In RI, we do distances in time; a day trip for us is 25 mins or more. A TX friend talks about 3-4 hour one-way trips is mind boggling. Not to mention city satellite towns described as 20/30/45 mi outside of it. This really what it’s like?

31 comments

  2. I imagine everyone understands time the same since we all have the same 24 hours to get where we need to go and do stuff.

    A 3 or 4 hour trip is a long drive. I would not be expecting to drive back from wherever I’m going, or if I am, it’s going to be a long day of driving.

  3. In Chicago many people have daily car commutes of more than an hour each way. I know people who take the train for more than two hours each way. A three or four hour one-way trip isn’t a commute but definitely could be a weekend getaway.

  4. Yes. We do in time and also give directions using weird landmarks. “You go 5 minutes north from the 4 way. Turn right at the smiths silo. We will be 10 min down the road. If you reached the railroad tracks you are too far. “
    South Dakota.

  5. I’m from Rhode Island and you’re right about the time thing, but I don’t consider a 25 minute drive to a be “day trip” lol. I worked 20 minutes from my house. I considered a day trip going to Boston which took like 90 minutes. I’d even go to New York for like a day, which was like 3 hours.

  6. > a day trip for us is 25 mins or more.

    I will never get tired of you motherfuckers packing a lunch when you have to go from Cranston to Charlestown. Last year I had to get something notarized at a gun shop in Coventry, and forgot a piece of paper I needed at my place in Westerly. When I told the guy I’d be back in 45 minutes he was legitimately shocked I was going to make such a trek.

  7. When we lived on the northwest side of Indianapolis it was a routine 2 hour trip to see my parents down near Cincinnati. Now that we retired down near Cincinnati it’s a routine 2 hour trip to visit my 94 year father in law on the northwest side of Indianapolis. A day trip is going to see my daughter in Iowa and is 7.5 to 8.5 hours depending on rest stops and restaurants. We made that round trip 5 times last year. A big trip is here to California and back, 6000 miles including side trips

  8. My preferred limit for a day trip is about 2 hours, any more then that and I would generally prefer to stay overnight if possible. Spending more than 4 hours getting there and getting back generally cuts into the time spent at the destination enough that I would rather not do it all in one day.

  9. Yes.

    3 hours is kind of long for a day trip, but I’ve definitely done it before. Many, many times.

    My town, a suburb of Grand Rapids, is about 25 minutes away from GR-proper.

    To visit my in laws we drive about 1.5 hours, or about 90 miles, each way. We usually stay for about 3 hours.

  10. >a day trip for us is 25 mins or more

    That’s a nice commute here. We don’t get into day trip territory until 2 hours.

  11. I’m in NJ, and time sometimes works, but it really isn’t practical for a lot of things.
    I’m fairly close to the NYC tunnels, so during rush hours, or on busy weekends, I might drive 45 minutes and only get 3-4 miles. (Same for riding on a bus or taxi/uber.)

    A 30 minute ride (with low/average congestion) is pretty normal to work or to see friends.
    My wife and I would take “day trips” to Albany NY, Lancaster PA, Cape May, NJ or Baltimore MD – each close to 2-3 hours (150-200 miles) driving each way.

    I don’t go often, but my Dad has a house about 450 miles away/8 hours travel time.

    I guess if someone asked me about distance, I’d give them both an approximate mileage and a “highway driving” time.

  14. I understand distances by travel length and time. 10 miles into Manhattan is a lot different then 10 miles into Long Island. And a hour driving east would get me a lot farther then an hour drive into Brooklyn or Manhattan.

  15. 25 mins wouldn’t even get you from Downtown Oklahoma City to the city limits even with no traffic. A day trip would be anything further than about 90 minutes away, otherwise it’s just normal shopping

  17. Lol so I had to check, but RI is around 1200 square miles. My county in Florida is over 1500 square miles. Anything more than a 30 minute drive and I’m outside of my county. So it’s all perspective.

