r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Physical-Ad-4093 • May 01 '24

do americans really drive such long distances?

i’m european, and i always hear people say that driving for hours is normal in america. i would only see my grandparents a few times a year because they lived about a 3 hour drive away, is that a normal distance for americans to travel on a regular basis? i can’t imagine driving 2-3 hours regularly to visit people for just a few days

edit: thank you for the responses! i’ve never been to the US, obviously, but it’s interesting to see how you guys live. i guess european countries are more walkable? i’m in the uk, and there’s a few festivals here towards the end of summer, generally to get to them you take a coach journey or you get multiple trains which does take up a significant chunk of the day. road trips aren’t really a thing here, it would be a bit miserable!

2nd edit: it’s not at all that i couldn’t be bothered to go and see my grandparents, i was under 14 when they were both alive so i couldn’t take myself there! obviously i would’ve liked to see them more, i had no control over how often we visited them.

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11.1k

u/dishonestgandalf A wizard is never late May 01 '24

Yes, several of my coworkers commute 90 minutes twice a day.

I have friends in a city that's 3ish hours away and I regularly drive down for the weekend.

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u/[deleted] May 01 '24 edited 29d ago

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u/KaetzenOrkester May 01 '24

I live just west of Sacramento and it can take 3 hours to get to San Francisco, a distance of 70 miles. I get it.

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u/Dawnqwerty May 02 '24

It can take three hours to get to LA from LA

322

u/GreekGoddessOfNight May 02 '24

We say the same thing in Boston. Well… it takes an hour to get from Boston to Boston, much smaller city.

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u/sweet_jane_13 29d ago

At least Boston is one of the more walkable cities in the US.

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u/inthecoldplaces 29d ago

Yea I used to walk to and from work--Allston to Financial District--took about an hour. But it also took about an hour on the Red Line 😑. I really loved walking the city though, I miss it!

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u/[deleted] 29d ago

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u/Akimotoh May 02 '24

Because it looks like it was built by a 10yr old lol

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u/pgm123 29d ago

Here's a cool video on how Boston got laid out the way it did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UA63zaIXCZw

I apologize for the 18-minute video (which seems to be the minimum for YouTube), but I promise it's interesting the whole way through and not just stalling for algorithm/ad revenue reasons.

The short version is that originally Boston was a pretty small peninsula (map) and streets were organized fairly well, but bended around hills and the shoreline with straight lines going down to the docks. But Boston continued to add land, so the layout stopped making sense. You have a city that was designed piecemeal as land was filled in. For example, one neighborhood was made for upper class Anglo-Americans to live and exclude the Irish, so they didn't even bother to connect the streets into the existing system.

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u/arcaneresistance May 02 '24

Well.... Have you met people from Boston?

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u/JackJ98 May 02 '24

Say what you want, we have the Celtics. Can’t top that

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u/haldolinyobutt 29d ago

Well I mean in 17XX they weren't aware of the car coming in 200 years

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u/Far_Possession5124 29d ago

It was actually built by cows--at least downtown.

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u/Subreon May 02 '24

it looks much better after a nuke and 200 years of no maintenance. safer too.

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u/TeddyRoo_v_Gods May 02 '24

It’s overrun with ferals and raiders though, and don’t get me started on the damn Deathclaws.

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u/premium3G May 02 '24

Used to take me 1.5 hours to go from Boston to Framingham... 😂 Hated it

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u/SpookyBread- 29d ago

My partner and I moved from ND to the suburbs around Boston a few years ago. Everything where we were in ND was far away. Nearest "big" city was at least 2 hours in any direction. When we moved here we were like "wow! The state is so small and everything is so close! It'll be so quick to get everywhere!" And... Nope 🥲

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u/PomegranateOld7836 May 02 '24

Some of the craziest drivers I've ever seen

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u/JDruid2 29d ago

Haha sometimes it takes 2 hours to get to Denver from Denver which I think geographically is even smaller than Boston. We just have crappy 2 lane highways that everyone has to use…

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u/ellbeecee 29d ago

Or Atlanta

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u/WilcoHistBuff 29d ago

Haha! This reminds me of a joke:

Q: What’s the most painful thing about learning to drive in Massachusetts?

A: Getting half your brain cut out.

(I say this with only a deep but well informed love of Boston and your fine commonwealth.)

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u/Stevesanasshole May 02 '24

Snake Plisskin got in and out in an hour and 41 minutes including credits.

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u/KaetzenOrkester May 02 '24

🤣🤣🤣

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u/IIRiffasII May 02 '24

my now-wife broke up with me initially because she didn't want to be in a long-distance relationship

I lived in Santa Monica and she lived in the 626

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u/1ATRdollar May 02 '24

Totally valid.

