When A Commute Becomes More About You And Not Your Kids

[selhars]

I think you missed the part about not wanting to go back into the traffic from "whence I came" (I-495). That was the whole point.

I got that. But you sort of mentioned it as a side bar to leaving PG for basic amenities so I thought you were linking it is some slight way to that discussion. BUt I TOTALLY get not wanting to get back into traffic. Just thinking about it I wish you had known there were closer Walmarts in MD than the one you went to.

Minimum wage workers with benefits and savings toward their children's college....

Most of the thread has offered schools and wages as the reason one might commute 3-1/2 hours one way from Hagerstown to DC.

Now that you yourself make the point that you can make minimum wage and live in Wash County --and therefore can't be used as a reason for the commute -- which you yourself say it too long -- you bring up the additional issue of saving for college?

This chat has been fun. Like The woman is welcome to her commute -- and justifies it however she does.
Regards...I'm done. (I think)

[Steelers10]

Originally Posted by selhars

I got that. But you sort of mentioned it as a side bar to leaving PG for basic amenities so I thought you were linking it is some slight way to that discussion. BUt I TOTALLY get not wanting to get back into traffic. Just thinking about it I wish you had known there were closer Walmarts in MD than the one you went to.


Most of the thread has offered schools and wages as the reason one might commute 3-1/2 hours one way from Hagerstown to DC.

Now that you yourself make the point that you can make minimum wage and live in Wash County --and therefore can't be used as a reason for the commute -- which you yourself say it too long -- you bring up the additional issue of saving for college?

This chat has been fun. Like The woman is welcome to her commute -- and justifies it however she does.
Regards...I'm done. (I think)

Yeah that definitely was not a good day on the GPS. Sometimes I think I know better. I just knew I wasn't getting back onto the beltway anytime soon that day. Accordingly, I have an aversion to US-1 everywhere from Connecticut to Key West.

Once again, I just come from the standpoint that I can't prescribe how this woman should be raising her kids. I'm a commuter as well (little over a half an hour each way -- not 3 1/2 flippin hours) but I could envision a scenario where I would NOT work minimum wage to be closer to home. It sucks to work a half an hour away from the kids in case of an emergency, but commutes are kinda life in the metro area unless you can afford to live in a close in walkable community where good paying jobs are located.

Likewise, good chat. Thanks for indulging me in conversation after I replied to this forum. It had been sitting dead for a few days but this woman must be found and punished for her idiocy! J/K

[EdwardA]

Originally Posted by ay jayy

At least anecdotally. I ride the metro every day, work downtown, go out in various areas around the region and I see diversity everywhere. You may see white and black, but there are a lot of shades in between. As far as economic diversity, you are likely correct.

How many of those commuters actually live in DC?

[EdwardA]

Originally Posted by EducatedBro82

Since she is so concerned for her child's education, Im guessing Hagerstown Schools are better than Fredrick Schools??? Hell, even Charles County Schools?? Her commute would be cut almost in half and no worry about the "diversity". Well depending on Charles County, she could do La Plata or Pomfret.

Evidently Charles County schools are on the dip. Two mothers in my office are fretting about their kids transitioning to middle school. They live in Waldorf. You're right about La Plata the top schools in the county are there.

[EdwardA]

Originally Posted by Steelers10

Of course I don't think moving into a room is her ONLY option. If you go back an read my first post, my first supposition was that if she absolutely had to live in Hagerstown, she could probably shave off 3 hours from her commute by taking the MARC down to Union Station. But once again, I could only get into possibilities because I don't know how reliable her car would be to drive down to Shepherdstown, WVa to pick up the train everyday. Of course it is POSSIBLE to get a job working close to home, but as myself and others have stated on these forums, once you get past maybe Germantown but definitely Frederick, job prospects are severely limited. In the two viable urban centers of Western Maryland (Hagerstown and Cumberland) there are very few high paying jobs. And when I say "high" I'm referring to a salary that allows you to live in the county in which you work.

