My Iowa Commute

[HungLikeJesus]

glatt -- it must be nice to be able to walk to work.

I really like this picture:

This is my Metrorail station. I just missed a train, so the platform is pretty empty. It will be packed like sardines in just a minute or two. The glowing sign on the left says the next train will be here in 4 minutes:

[glatt]

Originally Posted by HLJ

I really like this picture:

Thanks. I knew I had 4 minutes to kill, so I took a moment to actually compose a shot instead of taking snapshots like I did for the rest of them.

Originally Posted by SteveDallas

You're lucky nobody thought you were trying to take an inappropriate photo of that woman!

I know which websites you visit.

[Perry Winkle]

Originally Posted by glatt

Have any of you seen one of these R2-D2 mailboxes for the Star Wars 30 year anniversary?

Yup! There's one in the touristy Harbor District in Baltimore. It's the background on my phone... If I remember my camera I'll take a picture when I'm down there tomorrow (and some others, and post them to another thread).

[glatt]

I took some commute pictures today, because it was all pretty with the snow. I'm going to post them next to the same locations I took pictures of in the late Spring a couple years ago. Just for fun.

Originally Posted by glatt

I like seeing everyone's commutes, so I thought I'd join in as well. These are all on my Flickr page, so you can see larger versions there if you like. My commute will look a little different, because I walk. It's about 1.5 miles of total walking each way.

We start off at my house, where I just took out the recycling:

Originally Posted by glatt

Then I go down the street. There's a mixture of small older houses, and silly enormous McMansions. See the tall building in the distance? I'm walking about three blocks past that to enter the MetroRail system:

Originally Posted by glatt

I cut through the playground of this elementary school, but it's OK since no kids are here this early:

Boots are very helpful here.

Originally Posted by glatt

This street of older houses hasn't seen any new McMansions pop up because the houses are all duplexes. To tear one down, you would have to buy out two families, and I guess the developers think it's too much effort:

Originally Posted by glatt

I walk along this bike path for a short distance. You can see I'm starting to get into a built up area around the metro station:

I'm loving the boots.

Originally Posted by glatt

It looks like I'm in the city here, but I'm still in the suburbs, just a few blocks from my house. The metro station is three blocks ahead:

You can see the bollards they finally installed to keep cars from driving on the sidewalk. I was tilting at windmills to get them to install those, and they finally did. Don't know if I had anything to do with it.

Originally Posted by glatt

Here's the elevator down into the ground to catch a train:

Originally Posted by glatt

This is my Metrorail station. I just missed a train, so the platform is pretty empty. It will be packed like sardines in just a minute or two. The glowing sign on the left says the next train will be here in 4 minutes:


The train! You can see it's become more crowded on the platform:


I know where to stand on the train so I'm one of the first off and through the gates. This is coming up out of the ground in downtown Washington D.C. There's a huge mob of people right on my tail, so I take a quick picture and head up the escalator:


Have any of you seen one of these R2-D2 mailboxes for the Star Wars 30 year anniversary?

I didn't take any pictures in the Metro this time because it was a clusterfuck down there with the bad weather, and I didn't want to call attention to myself. And the R2D2 mailbox sticker is gone.

More in the next post.

[glatt]

Originally Posted by glatt

I cut through Franklin Square Park:

Originally Posted by glatt

Go past this old stone church and a new construction site. There's construction everywhere in this city.

...

Originally Posted by glatt

And here's my building! I actually went across the street to take this shot. I don't normally arrive from this direction. I normally come in a back way and sneak through the loading dock:

[Clodfobble]

When I visited DC I was very impressed with the effectiveness of the Metro system. Our only public transportation system in Austin is buses, and they suck harder than you could possibly imagine.

I really like this thread! I don't have a true commute, but I'm going to try to remember to take pictures the next time I drive into the office for a weekend recording session.

[Happy Monkey]

I wish I could use the Metro for my commute.

But here are a couple of pics from my daily drive:

A church on top of a gas station:




And the exorcist stairs:

[Sundae]

Wow - glad I stepped by to check this out again!
HLJ - I do promise my next creative writing session will include something naughty

Glatt - fantastic. You live in such a beautiful area, the walk must set you up for tackling the Metro. It looks head & shoulders above the dirty old Tube, but no commute is ever going to be ideal when you're sharing someone else's morning breath, right?

Happy Monkey - you're not kidding about the stairs
Having seen them, I'm now going to worry if you ever go AWOL.

[Happy Monkey]

I literally am not kidding- they are the actual stairs from the end of The Exorcist.

[Cyclefrance]

OK - contryside time! - all this concrete reminds me of the 30-odd years I travelled up to London and back each day, and taking 3 hours in total out of the day to do it. So that's 3 hours x 200 days x 30 years - jeez, that's 18,000 hours, or 2 years of my life (!), just standing on a platform or sitting/standing inside a train....!

Now it's a local job - in the winter I drive there but once the daylight improves I cycle for 2 or 3 of the days in the week. When using my bike, I try for quieter roads - sure, 19 out of 20 cars and trucks give you a wide berth when they overtake, but it's the 20th that's the problem. So I keep bsuy roads to the minimum.

The other thing is, well, most of you won't know where I'm talking about (or showing you photos of) - so here's a map of the route I take to start with - red marks the way (plus a bit of pinky-mauve color on the way back where I deviate from the morning route). So here we go...

[Cyclefrance]

First picture - out of the driveway and across the road past Headley Court Ministry of Defence Rehabiliation Hospital (used for many of the Gulf War and now Iraq War trauma victims) - no photos though, not permitted - teh guards would be on you like a shot - a fantsatic building as well. Still never mind - I'm soon turning into the Tyrells Wood Golf Court and residential area (grand houses - the ones here in the second picture are the old stables that have been converted...

.

[Cyclefrance]

Then it's past the Golf Club - the original manor house to the estate and as always there are alsways a few people there preparing to tee-off - no need to go to the office then....? The journey to work takes 35 minutes max - but it takes agood ten to fifteen minutes more to get home - why so much quicker in the morning - more downhill stretches - like the one in the second picture that runs through Tyrells Wood...

.

[Cyclefrance]

Have to disappoint you with the sewage works SG - and I must get on if I'm to do this in 35 minutes - already 7.30 am and I've hardly started! Now it's out of Tyrell's Wood, down the rest of the hill and then across the A24 into that little turning opposite in the first photo. That takes me down and towards Leatherhead - wher there are shops (of sorts...)

.

[Sundae]

I await photos of the sewage works with bated breath!
Joking aside - how wonderful is the Ordnance Survey? I love it for it's pedantry.

[Cyclefrance]

One good thing about the bike is that I can cut through the pedestrianised area in photo 1 and save aabout a mile of skirting around the town as the cars do - then I rejoin the road that takes me out towards Stoke d'Abernon and Cobham and mix with the traffic...

.