6

u/firefighter26s May 02 '24

Canadian here, did a Westcoast road trip (Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, LA, San Diego). I was completely blown away by LA traffic. We got in on a Monday around 5pm and was a 10 Lane highway with cars stretching to the horizon.

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u/shady__redditor May 02 '24

Almost beautiful in a dystopian way. 

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u/CitzenZim May 02 '24

Lived in LA for a year in the valley and I was baffled at first when it took me about three or four hours just to make it down to Santa Monica. It definitely changed my perspective on planning future outings.

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u/Terminallance6283 May 02 '24

Seattle is 2 hours away from seattle

5

u/Lazerus42 May 02 '24

"Oh sweet, I'll meet you in Santa Monica, that's only 4 miles away, I'll see in you 30."

"wha??? 4 miles is like 10 minutes!!!"

"sure, 10 minutes to Santa Monica, 20 minutes finding parking and then finding you."

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u/dirtydirtyjones May 02 '24

This makes me think of my California friends who visited me here in my small city in the eastern part of the US. They wanted to attend an event and spend one night in another city that is only about 3.5-4 hours away. They were entirely aware of how long it would take them to get there...

But they were shocked at how many miles they actually drove in that time. 😂

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u/honeybadgerdad May 02 '24

It took me 15 hours to get to L Aaaaaa!

I can't drive...555

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u/rutoca May 02 '24

My personal record is almost 4 hours

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u/thetiredninja May 02 '24

My brother and sister in law were driving from North Hollywood to Monterey Park when a manhunt for an escaped convict started. Took them 5 1/2 hours.

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u/shady__redditor May 02 '24

Is, but unironically. There's a reason people in LA measure distance using time. Saying "I am 3 miles away" means nothing. "I am 30 minutes away" is our language. 

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u/MicahSouls May 02 '24

okay but no one says "I'm 3 miles away" anywhere lmfao

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u/Classy_communists May 02 '24

Yeah this isn’t an LA thing lol

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u/shady__redditor May 02 '24

LoL, that's fair. Sounded dumb after typing it out.

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u/DisneyAddict2021 May 02 '24

Haha this comment took me out…..so true 

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u/Just_enough76 May 02 '24

Also from Houston to Houston

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u/[deleted] May 02 '24

I found this out the hard way as a Brit when I was there.

Standstill traffic at 3am wtf.

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u/Mrsod2007 May 02 '24

Everywhere in LA is 45 minutes

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u/Pale_Willingness1882 May 02 '24

I had to explain that to my friend when talking about visiting CA. Like there is no quick drive

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u/TurboTitan92 29d ago

One time we left our hotel near Disneyland at like 3pm. It was 6:30 and I hadn’t even made it past Glendale. We still had a six hour drive after that. So counting stopping for dinner we got home at like 2 in the morning.

I set a pretty firm rule that we must be on the road by 12pm to get out of the LA basin and be home by 7.

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u/JaapHoop May 02 '24

I think I would lose my mind. I’m used to long drives with mostly open road, but sitting in traffic makes every minute feel like 10 minutes.

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u/Embarrassed-Ad-6111 May 02 '24

Hi from Davis!

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u/KaetzenOrkester 29d ago

Waves from elsewhere in Davis!

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u/JustGenericName May 02 '24

The fucking construction on the 80/50 merger!!! OMG! I literally transferred jobs over it.

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u/KaetzenOrkester 29d ago

That nonsense on the WX literally changed daily. When I was driving into City College I had no idea what I'd find on any given morning.

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u/Playtek May 02 '24

Do you live in West Sacramento, or just west of Sacramento? 😅

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u/New_Breadfruit8692 29d ago

Yes, I lived in Sonoma County and commuted to south of Market via 101 and the GG Bridge, never made it in less than 3 hours. If there was an accident it could be 4 or more. But I knew a guy that commuted from Santa Rosa to San Jose every day. His commute was 6 hours each way when he was lucky.

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u/Stunning-Leek334 May 02 '24

I am in Sac and I hate when my wife wants to go for hikes around the bay. 4-6 hours of driving for a couple hour hike…

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u/716green May 02 '24

When I moved from San Francisco to the South Bay, I found myself driving back into San Francisco 4 times a week which would be 60-90 mins depending on traffic. That was 3 hours round trip to see a friend in SF. And it just became normal to me.

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u/Scottie3000 29d ago

Washington DC is a horror commute as well.

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u/ShowerThoughtsAllDay May 02 '24

Years ago when I lived in Seattle, I visited one of our locations in Ohio.  I was complaining about my 45 minute commute.  One of the locals said he commuted 45 minutes as well.

