Ask HN: How has Coronavirus affected your transport situation? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How has Coronavirus affected your transport situation?

2 pointsmichjedi3 comments

I am wondering what coronavirus has meant for people all over the world with regards to transport:

1. Personal - how have your views of transport changed? Have your preferences changed? - e.g. I (London, UK) am now more likely to cycle or drive a car to avoid possible infection on public transport

2. Governmental - has your government changed how transport services operate or are allowed to operate?# - e.g. London transport services were reduced (due to worker illness and isolation and additional measures required for sanitations) and people were encouraged to work from home.

3. Social - Has commuter behaviour changed in your neighbourhood? - e.g. London initially saw a huge amount of working from home and therefore a reduction in commuting, but has started ramping up recently

I live about 3 miles from my office (suburbs with 25 mile per hour speed limits the whole way), but because of restrictions on eating at my desk, for the past few years I had been driving home for lunch every day -- in other words, spending 40 minutes a day commuting because the 10-minute drive was repeated 4 times. (I used to occasionally walk into the office & skip lunch, but that was very dependent on the weather, & I couldn't manage that more than twice in a week because I'd get blisters.)

Since the work-from-home order came down, I've gone from driving 40 minutes every weekday to driving perhaps three minutes a week, and rather than refilling my gas tank every two weeks, I haven't had to fill it in about a month and a half.

I've had to go into the office a few times since the coronavirus began -- due to power outages, VPN problems, etc. Most of those times, I walked in.

1. Completely, since I now work fully remotely. I rarely drive. When I leave the house, it's almost always on foot.

2. The local city government has shut down or restricted use of public transit. The federal government is worse than useless and has not instituted any real changes.

3. Minneapolis traffic is 70% lower than it was this time in 2019. Most of us who can work remotely are working remotely.

I didn't step into public transport for half a year. I don't travel much now, but where I go, I go by car. The public transport here in Prague has been downsized a lot, to summer vacation levels.

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