
How far you can get if you leave the largest U.S. cities at rush hour - mcone
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/national/escape-time/
======
kristopolous
The second graphic confirms my hypothesis ... that los angeles employers have
somehow staggered their hours (or given the employees more liberty) and that
rush hour has become more equally distributed over a larger time range. This
remediation has helped increase the number of cars commuting on the roads
without significantly growing the underlying infrastructure (Washington seems
to have the same pattern but I can't speak to that).

You can see the middle yellow dot is about equal distance between the red and
teal ones. Recently (say 2013-) when I've gotten on the freeway at about
8:30pm in Culver City (near the 10/405 heading east), I've been shocked to see
it's light rush-hour style traffic (generally under 40mph + cars keeping close
distance + lots of brake lights). Honestly it's about 9:30/10pm when it starts
to free up.

In the morning time, commute starts about 5:30 and goes to 10/10:30am and then
the home commute starts up again around 2/2:30pm and goes until about 9:30pm.

I have a place about 250 meters from the freeway and I can hear the pickup in
the ambient freeway noise starting around 5:00 in the morning until about 5:30
where it reaches approximately its maximum background noise.

People do the same "rush hour driving" at this time. There's a small distance
between cars and large density of vehicles, but nobody has made a mistake to
slow everyone down yet so people are doing this at a "let's beat the traffic"
speed of around 80mph. It's so enormously dangerous. Take the 405 from the
valley to santa monica once at this time and you'll understand why there's
multiple accidents every day.

This is different from when I was in high school in the 90s. I went from
essentially Agoura Hills to Encino. The freeway was empty until about 6:30 and
then when I was lucky enough to have a free period where I wouldn't have to
show up until I think 930? I could leave at 8:30 and it would be a breeze on
in.

So in 20 years at least from my observation, the rush hour window maybe has
increased about an hour either way.

~~~
majormajor
Something that I think they missed (or else I missed) is that going from
downtown LA westbound in the evening rush hour isn't the worst one - it's
going east from the west side. Living west and working east is practically
reverse-commuting on the 10.

The west side in particular is basically the land of "rush hour never ends" to
an unbelievable extent compared to my experiences in the Bay Area, Seattle,
Atlanta, and Austin (all which have plenty of people stuck with terrible
commutes) - it's just a different magnitude of practically-never-ending-pain
on every possible route.

~~~
bkeroack
A big part of this is that the 405 acts as a giant nearly impenetrable wall
separating the west side from everywhere else. The few underpasses that exist
(Ohio, etc) become horrific logjams every day. I've spent 45 min going 1/4
mile to get past the 405.

~~~
H1Supreme
Holy crap. I'd get a motorcycle and lane split if I were you. Have a friend
out in LA that does this. It cut down on his commute time significantly.

------
monorepoman
The analysis conflicts with personal recollection. It seems to show leaving SF
at 4pm and being able to get to roughly central Mountain View in an hour.
Google Maps says that if I leave today at 4pm, that trip takes "typically 1h -
1h50m" which in my experience is about right. One hour is a good outcome, not
a normal one. In a car, at rush hour, sometimes it could take an hour to go
four blocks down Battery Street in SF.

Also, of course, the article has neglected other modes than cars. If you leave
on a rush hour Acela train from Boston you'll be in Providence in 33 minutes,
well outside even their 10pm driving radius for Boston.

~~~
nostromo
Seattle also seems very... optimistic.

~~~
ocb
It seems like it's assuming that you're starting on the freeway already...
totally ignoring the 30+ minutes it takes to get onto I-5

~~~
pacaro
Yeah, also it is not averaging well given geographic constraints, so the 4, 7,
and 10 distances are the same(ish) for all directions except north and south
and directly along i90, which makes their distribution seem oddly narrow

------
ChuckMcM
One of the interesting things here for me is building market rate housing in
the "south bay" region of the Bay Area. Current residents are up in arms about
all the 'high rise apartments and condos' being built because they worry about
the traffic, but don't consider that Apple alone is dropping 21,000 employees
into the area, if they can live close to work you get _less_ traffic. It's a
very nimbyish dynamic.

~~~
s0rce
Yes, its clearly not about traffic as every office building has an enormous
number of car trips, maybe a bit less than homes but not by much I'm guessing,
and they are clustered at rush hour.

~~~
lostlogin
Residents just need to push for a faster OS update cycle. Continual crunch
time will mean less traffic as employers won't be leaving the office.