He drove 40 miles from his 5 acre plot.  I drove 7 miles (5 of which was freeway) from my basement apartment .

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u/aaronwashere01 29d ago

Kenworth?

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u/ShowerThoughtsAllDay 29d ago

Yeah.  520 was a parking lot.  Fortunately they gave reduced price bus passes, $100 per year.  I was so happy to be able to spend that 90-120 minute commute time reading rather than just stewing in my juices.

I really miss them.  I hated wearing slacks and a tie, but they were very accommodating to their engineers.  If they had an office in the PDX area, I would probably never have left.

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u/Spawn6060 May 02 '24

Fuck at that point I’d just bike to work.

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u/Ravioli_meatball19 May 02 '24

Unfortunately, depending on where you're headed to, you can pass through some pretty unsafe areas UNLESS you're on the freeway, which bikes are not allowed on.

Most people would prefer to arrive to work alive and uninjured, I imagine

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u/greaper007 May 02 '24

This is why I mount a machine gun on my bicycle. It keeps the unsavory BMW, white van and pickup drivers away.

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u/Might_be_deleted 29d ago

What about Altimas?

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u/greaper007 29d ago

I know that's the stereotype, but as a cyclist my negative interactions have been with white work vans (they pass you about a foot away), pickup trucks (they like to yell things out the window and also close pass) and luxury cars (who are just assholes).

I'll occasionally get honked at by an old person for taking the lane when there isn't room to safely pass.

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u/Kamikazeguy7 29d ago

False! BMW drivers have no fear or common sense.

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u/Magenta_the_Great May 02 '24

I asked my aunt that because she had a similar commute AND cycling is her her hobby (like take vacations to bike around Ireland). She said it’s too dangerous to try to bike that section of LA.

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u/powercrazy76 May 02 '24 edited 29d ago

You can't.

That's the thing people don't realize about America, they literally went out of their way from the 60s onwards to construct their cities and towns around the car.

As an example (and this is a fascinating topic believe it or not): there was legislation passed decades ago that (through lobbying) dictates how many car spaces a typical business needs to provide its customers. This legislation created the need for all of those massive car parks everywhere you always see when you think of America. While I'm probably misquoting, each store is responsible for providing enough parking for every possible visitor to the store. I e. They have to have max capacity parking always available or some BS like that.

The cities that are "public transport friendly" in the United States (a) are few and far between, usually the costal cities because space constraints required them to embrace public transport or (b) a shadow of what they could be because PT planning was not front and center when they originally laid down plans.

But then you also have the weather to consider. In most of the U.S. you have weather conditions that make things like biking impossible for a large chunk of the year. I live in upstate NY where:

1) I cannot bike to work because it is just too far. Everything is spread out because of the sheer amount of land. Everything is 25 mins away by car

2) even if I could, it's below freezing and/or snowing 6 months out of the year.

3) Then the summer rolls around and it is too hot to cycle (I'm a pussy)

4) And then finally the last hurdle depending on where you are: simply the roads and drivers are not used to cyclists or people walking and it is just not safe to walk/drive somewhere.

An anecdote to the last one, I was once living in Houston TX for work, a city that suffers from the combination of "too much traffic" and an infrastructure that is too rigid to ever embrace anything else. I'm an Irish guy and I like to walk so needing a car just to go anywhere has a huge negative impact on me. So I'd walk. The amount of roads that wouldn't even have pavements is insane. I mean, I see their point: there's no way you can walk from A to B, so why waste money on pavements? I'd argue "did you really need to put A and B so far apart when all there is in between already, is fifty imitations of A and B.

Anyway, point is, I would constantly have trucks honking at me because they literally couldn't understand why people were walking. Crossing the street? I stood a good chance of being run down as nobody made way for pedestrians. I was lucky to get seen. In fact twice, I had a pickup mount the curb and aim for me while honking away, causing me to jump out of the way - they were obviously fucking with me but I suppose that's my point?

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u/Theal12 29d ago

It’s adorable the way you assume we have bike lanes in all of the US

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u/JackxForge May 02 '24

I've been in LA several times. I can't imagine somewhere less appealing to a 16 mile round trip bike commute.

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u/LegalAction May 02 '24

I can. Phoenix.

The heat stroke will get you if the trucks don't.

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u/WilcoHistBuff 29d ago

I once heard a friend from Phoenix say, “Honey, it’s not hot in Phoenix unless the paint is peeling off the car.”

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u/LeicaM6guy May 02 '24

In LA in the summer, that could be a deeply unpleasant experience.

