Next month I’ll celebrate my one year anniversary at my job — and my carpool will have saved me $6,800. To figure that out, I used the calculator at Carpool Match Northwest, which is also where I found my congenial carpool (six of us now) in the first place.
My situation is actually both better and worse than it sounds. I live in Portland, Oregon and work in Salem, which is a 100 mile round trip. I love my job, but even I think a 100 mile commute is over the top. So before I accepted the job offer, I negotiated to telework (work at or near home) two days a week. Teleworking two days a week in addition to carpooling makes my job much more sustainable, both environmentally and psychologically. I’m often exhausted on the nights I get home from Salem, even when I wasn’t the driver, whereas the nights after I’ve teleworked I feel better and have more energy to offer the world (particularly my husband).
If, like many people not lucky enough to telework, I had to commute to Salem all five days a week, my carpool would be saving me much more than $6,800 per year. But the people who are really saving money and carbon emissions are the people who live close to where they work. That situation, also known as the trip not taken, is the one with long-term sustainability, given that our nation needs to slash our carbon emissions by 60-80%. So my situation is worse than it sounds in that I’m ’spending’ an awful lot of money and carbon emissions in order to then ’save’ $6,800 a year, and lots of carbon emissions, by carpooling with five other people.
But my situation is also better than it sounds because I heart my carpool. Each of us has a varying schedule and is in the carpool an average of two or three days a week, so we have a constantly changing mosaic of conversation topics and news updates. At this point, I’d be doing the six hours of driving each week with them even if it didn’t save me a dime. They are funny, smart, interesting people who are great to hang out with. I played an April Fools prank on them that they took with good grace. That was when I really knew we had a good relationship.
Still, like all relationships, it takes some work. We’re currently having a quiet, low-key controversy over whether to include a seventh person on the numerous days we have an empty seat in the car. I want to include the additional person, four others are willing, but John (who I like very much) is uncomfortable with it. Like many things in life, I don’t know what the best answer here is . . . . it will have to present itself over time.
Next week I’ll write my Top Ten Tips For A Successful Carpool. Everyone deserves to save money, save emissions and have fun like I am lucky enough to do 
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