bcbusiness.ca JanuaRY 2016 BCBusiness 43
A
n average morning for Joel
Wood used to begin with a
20-minute drive from his
Langley home. He would
arrive at a park-and-ride in
South Surrey, board a bus to a
Canada Line station, then take
a train into Vancouver. From
there, it was just one more bus ride to
his job as assistant director of the Centre
for Environmental Studies at the Fraser
Institute in Kitsilano. At the end of the
day, he would do it all again in reverse—a
total commute time of 75 minutes each
way, or about two and a half hours per
day. He would spend 50 hours each
month in his car, buses and trains—the
equivalent of working more than three
extra months per year. "It was pretty
taxing," says the 34-year-old father of
one (soon to be two). "You're away from
family, away from small children, away
from your partner."
After three years of slogging from
Langley to Kitsilano and back, Wood
started to look for work in smaller
How communities
such as Kamloops
are attracting a new
generation of worker:
with economic
opportunities minus
the commuting
chaos
TICKET TO RIDE
By moving to kamloops,
Joel wood traded a
75-minute commute for a
15-minute bike ride
