If you’ve ever wished that someone would wave a magic wand and make traffic disappear, you’ve come to the right place.
For my next trick, ladies and gentlemen, I will do something that is not just unlikely, not merely improbable, not only death-defying, but actually believed — up to this moment — to be impossible.
Before your very eyes, I will make traffic vanish.
Watch closely.
According to a new report from UCLA, transit ridership is falling in Los Angeles — down almost 17 percent just in the last five years — because people are increasingly choosing to buy cars instead of using public transportation.
According to a new report by Global Workplace Analytics and FlexJobs, 3.9 million U.S. employees, almost 3 percent of the total workforce, work from home at least half the time, up 115 percent since 2005.
Those are the choices. Sit in traffic, use public transportation, or work at home. What if there was a fourth option?
Here comes the trick. See if you can figure out how it’s done.
“Hey, Google! We’ve got a project for you!”
Ladies and gentlemen, a fourth option: Remoting by Google. Or Apple. Or any other tech company that can manage it.
Imagine this: a “Remote Workcenter” opening up in vacant Blockbuster Video or Macy’s locations, in office parks, in strip malls, in every town or city in the entire state of California, and everywhere else.
Imagine the option for companies to lease offices or workstations inside the workcenter, where employees can work remotely instead of driving from their homes to a workplace that’s 20 or 40 or 60 miles away.
All it would take is secure, high-speed network connections and secure, locking office doors or desks. Remote workcenters can have conference rooms, break rooms, even food courts or restaurants. Why not?
How many jobs could be done remotely if there were well-equipped remote workcenters that provided a digital connection to the main worksite in a professional environment?
How long are we going to be stuck in the 1970s planning a fantasy future of carpools? How many times are we going to raise taxes to build out the transit system while ridership falls every year?
If 20 percent of drivers were able to choose remoting instead of commuting, the traffic problem would be solved. Not only solved, but permanently self-correcting. Whenever traffic worsened, more people would find it advantageous to remote instead of commute.
What would it cost? Because the project is voluntary and the government has absolutely no role in it, the cost would be a matter for the buyer and the seller of the service to work out themselves, to mutual benefit.
What would it save? Your car, your brakes, your nerves, and two to four hours a day that could be spent on something productive or enjoyable.
Think of the many problems that would vanish for employers and employees if remoting was an available option. How many businesses are talked out of locating or expanding in California because potential employees can’t afford housing within a commutable distance? How many Californians would find high-paying jobs with out-of-state companies without having to move? How many people whose family relationships are strained by the stress and schedule of commuting would be able to work close to home and have more time with the people who matter the most?
Why not?
In the 1970s, remote communication meant having dimes for the pay phone.
It’s about time we took advantage of a different kind of change.