------
DonHopkins
Does this have something to do with getting out of town if Trump starts a
nuclear war?

~~~
tptacek
This was downvoted (presumably as snark) when I saw it, but I think we can
reasonably assume that's the subtext behind why this piece ran today. Not
because WaPo believes such a war is imminent, but because people are talking
about one.

~~~
dfc
I assumed this was just another insincere and snide comment but then I saw
your name. I really don't think it has anything to do with Trump. For starters
without any local Washington context giving data for 4, 7 and 10pm makes no
sense if the subtext is mass evacuation. More importantly everyone loves
talking about traffic in this area, congress is gone so it's a slow news month
and the largest infrastructure project in the history of the area was
announced yesterday, the Frederick Douglas bridge.

~~~
tptacek
I'm not so much commenting about the likelihood of nuclear war, so much as
about the empirically obvious fact that discussions of nuclear war are very
much in the zeitgeist, most especially in the Washington Post.

~~~
dfc
I didn't think your comment was motivated by the likelihood of nuclear war.
Just to add another data point, this was one of two articles posted by this
reporter today. The other article was about the likelihood that Reps were
conducting town hall meetings in August. The reporter looks like they have a
schedule of two articles published in the middle of the month and one at the
end of the month.

------
makecheck
There are times I've literally taken half an afternoon off to go somewhere,
knowing that when I arrive I'll be sitting around for an hour and a half,
because this seems better than traffic. And 99% of people never have that
option. It's just gotta be a massive factor in daily stress.

As a society we need to get over the ass-in-chair-9-5 mindset and allow remote
work and weird hours to combat rush hour.

~~~
PhasmaFelis
Seriously improving public transit and reducing car dependency would also help
a lot.

(How bad is rush hour traffic in major European cities? I'm not sure.)

~~~
s0rce
I'm guessing if you travel by car in major european (and most major cities of
the world) rush hour will be similiarly bad. The main difference in European
cities is that you often have better options, including better public transit
or bike infrastructure, also more housing in the inner city and less endless
suburbia. I don't have sources for this but my thoughts are that if traffic
was much less more people would elect to use the roads and drive private cars
and it would end up as congested as here, as it does when more road
infrastructure is built.

~~~
Symbiote
Not necessarily, since there might not be anywhere to park (or the cost might
be too high).

~~~
s0rce
Good point, parking in American cities is way too cheap (often free).

------
valuearb
I usually leave around 6 pm and my average freeway velocity is 77 MPH (don't
go faster because I want to avoid tickets). If I leave at 5 pm, I'll have to
drive around 45 MPH for a couple miles, then back to 77 for the remaining 20
miles of my commute.

This is Phoenix, which continues to build out it's freeway system and
continues to falsify the "fundamental law of traffic congestion".

~~~
popdoit
That god damn heat.

~~~
valuearb
Best weather in the country. July and August are hot, Ill give you that, but
the rest of the year is awesome. And given I work and live in air-conditioned
buildings, and have a huge pool in my backyard, July and August ain't too bad.

------
DIVx0
I used to live in an exurb of Minneapolis (25 miles) and had to commute
to/from the city.

I'm sorry to say that at least for Minneapolis this map is wildly inaccurate.
My 25 mile commute would take me, not accounting for unusual weather, at best
1 hour and at worst 2 hours.

I wish I could live in whatever fantasy world they pulled the data from.

~~~
Pulcinella
Same for Dallas. My Friday home commute takes 45 min to an hour at 4 pm. It's
only 9 miles.

~~~
killbrad
Why not just bike it?

~~~
teach
Sure, if you want to get hit by a car and breathe in tremendous amounts of
carbon monoxide.

Most roads in Texas cities are _extremely_ unfriendly for bike traffic.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
I think you will find you are breathing in that carbon monoxide in your car as
well.

------
c3534l
Interesting facts and maps, but the major flaw I see is that rush hour isn't
the same time in every city. And I'm not really sure why rush hour was used
specifically, instead of some kind of average.

~~~
thatcat
Max commute distance for most people is related to rush hour traffic not the
average.

~~~
c3534l
Well, sure it is. There will be some people who make it out before or after
rush hour. If you take those people into account you will get a literal
average.

------
jarmitage
I was interested in the same idea but based on leaving London. This led me
down a rabbit hole which turned up the phrase 'time space convergence map',
which is an interesting way to cartographically project this feature:

(see image half way down on the right)
[http://geographylaunchpad.weebly.com/the-friction-of-
distanc...](http://geographylaunchpad.weebly.com/the-friction-of-
distance.html)

~~~
dredmorbius
Space v. time is one dimension, but energy costs and infrastructure
requirements are other critical elements.

