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How do people survive carpooling?

One perspective on commuting.

By SCOTT LONG
Published February 12, 2007

It starts as soon as we pull out of the garage.

I power down the windows, breathing in Mother Nature's air conditioning. My wife pounds every blue button on my dash.

As we turn onto McMullen-Booth Road, I spin the volume knob all the way to 11 as The Bone blasts Van Halen. My wife spins it right back, the tiny ear buds connecting her ears to her iPod struggling to keep up.

As we turn onto Interstate 275, I bark at the chowderhead who's dawdling down the left lane. My wife wraps her frightened fingers around that handle just above her head that she's certain carmakers started installing the very day I got my license.

As we pull into the parking lot, with all the precision of an Olympic synchronized swimming team, we snarl, "WE ARE NEVER RIDING TO WORK TOGETHER AGAIN!"

If two people who have professed to love and cherish each other for better and for worse can't make it 27 miles without wanting to turn each other into road kill, how can complete strangers do it?

To find out, I gave Sandi Moody a ring. She's the executive director of Bay Area Commuter Services, the Department of Transportation-funded agency that answers the phone when you call the toll-free number on those blue highway signs that trumpet "Try Carpooling Call 1-800-998-RIDE." She didn't really have much advice for my wife and me, but I took the hint when she said her agency has 6,700 seemingly happy bay area commuters in its database.

"We've never really had a problem - that we've heard about," she said. "We have heard about budding romances, though."

It's easy to see why folks who are eager to save a few bucks, and a few pockets in the ozone layer, would be road rageless over all the free stuff Bay Area Commuter Services offers for commuters in Pinellas, Hillsborough, Pasco, Hernando and Citrus counties.

So what happens when you call the number, or log on to tampabayrideshare.org?

"It's really simple," Moody says. "We take down their information, where they live, where they are going, what their work hours are and try to pair them up."

Sounds easy enough. And if you don't want to wait for your computer-generated list of potential partners to arrive by mail, you can use the agency's EZ-Ride service, which gives you an immediate list online.

But as much as she'd like, Moody can't promise something for everyone.

"I'll be really up front," she said. "The more challenging the commute, the tougher it is to find a match. People who work second or third shifts just don't have much of an opportunity."

Scott Long can be reached at long@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8556.

[Last modified February 12, 2007, 09:29:21]