There was a very good turnout in last week's Fun Online Poll (133 took part, multiple choice, thanks to all who took part), results as follows:
Which is the least stressful way for you to get to your current place of work?
Driving by car - 56 votes
Walking or cycling - 25 votes
Taking the train - 16 votes
Taking the 'bus - 6 votes
Other, please specify - 4 votes ('jogging' and 'motorbike')
I work from home, am retired or currently unemployed - 37 votes
So stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Greener Journeys! The twattish thing is that I might just as well have asked "How do you get to work?" and the answers would have been much the same; so really I could have asked "Do you choose to the least stressful mode of transport to get to work?", a question which is barely worth asking...
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Fiona Bruce was back on telly again yesterday (I've not noticed her for a while) and has inspired this week's Fun Online Poll: "Who has the sharpest eyebrows?"
Vote here or use the widget in the sidebar.
Meh
1 hour ago
14 comments:
Yeah I see your point. But it omits the real world that most are compelled into one mode or the other so never know what is the best way.
Thats an effect of wageslavery of course.
So I dont really see the point of this poll. Its only correlative.
I don't think you've disproved the point in the article at all. As you yourself and RS point out, most people take the least stressful way to get to work already, but this doesn't mean that driving is less stressful than going by bus per se, it just means that for many people the public transport on offer is so poor it would be more stressful to use than driving. What the poll more likely shows is only 25% of the respondents have a viable public transport option open to them.
RS, B, hang about here, I am the world's biggest fan of public transport, but whether that is a viable/the best option depends on where you live and where you are going.
I managed quite happily for 15 years without a car when I lived in London Zone 3, and still use the Tube every day to get from Zone 5/6 into Central London where I work; but if I have to go outwards or diagonally, taking the car is the only rational option (I stuck it out for a year without a car in Zone 5/6 and it really was shit).
Hang about back MW: I live in sleeper town Wokingham and use car, train, bike and bus. Bus is the most stressful mode followed by car. Ok so I can get to more places in the car.
As you know I'd love to be able to drive an electric car everywhere so long as the lekky was from a nuke plant, but I am always most stressed when using it. Not sure quite why, but that is how it feels.
Yeah so I do nearly get killed every time I jump on the bike by Mum's on the way to school, but that's not stress. Its anger.
Anger is a more useful emotion than despair
Arny, Terminator III
RS, what do you find so stressful about using the bus? When I lived in Central London, I hardly ever used the bus, because I never knew how long I'd be waiting for one and so whether it would be quicker to walk. For my mind, being driven (train, bus, taxi, lift) has got to be less stressful than driving, but I can see that other factors may apply.
@Bayard
You are right I hardly ever use it too for same reasons. I had not thought carefully enough about it. But just remember that when I walk to the bus stop to get to the station, its very hit and miss if one will turn up within 20 minutes of the allotted time. So the stress is not in actually being on one, more that you never know if you are going to get to work on time.
My friend Dr Wrigley has done an excellent analysis on bus service and it is fully fraudulently subsidised as a side note.
"Robin Smith said...
Yeah I see your point. But it omits the real world that most are compelled into one mode or the other so never know what is the best way."
I disagree, i've done the whole bus thing, all that use public transport (less polluting vehicles on the road) guff. I found it to be most annoying, chavs blaring music out through the speakers in their phones should be shot on sight.
B, R, SW, which illustrates my point - we are all individuals who live in different places and have to travel to other different places, and unless people are stupid, they will do a full cost/benefit analysis of where to live, where to work and how to get there and back.
Whereby buses (to the extent that there is a convenient services) are cheaper in £-s-d, BUT have an extra cost in terms of being late/irregular and you might end up stuck next to one of SW's music blaring chavs.
MW are you still externalising the internals? Bad habit for an accountant (:
BTW buses are not cheaper. They are more expensive and could be much much cheaper. Monopoly power at play. Always makes things poorer quality and more expensive. Induced logic. Which is the point being missed
Scott. Any reason for your psychotic intolerance of other people we must live with. Do you have a monopoly on being imperfect? Do you own land. Do you pollute for free? Have you never put anyone's life in danger while motoring? What things are more harmful in comparison. Glass houses
I'm guilty on all counts too.
RS, don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs. I know more than you about all this stuff, it's just that I don't bandy around fancy terms.
It is quite clear that the music playing chav has an external cost - which is borne ('internalised') by Scott. We don't need buzzwords to explain this - we respond to these costs by choosing to walk or use a car instead of taking the bus.
Are you now going to lecture us on the external costs of walking?
And maybe buses are subsidised. So what? In theory, they can be subsidised out of LVT; and LVT receipts in turn are boosted by a regular, chav-free bus service, so what's the problem?
Woah!!! Bad day? Looks like I've hit the spot here? Ad hominem attack shows it all.
Suck eggs - "My idea is better than yours right?". "I know more than you".OK so when are you going to start using that expert knowledge to reveal the truth over prejudice then if so?
Chav - well yes I did say that. and why do words bother you so much. You use fancy words all the time. "The Laffer Curve". A desire for monopoly power perhaps, same as Scott?
You still don't get the point on externalities. I call that the accountants burden. Its so common I'm sure there is a natural law.
Lecture? - more ad hominem
Subsidised buses. What on earth are you talking about? Land values are raised even more than anything when people are nice to each other rather than intolerant. Every little counts right? This is classic Matrix behaviour. HOI's do it perfectly too. Sounds all too fancy wording to me.
Gotcha! You asked for it (:
Of course this is all done in the interests of fun.
RS, "externalities" is a favoured buzz word among NIMBYs. "Ooh, we can't have any new housing, roads, railways, factories, airports etc because they have externalities, don't you know?".
The simple fact is, of all human activity, the external benefits vastly exceed the external costs; we can measure this quite easily by e.g. looking at land values in densely populated areas.
So I tend to ignore the external costs of any activity and worry far more about the external costs of state-sanction inactivity, such as restrictions on other people's freedom to trade, take drugs, build houses, start a business etc.
That may be so but I'm talking about something else. The things one chooses to externalise, that actually create dead weight costs internally.
This results in an unjust distribution AS WELL AS lower production and more waste. The thing HOI's are calling for and also the climate denialists (actually protectionists without the courage to admit it). Monopoly really. Tax on everyone else.
You are doing it again. Stating something different is false then attaching it to what I say.
Your last para seems to be causing confusion for the sake of it. I cant be bothered to analyse it it sounds so circular. Anyway I've already identified the logical fallacy so why waste time.
Are we still having fun?
RS, no I'm not having fun at all because I still don't know what you mean.
Can you give me a couple of real-life practical examples of "The things one chooses to externalise, that actually create dead weight costs internally"?
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