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In the bustling city of Toronto, like many other major cities around the world, the daily commute is an accepted part of working life, especially for those living in the suburbs. However, this seemingly mundane aspect of the workday carries a significant, often overlooked cost – the time cost. As an office worker who commutes from the suburbs into Toronto every day, I have firsthand experience of how this routine can extract a heavy toll on one’s personal life, health, and overall well-being.
The Time Cost: More Than Just Hours on the Clock
The Physical and Emotional Toll
The Ripple Effect on Personal Life
The Time Cost of Commuting Broken Down
The Time Cost: More Than Just Hours on the Clock
The most apparent cost of commuting is time. For many, the daily journey to and from work can consume several hours. This is time that could be spent with family, pursuing hobbies, or simply recovering from a long, exhausting work day. Instead, it is spent navigating traffic or crowded public transport. The hours lost in transit are hours subtracted from the finite bank of time we have to live our lives. As a commuter, I often find myself calculating the time spent on the road, equating it to the time I could have spent reading my child a bedtime story, attending a family dinner, working out (because we spend too much time sitting), or just doing something more valuable with my time.
The Physical and Emotional Toll
The impact of commuting extends beyond the loss of time. It’s physically and emotionally exhausting. Long hours of sitting in a car or on a train contribute to a sedentary lifestyle, which is linked to various health issues like obesity, heart disease, and diabetes. The stress of dealing with traffic congestion or delays in public transport adds to the mental burden. Commuters arrive to work exhausted and energy-drained even before they walk through the office door. This daily grind leads to increased levels of cortisol, the stress hormone, which can have long-term effects on health.
The Journey to Burnout
The cumulative effect of this daily stress and time loss can lead to burnout – a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion caused by excessive and prolonged stress. Burnout affects one’s productivity and energy levels, leaving a feeling of helplessness, disillusionment, and resentment. As a commuter, the constant rush to beat the traffic, the frustration of unexpected delays, and the sheer monotony of the journey can feel like a never-ending battle, contributing to this sense of burnout.
The Ripple Effect on Personal Life
The consequences of this burnout ripple through all aspects of life. Relationships can suffer as stress and exhaustion spill over into family time. The desire to engage in social activities diminishes, leading to isolation and a feeling of disconnection. For parents, the guilt of not being present enough for their children adds emotional weight. Daycare teachers frequently need to have difficult conversations with exhausted parents about the long hours their toddlers spend in daycare and inquire if there is any way that their child could be picked up any earlier because the day is just too long for a little one. Then there is the need to designate an emergency contact for when the highway gets shut down because of an accident or the GO trains get canceled and it could be many hours before they are running again. Who is going to pick up your child from care when our broken infrastructure fails you? Family and Children’s Services? The time spent commuting is time not spent building memories, supporting them with their homework, or simply being there for the important moments.
The Time Cost of Commuting Broken Down
Let me share with you my own experience with the time it takes to commute into Toronto. I was consulting at a government commission in Toronto before the pandemic. This was my schedule:
Time to Commute to Toronto
| 5:55 am | Leave home, drive to GO Train, park at GO station, walk to platform |
| 6:18 am | Depart for Union Station, Toronto. |
| 7:00 am | Arrive at Union Station, walk through Union Station to TTC subway platform |
| 7:30 am | Take subway, arrive at office |
| 95 Minutes | Total Time to Commute to Work |
Time to Commute from Toronto
| 3:30 pm | Leave Office, walk to TTC, take subway to Union Station, go to GO Train platform |
| 4:10 pm | Depart Union Station on GO Train |
| 4:57 pm | Arrive at home station; large crowds walk to parking structure |
| 5:10 pm | Slowly move through crowded station parking lot to city street |
| 5:25 pm | Drive home |
| 115 Minutes | Total Time to Commute from Work |
Total commute time per day: 210 minutes (or three hours, thirty minutes).
In Toronto, office workers whether for the government or corporations generally work around 7.25 hours per day (7 to 8 hours a day). This means that the commute time is equal to half a day. This assumes there were no problems on any of the routes or on public transportation, which is very often not the case. There are frequent accidents on GTA’s congested highways and streets, not to mention delays and problems with buses and GO trains.
The Search for Solutions
In response to these challenges, many are seeking alternatives. Many Canadians are learning how easy it is to work for American companies, either on a permanent or a contract basis, remotely while living in Canada. You don’t have to move to the United States anymore to work for an American company. This is a great arrangement for American companies because they can access the best talent in Canada while paying Canadians less than what they would need to pay an American resident (but still pay more than what Canadians get paid in Canada) and pay the Canadian person in Canadian dollars. No private American health care benefit costs to cover either. Besides, Canadian companies, like banks and technology firms, have been outsourcing Canadian work to countries like India for years; turnabout is fair play.
Flexible work arrangements, such as remote or hybrid work, aren’t just very popular; they have become an absolute necessity, especially as our transportation infrastructure continues to fail to meet the demands of Canada’s increasing population. A commute into Toronto that used to take 45 minutes 20 years ago now easily takes double that. Even GO train service has deteriorated since the pandemic. Before the pandemic, the East Lakeshore GO train line used to have an express train that ran every 20 minutes during rush hours that could get you into Union Station in about 40 minutes; now it takes an hour. That’s 20 minutes one way, or 40 extra minutes out of your day.
Price of Commuting: The Daily Journey into Toronto
Employers are increasingly recognizing the benefits of these arrangements in terms of employee well-being and productivity. Unfortunately, employers who own their office buildings or are stuck in long-term office leases are reluctant to provide hybrid or remote work. They see expensive space being unused and need to justify this expense to investors and senior management. Further, many large corporations and businesses are under pressure from local governments to push workers back into the city to help address decades of municipal overspending and city debt. However, when the time comes to renew the office lease, the business will quickly calculate the large savings that will flow to the bottom line by giving up office space and the increased productivity of their people, remote and hybrid work will be embraced.
Ultimately, the solution may simply be to change positions, companies, organizations, and even professions. Some types of jobs require you to be in the big city, and you need to take a hard, long-term look at the time cost and the financial cost that taking such a position demands. Almost always, the conclusion is that it is just not worth it. Canadians are taxed too high and paid too low. When you take a hard look at the long-term time cost and the financial cost, it may just not be worth it. You may need to start building a plan to get you out of commuting.
Conclusion
The daily commute, a seemingly mundane aspect of working life, carries a significant hidden cost. Real difficulties that commuters face include lost time, the physical and emotional toll, and the path to burnout. As we navigate these challenges, it’s crucial to seek solutions that not only alleviate the burden of commuting but also enhance our overall quality of life. After all, time is our most precious resource, and how we spend it profoundly impacts our health, happiness, and well-being.
