Commuting Part 2

In the past I’ve been highly critical of suburban living generally and the commuting it requires specifically.  While I still believe that suburbia is an ecological catastrophe, I’m quickly approaching my own moment of truth in which principle meets practice.  Unfortunately, that moment is looking more and more like it’s going to be a no win situation. 

 

The situation that I’m talking about is mine and Laura’s newly acquired status as college graduates.  Laura recently got a job in American Fork (about a twenty minute drive to the north) and we no longer have any reason to live next to BYU campus.  Because I still don’t have a job, the logical thing for us to do would be to move to American Fork so that Laura could bike or walk to work.  Such an act would be in keeping with my earlier statements about the environment and the need to eliminate commuting from American culture.  In other words, it would be the ethical choice because it would avoid causing unnecessary damage to the environment.  

 

The problem is that American Fork is a really undesirable place for a young couple to live.  Generally speaking, there’s nothing to do there.  There are a few bottom-of-the-barrel chain restaurants and a movie theater that plays the most mainstream of films, but as far as I know there’s nothing that caters to a diversity of interests (with the very notable exception of the Chocolatier Blue).  The surrounding communities (Lehi, Cedar Hills, Highland, Apline, etc.) are more of the same, only worse.  Obviously these communities cater to a specific group of people, but they hold absolutely no appeal for me.  What’s more, rents are actually higher in these areas than Laura and I currently pay (and apartments are smaller), so we couldn’t really afford to live there if we wanted to.  These factors have combined to create a situation where the choice I see as most ethical also means months of insufferable ennui.  

 

So we’re faced with a few options.  We can live in American Fork or the surrounding communities.  Laura wouldn’t have to commute (which I’m sure would be nice for her) and I wouldn’t feel like a hypocrite for condemning something that I’m overtly complicit in.  However, we also wouldn’t have many (or any) friends and we’d have to drive a considerable distance to do any of the things we enjoy.  We’d also be paying more in rent, which would obviously be difficult.  On the other hand, we could stay where we are and continue to have easy access to many of the things we love.  Still, that’s hardly the behavior I’ve argued for in previous blogs.  

 

I draw several conclusions from this scenario.  First, that people often have to make hard and unpleasant choices when it comes to where they live.  Unfortunately, environmental factors rarely take precedence (or even show up on people’s radar) when they weigh the pros and cons of a particular living arrangement.  For me, I do weigh environmental factors against things like social life, but I’m not sure which is more important.  I’d like to say that I’d sacrifice all my friendships and hobbies for something that I believe is ethically right; I’m just not sure that I will.  For other people it might be schools or big houses, and while I don’t think those reasons are any good, I recognize that to some people they're much better than my own.   

 

Second, I conclude that many modern communities are not set up to provide for all the needs of their members.  American Fork definitely isn’t.  (Provo might not be either, but it does a better job than a lot places.)  In turn, people have to drive considerable distances if they want to do anything outside the home.  This seems like the bigger problem to me.  People are constantly forced to choose between schools, social life, etc. and how much time they spend in the car.  If housing choices always represent an expression of values, it seems immensely problematic that the environment is so often on the losing end of those choices. 

 

For the time being we’ll be in Provo while we figure out what we're going to do (and while I figure our what I’m doing post-graduation).  Ultimately, I’d like to put all the blame on the way our culture has been set up to encourage unethical behavior.  And while I think that that is definitely part of the problem, I also believe that I can’t completely avoid culpability for being willing to contribute to the problem rather than sacrifice for change.