Bless you, pj. Is there any way we can make this family vaction thing permanent?

Nah, If we didnt have OJ, who would we mock?

So much for trains...........

Did you anyone actually read the paper and evaluate its arguments, or is its existence enough? And yet the boys come flocking out to draw conclusions. Solid thinking.

So Rick Perlstein and a horse walk into a bar, and the bartender says, Why the long face? And Rick says, don't you know anything about equine anatomy? Both primary and secondary scholarship clearly indicate... and the horse says, don't mind him, he never gets that joke.

Lighten up, Francis.

Rick - When the abstract confirms my prejudices, I don't need to read more.

I have lived in Europe, and used the trains.

I'm with pj on this one.

Don't want to spoil the fun, but can lower population density lead to shorter commutes? And much as I hate mass transit, I've never heard even the most fanatical car lover claim it gave him lower fixed costs.

(Please don't ask me to read the whole thing.)

Sorry, should read ...how can...

"We find that geography – the low population density of the New World that has led to shorter commutes and lower fixed costs of getting to work – has had an enduring impact on supply of labor time."

Does not compute ... does not compute.

For all you car lovers, er petrophiles, a message from V.D. Hanson:

"[...]So take the dependency on oil away from Europe and the United States, and the billions of petrodollars the world sends yearly to medieval regimes like Iran or Saudi Arabia, and the other five billion of us could, to be frank, fret little whether such self-pitying tribal and patriarchal societies wished to remain, well, tribal. There would be no money for Hezbollah, Wahhabi madrassas, Syrian assassination teams, or bought Western apologists.[...]"

http://www.victorhanson.com/articles/hanson020306.html

I am not a math person but let's see about this fixed cost thing...

Most trains cost commuters about $1.10 per token - one way. Times that by 335 days (assuming 4 weeks vacation) and you get over $600 in fixed costs.

I live 6 miles from work and use approximately one-half gallon of gas to get there each day. If gas is $2.25 a gallon and my car holds 11 gallons of gas then my fixed cost for the same 335 days is $205.00

Anyone better at this than me, I would love your imput...

Oops...my round trip costs would be around $410.00...still lower than mass transit.

Lets see now: Lower Population Density=Fewer Cars on the Road=Shorter Commutes.

Do room-hogging Red Staters like me need to explain everything to ya:)

Bartman, try running those numbers again using the auto mileage costs allowed by the IRS, or any other mileage cost calculation paid to employees by any company that has an established mileage allowance for employees driving on the job. You seem to have overlooked a few minor driving expenses.

Brad,

Blink blink: Does not compute.

My own car:

1. Is ensconced in my personal garage which is attached directly to my personal bunker; 2. Comes and goes on my personal schedule; 3. Allows only those whom I personally invite to come aboard; 4. Is maintained to my personal satisfaction; 5. Is cleaned ditto;
6. Arrives at the door of my personal destination directly; 7. Precludes the necessity of my personal self hobnobbing with the traveling public in airports or God Forbid train stations; 8. Allows my personal self to breath fresh, i.e., not pre-breathed, air; 9. Permits carry-ons determined by my personal preferences, limited only by my personal selection of auto size and design, chosen by my personal self; 10. Allows my personal self to view the gorgeous scenery in every part of our great land at ground level.

Mass Transit:

No redeeming social values.

E.F.

I know I left out maintenance costs. I don't just use my auto to commute to work. I was singling out pure commuting costs.

But, as I said, I'm not a math person.

Bartman:

The paper suggests that transport infrastructure circa 1900 had a critical effect on relative working hours in Europe and North America which lingers to this day.

Looking at present-day transport costs isn't relevant to the working habits of early 20th century Belgian farm workers.

This is off topic, but I don't have any way to contact the other members of the Justice League who are running this joint while His Juddness is in Fla.
Apparently, Western Union has stopped sending telegrams.

Somewhere, Orrin is weeping softly.

