The Cost of Living Here

Ok, so living in this part of the country is expensive. Last year I tried (and failed) to cut down on my commuting costs by taking mass transit. That didn't work out so well. Economically it makes the most sense for me to take the train in but ... I really can't take the train and not end up in prison. Plus, they recently upped the parking lot fees at the train station from $2 to $4 per day. That's significant.

I drive to work (car-pooling with the Wiff) and while not the cheapest way to go, it is by far the quickest and most likely to let me retain my sanity. We live north of Boston so in order to get to our office here in Cambridge we have a few options: One is the Tobin Bridge which is constantly under repair or painting or some other bullshit and therefore almost constantly choked with other cars. There's also the fact that in order to get to our office we'd have to go over another littler bridge that is also choked with cars. It's not a quick route. And the toll on the bridge is $2.50 (since we have the E-Z Pass doo-dad).

Another route is to take Rt. 16 all the way from Revere to Everett and then jump on Rt. 99 and even typing that sentence made me cringe. That route would also dump us onto the shitty little Gilmore bridge over by Bunker Hill that is constantly choked with cars. Not a decent option but, no toll. Just lots, and I do mean lots, of lights. Please to remember that I drive a 5-speed and stopping and starting sucks balls.

The third option is our current one. That is to take the airport tunnels (Sumner and Callahan). As of right now the tolls (which are only for going INTO Boston not LEAVING Boston thankfully) are $3 (again with the doo-dad). However, these are poised to increase to $6 come February or March of 2009. Holy fucking fuck people. That is some Grade A bull poop. That will mean that our current toll costs will increase from $60 a month to $120. This irks me.

What to do? Aside from winning the lottery (please baby jeebus? please?), it looks like I'll be choosing option #2 or some variance come next year. Why not go with the Tobin? Well I figure that the bulk of the people who, like me, refuse to pay the increased toll for the tunnel will be taking the Tobin instead. I already didn't like taking the bridge to begin with so adding another say 20-30,000 pissed-off drivers per day onto that dilapidated structure isn't an option I'm willing to consider. I'll do the stop-and-go portion of Rt. 16 to 99. I won't like it, but I'll do it.

There is also talk of increasing the state gas tax rather than increasing the tolls. I'm more in favor of that because it more evenly spreads the burden across all of drivers in the state. Plus, we have a pretty low (based on national average) tax as it stands right now (23.5 cents/gallon). I guess the biggest annoyance is that all of this debate over whether to raise the tolls or the gas tax is all due to the amazingly shitty job they did managing the cost of the Big Dig. All $15 billion+ of it. I'm sure the peeps in the state who never even use the "improvements" that the Big Dig made would much rather have the toll increase but this isn't their blog so f 'em. Heh.