America's commutes start earlier and last longer (BBC)

[eppur_se_muova]

By Franz Strasser
BBC News, Maryland

Working in the city and living on one's own land far out in the countryside has always been a goal for many Americans. The recession has turned hours of commuting to and from work into a reality that's hard to escape.

Every morning, Catherine Fortney's alarm rings at 03:30 and by the time the clock strikes 06:00, she must be at the nearby bus stop.

Her commute to a law practice in downtown Washington DC will take 90 minutes to two hours each way.
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The limited amount of good-paying work has forced many job seekers to look further away from home. The housing market collapse has left home owners stranded in the countryside.
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Traditionally people have switched jobs more often when they showed greater dissatisfaction with their commute, explains Mr Wener. Now those people are afraid to change the job.
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more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15207973




Worth reading the whole article for all the ramifications. Another gift from the 1% ...

[-..__...]

1. And what better cure...

than to have OWS protests blocking/impeding traffic and make a miserable commute even more insufferable.

[dkf]

2. Should have looked into peak oil...living closer to work is key.

[Selatius]

3. This problem originated in the 1930s and 1940s. The car companies colluded to bring this about.

They purposely bought out trolley and bus companies with the purpose of destroying them. They wanted people to buy their cars, and they figured the best way was to destroy their mass transit competitors. They were largely successful. The US is the only industrialized nation with an interstate highway system but no interstate high-speed passenger rail system. In most American cities, the mass transit infrastructure is outdated. It works fine if the population were at 1950 or 1960 levels, but this is 2011.

I dare to say the Soviet Union's mass transit system circa 1985 to 1990 was far more capable than the US mass transit system 2011.