A passenger car and a long-haul airliner are about equivalently efficient, on
a fuel-per-passenger-mile basis (assuming a high load factor for the aircraft,
and a single occupant for the auto).

Rail is far more efficient, and time-competitive with air for modest to fair
long trips (given high-speed rail).

Shipping is the most efficient form of transport by far, but also one of the
slowest.

Automobiles require roads of some description, though they can flexibly shift
routes across these. Aircraft and ships require ports, though have freedom of
movement exclusive of these (with some choke-points: straights and canals,
mostly, for ships).

Rail is almost the equivalent of "ships on land", though the right-of-way
itself is required. The requirements for these are comparatively modest for
basic service, though high-speed and high-capacity routes, and switching,
increase requirements.

It's an interesting field.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Flying commercial is about 43% more efficient than driving.

[http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_juice/2014/07/dri...](http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_juice/2014/07/driving_vs_flying_which_is_more_harmful_to_the_environment.html)

~~~
dredmorbius
Given that we're looking at order-of-magnitude differences, that's
"equivalently efficient".

The actual efficiencies depend _tremendously_ on the range of the trip, the
loading of the aircraft (or car), and base vehicle efficiency.

But ~30 - 40 passenger miles/gallon are possible in either.

For cargo, the (again, very rough) numbers are:

Ship: 514 ton * mile / gallon

Rail: 202 ton * mile / gallon

Truck: 59 ton * mile / gallon

Air: 13 ton * mile / gallon

Something I had cause to look up the other day as I was trying to figure out
how to ship my M-1 Main Battle Tank.

[https://plus.google.com/104092656004159577193/posts/MZ5Pi7AT...](https://plus.google.com/104092656004159577193/posts/MZ5Pi7ATeSQ)

------
rdtsc
Heh, DC and NY you're not getting far, doesn't matter when you leave. After
being stuck on I66 or I495 even at odd hours at night I can believe it.

------
seandougall
I'd be curious to see a comparison of weekdays vs weekends. My experience
living in the Bay Area was that driving through the east bay was way worse on
Sundays, while it's far better than weekday traffic in L.A., where I live now.

------
seanmcdirmid
First world problems. Beijing has worse traffif than any of these cities, and
if you try to get out on a holiday, it could take you the whole day just to
exit the city. If they do construction on the highway in and out, multi day
traffic jams are possible, the longest one being 8 days (mostly for trucks,
though).

------
robin_reala
“…by car”. Nothing about rail or other public transport sadly.

~~~
mratzloff
Yes. There are widely-used rail systems in the majority of the cities with the
worst traffic. If you reframe the question to how far you can get by any
transit mode, the result looks very different in Seattle, which has some of
the worst transit outcomes in the country, compared to NYC, which is not bad.

~~~
0xffff2
The first line of the article and the time this was posted both rule out
anything but a personal vehicle in my mind. It's Friday afternoon and I want
to leave work early means I'm going camping or something similar. Caltrain
won't even get me to a relaxing weekend in Monterey, much less to a camp site
in the Sierras.

My commute is what it is. 45 minutes to drive 12 miles sucks, but it only
really bothers me when I'm going somewhere _other than_ home.

------
zjaffee
It's interesting, because in LA, while downtown traffic is bad, the most
horrendous areas are west of downtown, where if you start in Santa Monica
let's say, traveling more than 10 miles in an hour is difficult during peak
return traffic.

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gshakir
I don't how it accounts for the fact that in coastal cities like Boston, the
only direction you can travel is West (SW, NW) etc. So that kinda limits the
area that you can cover in an hour.

------
jimktrains2
You can sit on 376, especially through the bathtub, for a good 30' at rush
hour in Pittsburgh. I'm not sure I believe that map.

------
mikeash
With all the fuss over North Korea recently, I was expecting a completely
different sort of article for this headline.

------
JaggerFoo
I think Thursday is a busier traffic day than Friday, here in Los Angeles.
There is a term that traffic reporters use in Los Angeles - "Friday Light"
traffic.

I wonder if "Friday Light" occurs in the other cities mentioned in the report.

That being said leaving at 7pm is a valid strategy any day of the week here in
Los Angeles.

Great reporting.

~~~
madcaptenor
In Atlanta we have light traffic on Friday mornings but heavy traffic on
Friday evening. My theory is that morning traffic is almost entirely people
going to work, of whom there are slightly fewer on Fridays, but evening
traffic is both people coming home from work and people going out for fun. The
extra fun trips on Friday evening more than make up for the people not working
on Friday.