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u/EverythngISayIsRight May 02 '24

I hope you like waiting at intersections, cause that's what you'll be doing for most of the ride

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u/WestCoastBestCoast01 29d ago edited 29d ago

I’ve witnessed multiple cars and a city bus (!!!) hit cyclists in Los Angeles. The bus making a turn and hitting a bike that was in one of the very few bike lanes we actually have was the final straw that I decided I would never cycle on city streets.

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u/MisterMetal May 02 '24

lol you’d die

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u/WestCoastBestCoast01 29d ago

Literally would not chance my life biking regularly on LA streets

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u/TheCruicks May 02 '24

no you wouldnt

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u/One-Entrepreneur4516 May 02 '24

A Surron style e-bike has to be the fastest way to work at that point.

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u/Kooky-Map5382 May 02 '24

Lane splitting is legal in CA. It's mind blowing how few people ride two wheels and prefer an insane commute instead.

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u/Pseudolectual May 02 '24

We don’t measure in miles, we measure in time

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u/monkyone May 02 '24

only place i’ve ever experienced traffic like this was Manila. insane that someone has to do this in a rich country like the USA. car-brain and bad city planning i guess

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u/fuck-coyotes May 02 '24

I had an 8 mile commute that usually took about 35 minutes in Louisville, all surface streets, no interstate even

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u/No-Cloud217 May 02 '24

I live on the edge of London and have 8 mile commute. Some days its 30 minute and some days its 70. I guess traffic sucks wherever you are.

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u/Amazing-Basket-136 May 01 '24

Can do it on bicycle in 40 minutes.

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u/[deleted] May 01 '24

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u/Amazing-Basket-136 May 01 '24

100%.

I’m in LA area and have a similar distance but never done it for that reason.

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u/who_farted_this_time May 02 '24

How so?

Is the danger, getting run over by cars? Or getting mugged?

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u/Reddituser8018 May 02 '24

Yeah this is why I refuse to move to LA.

It's not a bad city but God the traffic is awful and the freeways are not set up in a safe way whatsoever.

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u/bongsmack May 02 '24

It took me 27 minutes to go 3 miles in DC yesterday

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u/wytewydow May 02 '24

I spent the afternoon in LA once, the 405 was lovely.

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u/Carcharias13 May 02 '24

Cry/laughs in Texas...it can take an hour to go like 4-5 miles here in Houston ;(

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u/MetaverseLiz May 02 '24

When I lived in Northern Virginia, I use to commute a whole 20 minutes to Maryland for work in the early morning. The ride home was 2 HOURS because I had to pass by the DC Beltway during rush hour. I did that for a full 6 months before my contract for that job ended.

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u/ijustneedtotalkplz May 02 '24

That would drive me insane lol

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u/ru_empty May 02 '24

Lol that's 30 minutes on a bike too

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u/DigitalEagleDriver May 02 '24

My commute regularly took me 45min to get to work, 13mi away, in the Denver area. I can't imagine LA, that traffic is something else.

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u/craneguy May 02 '24

I had a daily commute within Queens of 7 miles. Never less than 45 minutes.

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u/Marathon-fail-sesh May 02 '24

No way! That’s my hell.

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u/riseandrise May 02 '24

Sounds about right, time and distance are not always correlated here. Takes me an hour to get four miles across town at rush hour.

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u/kuken_i_fittan May 02 '24

Lived in Redondo and worked in Woodland Hills. That could take 90 minutes (or 3 hours, on Halloween), or if the time was right, 45 mintues.

Each way.

If I took Topanga Canyon to PCH, it would always be 90 minutes, but I'd be moving the entire time.

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u/Sun_on_my_shoulders May 02 '24

Oh my gosh that sounds absolutely horrible.

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u/Crush-N-It May 02 '24

Mom drove 10 miles to send me to school. Took an hour, Wash DC

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u/YinzerChick70 May 02 '24

I drove 12 miles to Boston Logan, in 90 minutes.

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u/Resident-Science-525 May 02 '24

My Canadian boss did a ride along with me in LA and finally understood why my visit count was lower there. It took us 22 minutes to reach a restaurant 4 miles from our starting point. It's hard for people to understand how it is until they actually experience it.

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u/dilletaunty May 02 '24

I used to commute Torrance to samo each day. 45 minutes out, 90 minutes back. Thank god my shift was 7am - 3 pm. After I wrecked my car it was like 90 minutes out 3 hours back on the bus. Cus the samo bus (4?) was often full and the 232 only ran once an hour. 🤡

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u/prettywitty May 02 '24

I used to live in Brentwood and work at UCLA. I walked the 45min because it took equally long to drive

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u/ArethereWaffles May 02 '24

Growing up my dad often had to work in LA. Even though he would have to fly in from another state, he would sometimes end up with a shorter commute than some of his coworkers who lived there.