Here's a shot of the northern end of the IRT #1 Broadway line in New York, circa 1908. It's important to remember that back when these lines were first built, they weren't being extended into areas to reduce traffic congestion at the outer ends, they were being put into areas that were nothing but trees and grass, to get the people out of the jammed inner cities.

Back then, owing a car was a major luxury, as was paving a street with something besides cobblestones. The development of the Interstate highway system in the 1950s and 60s also created the phenominon of not only speading out populations in more directions than a bus or rail line could, but eventually moving major businesses out to the near suburbs, so that people now commute perpendicular to the normal suburb-downtown routes. That makes home-office drive time shorter than if you had to go all the way into the central city, but most mass transit hasn't address that change, and it makes anything but a vehicle impractical for commuting purposes.

Means of transit aren't an issue for me, or to me (I own 2 cars, one truck, a tractor and a boat). The last train I took was in Italy a few years ago. The market place will eventually resolve the methods of transit issue.

What I resent is sending our money to some of the most disgusting nations in the world. If you want to calculate U.S. Petro costs please be realistic enough to include the money and lives lost, starting with 9/11, to support our addiction, And the beat goes on. Where do you think Iran got the money to support their nuclear program. And don't forget Chavezs' recent antics. They will have to be dealt with eventually and at what cost, and by whom? Your kids or your grandkids?

To add to Bartman's totals, one must include depreciation and insurance to whatever maintenance is also pro-rated. Don't know what it is, but since before that it is already $410 to $600, it's either a wash or higher.

However,a 6 mile commute seems very short to me (although in lime with my current commute). Not sure what the average commute is for the US, but add a few more miles and even before the rest is added, then mass transit will beat it.

Genecis: We could achive the same effect in a several different ways.

We could create substitutes for oil.
We could drill elsewhere for oil.
We could invade and take the oil fields away from them.
We could blow their oil fields to smithereens.

Which option is fastest, cheapest, most acceptable to the rest of the world?

John: that is a neat picture. It was a good thing that they did all of that work back then. It would be impossible to fill in all of those ecologically significant wetlands today. Back then they were called malaria swamps.

Of course when we "compute" the economic value of the privately owned vehicle (hereinafter,
"POV") we must include the cash value of the savings in time savings which accrue to us, not merely on our daily commute, but also on every trip to the children's, the store, the library, the gun club or wherever it is our fancy takes us.

Now consider the cash value of the cartage capability afforded through the POV. Consider the myriad errands run which otherwise should have forced resort to taxicabs, or the inconvenience, expense and delay of delivery.

Need we mention the economic value of heavy towing capability, which our choice of POV may provide. If it please us, we may trailer our I/O from the nearby river marina to the shore for a day's salt-water fishing, and back, a value of hundreds of dollars.

But thus far we have been engaging is shopkeeper's quibbles, as if we had been Belgians or something. Consider now the political, or perhaps, the spiritual value of the POV.

Erp has set us on the way to understanding this. Being a peasant, transported like cattle, is such a European thing. Consider just the European words for noblemen: Ritter, chevalier, cavalier. With us, ordinary men and women aspire and presume to ride.

Robert,
Add nuclear plants and clean coal plants and I'll sign on for the first two. The fourth one may not be an option but a neccesity for Iran because that's where their major nuclear facilities are located. They're not stupid. Getting the first two items online would give us the fourth option as a possibility.

Without reading the paper, I will guess that the "fixed costs" in question are measured in time, not dollars. Having cars saves time; the high density in Europe discourages them from having cars.

I'd have to read the paper to see why they say the difference emerged about 1900. But significant automobile traffic emerged in the U.S. by about 1908, but not until after WWI in Europe.

Lou Gots beat me to it - the costs saved are in time and convenience (leave when *you* want to, not when the 7:20 wants to). It is also questionable that the mass transit costs are really as low as stated as many mass-transit rides are subsidized. Not only that, one generally in the US must drive to the mass-transit station in a car(!) then use the bus/train.

My experiences here in western NJ riding the NJ Transit trains to Eastern NJ and sometimes Manhattan are that the cost is high and convenience low, but I hesitate to generalize.

