The Commute

In March 2017 I took a job in Somerset, New Jersey. I live in Manhattan, in Washington Heights, a mere three blocks from the George Washington Bridge, which is part of I-95. This meant I'd have a reverse commute, albeit a long one. Deep in south-central New Jersey, to avoid tolls I'd drive over 60 miles each way, adding 630 miles every week to my car. Here are some notes and observations after a few months of this commute. 

The Drive 

The drive itself is not a bad one. The most direct, shortest route would be to go over the bridge and stay on I-95, cutting the miles down to about 48 and change. However, I-95 is a toll road, and it adds up over time, so instead, I get onto I-80 and take that out to Parsippany, where I get onto I-287. I-287 eventually intersects with I-78, which I pass, and loops back eastward, so I get the odd sensation of heading back to where I started, at least by way of Staten Island. 

I leave early, driving up three blocks and over another three to get on the bridge. I shift over to the left lane and stay Express until the turnoff for I-80. Things are normally pretty smooth until about 5 miles before exit 43; there are a series of merges and interchanges that slow things down, even coming to a stop several times.

I've learned to just stay in the left lane and avoid the two ramps that lead back onto I-80. Sometimes, Google gets confused and thinks I'm still on I-80, which is only a few yards away. I-287 is a bit crowded until past Morristown, then it opens up until the last five mile before my exit to local roads.

Mondays appear to be best. Fridays, which I've since gotten to work from home, are worse. 

After another half hour or so, I get close to my exit ramp. When I first started, I'd follow Google's directions diligently and take Exit 10 to get onto Easton Road. I've stopped doing that, opting for Exit 12 instead. It's a bit convoluted to explain why, without a map: 

Exit 10 on I-287, east-bound.

Basically, to take exit 10 I have to quickly cross two lanes of traffic merging from another road, duck into a cut, and yield to traffic coming from the opposite direction, cross that traffic into another cut, and then cross two more lanes of traffic to avoid getting stuck in a line to get back on I-287. That last lane has traffic coming at 40+ mph, comes in spurts, very much a blind spot, and I'm typically trying to get over from a stopped position. It's harrowing and not how I like to end my morning drive. 

Instead, by taking Exit 12, I drive a little farther on local roads, but with better lanes and signaling, and with the added bonus of easy access to drive-through coffee. Coffee without cream, and without being creamed, is the order of the day. 

Coming back, I have a couple of local road routes depending on whether I'm getting gas, or if the highway looks backed up. Typically, things are slow but moving where I get on at Exit 10 (a much less harrowing entry than exit), open up a bit by I-78, and then slow and congested between Morristown and Parsippany. 

The last two or three miles before the interchange for I-80 in particular are challenging, and it's clear that I-287 doesn't get better for a while after I leave it. Usually, I-80 is pretty open all the way back to the bridge, and the bridge is, more often than not, pretty reasonable. Sometimes, it's backed up for miles. 

I've stayed at my boyfriend's house a few times. He lives near Piermont, NY, and to get there I stay on I-287 all the way to I-87, getting off just before the Tappan Zee Bridge, and then heading down the Palisades Parkway. Leaving from his place is the reverse; overall it's a prettier commute, but longer. 

Coming across the George Washington Bridge, the hardest part is the merging that happens after the tolls. Most people are smart enough to practice "alternate merge", but it's from multiple lanes, and not everyone understands how to merge properly. Other than that, if the toll lanes are backed up, I can find myself idling in neutral waiting to go uphill, making the shifting a bit more of a challenge. Neutral-brake-neutral-first-neutral-brake-neutral-first and so on. 

Lately, Google has consistently advised me to take Exit 73, which is marked to get onto Route 67, except I keep going and get to the toll lanes. This has the advantage of putting me on the right (and correct) side of the bridge, so I do that. It usually gets me out of a bit of traffic as well. 

Since commuting a few more weeks, I think that further back, Google is usually trying to put me on to the lower level of the bridge via I-95 Local, in order to take a short jaunt down the Henry Hudson and back up Riverside Drive, which is directly behind my building. Usually, I just stay Express and jam out the driving, and take the upper level, followed by 6 blocks of local streets, which are usually not terrible.

The Duration 

It takes me a little over an hour to get to work and about an hour and a half to come back. When the weather's bad or there's something backing up traffic, it can take me two hours to get home. Thus, I spend about 12% - 16% of the day driving.  

It's amusing how many of my friends suggested, when I first described my commute to them, "I have audiobook recommendations". I've only ever managed to make it through a few audiobooks; I think when it comes to books I prefer to actually read books. Most recently I finished listening to Barbara Tuchman's "The Proud Tower", but that was something I listened to at home when cleaning house. It took me months. 

I do listen to podcasts, and have a few that I like and which mostly match the duration of the drive. I've been a longtime fan of Mike Duncan's Revolutions series, and his History of Rome before that; I listen to the Economist, and also Backstory, a solid trio/quartet of historians putting current events in the context of American history.

I also have music, a lot of music, and more often that's what I listen to on the way home. Familiar songs in particular seem to relax my brain as I concentrate on threading through traffic, whether at 80 miles per hour or 10 miles per hour. 

In the mornings, though, I usually listen to NPR radio. It catches up or fills in details on news headlines I read before I leave, and reception is good most of the drive in – I get interference after coming around the bend shortly after I-78. By then, though, I've usually looped back to the top of the hour, and I'm not hearing much that I didn't hear at the start. Turning off the radio and mentally organizing my day takes over. 

The Ride 

My car is a 2005 Saab 9-5 station wagon in base trim and manual shift. I love this car, but I did not buy it to be a daily driver. I've had three major repairs on it, including replacing the clutch and related hardware last year. It runs great, but while I'm confident in the car, I'm not liking the fact that I'll put more miles on it with three months of commuting that in the previous year and a half of ownership. 