    I have family in Alabama and they make it sound as if everything is really close and not a huge deal to drive to. I’ve looked at actual distance and their grocery store is about 6 miles away. Now when they stay with me and the grocery store is about a mile away and I suggest going somewhere a bit farther they make it sound as if it’s too far to drive. However it’s less than 6 miles, which to them at home isn’t far.

  20. I understand it in time, but anything under say 45 minutes I wouldn’t consider especially far. Plenty of people have commutes that long normally.

    When I was going to the office everyday it was a 20 to 25 minute drive, which I always considered pretty short.

  21. I used to have to drive a half hour (rural Ohio) just to get to a decent grocery store, and an hour to a real city. Now I live in the city and I have probably a half dozen or more places to buy groceries within 15 min. So I’m less patient than I used to be about distances. I used to make that hour drove twice sometimes. Now I’m gonna be real annoyed if I have to do that, I rarely go more than 30 min away.

    It just depends on a person’s proximity to things. This is a huge country and the experience is going to be vastly different depending exactly where a person lives, and whether or not they drive.

  22. I prefer to know the distance in actual units of distance, not units of time. Let me figure out what my driving speed is. The formula is Distance = Velocity x Time. When you give me the “distance” in time units you are doing this: Distance / (the speed the person answering prefers to drive) = The time it takes the answering person to go that distance. To answer that way is to dictate to to person asking how fast they should be traveling. It’s really pretty rude and arrogant. It also means the person isn’t bothering to read the road signs (which is actually scary!) or their odometer (if you are figuring gas mileage this is pretty important). When I get this kind of answer I then ask them “OK, and at WHAT speed are you figuring that at?”. I listen to that answer if they are able to give it and actually do the math in my head and reply back “Oh! The DISTANCE (and I do actually emphasize that word!) is X miles. Thank you.”.

  23. Personally I’m not driving more than 15 minutes to go anywhere unless it’s to the airport, or if someone is paying me.

  24. I used to live in Cape Cod when I was growing up. Usually most places I would go were within 15-30 minutes drive.

    The farthest I would go regularly was the 1 hour trip to Boston. That’s still in the realm of daytrip distance to me.

    Now that I live in Maine, my work is 45 minutes away. My in laws are 3 hours away. The nearest big city (Portland) is 2 hours away. I can still mostly live my life within the city that I’m in, so most things are within 15-30 minutes away. We’re not rural or anything. But if I wanted to daytrip to the city or to the beach, a 1-2 hour drive to get there is pretty normal for me now.

  25. For me a day trip could be *up to* 3-4 hours (with traffic) each way. IE Death Valley, Joshua Tree, Palm Springs, San Diego, and Santa Barbara are all “day trips” for me. But 2 hours in traffic could also get me, say, to Malibu on a busy day, which is only 30 mi away. So I understand distances with their relation to traffic, for the most part.

  26. I drove 6 hours to get an autograph from Slyvester McCoy and then drove 6 hours back home.

  28. I measure distances in time as well.

    Generally speaking, the kinds of trips that aren’t “a lot of driving”:

    (one-way)

    – 1hr – after work.

    – <3.5hrs – day trip.

    – <6hrs – overnight trip.

    – <8hrs – weekend trip.

    I make trips longer than that pretty frequently, but that’s the point where I go “it’s a lot of driving, but it’s a special thing so it’s worth it”. I wouldn’t go visit a buddy that lives 2hrs away after work just to hang out for the evening or because I’m kind of bored, it’s too far. I would go see a concert for a band I like, though.

  29. It’s not the distance it’s the traffic. Anything under 500 miles is a joy ride to me, but I will go to great lengths to be sure I get through places like Los Angeles and San Francisco sometime between midnight and 4am.

  30. Probably consider a day trip between 3 and 6 total hours of driving. I live in the Albany, NY area and there’s somewhere fun or refreshing to be within 3 hours in any direction.

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