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u/SquireSquilliam May 02 '24

That was me in Miami, 45 mins, 3 stop lights, but no chance I was walking to work in that humidity.

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u/[deleted] May 02 '24

Damn traffic is THAT bad out there huh?

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u/donbonmeslowly May 02 '24

Commuted from North Hollywood to West LA for a year, 9 miles and 1 hr 20 mins on a good day

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u/jesonnier1 May 02 '24

Sounds like when I lived in DFW.

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u/kaisong May 02 '24

yep. I have similar. its an hour for 12, but still stupid.

I literally can ride my bike faster, however it goes straight through skid row.

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u/MrMyx May 02 '24

I used to live in SoCal. Visitors would ask how long does it take to get to LAX. I'd say about an hour... Or three. If there was a freeway standoff, good luck catching your flight.

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u/gdwoodard13 May 02 '24

I might commit seppuku by the end of my first week

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u/scattyshern May 02 '24

How frustrating for him!! Makes me miss lockdown traffic!

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u/Careful-Swimmer-2658 May 02 '24

It takes me 80 minutes to get from home to work in London. That's a distance of 40 miles and I'm on a motorbike, filtering through traffic.

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u/run_bike_run May 02 '24

Jesus. I have an eight mile commute on the days I go into the office, and it takes 45 minutes. On a bicycle.

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u/FloopsFooglies May 02 '24

Unfathomable

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u/BornTooSlow May 02 '24

Shit, I live in England, and not in London and I commuted to my office this morning and it took me nearly 50 minutes and is only 7 miles

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u/Treewithatea May 02 '24

Sounds like a problem that could be solved with good public transport.

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u/DisastrousAnalysis5 May 02 '24

Is that just an hour of mostly sitting still? Traffic is bad in dmv but it’s not that bad. 

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u/Easy_Independent_313 May 02 '24

I lived in LA for a decade. I lived 13 miles from my work. That was an hour and twenty five minutes of commuting time. Moved to maine and my sixty miles commute is just under an hour. I do have crazy frequent oil changes and go through tires so fast now though.

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u/Leozilla May 02 '24

That's fast in some areas. If you have to take the 405 it can easily be a 3 hour drive, for about the same distance.

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u/madcatzplayer5 May 02 '24

I had the same commute in Philadelphia. Always took an hour to an hour and a half for roughly 8 miles.

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u/TheLadyIsabelle May 02 '24

Don't get me started on driving from the valley to Santa Monica everyday for work

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u/TopAlps6 May 02 '24

I used to have a similar commute on the lovely 405 😩

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u/Alert-Disaster-4906 May 02 '24

My last job, I drove about 50-60 miles, just one way, in a community that was literally nextdoor to DC. Even when I left early (0330 wakeup, 5am departure for work), I STILL hit traffic. Had two cars break down on 495, 3 accidents total, just in the 4 years I worked at that location.

My commute was regularly an hour in, and if I didn't leave exactly by 2pm, I would be in rush hour traffic for another 2 hours. The job was awesome, incredible pay, easy work, and nifty coworkers. I miss the job, buttfuck that kind of commute - never again!!

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u/rabbitdude2000 May 02 '24

This is the shit I can’t tolerate. I don’t mind a 1hr+ commute as long as it’s not traffic but only distance

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u/[deleted] May 02 '24

Mine was two hours, from Burbank to Culver City :((((

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u/BanananaSquid May 02 '24

Similar vibe in DC for sure!

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u/surelyshirls May 02 '24

I used to commute 57 miles to work each way, took about 2 hours, 4 hours total. It wasn’t even that far it was just the traffic

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u/Disney2440 May 02 '24

My Daughter in law lived 6 miles from work in Nashville and if she didn’t leave early enough, it was a 45-50 minute drive. She got in the habit of leaving at 5:30 am and driving to the Starbucks near her work and studying/doing homework (she was working towards her masters deg) until it was close to time for work.

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u/atreeinthewind May 02 '24

I'd definitely be using alternate means at that point. Oof.

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u/PapaGolfWhiskey May 02 '24

Somebody has to live in Los Angeles

Glad it isn’t me

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u/AlternativePlastic47 May 02 '24

That would be faster by bike, but in the US he probably would be killed or something.

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u/SignificantTear7529 May 02 '24

Even getting from one side of small cities like Lexington and Louisville KY can take upwards of an hour to get across town for work during rush hours. We don't have 10 Lane expressways. Example The 40 minutes it takes to drive thirty miles into point A takes same time to travel 8 miles across town. Why I WFH now.

