Commute can be fun if you do it right

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Aug 21, 2006

EDITORS NOTE: This is a condensed weekly sampling of transportation writer Erik N. Nelson's Capricious Commuter blog about getting around the Bay Area. Read the rest of the blog at http://www.ibabuzz.com/transportation.

Aug. 15

I WAS heartened to learn recently that one of my readers and de- facto editors doesn't commute any farther than his den each day.

It must be nice to read about others' suffering while sitting in one's bathrobe, earning a real income.

But I've been there, and frankly, I would rather be sharing airborne pathogens with my fellow travelers than sit alone all day, a few steps from the fridge.

That doesn't mean one can't simplify. I've very nearly parked my car for good, eliminating much of the stress of commuting. As I type, I'm feeling the grinding of metal wheels on curved track along the bay shore near Pinole.

I've been riding the rails of the Amtrak Capitol Corridor every day, getting off in Richmond and BARTing it to downtown Oakland. That gives me plenty of time to read various newspapers, eat, grab a Hefeweizen (for those of you who read the beer blog) and unwind on the way home. Such activities at 75 on I-80 could easily result in death or serious injuries, not to mention jail time.

This month, I decided to pare my routine yet again.

Jumping off the train at Richmond to catch BART is certainly convenient, but it posed two problems. One, it required waiting on the Amtrak platform, exposed to the elements and the odd panhandler for anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours, thanks to freight traffic and trackside homicide investigations. Two, it involves an outlay of BART fare that quickly adds up, even with the 20-percent discount BART farecards sold aboard the Capitol Corridor.

So instead of paying $2.30 each way to Oakland, I can get there for 69 cents extra with a monthly Amtrak pass.

So I've decided to eliminateBART from my commute, and bike or use the free bus transfer from Amtrak, with apologies to Linton Johnson, the BART's celebrity spokesman.

Now you're probably asking, "what's in it for me, who reads your newspaper and doesn't live way out wherever?"

Next week the Capitol Corridor starts something resembling regular service all down the East Bay. That means people in Oakland, Hayward, Fremont and intervening communities will get a fighting chance to commute into Silicon Valley long before Santa Clara County figures out how to come up with the billions needed to run BART south of Warm Springs.

That's three more trips each day to San Jose, added to the three already on the schedule, and no more of those horribly slow Amtrak buses. That means getting from Jack London Square to downtown San Jose in an hour and 12 minutes. I'm thinking that a lot of people wouldn't mind avoiding I-880's infamous snarls.

But what do I know? I'm nearly home and have gotten so wrapped up in my work that I haven't had time for a Hefeweizen.

Big squeeze at the airport

Aug. 14

This is not a stock tip column, but you should know that I really wanted to buy Google when it was first offered. Disclaimer proffered, this week I'm recommending Johnson and Johnson.

Returning from a camping trip to Crater Lake, I returned to civilization to discover that I'd missed the big terror plot to blow up flights from Britain to the East Coast using some kind of liquid explosive carried onto an airplane.

The morning after getting my dog out of the kennel and unpacking the car, I took my 17-year-old son to the airport so he could visit a friend in Southern California.

An hour later, I'm in Safeway and he's calling me on the mobile: "Um, Dad? There's a sign here that says I can't take any liquids or gels in my carry-on."

"That's unfortunate. Maybe you should call your mom."

Now, I'm not always passing the buck, but my wife is a seasoned traveler. She's flown to such places as Lebanon and Iran, where even a J-Lo CD might be considered contraband.

Mom advised compliance, so the shampoo, toothpaste and complexion treatment all went in the trash, and drugstore managers across the nation put out welcome mats.

Having lived in the Middle East, we aren't strangers to tight security. In Israel, I've been felt up and interrogated about my religion, my heritage, distant in-law relations and my son's girlfriends before being allowed to fly.

I've been asked, "Are you nervous? Why are you nervous?"

"My plane is about to leave without me. Wouldn't that make you nervous?"

But I must say that surrendering one's toothpaste is a new one. Even at the height of the Palestinian uprising in 2002, no Israeli airport security person ever took away my Aqua-Fresh, even if it had Arabic writing on it. That may have had something to do with my hesitation to tell my son to chuck his toiletries.

But mother knows best, and being the object of more than her share of enervating questions about her grandparents' political leanings, I trusted her to make the right decision.

And from here on out, we'll always fly with a small, collapsible spare bag to check all of our sloppy stuff or whatever else seems dangerous that week.