Denver Light Rail

The new train lines opened in Denver on November 19th, and apparently they are a huge hit! I've been watching and waiting for this project's completion for years, so it was a momentous day when I first tried it.

Since the pedestrian bridge to the lightrail platform near my office won't be done until spring, I have to drive the 1 mile, and leave my car in the public lot. Then I ride the train for about 9 miles, and catch a connecting bus for the remaining 5 or so. Start to finish it takes me about 50 minutes, and I happily read my book instead of worrying about the jerkheads on the road. Honestly it's taken me a while to get comfortable with leaving my car in a public place overnight, and not having the car at my disposal for 15 hours, but it's getting more routine now.

In the last 4 weeks I've put about 200 miles on my car. I've had two occasions to ride the train all the way downtown, have some fun, and walk home. There was only once that the train had standing room only, and I looked up from my book to a bunch of Avalanche jerseys. I was so happy to see that all the sports fans are using the train!

I've noticed some nice things about public transportation since my experiment started. Amazingly, everyone is NICE on the commute. Everyone thanks the bus driver, everyone shares a seat. I had a funny surprise one morning as a train was pulling into the platform -- one of my co-workers whooshed by in the window! I gave him a lift that last mile to the office, and we rode home together too. What a nice sense of community.

Of course I haven't mentioned that I'm saving wear and tear on my car, saving gas money, saving pollution. Mostly I'm excited about preserving mental health, and it seems to be working nicely!