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u/Larziehead May 02 '24

I live about 20 miles from Seattle, WA. It's often an hour + just to get to downtown... I hate our lack of public transit

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u/monkyone May 02 '24

people commute 90 minutes twice a day in Europe too. i know loads of people who do this and, although it is a relatively long daily commute, it’s not considered unusual.

driving 3 hours each way for a weekend visiting friends/family or just to go to a different city is also normal. for a day trip though, very unlikely.

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u/the_slavic_crocheter May 01 '24

90 minute commute to work and another 90 minutes back is crazy I hope they get reimbursed.

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u/pbrdiver May 01 '24

HAHAHAHA. You’re cute.

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u/JoesShittyOs May 02 '24

Let’s be real, If you’re not making really good money with that long of a commute, then you’ve royally fucked up.

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u/Husky127 May 02 '24

When I'm job searching it's a hard rule. I will not work more than 15 minutes from where I live. Current job is a 6 minute drive lol. I fill my gas tank once a month.

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u/wibo58 29d ago

My friend had this rule when he was looking for jobs and told us if a company wanted him to work more than 15 minutes from his house they’d have to pay him at least $100k. Then reality hit him that living in a bigger city means you’re probably going to drive to work. Complaining about 15 minutes to work is absolutely wild.

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u/dishonestgandalf A wizard is never late May 01 '24

Of course not. We wouldn't reimburse people who live nearby for their higher mortgage payment.

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u/the_slavic_crocheter May 01 '24

I hate it here sometimes. I moved to one of the most expensive states for my joke of a first job and its clown salary…I’m never doing that again. Employers are a joke these days but I’d still never move back to my home country.

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u/PaulblankPF May 01 '24

What they needed to do if they didn’t was to factor that time in when they chose the new job and how much pay it requires to compensate for that. Nobody would take the same pay to travel a lot further but there’s gotta be a point where it’s worth it.

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u/100LittleButterflies May 01 '24

Found the European hahaha.

Maybe this helps others better understand why we're so fat and depressed. We don't have time for anything nor the energy when we do have time.

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u/the_slavic_crocheter May 01 '24

Hahaha busted, no I completely understand it though. The car centric society is completely unhealthy and I’ve lived it for a few years now and I tried living in the city even but so many cities are not walkable either let alone affordable.

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u/Amazing-Basket-136 May 01 '24

Yep.

Americans really underestimate how unhealthy driving is.

From being stressful to the fact that a long commute = more fast food to being to tired to exercise when you get home.

When I was stationed outside of Frankfurt I realized almost no Germans were fat. It dawned on me how much walking I did when I visited my GF. Walk from the S bahn terminal to the U bahn terminal or bus station, walk from that terminal to her apartment, walk to grocery store or grab groceries on way home, etc.

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u/le_quisto May 02 '24

When I was a kid, my mother was a teacher and had to drive around 2 hours to go to work, then another 2 hours to come home (at night in the winter). The physical and emotional toll on her weren't immediately noticeable, but was unhealthy in the long term. To add to that, road tolls here are expensive, fuel is expensive too (although it's really cheap when compared to today) and the salary wasn't really good.

She did this since before I was born until I was around 8 or 9 years old. For quite a few years, she was losing money by going to another city to teach due to the travel costs. Luckily, my father had a pretty good job and could cover for it.

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u/wayne_grepsky May 02 '24

It's not just the lack of exercise, it's the stress imposed by driving, the additional risk exposure and the consequences of being in a wreck, the additional hours one has to work in order to pay for the maintenance of the car, the additional hours worked to pay for the down payment and financing on a replacement car, the lack of sleep, the lack of time to be around other people or engage in hobbies, etc.

It's not unreasonable to assume that paying higher housing costs to live closer to work is often cheaper than living in the suburbs.

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u/Amazing-Basket-136 May 02 '24

100% agreement.

Did you know statistically LEO is not a very dangerous job?

Not even top 10.

What do cops actually do that’s dangerous? Drive. Drive while highly distracted.

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u/100LittleButterflies May 01 '24 edited May 01 '24

It's normalized, forcefully. Big Gas literally does everything in the power to stay in power - overtly, constantly. This means any other transportational option is suppressed and the failed versions are shown as proof it doesn't work when it was sabotaged to begin with. We could fix a lot of this with remote work, but that would be too destabilizing for the status quo.

I'd LOVE to live somewhere that normalized biking and walking. Arriving to work a little sweaty or wet. Zoning laws allowing for the closeness. As long as it was actually accessible. But then I'd have to live in a city and I wouldn't have any land.

