What's an acceptable commuting distance?

platypus

platypus

platypus

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Just wondering what people consider a reasonable drive to work, and if you get a driving allowance, what is it?

I'm just sick of the cost of commuting to work, when sometimes I cannot avoid driving.
 
When I worked down in London I was doing 4 hours a day via car/train/tube, that was horrible and far too much.

I would say 35/45 minutes door-to-door.
 
takes me about 1hour 30mins to get to work on 3 busses...doesnt really bother me, gives me time to listen to some music and play my DS lol
 
Hour max. I park 15 mins walk away from the office and it takes me half an hour to get here.

Wouldn't do more.
 
Doing about 5 hours a day at the moment which is horrible, which is why I'm changing to a job 40 mins away next month.

I'd say 1 hour is acceptable.
 
Depends on the pay

As a contractor I end up commuting for 20 hours a week on average - some times more. But then on day rate this is acceptable. I am however desperately trying to reduce this and am now working from home 2 days a week.
 
The costs also do mount up, especially if you can't use your car, I think the season ticket from Huntingdon to Kings-X is over £5K now!
 
Personally I look at the time taken to commute rather than the distance. Where I live a new bypass has been built which has resulted in a hell of a lot more traffic rather than calming it. So unless I set off at 06.30-06.45 then it can take me the best part of 45 minutes to do a six mile journey. However I could work somewhere else in the opposite direction, it be twice the distance, I can set off later and get there in half the time.

All depends what you want to compromise really be it travel expenses, travel time or quality of life
 
I guess at 45-50 minutes it's not going to be enough to complain about then :(.

It really is too much for me, and yeah it's expensive.
 
I do Cambridge to Luton. 45 miles around an hour and a bit. My journey time is to start work for 7 and finish at 7 so I miss all the traffic. I do that on shifts, so I work about 4 and a half months a year total with holidays. If I had to do that monday to friday I'd not bother.

I don't claim for it and when I used to work in the center or cambridge and travel from a village in and out of work it used to take me 45 minutes anyway if I caught the traffic wrong.

I put up with it because the pays great, the times offs fantastic (from april to september there isn't a month I work more than 12 days) so Naturally it has to be the right job.
 
Sometimes I think you do need to take a step back an evaluate that you are achieving a decent work/life balance
 
I'd say up to an hour would be just about acceptable but that is pretty much my max limit, ideally though my work is within a half hours walk or less which isn't quite so hard to find in a smallish place like Dundee.
 
I wouldn't consider more than 35-40 minutes door to door absolute max.

But then when you're working 8.30am - 9.00pm or longer you don't want travelling to take up your only free time. I know people who work the same hours and do a 4 hour round commute a day :(
 
At the moment doing 20 minutes door to door (which is terrific) I have done 1hr plus in the past.

I would say up to 1 hr driving, perhaps up to 90 minutes on train (as you can read, game, browse web, etc), but only 10 minutes on the bus as I can't stand it ;)
 
I've now moved to "working from home" which has it's positives and negative tbh, I go down to London once or twice a week now.
 
I'm a consultant so where I work varies widely. At the moment I'm in Canary Wharf which takes me between 1.5 hours and 2 hours door-to-door via train/tubes. I get up at 6am leave the house at 7.20am and get into work at 9.20am. Leave at 5pm and get home at 7pm. It's not ideal, but fortunately the wage is enough for me to tolerate it.
 
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