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Comment by heavyset_go | Hacker News Reader

> I find the commute far more effective for unwinding to be honest

No one is stopping you from unwinding after work if you work from home. Hop in the car when you're done with work and enjoy a relaxing "commute" on your own terms.

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I should have specified that my commute is a train ride. Taking the train somewhere for no reason and back again wouldn't be particularly relaxing. But if you have to take the train (and you're fortunate enough to get a seat like I can) then you do find ways to make the most of that commute.

But the real point I'm trying to make isn't that everyone should commute. No. What I'm saying is I'm as entitled to enjoy my commute to work as you are to enjoy working from home. A good company will offer flexibility rather than applying the same rule to everyone universally.

This is an important detail. A huge proportion of those in the US are going to be commuting by car (which is really unpleasant for me personally), or paying a lot of money to live somewhere with good transit options.

And an even larger proportion of those who work in technology don't live in the US. I know this is a very SV orientated forum but discussion companies are having with their employees regarding remote work is happening right across the globe.

Okay, but Blue Origin is in the US and is not in Silicon Valley. It is in Kent, Washington, which despite being <20 miles from downtown Seattle, takes an hour to get there via bus. Even longer if you live up in Fremont, or god forbid Bellevue (1h40m by bus, again for <20 miles).

This discussion went beyond the scope of Blue Origin right at the OP level.

I actually think city dwellers are entitled to not have a horde of office workers invade every day and demand roads and parking spaces be built for their utterly superfluous unwinding commute.

They call it congestion charge but it's more your suburban commuting habit is making everyone that actually lives here miserable.

I pay my taxes and I’ll use the services I pay for as I see fit.

London earns millions every day from office workers coming into the city, paying for food, drinks, and other local services. It's not like us commuters are draining money from your local economy.

Plus if you didn't want your home town to be invaded by commuters each day then a city, any city in fact, is absolutely the worst place you could chose to live.

I was in Paris for a conference in the mid-90s. Actually, it was in La Defense which is out in the 'burbs. In Paris, people live in the city and commute out to work. They can't build skyscrapers within the city.

This was before WFH was a thing.

While you're right that the ground isn't strong enough (which itself is a fascinating subject) for skyscrapers in the city centre, there are still plenty of multi-story office blocks. Plus there are plenty of business districts that fall outside the city centre but still very much within the parameter of Paris itself and those districts do have sky scrapers (I've spend some time in one of those districts myself). https://www.consorto.com/blog/paris-is-top-for-european-offi...

This isn't that unusual for European cities. Often you'll find the city centre will be buildings of historic significance so a lot of the office blocks in the city centre will still be multi-story but not 10s of floors. Even in London the skyscrapers are generally just outside the centre.

From what I gather about London, most of the skyscapers are pretty expensive units to rent so many offices find the relatively smaller blocks a more attractive option. Usually renting space from those skyscapers are more a signalling of importance -- or rather a business attempting to signal that.

If I move to London now, I’m entitled to demand all the commuters stop “invading” my city?

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