According to the website treehugger.com, U.S. workers spend an average of 47 hours a year commuting through rush-hour traffic, which equals 3.7 billion hours and 23 billion gallons of gas wasted in traffic each year.
• If you can walk, bike or take public transportation to work, try it. If you bike or walk, you’ll notice the health benefits. If you take public transportation, you’ll avoid tolls and dealing with traffic, and you’ll get a chance to relax or catch up on sleep or reading.
• If those options won’t work, consider organizing a carpool with coworkers. If every commuter car in the U.S. carried just one more person, it would save 8 billion gallons of gas. (See the Get Around section on page 17 for local carpooling options.)
• Ask your employer whether working from home is a possibility. According to treehugger.com, 44 million Americans telecommute. Why not join the club?
• If telecommuting isn’t an option, consider asking whether you could work four 10-hour days instead of five eight-hour ones, which would cut down on a trip to the office each week.