Driving to work in houston (Center: apartment, renting, employment)

[STARRWOODEN]

Could anyone tell me if driving to work while living in Houston will be brutal. Are there any trains that will take you to work instead of driving. Is Texas a place that a car is essential and need to be driven all the time. Please let me know. I come from the City of Chicago and we have the greatest transportaton if you do not want to drive.

[rbchamps2]

I'm from Boston, a car is a must in Houston, unless you live close enough to your work to walk.

[jfre81]

Depends on where you live and work.

No train unless you live and work along the light rail line, but there's the chance you might be able to do that. You are probably still going to want a car. The LRT connects two major employment hubs, downtown and the Texas Medical Center.

[City Love]

Car is a must. Public transportation here sucks.

[DrLizardo]

Houston is much bigger than Chicago and that makes any kind of public transportation an expensive challenge. The city itself is more than 600 square miles (we could fit three Chicagos inside Houston) with more than 500 miles of freeway inside the city. The metropolitan area is much larger. And with all that the average commute time is still less than half an hour (according to an NPR special report this morning), but just about everybody makes the commute in a car.

Some of us have brutal commutes, and others have it much easier. It all depends on where you work and where you live, so if you know what part of town you will be working in you can get some more specific advice and information.

[Oskar_Z28]

It all depends on where you live WRT work. I live close to my work and my commute is about 10 mins.

When I originally moved to Houston I made an error of living away from my work and my commute was about 45 mins. Luckily I was renting an apartment and 6 months later I moved.

Oh, and as others pointed out - car is a must here, unless you have too much time on your hands to take a bus.

[EasilyAmused]

yeah, live as close to work as you can. It will make life much better.

[Mayor_McCheese]

I agree. A car is a must. Unless you want to pay $7 a day to take the bus back and forth downtown. The light rain is pretty much useless as it really doesn't go far beyond downtown.

And yes, driving to work can be very brutal unless you're an early riser.

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by Mayor_McCheese

The light rain is pretty much useless as it really doesn't go far beyond downtown.

There are places to live along it however. She doesn't have to live in the burbs. Light rail and local bus fare is still under $3 roundtrip.

In fact, living in the burbs is not advisable if limiting time in the car is a priority.

[texas7]

Depends on where you plan to live and where your employer is. Some commutes can be brutal but others not so bad.........location, location.