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Comment by michaelbuckbee | Hacker News Reader

It's not the physical space so much as the time. If you calculate _all in_ times for commuting (getting ready, travel, gas, wait, walk to/from transportation) most commutes are easily an hour on each side of the work day.

That's 10 hours a week.

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Make it three hours a day. Grooming, picking pants, packing computer, etc, those all take time. If you're working 8 hours, you're spending 3/8 = 37.5% of the time not building value.

Which is insane in retrospect.

If your 3-hour commute comes out of your 8-hour workday (as is suggested by your formula), then your experience is not representative.

I assume you intended 3/11 ?

Ivan Illich calculated that if you added up the time it took you to drive your car, park it, maintain it, and work to pay for it, it would work out at 4 MPH. That's walking speed.

So basically the car is free from a "waste hours of my life" perspective and you get the added convenience of being able to be a lot more flexible about when you waste that life and not having to walk in the rain or jump though extra hoops when moving stuff you can't just carry.

When I go into the office, it's 90 minutes by commuter rail (with very limited service hours) plus another 30-45 on the subway (when it's not on fire), then another 15-20 minutes walking. Each way. I'm mentally wiped my the time I get in. Most of my job is WFH, and I'm only going in when I must be in the office.

I'm fortunate that I can shift some of my work time to my train time, but it's still a big chunk out of my day to just move around.

I like taking light rail, and on days I go into work, it is understood to be 10 to 4, and mostly spent chatting to people (about software largely but not necessarily this sprints top tasks).

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