The Saab has a 2.3 liter turbocharged engine, so I can keep up and even surpass the late model BMWs, Infinitis, and Mercedes on the road. On the return drive, the stretch from about Hasbrouck Heights to the bridge in the express lane is often open and begging to be driven. It's a pleasure to drive. Even on the slower parts of the commute, the Saab's handling is just fun. Heated seats make even chilly days comfortable, and the moon roof pops open to make hot days cool. Approaching summer, the AC blasts cold.

Being a stickshift does make stopped and congested traffic a challenge, but I've gotten much better at my lower gear shifting. I idle in neutral, and give traffic a few moments before committing to a higher gear, in case we're slowing down again. Many times, in particular near Morristown and also on the bridge, I've crept along for miles in first or second gear. 

I'm getting better at matching wheel speed to engine speed, shifting down in sudden slowdowns, shifting up just enough to get over a lane when there's an opening. I don't heel-toe; I doubt I have the dexterity for it. I have started to play with double-clutching, or dropping into neutral between each gear, and sometimes goosing the gas a bit at that point when shifting up. I try out engine braking when coming off exit ramps, especially with sharp turns to them. 

I do love the feel of manual shifting. As much as I worry the clutch, there's nothing like the feeling of really getting it right, rather than waiting for the computer to figure out what to do. Dropping into a lower gear for a hill, popping into a higher gear for speed, it's all really good. 

New Jersey Drivers 

I've driven in New Jersey before, just not this regularly, so some of what I might have thought was unusual turns out to be typical. Even my New Jersey friends corroborate (and commiserate). 

First of all, being totally fair: New Jersey drivers are aggressive but not necessarily unskilled. They will climb right up to your bumper with no safe stopping distance. They will, far more often than not, fail to use their turn signals. Every lane is potentially a passing lane, and 80 miles per hour is the default cruising speed. 

Yet, despite all this, their maneuvers are generally successful. Compare this with notorious Massachusetts drivers ("Massholes"), who genuinely seem to not even bother being aware of other traffic around them. New Jersey drivers may be aggressive, self-centered, and annoying, but they're at least paying attention. 

New York and Connecticut drivers are somewhere in between. They are generally good about signaling and not particularly aggressive, except in expensive cars. It's as if the more they paid for it, the more entitled they feel to the road. Put another way, I suppose someone entitled enough to afford a late model luxury performance car will feel entitled to drive all over the road however they see fit. 

Habits 

My day, and my ride home, start with a brief check of traffic. I've learned that it's best to do this all on my phone, because when Google hands from browser to phone, it doesn't include the route; it's more like the start and endpoints, and one device will come up with a different route based on the preferences set on the device. I usually "avoid tolls" though some  - the bridge – are inevitable – and that's what takes me to I-80 and I-287. 

I mount my phone in my car, plugged in to power. If I'm listening to music, I'll use a Bluetooth cassette adapter - the built-in stereo is old enough to have cassette and CD, but neither Bluetooth nor auxiliary input. I keep a Camelbak bottle of water in the front passenger seat, for easy and spill-proof access to water should I get thirsty. Depending on the temperature, I'll either bundle up in fleece or tear down to my shirtsleeves. I tighten my laces and get comfortable before backing out of my parking spot. 

I truly feeling like a pilot, nodding to Saab's "born from jets" advertising a few years ago. Even in hot months I usually wear a jacket for comfort, I'm eyeing speed and rpms on my gauges, ETA and traffic off my phone, outside temperature off the Saab Information Display (SID, and yes that is what it is genuinely called). 

Hazards
I see dead animals routinely on the side of the road. Usually deer, sometimes smaller critters. Unfortunately, some of them linger for days, and sometimes, I'm not sure if I'm seeing a new one, or an older one that's gotten moved down a ways. I did up my insurance to include anything like hitting an animal or getting hit by a branch.

That paid off, too. One day I was behind a couple of large trucks, and sand was sifting off the top of one. I changed lanes, and suddenly a pebble struck my windshield and left a mark, right in my line of sight, about as wide as a dime. Full coverage, no cost to replace the entire windshield. A brand new windshield is a remarkably clear thing.

I've see entire pieces of trucker faring on the side of the road, molded pieces of plastic three or four feet long; shards of tire, sometimes in the middle of the lane; once I saw a sofa cushion in the middle of the lane. I've seen trails of trinkets, probably from loose or fallen box, strewn a quarter-mile down the highway. I've seen wrecks.

Most accidents I've seen are, fortunately for me, in the opposite direction. I saw an SUV that had clearly plowed into the end of a long guardrail, the latter of when seemed to have rolled back and also carving away the SUV's grill. I've seen two-car fender-benders, which hold up traffic while everyone gets sorted. I've seen multi-car fender-benders blocking two lanes of traffic. I once saw three tractor-trailers with a forth tractor-trailer hauler, after one of them had an entire trailer catch fire and burn down to the boards. That last one was actually mentioned on the radio traffic reports not longer after I passed it.

Driving: it's not like the brochure.

Summary
As much as I dislike putting so many miles on my car, the drive itself is actually somewhat enjoyable. I'm certainly a better driver for it, though I realize, every driver things they are a good driver, and it's the other drivers that are a problem. Hence, "better", not "best". Learning the local interstate systems, and some of the back routes around them, has been helpful too. I bought my car for carrying kayaks, and knowing how to get in and out of the city, at least to the west, is useful.

So, that's my commute. Sit back, buckle up, plug in your devices to charge, if you need, and enjoy the ride.