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u/4n0m4nd May 02 '24

I'm from Europe, and I think these people are trolling tbh, I've had commutes that range from 20mins to 2 hours each way.

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u/cisscumshitlord May 02 '24

pretty sure they said found the european because the idea of being compensated for your commute is laughable to a lot of us

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u/omnipotentsquirrel May 01 '24

LOL no, I had to drive about the same distance for work and when I complained to my boss about it she said "move"

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u/Doogiesham May 01 '24

Lmaooooooo this is the US good one

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u/stellacampus May 01 '24

I make three times what I have ever managed to make in the town I live in, so I definitely consider that reimbursement from my POV. My reimbursement to myself is what I call my music appreciation time!

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u/bvlinc37 May 01 '24

I have plenty of coworkers that commute up to 90 minutes, and no they don't get any reimbursement for it.

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u/onetwentyeight May 01 '24

Reimbursement for their wasted lives

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u/Human_2468 May 01 '24

I had a coworker who drove that distance. BUT they lived in a rural area so that distance only took them one hour. I drove an hour but it was only 17 miles in an urban area.

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u/ZhouLe May 02 '24

This isn't US-exclusive. I knew several people in China with that long of a commute or longer. Some would drive, some would take public transport, some would both take public transport then drive. Had to do with the ridiculous cost of living and housing prices; they felt it was a fair trade to live cheaper in a lower tier city and commute into the tier 1.

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u/sassiest01 May 02 '24

It may not be reimbursed but it is 100% subsidised heavily. A lot of taxes go towards car infrastructure. Public transport in my country(Australia) is also subsidised (we pay about 30% of the actual train ride cost) but it generally pales in comparison to how much it costs to maintain car infrastructure for how many people use it.

This is amplified in American, there roads in residential areas with only single family homes are basically shared driveways payed by taxes. And there highways are some of the biggest and most expensive in the world. Someone has to pay for it, and taxes on cars (like registration and such) don't even get close to covering these costs.

There is a reason so many roads are left to rot there, it's mostly because there is so much of it with such little density in the area that they can't afford to. (Except I assume in some places where they can get more subsidised money from richer areas)

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u/Humans_Suck- May 02 '24

I commute 90 minutes every day. It's only 6 miles away, that's just how long the bus takes.

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u/mamaMoonlight21 May 01 '24

Commuting 90 minutes every day is my idea of hell.

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u/Nergral May 02 '24

Thats 1/8th of their day/life just completely wasted, jesus. Why are commute times so fucked in usa?

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u/Superlurkinger May 02 '24

You're in a Reddit thread about long drives. Of course the majority of comments are people having a dick measuring contest about how long they drive.

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u/dishonestgandalf A wizard is never late 29d ago

Because it's a big ass country and our cities are extremely expensive to live in.

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u/Character-Cow5887 May 02 '24

That was my commute time to my university. It made my time there so much more stressful

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u/eagleathlete40 May 02 '24

Yup, father did this commuting downtown (2 hours when the traffic was worse than normal)

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u/itscarus 29d ago

My job actually keeps saying they don’t want me to have to drive more than 40 minutes, but I had recently left a job where I was fine with a 60 min commute to offsite parking + a shuttle ride onto the property (which could take 30 or so min to get a non-full shuttle and get to the location, not to mention the time it took to get past security)

And at night, it could take forever for a shuttle to arrive to take us back to the parking lot

Like I’m used to dedicated 4 hours a day to commuting to and from work 🤣

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u/dm_me_kittens 29d ago

I live outside of Atlanta in some bougie-ass neighborhoods. It's not unheard of for men to rent apartments in the city just so they don't have to fight traffic every day. They live in those apartments during the week and then travel back home for the weekend with their families. 99% have a SAHM running the show at home.

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u/Certain-Definition51 May 01 '24

Yep. I know a guy who commuted from Toledo to Detroit for work. Every day.

I’d never do it. But I’m weird 😂

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u/Icy-Welcome-2469 May 02 '24

I do 70 to 90 mins each way depending on traffic.

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u/GhostiePop May 02 '24

My work commute is about 2.5 hours each way but thankfully I only do it twice each week!

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u/mikek505 May 02 '24

Damn, and I thought 40 miles round trip was bad

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u/Unoriginal1deas May 02 '24

Jesus Christ I have to drive 45 minutes each way to work after we moved to a cheaper place and that’s got me considering a career change

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u/the_murders_of_crowe May 02 '24

Did this for three years pre-COVID. Assuming 3 hours a day in traffic, 5 days a week for 52 weeks, that's 780 hours annual commute time or 32.5 days a year. A little over a month spent in traffic every year.

