Where to ride out a gas crisis

CNN named 10 places in America to "ride out a gas crisis"
http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/moneymag/0807/gallery.bplive_gas_crunch.moneymag/index.html.

Four of them are small towns, and the average commute is 8-10 minutes in Marquette, Mich.; Hays, Kan.; Laramie, Wyo.; and Aberdeen, S.D. I'm not sure where people work in these small towns, except as close as the local quick-stop, school or post office.

In three places, 11-12 percent of people tele-commute from home -- Naples, Fla., Bainbridge Island, Wash., and Westport, Conn. Commuters there live in a beautiful place and are too remote, too educated and too wealthy to drive to work daily.

In a university town, State College, Penn., 42 percent bike or walk to work. That's cool. It's part of the culture. Biking and walking are the high-status ways to get around. Footpower is friendlier than car-power. Being a university town, it's also fashionable to live frugally, with fewer cars.

Outside of New York City in Hoboken, N.J., a majority of commuters take advantage of one of the nation's finest public transit systems to get to work. Only 25 percent of commuters drive alone to work in Hoboken. I'd take the bus, too, if it ran every 15 minutes, within a stone's throw of my house.

My favorite place is the Santa Paula, Call, where 29 percent of commuters carpool to work. Want to know why? They're migrant workers in the Citrus Capital of the World. The farm workers share vehicles to commute to the orange, lemon, avocado and strawberry fields.

The message here? The most devoted carpoolers in America are migrant workers. It explains why carpooling is such a tough sell, especially if you can afford the luxury of your own car. We aspire to do what the wealthy in our society do, not the poorest.

Finding a carpool partner is a bit like a dating service

While speaking about the dozen people with whom I've carpooled in the past three years -- the good, the great, the too loud, the too late and the long-winded -- someone in the audience said, "Finding a carpool sounds like a dating service."

He nailed it. That's why carpooling is so tricky. Our cars are personal spaces, and our commutes are potentially long.

In a two-person carpool, compatibility is a MUST, not an option. For carpools with three or more, even the most odious, loud-mouthed person can hopefully be diluted by the other people in the carpool.

Most carpools have two people for maximum simplicity and flexibility. So your match must meet three standards:

1. You must work near each other. Otherwise, you will waste a lot of time driving. You DON'T have to live near each other, just on the way to work or near a meeting place.

2. You must work the same hours -- or be willing to compromise on the days you carpool. The compromise must be made FREELY, or else it will not work out for long. One person will start resenting it.

3. You must be compatible -- especially in a two-person carpool. Then the carpool will be enjoyable. You'll be willing to do small favors for each other and will look forward to your time together. Even if that time is spent in silence. Talking machines can be very annoying.

I am not able to drive to work with people who have loud voices, talk too much, have not mastered the art of listening, or are unreliable or uncommunicative. We don't have to agree on everything. I can stand carpooling with Republicans -- as long as they listen to my perspective, too. Or maybe we avoid the topic of politics altogether.

My carpool partners and I are not dating or getting married, but we sort of are -- because we do drive together plenty. It's just that the destination is work and not a date.