Commuting (or how I started worrying about my life)
For those of you who don’t know, I live in Bristol, with Ruth. However, I’ve recently started a PhD. The problem is that this is with University College London, and is based in Ipswich. That’s the other side of the country and, according to Multimap, is 220miles and would take just over 4hrs to drive. If I was to get the train all the way, it’d take 5.5hrs, and involve 4 changes. A more sensible journey would be a 25min bus ride, a 4hr train journey, and a 15 min bus ride.
So, it’s obviously insane to commute. Yet that’s what I’m doing. I’m not doing it daily (fortunately), as I’ve found a bed and breakfast. However, that costs £25/night. It’s about 5 miles away, and took me just under 1 3/4 hrs to walk. An alternative is to bus (15 mins + 30 min walk), or to drive (10 mins, but with the associated costs of getting my car on the road - £1000 by the time you’ve considered insurance, MOT and a service).
Any cunning suggestions from the public would be most appreciated. I’m trying to work in Adastral Park / BT in Martlesham…
October 20th, 2005 at 9:30 pm
Suggestions, suggestions…
Have you considered a bicycle? If my hazy knowledge of Geography is correct, Ipswich is reasonably flat and so it shouldn’t be too hard to cycle. It would also (depending on your cardiovascular fitness and leg muscles) shave at least an hour from the time it takes to walk. If you ask the landlord/landlady of the B&B nicely, they might look after the bike for you while you aren’t there as you are a regular customer.
I can sympathise with the pain of the commute, since I’m currently spending about three hours a day either on or attempting to catch some form of train. The London Underground is decidedly gross.
October 20th, 2005 at 10:56 pm
1) Do the PhD in Bristol
Probably a bit late now that you’ve started already, but I’m sure there are possibilities here.
2) Move to Ipswich and spend all your free time in Bristol
I’ll probably be hated for this suggestion, but this way you are only renting one place and you still get to spend the same amount of time with Ruth.
October 21st, 2005 at 8:23 am
Adam: A bike. Yup. It’d be a good solution as the UCL building has a (relatively) secure bike shed where I could leave my bike permenantly. The downside is the one-off hassle of getting my bike up here, as I’d need to travel through London off-peak, and avoid the tube / cycle from Waterloo to Liverpool Street (not too far). I will probably do that next time I buy my train tickets to Ipswich.
Bill: Yeah. I need to be with UCL to be associated with my supervisor. Bristol aren’t doing any work in my area, and their eye-tracking research is a bit stale. Lots of universities are all researching the same thing - my work at UCL might be a step change, but it’s at least off to one side.
Move to Ipswich. Yes, now I didn’t post all the complicated thoughts about this. Here’s a summary:
Rent: £300/mo
Buy: 1 bed flat = £60,000, 2 bed mid-terrace houses are ~ £80-100k. This means that I could get a mortgage with monthly repayments as low as £200 (but only paying off the interest).
The problem is that I’ve got a 12 month rent in Bristol, and don’t really want to rent in two places at once. Whilst the B&B = £25/night, plus £1.50 bus plus £3 lunch (~£30/day), I’m hoping I don’t have to do that very often. Basically, if I spend more than two weeks / month in Ipswich, it’s more expensive than renting… but it is very convenient in that there’s no need to pay if I’m not here.
From July, when Ruth and I are free to move from Bristol, we’ll look at being near Ipswich, or even in London (as it’d be possible to move my work to UCL’s main London campus).
Oh what fun.