I Vowed to Go From Lafayette to My Home in the ‘Burbs Using Only Public Transit. I Failed, But Learned a Ton.
LAFAYETTE, CALIFORNIA – I couldn’t take another Uber.
This week, after spending the whole of last week traveling, I found myself working at the Philz coffee in downtown Lafayette, California.
I needed a way to get back to my home near the Pleasant Hill border, but I didn’t have my car. Rather than spend $27, stand around for 15 minutes, and put yet another vehicle on the road, I vowed to find another way.
I would get home from downtown using only public transportation, if it killed me.
Almost two hours and 3 miles of walking later, I had failed. But I learned a ton about how transit works–and doesn’t–here in the 925.
Here’s a video I made of the whole crazy experience.
The Good Parts
My journey started out smoothly enough. Leaving Philz, I plugged my home address into Google Maps and asked for a transit route back home.
I also asked ChatGPT for transit directions, in case it knew something that Google didn’t.
Google plotted out a route that involved–amusingly–riding BART two stops, taking a bus, and walking.
So I followed the directions, and started walking towards the BART station. On the way, I discovered a lovely little connector that goes from the parking lot behind Panda Express to the South entrance of the BART station.
I’d never had the occasion to walk it before, but it’s lovely–filled with public art and bordering a creek. That was a really nice way to begin my trip.
I scanned my credit card, went up the escalators at BART, and immediately boarded a train heading towards Antioch.
That’s a big win for public transit!
As BART whooshed towards Walnut Creek and the Pleasant Hill station, I enjoyed standing in the doorway and getting a panoramic, overhead view Retro Junkie, my car dealership, and the other assorted buildings along Main Street.
BART pulled into the Pleasant Hill stop, I got off and swiped my card again, and I was on the street closer to my destination, just about 10 minutes after I’d started. The ride cost me $2.10.
Bus Troubles
That’s when things started to go south. Google Maps and ChatGPT had both advised me to pick up the Number 18 County Connection bus at the BART station, use my Clipper card, and ride it a mile or so closer to my final destination.
Trouble was, at this time in the morning, I was past the rush hour period. There was only one bus serving the route, and it wouldn’t be back to BART for almost an hour.
So, I started to walk.
Google Maps said my house was about 3 miles from the Pleasant Hill BART station, and it would take me about 1 hour and 15 minutes to walk there.
I secretly hoped I would find some other solution along the way–a different bus route that Google didn’t think about, or a Lime scooter I could rent and ride home.
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As I started my walk, though, I found that at least the pedestrian infrastructure around Contra Costa Centre is top notch.
Crossings are clearly signaled, the sidewalks are wide, and there are pedestrian paths cutting through the areas around many of the buildings.
Ironically, I walked by the Contra Costa Transportation Authority’s offices. I thought about knocking on the door and saying “More buses please!”
The Long Walk Home
I walked over an overpass spanning Highway 24, and past Manakish, an excellent local Middle Eastern place. It was kind of cool to experience those places as a pedestrian, after driving past them hundreds of times.
As I walked up Geary Road, the infrastructure was still solid–wide, new sidewalks with sloping ramps at each road crossing, and stops signs or traffic lights to make the crossings safe.
It was a bit hot in the sun, and I was really wishing I hadn’t worn long pants. But the walk was perfectly pleasant otherwise.
After walking for about 30 minutes, I reached Palos Verdes shopping center and started walking into the suburban neighborhoods.
Abruptly, the sidewalk ended. There was even a little “No Pedestrians” sign telling me I’d reached the end of the comparatively easy part of my journey.
I was able to cross the road and pick up another sidewalk, but that eventually petered out too. At that point, I was walking through crunchy little gravel or dirt areas that people had constructed in front of their homes.
I still felt safe from the oncoming cars–I was effectively walking in a little ditch beside the road–but the presence of litter and the inconsistency of the surface made walking there far more challenging.
It must also be said that if I was in a wheelchair or was unstable with my movements, this part of the journey would have been impossible.
Soon, I started walking uphill. At least in this semi-rural part of the county, there weren’t many cars to worry about!
Finally, about one hour and twenty minutes–and three miles of walking–after I’d left Philz, I was back at my house.
What I Learned
I had failed in my goal of getting home using only public transportation. BART, it turned out, was the only transit that actually got my closer to home.
But I learned a ton from the experiment.
Firstly, I learned that transit infrastructure declines in quality the further you get from population centers. In downtown Lafayette, there was a beautiful connector leading right into BART, and a train picked me up right away.
As I got further out, there were still bus routes available, but they were much less consistent. Initially, the sidewalks were great, but as I got further into the ‘burbs, even those dropped off and ultimately vanished completely.
Clearly Contra Costa has solid transit options where lots of people live. Further out, though, it fades.
I also learned that timing is everything. I got lucky and was able to hop BART right away. But the hour-long wait for a bus that would have gotten me only marginally closer to home wasn’t worth it.
If I was relying on transit to commute, I’d need to time my BART ride to get to the bus at the right time. But I can easily see how even a tiny disruption could have left me with an hour-long wait if I didn’t get to the bus stop on time.
Finally, I learned that the “last mile” (or in my case, three miles) is the most challenging part. About 2 miles into my long walk, I yearned for a bike.
If the Pleasant Hill BART station–or even one of the numerous shopping centers I passed by on the way home–had a bike share or even a casually-dropped Lime scooter, I could have bridged the gap between transit and my home much more easily.
It makes me think that we should have better options for that last mile–even if those are ad hoc ones, like bike share or scooter share.
Overall, I don’t think I’d recommend my car-free journey to others who live in the burbs. But it wasn’t all bad–I got a great workout, had a pleasant BART ride, and got to see my town from a new perspective.
Had I brought a folding bike, getting home on transit would have been completely viable–Google Maps shows that my 3-mile walk would have taken only 20 minutes with a bicycle.
In the end, my experiment proved to me that our local transit isn’t perfect. But if you’re willing (and able) to do a little legwork, you can indeed get all the way home in CC County without setting foot in a car.