------
mrbill
I live in Houston. My commute home (from up on North Loop West, to near
Gessner/Westheimer) takes a minimum of 30 minutes even if I leave at 6-6:30pm.
Total distance? ~11 miles.

Here's the data from my Automatic Pro GPS OBD2 dongle, on a "good day":

Trip started August 10, 2017 at 06:20PM

Trip ended August 10, 2017 at 06:58PM

~~~
j4kp07
World's largest highway system (28 lanes at some points), yet still the second
most congested.

~~~
mrbill
That 28-lane part (BW8/I10 intersection and around it) is just 2-3 miles from
my house.. fortunately my commute doesn't go anywhere near it (in the other
direction, actually).

I do have to deal with the 59/610 interchange, which they're getting ready to
re-do in the next few years.. the detour/re-route for that project is going to
cause hell for quite a lot of people.

------
HumbleGamer
I live in Daly City/SF. I dont even attempt to go to the East Bay until
8:30-9:00pm through the week. Guaranteed hour of traffic just to get out of
SF, at least 35-45 minutes to reach the Bay bridge in high congestion.

------
syntaxing
I drove near the country side of Illinois yesterday. Traveling 65 miles took a
little over an hour. I drove 30 miles today near the Greater New York area and
it took almost two hours... The traffic here is infuriating.

------
agentgt
New England looks pretty bad in this article but I beg to differ albeit I am
biased.

I live around Boston and while I agree I will say that Boston like the rest of
New England is extremely seasonal and even then it's week by week and based on
weather. I'm typing this while on my iPhone after just traveling to Cape Cod
this Friday evening and it only took 1.25 hours and left at 4pm.

I hope to make two points:

1\. you can see hell of lot more interesting things in 5 hours or less from
Boston than almost any other city in the Midwest or even California.

2\. Boston is extremely high variance particularly because it is a college
town and has "4 seasons". If you know what you are doing you can use this to
your advantage.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
> 1\. you can see hell of lot more interesting things in 5 hours or less from
> Boston than almost any other city in the Midwest or even California.

Within 5 hours of LA, I can get to both the lowest and highest point in the
continental USA, I can see deserts and forest mountains, not to mention
oceans, surfing, beachside houses that make cape code look cheap. Vegas is
only 4 hours away, at most 5...

~~~
agentgt
LA has absolutely the worse traffic.

I have no doubt you can see many things with no traffic in LA in 5 hours or
less. Every time I have been there it's been horrendous that it makes Boston
traffic look like a joke.

With New England it's not necessarily the traffic its the fact that the roads
are smaller and not straight shots.

As far the Cape looking cheap which was a poor taste comment I would take it
over any pacific beach :P .

The pacific coast beaches while do have surf are for some reason so cold with
the some minor exceptions.

Over all I meant certain parts of cali and not LA specifically.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
I moved to LA from Beijing and I'm amassed at how great the traffic is. It's
all relative, I guess.

My point about Malibu vs. Cape Code was just about price, not value.

~~~
agentgt
My overall argument wasn't that Boston is so special (albeit clearly it is as
this article shows at the top). Its that the high congestion cities are far
more compact and there are more things to do in less mileage (ignoring nature
activities like hiking).

I'm annoyed that I said "parts of California" at all and probably should have
said Texas (I clearly got downvoted for mentioning Cali didn't have things to
do).

------
eagsalazar2
Why did they pick 4pm? In Seattle, for example, leaving at 4pm frequently
means you miss heavy traffic all together while leaving at 5pm is almost a
guarantee of gridlock the second you get on the freeway. If you leave at 4pm
and head due east on 90, most likely you'll be in eastern washington by 5pm
and won't hit any traffic at all.

In SF it is more complicated because there are big traffic problems in almost
every direction so if you leave at 4pm and are still driving somewhere at 5pm,
_then_ you'll get stuck in traffic. Still 4pm seems like an odd time to pick.

~~~
kbrosnan
Summer Fridays tend to have an earlier rush hour than other days of the week
and other times of the year. People try to get a jump start on their weekend.

------
Trickilozis
The map is a little misleading, only in the sense that people care a ton about
the difference from 0-1 hour, but no one commutes 5 hours. So we get a map
that gives a ton visual weight to "commutes" more than two hours. I know I'm
the one making this about commutes, but they are concerned with rush hour, so
I don't feel like I'm out of bounds.

The fact that all the cities look the same speaks to this fact. The only
restriction seems to be geography/geology.