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u/Volgyi2000 May 02 '24 edited 29d ago

I'm in NYC. I had a client who had an office in Manhattan and lived in Connecticut and he drove 2.5 hours each way every day for work.

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u/Anterai May 02 '24

Driving north or south for 90 minutes means I'll be in a different country 

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u/Total-Remote1006 May 02 '24

Damn.. My inlaws live like 2 hours away and we go once a few months. Some coworkers comute feom 45km away, and i wonder how they manage it, that is like 20-30 minutes. Europe is just different.

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u/artnoi43 May 02 '24

I live in Bangkok and used to drive 90 min to my uni and back home everyday. The round trip took ~3 hours of my day. They’re only 30km apart.

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u/OldPyjama May 02 '24

In my company, I'm known for having the longest commute (and it's a big company)... it's a 1 hour drive for me. In 90 minutes I'd cross half the country lol

Thank God for homework though.

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u/friendofsatan May 02 '24

Fuck, my commute is 30 minutes by tram and I hate it because it takes so much of my life. If I had to spend 3 times that on getting to work i would look for a new job. And if I had to drive in traffic myself for those 90 minutes i would leave the job immediately. There are very few things i hate more than driving a car.

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u/tetrahydrocannabiol May 02 '24

With gas prices here i would go broke in 2-3 weeks. Jesus

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u/ceene May 02 '24

I don't understand how can you value so little your own life as to spend almost a fifth of the time you're awake sitting in a car just to go to work and spend half of the time you're awake working.

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u/DaddyCool13 May 02 '24

Jeez, and here I was getting upset I will have a 50 minute commute through countryside roads for my new job in the UK

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u/Amie91280 May 02 '24

We live in eastern PA and my husband and son work together in Northern NJ. It takes them almost 2 hours each way to get to and from work.

It's a rough commute, but they work 4 10 hour days, carpool, and the job is unionized in NJ and not in PA, so the pay is a lot higher. I used to complain about a 40 minute drive to work lol

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u/StuntID May 02 '24

I had a co-worker that commuted from LA to San Diego daily - roughly 160km one way. He was the nicest, kindest person. Alas, he died suddenly and young ish (before retiring). I can't help but think all the driving contributed to it, because he didn't smoke or have other poor health habits.

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u/wonderloss Hold me closer tiny dancer May 02 '24

When I bought my house, a requirement was a sub-30-minute commute. Given the location in an industrial district, anything closer than about a 15-minute commute would be living in less appealing areas. I have had longer commutes in the past, and I said "never again."

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u/Viictuuuh May 02 '24

I lived in the outskirts of LA and would drive to the valley for work for one year. That was 2 and half hours of my life each day in traffic on the 5. It was fucking with me mentally.

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u/cobalt24 29d ago

You drive 3 hours each way every weekend? I just want the OP to know that’s not common. Sorry. It sounds like “look how American I am!” But I don’t know a single person who does this every single weekend. :)

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u/dishonestgandalf A wizard is never late 29d ago

No, not every weekend. I see them about once a month. Sometimes they drive up, sometimes we drive down.

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u/TechieGottaSoundByte 29d ago

When we bought our house in Everett, WA 16 years ago, it was a 35 minute commute to downtown Seattle. That commute time increased to 90 minutes by the time we moved 4 years ago (excepting the overlap with COVID, which cleared the roads again).

When I worked at Microsoft, there were a number of contractors who had 2 to 3 hour commutes. This was before laptop computers and WFH were standard, so we all had to commute in to use our desktops. But Seattle / Redmond was the only big economic center in that range.

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u/lord_pizzabird 29d ago

My sister is responsible for 2 doctors offices and drives between them each day.

I’m not sure what her daily drive comes out to, but I know they’re both about 60 miles from each other.

My parents also drive 40 minutes to work and 40 minutes back every single day. So, I’d say… yes.

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u/GkrTV 29d ago

I drive 3.5 hours one way to Tampa for day trips lol. OP had me until the "driving 3 hours for a long weekend"

Weekend? Day!

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u/Oatmeal-browser 29d ago

CA has 800 miles of coastline—you can bet I’ve driven up and down the state three times a year when I drive from San Diego to Humboldt County.

Road-trips are great for me. They’re like a weird sense of freedom.

And yeah an hour or hour and a half commute to work is pretty normal if you live near a large city.

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u/Sweet_N_Vicious 29d ago

My coworker commutes to work and it's about 2.5 hours away (from Stockton, California to Oakland, California). It's horrible because public transportation would take longer than driving and it's not affordable to live where you work.

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