Transportation...or lack thereof



M3.5 Transportation

I thought that living in the city would reduce my driving... I was wrong. Living in the Richmond District, I drive everyday. Parts of the bay and the city are just too challenging to access without a car.

The grocery store is just a little too far, class gets out too late to make the bus worth it, BART has one too many incidents on it to make it reliable. I have a million of these excuses that just make driving that much easier.

I moved to the city when I worked at UCSF, living in the Richmond meant that I could run to work. So 5 days a week my commute was a 5 mile run round trip, which really benefited my physical and mental health. Now I commute to San Mateo, which is 40 min to an hour in the car each way. So I may be catching up on my Podcasts, but I am lacking (and seriously missing) the benefits that running to work really brought me.

Image result for SF MuniI additionally try and carpool, work from home, and take caltrain at least once a week to mitigate the negative effects that driving 2 hours a day can bring. But each of those solutions has a cost. Caltrain takes 2 hours each way with multiple transfers along the way. A bus, to another bus, to the rail line, to caltrain. And working from home stunts my physical activity even.

So I know the pollution that comes from my driving and try and reduce it, but really what I think is hurting my health using my car as opposed to efficient public transportation to get around the bay is my physical and mental health with loss of time and physical activity from using my personal vehicle.

Comments

  1. Aubrey MatthewsSeptember 10, 2019 at 10:16 AM

    Your 5mi round trip story sounds a lot like when I had to commute from home , school, work and the bus stops were at least 1 mile apart from each destination. I was really fit and in-fact, I could not gain weight to save my life (my freshman year of college). I think as we get older, driving becomes a necessity-especially the farther you are from work. I think that we all would like to commute, but commuting can be dangerous depending on the time. I am glad that older cars are being phased out with newer environmentally friendly ones.

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  2. Aika KitilyaSeptember 15, 2019 at 6:49 PM

    It sucks that you can't run to work anymore and now have to spend more time siting. Growing up in SoCal I never got to enjoy the luxury of walking to the grocery store or even to school and take full advantage of this while I am here in the city. Do you think the next place you work or live, proximity to places like the grocery store, work, and just a park would be a priority of yours?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Adam J. LanderosSeptember 16, 2019 at 11:26 PM

    I totally feel this! You make a great point that driving in San Francisco is definitely easier in some situations than using public transportation. I recently bought a hybrid car, which has come in handy in the city because it uses battery power at low speeds and downhill stretches!

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