Commute from Cottage Grove/Woodbury to Minnatonka

[wtfci]

I have a friend that has this same commute, but from Inver Grove Heights. It's 45 minutes at best. It's 90 minutes if there is traffic. It's 120 minutes if there is snow.

The only relief from this is to start earlier than 8AM or later than that.

You can just do simple arithmetic to determine the cost of time for the commute. So you are paid for the time you arrive at work and when you leave, but commuting to the job is time worked that you are not compensated for.

Yearly salary divided by (52*(5*(commute time + required time at work[9 hours]))) = average hourly wage.
$50,000 divided by (52*(5*(2 hours commuting + 9 hours work))) = $17.48 per hour.

[Min-Chi-Cbus]

Agreed with others here. I worked in "Minnetonka" (aka UnitedHealth Group) and lived near Southdale Mall and was literally 5 miles from my work (I knew that for auto insurance purposes) and it usually took me 20-30 minutes to get home from work during rush hour, from May through January (busiest time of year because the Snow Birds and college students are in town). In off-peak times that drive takes less than 10 minutes.

I don't know what your situation is but if you're moving from another state or city PLEASE consider living closer to your job, for your own sake as well as the sake of others on the freeway! Nobody can tell you what to do or where to live but this would be my personal suggestion if you were to ask me.

[ocsid]

Agreed. For ten years I had a 20 mile commute. At the best of times, it was 45 minutes. The very worst, with snow, it was over two hours. We finally got fed up and moved 5 miles from both of our jobs. We probably overpaid for our house, but being able to save 200 hours a year between us spent in the car - you can't put a price on that.

[Kayekaye]

Yup can be up to two hours with snow. My route was a bit different and not as long but ended in the same place. Would not do that again for anything.

[davephan]

A commute from Cottage Grove/Woodbury to Minnatonka is going to take at least an hour each way during rush hour. There really isn't a good route. I think I-494 would be much better than I-94. When the Wakota bridge in the southeast corner of the 100 mile freeway loop was completed, that bottleneck went away. Before the new bridge was completed, the bumper to bumper line was about 3 - 5 miles going west in the morning and 5 - 7 miles going east in the afternoon during rush hours. Traffic on 494 still bogs down west of the MSP airport and in the western suburbs during rush hours, both directions. The west metro population density and traffic density is higher than the east metro.

If the commute was started at 5 AM and return at 3 PM, it wouldn't be too bad.

If the job is going to last for years, it would probably be worth it to move to the west metro, unless there are things, such as other family that all live in the east metro.

Dave

[dmbeautifulbabies]

Thanks so much everyone. I wanted to update for others that may have a similar question. Hopefully I am not speaking too soon but he did take the job and the commute has been acceptable. He generally takes 94 there and 494 home. The drive in has been between 37-42 minutes and the drive home is generally close to 45 minutes, sometimes a few minutes longer. It always is worse in the afternoon. He hasn't had any bad weather yet, so hopefully that won't be too often. One thing we hadn't considered is that his door to door time is shorter because he works for a small company. He arrives at work and generally parks 10 feet from the door and walk into his office. Prior to this, he has always worked for large corporations that tend to have huge parking lots with "decorative" entrances and large turn around circles so he had to park quite a distance away and then navigate the building for quite awhile. It sounds silly but it was always something that annoyed him, especially when it's cold or rainy. His commute time is shorter than our friends that go into downtown Minneapolis, either by bus or car when you factor everything in, so I guess it works for him. It would drive me crazy but thankfully, he enjoys driving much more than I do.

Overall, we tend to prefer to live somewhere we love, and have him work where he has to, though I can see how living closer to work has it's advantages. We have three school aged kids so moving isn't an option. He hopes to stay put at this job for quite awhile but you never know. He used to work very near where he works now about 13 years ago and he said the commute is significantly better than it used to be. Obviously the improvements to 494 and Hwy 61 have helped, and I believe he said 169 has also been improved.

[Pisces69]

I commute from Hudson to Wayzata. Only 45 minutes. No big deal.