Call ME crazy here, but has anyone noticed the trend that public sector employees in DC live in MoCo (for example), public sector employees in MoCo live in Frederick, those in Frederick live in Washington County, and those in Washington County live in West Virginia or Pennsylvania? Of course in the realm of possibilities it is possible. But I keep asking on this board, if others were to keep reading that PG County is more affordable than MoCo, Alexandria or Fairfax, but that tuition you have to pay for your kids' private schooling because the public schools are so bad nullifies the cost savings, would someone construe that all of the close in counties are unaffordable? If families have to go to over to Virginia for the most basic of amenities that aren't present in Southern PG or Charles County, isn't that an additional expense and waste of time?

I'm not seeing why her situation is so improbable as it is pretty well-known that metro Washington D.C. has the worst commutes in the country. This is even worse than L.A. traffic and I remember the stories of people from San Bernardino County getting up at 2:30 in the morning to beat the traffic and making it to work at 6:00 then sleeping for a couple of hours in their cars. There are people who sleep an hour on the MARC trains. Well somebody had to have the worst commute to make metro DC the worst commuting city in the country and apparently it's the woman in the OP's article.

Southern PG and Charles County have the amenities. The problem is we have a critical mass of a particular group of people that makes the schools pretty bad and crime relatively high. If this group moved to Fairfax en masse you'd see the same thing.

I think sometimes folks think a particular area is good or bad just because when it simply has to do with the people living there.

[EducatedBro82]

Originally Posted by EdwardA

Southern PG and Charles County have the amenities. The problem is we have a critical mass of a particular group of people that makes the schools pretty bad and crime relatively high. If this group moved to Fairfax en masse you'd see the same thing.

I think sometimes folks think a particular area is good or bad just because when it simply has to do with the people living there.

Couldn't agree with you more

[EducatedBro82]

Originally Posted by EdwardA

Evidently Charles County schools are on the dip. Two mothers in my office are fretting about their kids transitioning to middle school. They live in Waldorf. You're right about La Plata the top schools in the county are there.

Waldorf schools may be on the dip, but as a bedroom community, Charles County has more services than Washington County. And Middle Schools across the State are different. Middle School in Charles County is different than PG than Baltimore City than Wicomico County than Cecil County, etc.

[EdwardA]

Originally Posted by EducatedBro82

Waldorf schools may be on the dip, but as a bedroom community, Charles County has more services than Washington County. And Middle Schools across the State are different. Middle School in Charles County is different than PG than Baltimore City than Wicomico County than Cecil County, etc.

True enough. I've worked in Charles County for a few months and it is growing on me. Nice part of the state comparatively speaking.

[Steelers10]

Originally Posted by EdwardA

Southern PG and Charles County have the amenities. The problem is we have a critical mass of a particular group of people that makes the schools pretty bad and crime relatively high. If this group moved to Fairfax en masse you'd see the same thing.

I think sometimes folks think a particular area is good or bad just because when it simply has to do with the people living there.

Agreed. This is why I think both Democrats but especially Republicans (behind closed doors) are for welfare and subsidized housing. If these "entitlements" were to be cut, then the "particular group of people" of which you speak would not simply evaporate. Like water following the path of least resistance, this "particular group" would simply seek out those places where you could live if you could even manage to eek out minimum wage. That would be places like Washington County where housing costs are exceedingly low and such places are populated by a majority conservatives. One complaint I've heard out of Hagerstown are about people who pull up stakes from all points Maryland to live in the very inexpensive downtown to be within close proximity to their incarcerated significant other in the state prison off of Sharpsburg Pike.

Originally Posted by EducatedBro82

Waldorf schools may be on the dip, but as a bedroom community, Charles County has more services than Washington County. And Middle Schools across the State are different. Middle School in Charles County is different than PG than Baltimore City than Wicomico County than Cecil County, etc.

Charles County has more services than Washington County? I do not necessarily doubt you. A while back I started a thread about the future prospects of Charles County. Charles County has the 11th highest median family income in the country and has become wealthier as it has become more minority. It is actually disheartening to hear that its schools are actually declining in this process. It's counterintuitive to think that people with higher incomes either have less education or value it less for their children. I assumed that it was ranked 20th by Schooldigger.com (for whatever that's worth) because it started out as a rural, unpolished county but would actually improve when more educated people moved in.

Not cool that the quality of schools is declining. But out of curiosity, what are the services that Charles County has that Washington County does not? Or if it is just a matter of the same services, what does Charles County have more of? I would be interested to know because the counties were essentially identical in population as of the 2010 census.