van pool

Several years ago I started carpooling when a neighbor invited me to join an existing carpool. Because all three of us lived in the same small community, it was very easy and convenient to share a ride. After riding for two months, I left the company that I worked for to pursue other opportunities in another state.

When I returned to that same company, I had forgotten about that first carpool. But after I bumped into the same person later in the building where I work, we decided to start carpooling again - just the two of us. This time I was motivated more by the price of gas and the rising cost of my auto maintenance bills. After I had commuted to work alone for over a year, it was getting boring, even though I listened to all kinds of music, occasional audio books, or language-learning lessons. I thought I’d miss these if I started riding with someone else, but I was willing to give it up to save money on gas. Because I was an early-morning person, finding a parking spot at my building at work wasn’t a problem. But it crossed my mind that I might have to walk further each day if I arrived at work later! Another motivating factor: I had worked for the Saudi Arabian national oil company for a couple of years. Seeing money flow freely from the U.S. to the Middle East due to our oil dependency just seemed so unnecessary. I had seen first-hand the amazing wealth it was creating, so I thought I could do my small part by joining a carpool and maybe one day helping others do it too.

Once we started carpooling, we found others interested in joining us who had carpooled previously. Through word of mouth, we found a few more people each month. Initially, some rode only a few times each week, while the rest of us faithfully rode to and from work every day.

An early concern we each had was how to run errands during the week at lunch when we each drove only about one day a week. This required a bit of advance planning because we had to condense everything into a single day. But within a month after deciding to alternate driving, we had a good working system. Anyone having to stay late or go in early simply didn’t carpool. Anyone needing to drive on a certain day to service her or his car or to see the doctor simply volunteered to be the designated driver. To be fair, we devised a simple spreadsheet to record drivers and riders each day and week. Each day on the way home we’d talk and determine who wasn’t riding and who would drive the next day. After a couple of months of alternating drivers during the week, I was driving only once a week. So, instead of spending $65 per week on gas, I was now paying only $65 per month. My only challenge was convincing my wife to get up 30 minutes earlier to take our kids to school, which used to be my daily duty and privilege.

From the very start we considered getting a Triangle Transit Authority (TTA) van because that would mean even less car maintenance for each driver. Many months later, we had more people than would fit into a single vehicle. As the number of people increased, it became harder to balance and maintain fair driving arrangements. But as it turned out, that was actually a nice problem to have. Once we reached six regular carpoolers, we figured it should be pretty simple to find more riders. We had all seen the benefits of ride-sharing, so it seemed obvious that others would jump at the chance to save money on gas. Because TTA paid for all gas and maintenance, we need only to find enough riders to fill a 12-passenger van. The more who joined, the lower our individual cost. We posted flyers in break rooms at work to get the word out about our vanpool and asked those we knew who lived along our route if they’d like to join. At that point a fellow carpooler showed me how to create a list of company employees who lived nearby by using a utility to locate people by town name. Using this, I could find potential riders who lived as far from work as I did who might want to join us. As a result of our efforts, we now have nine people in our vanpool, and we thought this article might entice others to start their own carpools.

Some of the real benefits I have seen can be understood from something that happened to me early on. After entering my car one rainy afternoon, I found I couldn’t start my car. I didn’t have a cell phone, but my fellow carpooler did, so he called security at work. Literally, within minutes, security arrived and jump-started my car so that we could pick up other riders at other buildings at work. Not only did I find a new friend to help me in a time of need, I never knew that security could do such things. Now that we have our preferred vanpool parking spot at our building, I never worry about my car not starting. I also have plenty of new friends on whom I know I can count when I need them. My 30-45 minute commute now goes by so quickly every day as we talk about each other's life experiences and learn all kinds of things in general. I think one of the best lessons I’ve learned is how kind and considerate people are at work, which is not something I can say about other places I’ve worked. Instead of being totally immersed in my current project and the technical abilities of those I work with, from our rides together to and from work I’ve learned that people have lived though and survived personal experiences similar to mine. I feel like I learn something new every ride, so that’s pretty good too. After seven months of ride-sharing, I now miss the days that I don’t vanpool.