We live 2 miles from my wife's workplace in perhaps the most heavily mass-transited area in the country (Cambridge-Boston; only NYC is competitive) and it takes her 7 minutes by car, 45 minutes by bus - and Harvard University provides a shuttle bus, otherwise it would be over an hour. So driving saves an hour and a half per day.

PJ,
This summer we drove from the Custom House in downtown Boston to Harvard and including parking and walking to the Peabody Museum it took about an hour. Walking to the museum we passed the T station coming and going. The T also stops next to the Custom house. It took one hour each way and the parking was $10.00. The T would have cost $12.50 for the 5 of us, so we Saved $2.50, except the van we rented was about $50.a day, plus gas, and we wasted about one hour round trip compared to the T. Addtionally, parking at the Custom House was $29. That night we hopped in the van to drive one mile to the North End for dinner. No parking, so we dropped it in a lot for $17.00.

Having a car and Driving's so convenient in Boston/Cambridge. If I were your wife I'd walk.

When's OJ getting back?

Yes, Boston is a tourist trap.

E.F. - The case you mention is the most favorable to mass transit: the hardest place to park of all, and the quickest and most direct mass transit line in all Boston. In this case the subway is adequate, although you can easily wait 15 minutes for a train and have a 15 minute trip. If you know where to park, know the best route, and own your car, that same trip would be less time and less money by car ($10 for parking, 10 min drive, 10 min walk).

But any other trip - like my wife's, which is orthogonal to the main mass transit lines - is painful - a one-hour trip to go anywhere away from downtown. And the parking gets much cheaper away from downtown, so the cost of driving goes way down.

For tourists, sure, I wouldn't recommend driving unless you know the city. But for residents, driving still beats mass transit easily.

oj said he'd be back late Monday.

Driving in Boston:

I learned to drive in the traffic of New York City, so I thought I'd be good to go anywhere on earth. Sadly I was mistaken. The drivers in the Big Apple have the manners of the Knights of the Round Table compared to Bean City.

Shortly after receiving my license, I drove a bunch of older ladies from New York to a bridal shower at the Copley Plaza which (if it still exists) is on wide multi-laned avenue.

I simply could not get over into the right lane, so after fourth or fifth pass, the cop on duty, actually stopped all traffic, walked over and asked me where I wanted to go. He then theatrically directed me to the entrance of the hotel to the wild cheers of the other drivers.

It's a good thing there were no TV trucks trawling around in those days, or we surely would have made the evening news.

Ali: True

Chris: Insurance adds $2.59 a day to the cost. Not sure about depreciation. But it can't be much per day...

Oy vey, pj!

We live 2 miles from my wife's workplace ... 45 minutes by bus

The bus doesn't even been a brisk walking pace!!! How incredibly lame is that? Or is a good part of the 45 minutes layover time for a bus change when the arrival/departures aren't close and/or predicatable? Still lame, no matter what...

still name, no matter what

But NOT as lame as my typing! That should have read, doesn't even beat a brisk walking pace; and "predictable". Oy indeed.

SHhhhh!! The Cat's back folks. We're busted!

[/JoyRide]

Kirk - 2 miles driving, 3 miles by bus. 10 minutes walk to the bus line, wait 5 minutes (if you've timed the schedule), 20 minute bus ride, 10 minute walk on the other end. None of the routes go where you want them to.

3.1 miles to work, less than 20 minutes by bike, two downhill parts to go wheeee on. 75+ degrees today

I actually think that the traffic in Chicago is worse than that in NYC. The Boston problem is that the cowpaths are too narrow and the drivers are suicidal.

Wow, pj, it's even worse now that you break it down. 20 minutes worth of walking??? That's half the walking distance right there! I realize she probably can't walk it in the Boston winter, and not comfortably do it in the middle of the summer, but what are spring and fall for? It's still amazing that the bus trip, which costs something and requires somewhat well-maintained infrastructure, is no faster than a free walk that only requires a rudimentary path.

Viva mass transit!!!