Friday Fun Poll: What motivates how you spend most of your time on transit?
Friday Fun Poll: What motivates how you spend most of your time on transit?
This is a follow up to the “How do you spend most of your time on transit?” poll conducted on the blog in September. Now that we know what Buzzer blog readers are doing on transit, what’s the motivation behind it? I’m curious how people view their time on transit. Is it time to relax, is it a time to communicate or is it a time to prepare yourself for what comes after the trip? Taking public transit isn’t just about going from a to b, it’s something many of us do every day. So finding out how you view this time is kinda interesting!
Myself, I treat my time on transit differently than I used to. Before working at TransLink, transit time was either a time to relax (I’d usually read or simply zone out) or to prepare for what was going to happen after I got off the bus, SkyTrain or SeaBus (I don’t use West Coast Expres… yet). Now, thanks to technology, transit time is work time. Checking emails, reading blogs and writing can all be done on my phone or laptop. Since I don’t have to concentrate on where I’m going, I’m free to cram in as much work time as possible before my stop.
Now I want to know what motivates you to stare out the window, people watch, listen to music, etc. If you answered the last poll by indicating that you mostly stare out the window while on transit, you might answer this poll stating that you want to relax, daydream or think about what you’ll do after your trip. If you listen to music mostly on transit, answering this poll might be more difficult. Do you do it because you want to escape, be entertained or relax?
I’ve tried to keep the answers somewhat broad since drilling down to specifics would leave too many options. If you think there are other potential answers that one of these choices just doesn’t cover, pick the closest answer available, and leave your thoughts in the comments section. Also, I think the comment section can really help explain if people treat their time on transit differently than other times in their life. Is transit time a special time for you? Is your time on transit a relaxing time because it’s the only time in the day that you can knit that toque you can’t wait to finish or get to the next level of Angry Birds?
I can’t wait to see the results!
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What motivates how you spend most of your time on transit?
Total Voters: 151 |
What I want to do and what I can do depends on how busy it is on the bus… if you have a seat, your hands are free to do whatever you want (ie reading). However if it’s a crowded bus and you have a shopping bag or a wet umbrella, your activities will be very limited.
Since the transit trips I need to make these days are 30 minutes or less between transfers (if transfers even necessary), I like to keep my brain occupied just enough to stay awake, but not so much that I get totally absorbed in what I’m doing. I prefer to listen to music, look out the window, and/or people-watch, which keeps my brain entertained while letting the rest of me relax on the journey. That way I stay alert enough not to miss my stop, and to be mindful of what’s going on around me inside the vehicle. If I read, do crosswords, or start texting, it is very entertaining, but I tend to get too absorbed and lose track of where I am.
Before the Millennium Line was built, I took the #151 from Ranch Park in Coquitlam all the way downtown to Hornby & Nelson every day, a journey of approx 1.5 hours (on a good day — thank heavens for the Millennium Line!). This long journey time was GREAT for sleeping on the bus (and I needed it because I had to get up so darn early)! I got to know the twists and turns along the route so well that I learned to automatically wake up when we turned left from Hastings onto Burrard, where I knew there would be 5 minutes left to pry my eyes open, empty the fog out of my brain, and fix my hair, before the last stop. Occasionally I’d be so tired that the driver would have to wake me up and kick me off at the end, but they were always nice about it. :)
So in my hardcore commuter days, I used transit for sleep. Today, with my shorter rides to various places on varying days, I use transit to relax and take in all the interesting things the world around me has to offer.
I’m probably really antisocial or rude (probably both), but I’m generally trying to have as little contact with other people as possible. I stick my headphones in and my nose in a book so nobody else will talk to me. Horrible, but true.
;-) Good point about how where you’re sitting and how busy transit is dictates why you do what you do on transit. When I can’t find a seat I usually use my phone or just think. When I sit I can do all sorts of things (including work).
Reva: Another great point! Shorter and longer trips are really conducive to different types of activities. I long for those long trips sometimes so I can really get into the reading or writing I have to do. I wonder too about people age and how the activities people are taking transit to dictate what they do on transit and why.
Erin: You’re not the only one. Sometimes I see more ears with buds or headphones than without on transit. I used to listen to more music on transit than I used to. However, I always have some on me in case I need to drown out a conversation I don’t need to hear.
[…] at the results of this month’s poll, it’s not surprising that many of the motivations matched the actions. Wanting to relax, […]
[…] I thought it would be nice to have another Friday Fun Poll since the last one was in October when I asked the question, “What motivates how you spend most of you time on transit?” […]