How's your commute?

pclancy

Was thinking about my daily commute today and comparing with how crap it used to be in Ireland.

Until recently I lived in the Houghton Bay and Hataitai suburbs of Wellington. My commute to work in Newtown was either 15-25 minutes by bus or 5-10 minute drive by car. Pretty sweet. Now I've moved out to "the sticks" or Tawa which is 20 mins drive off peak/45 minutes peak from door to office by car or a nice 25 minute train ride on a nice new train with plenty of spare seats.

In Dublin my commute was either two hours by car along the M50 each way or a 45 minute train journey where everyone was packed in like sardines and people routinely had to be let off at stations along the way because they had feinted.

I'm loving the commute right now. A lot of Kiwis knock Wellington's public transport but between the buses and trains I think its pretty good. Traffic gets gnarly on SH1/2 at peak hours but its nothing compared to back home...

What do ye reckon?

FearDark

Im Im Chch and I work all over the city, I could be on three jobs in a day and I find it great. Takes me usually about 5-10 mins to get to work in the morning or if Im at the other side of the city about 20 minutes. The bad part is where you run into a bad part of town where there are road works happening and in chch there's a lot of that going on. You just gotta learn the streets to avoid.

I think it's gas. I always hear the locals giving out about traffic here. A 20 minute commute is hell for them...

MrCreosote

Miramar to Karori- a sweet 16k cycle round Evans and Oriental bay. Cycle lanes to the city centre, up past the Botanic gardens, and plenty of coffee stops on the way home. It does get a bit windy occasionally! I get stressed in the 2min traffic jams now if I drive.

Had a bit of a throwback to Irish traffic the other weekend when the Mt Vic tunnel was closed with a crash. It was gridlock- pretty rare when that happens.

I used to come in SH1 occasionally in rush hour, even though it was heavy the traffic was always moving which seems to make it easier.

pclancy

Yeah I seen that Mt Vic one too. Mt Vic-Roseneath is a good detour when the tunnel gets busy.

CatFromHue

I don't think comparing Dublin and Wellington is comparing the same thing as Dublin is far far bigger.

I lived in Welly in 06/07. I lived in Northland so used to walk down to the bus station (all down hill) and then get a bus out to the Lower Hutt. About a 70 - 80 min commute all in. Depending on how energetic I was feeling on the way home I'd either walk from the bus station up the the hill or get a tram. If I was feeling very very energetic I'd walk The Rigi, which is a short but very very steep road!

MrCreosote

CatFromHue wrote: »

If I was feeling very very energetic I'd walk The Rigi, which is a short but very very steep road!

I came down here yesterday! Still as steep as ever.

Some of the roads on that side of the city are ridiculous- bolton st for example. Can just about cycle up it...

spunkymunky

I guess you dont live in Auckland and travel to the city from north of Auckland!! LOOKS, like a nightmare and like it would take and age.
Thankfully, i live and work on the shore. 7 minute drive....8 if traffic them a 10 minute walk. If im based in the city, i catch the ferry. I stand up top, wind in my hair thinking how great it is as I look up at the Harbour bridge. 15 min of sun soaked (sometimes) wake up juice!!

I used to live in Mount Eden and work in Albany. Only took about 25 minutes in the morning. Not bad i say!!

In Dublin, i cycled in to the city everyday. 25 mins finglas to St. Stephens green, otherwise about 45-60 minute bus trip, lame!!

Cookie_Monster

2.5km each way on the bike - often lengthened

MrCreosote

I was up in Auckers a few weeks ago, didn't think the traffic was too bad.

The thing that I noticed was how long the lights took to cycle to pedestrian. A 500m walk would take 10 minutes. And nobody jaywalked...

pclancy

Parts of Auckland are quite bad for traffic, probably on par with Dublin. Trying to get from/to the airport to CBD or North Shore and back can be quite sucky.

Rodin

10-12 minutes walk depending on wind direction.

Mrs OBumble

In fairness, you should only try comparing

Auckland vs Dublin
Wellington vs Cork
Christchurch vs Belfast


That said:

I used to live in Hataiati: the bus ride to central Wellington took 15 minutes, and there were four different bus routes I could get. The least frequent of these ran every 30 minutes right through til 11pm, the most frequent every 12 mins. I usually had a 5-10 minute walk from the bus stop to the office (worked in various buildings). Every bus stop in town had a bus-shelter, or some naturally-occurring shelter (shop verandah etc). The stop closest to my house didn't have a shelter, but the one in the village (3 mins walk) did.

Now I live in inner-city Galway and work in an industrial estate. The bus-ride takes 10-15 minutes, and there's a 10 minute walk after that - with no protection from the weather. After five years here, I'm delighted that a bus-service has this year started coming just inside the estate - now I have access to a service that runs every 20 minutes until 7pm. Until then, there was a relatively unreliable bus every 30 mins. Bus shelters in the city-centre, but not at any of the stops near the estate. And it rains a lot here.

All in all, I think I'd take Wellington's commute any day, but not for reasons of travel time.

earnyourturns

15-20 min bike ride from St Kilda into Uni of Otago. Regularly do battle with headwinds, crosswinds, southwesterlies, rain and drivers who appear to be actively out to kill cyclists, so am lit up like a Christmas tree with the amount of hi-vis stuff I wear. Love how easy it is to get around Dunedin though.