Back on the Bus

"Oh good. It's nice to see that Bret & Erin are putting things back together and moving on."

Nope. That's not it. I'm literally getting back on the bus.

Ever since we moved into our new house, I've had what feels like a ridiculous commute to my job downtown. In the end, it takes around 50 minutes door to door each way. This includes a long spell of bumper to bumper driving and a walk of several blocks from a parking garage to our office. The stress of the driving coupled with the inadvertent exercise has gotten me thinking about whether there was some way to use Indy's limited public transportation to make my life easier.

After doing a little research, I discovered that a city bus gets to within about 15 minutes of our new house. At this point, the schedule claims that it's about 45 more minutes to my office. This puts me right around the hour mark. Maybe a few minutes longer each way. But there are some key differences that make the extra 30 minutes per day worthwhile.

First, I don't have to drive NEARLY as much. While this might be a deterrent to many, it's a good thing to me. I'm tired of driving. I'm tired of skidding around on ice and snow all winter. I'm tired of filling my tank multiple times each week. If I'm not driving, I can be checking my email, listening to the new Decemberists album in headphones, or sleeping.

Second, the bus drops me right at the door to my office. No more hike up the street in 10 inches of snow. While this isn't a big deal in June, it'll be a big deal in January.

So for the past few days, I've dumped my car at the 15 minute mark and taken the bus. Now I know some of you are thinking, "But aren't there guys with needles literally hanging from their arms on the bus?" or "Isn't the bus just, well, nasty? I'm pretty sure someone urinates on the floor first thing every morning."

The simple answer is "No." I've been surprisingly impressed this week with the ease and cleanliness with which IndyGo seems to operate. While not everyone on the bus looks like me, it's also safe to say that I would have no problems bringing my kids along with me on our bus system.

As a life long Hoosier, the use of public transportation has almost always been a non-issue. It's just not something that many people in Indy have ever grabbed onto -- especially those living in the 'burbs. But my travels in China made me aware of just how great a good public transportation system could be. My ability to cross all over both mainland China and Hong Kong with such ease made me a big fan of the concept. So while the offering here in Indy is pretty limited, it would certainly grow with greater use. The bus I take home at 5pm is only about 1/3 full each day, which is a shame really.

Erin has been teasing me about the fact that I fall asleep on the bus (which resulted in me narrowly making my destination yesterday). On top of the snoring and drooling, I ripped the crotch of my jeans out at work yesterday, so here I was on my way home, on the bus, hole in my crotch, asleep, snoring, with earphones on. I'm pretty confident that I was the dude being avoided on that particular route.