention all those other 'trips into town' they have to make (doctor, shopping, et al.) No thanks!
All that driving time gets subtracted right off of the time one can spend doing enjoyable things, unless getting tailgated all the way to Leamington on Hwy 3 five days a week is your idea of fun. ;)
No, I'm not anti-car, I wouldn't want to live without my car, but at the same time it can sit for days on end thanks to having access to so many walkable destinations. I wouldn't want to have to 'drive into town' because I ran out of milk unexpectedly, or felt like picking up subs, or whatever.
240km commute. Hah!
Wow, that is the dumbest thing I've ever read. Thanks for showing how stupid people can be, especically when they get talking about their fake quality of life.
I could not imagine wasting that amount of my life every day in a car.
It could be just me, but if I didn't live in an urban environment I think I would likely go crazy. I couldn't live with facing a 40 minute drive just to go shopping...
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