I have read (though I can’t find the source) that the maximum length of a commute is forty minutes. Any longer, and people make changes in their lives to shorten it. And so it has always been, from chariots in Rome to SUVs in LA.
A four-part series on commuting in the Los Angeles Times seems to provide some proof. Accompanying the articles is a Google map of average commuting times for cities throughout the Southlands. (The national average is 25.5 minutes.) Take a look:
I could find only one instance where the average commute time was longer than 40 minutes. Obviously, an average requires that there must be many Angelenos with times longer than that – but it does reinforce the conclusion made by Rand Corp transportation expert Martin Wachs:
The solutions are not unknown,” Wachs said. (Congestion pricing has worked around the world in about 100 different places, 100% of the time.) The fact that we are inhospitable to all of the solutions must indicate we would rather have the problem as we have it now than solve the problem.
I suppose the 40 minutes relates to car commutes. A commuter train commute can typically be an hour (i.e. GO train from Milton to TO) but is much more tolerable.
Good point, Ron. I’m under the impression that many variations of Lower Mainland transit (Seabus-Skytrain, Skytrain-BLine, West Coast Express-Seabus) would be longer than one hour.
Which raises the question: Do lengthening commute times correlate with sprawl, or more likely these days, greater usage of public transit?