Makes My Yuppie Heart Go Pitter-Pat

Two awesome things worth blogging about: things to make the commute easier, and waste reduction.

After a few months of experimenting, Yelena & I have reduced the size of our trash can and increased the size of our recycling bin.  San Francisco is awesome because you only pay for the trash bin; recycling and composting are free.  So now we've cut our monthly waste bill in half by moving to a smaller trash bin.  (They actually took the old trash bin and put a plastic insert inside it, so we can only use 20 gallons instead of the full 32.)

Ever wonder what happens to the compost bins?  Apparently San Francisco sells its compost to wineries in Napa.  In fact, we're not even meeting demand and grape farmers are begging us for more.  So when I enjoy that fine Napa wine, it may have been fertilized with my own compost.  If that's not enough to encourage yuppies to compost, I don't know what is.

What's so great about being a commuter in the Bay Area?  Two new things: Translink, and My 511.

511.org has been around for a while.  It will help you figure out the best public transit route from Point A to Point B, it gives you traffic reports, and will even help you plot out a good bike route.  If you call 511, it will give you traffic reports over your cell phone which is great when you need to figure out whether to take 101 or 280.  But their newest feature brings the service to whole new levels of awesomeness: My 511.

When you register, you can put in custom routes.  I have three: "Home to Work" and "Work to Home" for public transit, and "Home to Family" for driving to my mother's house.  When I leave the house in the morning and want to know whether I have to run to catch the train, I call 511 and it automatically recognizes my cell phone.  All I have to say is "Home to work" and it tells me when the next L-Taraval train will be at my stop.  Same thing in reverse on the way home.  And when I hop in the car to visit my mother, all I have to say is "Home to family" and it tells me whether the Bay Bridge is backed up (or open at all--you never know).

But the coolest thing about being a Bay Area commuter is Translink.  I've been watching this product go through development since I was in law school.  It's a single card with an RFID that works on Muni, Bart, AC Transit, Golden Gate Transit, and now Caltrain.  Eventually it's going to work at every single public transit agency in the Bay Area.  It carries a cash charge so all I have to do is hop on Muni and swipe the card.  When I run out, it automatically recharges itself from my credit card.  I can also load on monthly passes.  And if I lose it, I can go to the website and have them send me a new card.  No more tokens, no more standing in line at the Bart machine during rush hour, no more "I'm sorry sir we just raised the prices and your old tokens don't work any more," no more "oh shit I forgot to bring $2."  I don't even have to take it out of my wallet.  You can get it at Walgreen's.  It's very, very cool.

Commuting is still a pain in the ass, but with these tools it suddenly got a lot better.  I love the Bay Area.

J<